Thomas Hardy: The Complete Poems

Hardy's novels evoke dark moods and frequently feature innocent victims of others tragic flaws. Strangely his poetry is a mixture of light and dark but leaning heavily on the light as his focus on memory of loves lost and other themes can be uplifting rather than grim. I've always found it fascinating that a novelist as richly talented as Hardy would turn from fiction and concentrate only on poetry in his later years. His novels are among my very favorites and I read them repeatedly. For me, having this collection of his poems is icing on the cake even though I am not a frequent reader of poetry. Thomas Hardy was a literary genius and these poems are infused with his artistic integrity.

Perfect! What more needs to be said? This collection was delicious and is a treasure for any Hardy fan. Enjoy every bite!!

After the Library of America edition of Robert Frost's poetry, this might be the best collection of poetry there is. Not only is Hardy one of the best poets ever (easily top five in the English language), but Mezey does a great job at putting together this collection. He selects the best of Hardy's poetry and a highly representative selection as well. His introduction is very well written and highly informative. It's like taking a quick class on Hardy. The poems are very much annotated, almost too much, but the notes are at the back of the book, so they are unobtrusive. There is a chronology and Mezey includes a few quotes, some of them quite witty, from Hardy. And all for an affordable price. You really can't beat this, and Hardy is one of those poets that should be on everyone's shelf.A quick list of my favorite Hardy poems: Hap; Neutral Tones; At a Hasty Wedding; The Last Chrysanthemum; The Darkling Thrush; Mad Judy; The Ruined Maid; The Man He Killed; Channel Firing; Ah, Are You Digging on My Grave?; Without Ceremony; The Haunter; The Voice; His Visitor; She Charged Me; At Tea; Over the Coffin; In the Moonlight; Near Lanivet, 1872; Something Tapped; The Ballet; A Backward Spring; At a Country Fair; A Night in November.

Hardy had a life-long fascination with the paradox of memory: how people, events, and even isolated feelings can be buried by time and later resurrected in the fullness of emotional memory. His central aesthetic principle is that of `the exhumed emotion,' which one can wryly interpret as a graveyard variant of Wordsworth's "emotion recollected in tranquillity." But for Hardy, it was a mysterious capability, like his comment that "I am cut out by nature for a ghost-seer." Hardy's aesthetic of the "grotesque" frequently features past lovers as ghosts or elusive phantoms. In "She, to Him III" he muses on the "souls of Now" who would disjoint / The mind from memory, making Life all aim, / And nothing left for Love to look upon." In this brief phrase, from the start of his career, can be found four of the major themes of his entire life and work: the present ("Now"), memory (past), Life, and Love, all in tension with one another.The volume contains innumerable poems of unrequited love, regretted love, guilty love, repentant love, etc. etc. One of the great English poets of the 20th century. Ranks with Yeats and above Heaney.

If you are looking for a collection of Hardy's poetry, look no farther than this collection. The Penguin editors have done an incredible job of organizing the dense, complex body of Hardy's work into a very readable collection. This is more than just a simple "Hardy's greatest hits." Yes, there are the standard favorites here, but there is also an impressive collection of the writer's more obscure work. Reading the entire contents of this book is the best way to see the breadth of Hardy's existential and metaphysical angst.