Julian Meynell's Books

This is one of Hardy's most obscure books and rightfully so. It is a book for the dedicated Hardy fan. I think that everything that Hardy ever wrote is worth reading and this book is certainly that. It is a doomed romance with an element of comedy set against a celestial back drop. The end about sixth of the book is too hurried. That is no doubt partially because Hardy was hemmed in by Victorian sensibilities and the very end (the last page) did not work and seemed to be just tossed in as further enforced tragedy.

Having said all that about it, it is still worth reading. It contains many good scenes and the characters are interesting, but not so compelling as normal. The more I read Hardy, the more experimental he seems to me. The book is playing around with tragedy and comedy. It is also playing around with the contrast between small human dramas that are almost unnoticed and the larger cosmic realities of the universe. It's OK, but that last page is a bit of a fail.