Thomas Hardy Life Thomas Hardy was born near Dorchester in 1840, he learned to play the violin and

he always loved music and dancing. In a second time he was working and studying architecture in London, and he began to write poetry at this time. He devoted his wife to writing and became a successful novelist and distinguished man of letters. In 1895 he published Jude the Obscure, the book scandalized Victorian public opinion with its pessimism and immorality; one copy was even burnt publicly. His first wife died in 1912 and he married again in 1914. He died in 1928 and his body was interred in Westminster Abbey. Hardys deterministic view In Hardys there are considerations about life, death, man and universe, these aspects are characterized by a deterministic view in which there isnt the consolation of divine order, he thinks that the Universe is controlled by an insensible change, but in this way man had no power. The authors loss of faith derived by his reading both of the classics and of contemporary authors. However Hardy isnt a total pessimist, in fact he recognized the need of altruism through the cooperation and the application of scientific knowledge. Hardys Wessex Most of Hardys stories are set in a very small area, the south-west of England and his native country of Dorset called Wessex. Hardys Wessex transcends geographic limits and it combines the imaginative experience of individual with a sense of mans place in the universe. Hardy has a superb sense of place and a great knowledge of the country traditions, for example the typical dances and sings of the communities. In Hardy novels there are similar characteristic with the Greek tragedy, for example in the second the chorus acts as a messenger and comments on the actions of single character, which are characteristics of the Hardys peasants. After his first works Hardy changes and begins to give a realistic portrait of the poverty and sufferings of farm laborers. Main themes One of the most important theme in Hardy is the hobble of the being alive. Being alive means being an existence, an experience, a passions, but also being in a place in which there are a serious of circumstances which hit upon the little cell called your life. Another important theme is Nature which is a co-protagonist of the characters but it is indifferent to mandestiny. In his novel Hardy describe the most conventional, moralistic and hypocritical aspects of Victorian Age He also inserts a polemic against the religion: in fact he thinks that Christianity cant satisfy the needs of modern man. We find also the difficulty of communication and it is symbolized by the notes and the letters that continuously go astray causing catastrophes. It is the communication of feeling that is especially difficult. Hardy doesnt introduced psychological or moral characters, they are presented through their experience and their reaction to events.

Hardy language Hardys language is detailed, controlled and rich in symbolism and his love for Nature is reflected in the use of metaphors, simile and personifications. What is very important is the sight, in fact the characters watch each other and are watched by the rest of Nature and by inanimate objects. The use of colour is linked to emotion and experience, especially connected with natural landscape.

Structure and narrative technique Hardy gives importance to rigorous form, symmetry and he makes a mix of dialogue, description and narration. Hardy uses the Victorian omniscient narrator, who is always present, and sometime comments the action or introduces his opinion. Hardy often describes actions through the eyes of an hypothetical observer with whom the reader is invited to identify himself.

The cinematic technique The so-called cinematic novel started in 19 century and anticipated film and it wasnt influenced by it. The cinematic novelist used the camera-eye and the camera movement, moving into their subjects, from the city to the street, from the street into the house. Characterize of the cinematic novelists is the realism an aesthetic effects which permitted to describe reality through a transparent window. People believed on camera eye and accept what it shows them as truth. Both novel and film are able to change their point of view between an impersonal perspective and the perspective of a particular character. There are some different between a film and a novel, for example the first is obliged to tell its story in terms of the visible while the verbal medium of the novel can describe anything, visible or invisible. The panoramic, aerial views are characteristic ways of introducing an action; these are motion-picture: the scene is empty at first, then an object appears nearer a point of observation, when it reaches the foreground (aggiunge il primo piano) and it seems to fill the picture just as in the cinema it would fill the screen.