Classics Retold

Greenhill was the  Nijni Novgorod of Wessex. Greenhill sheep Fair was a yearly gathering. It used to take place upon the summit of a hill.  There on the hill remains an ancient rampart of  earthwork in oval shape encircled by a trench. There were two openings face to face.  Two winding roads ascended to each of these openings.  The summit had a level green spce of twenty or thirty acres. A few permanent erections dotted the space, but the majority patronized canvas alone for resting and feeding during the time of their sojourn here. Shepherds who attended with their flocks from long distances started from two or three days before the fair, driving their charges a few miles each day, and resting them at night in hired fields at way side, at previously chosen points.  The shepherd of each flock marched behind; a bundle containing his kit for the week strapped upon his shoulders; and in his hand his crook, which he used as the staff of his pilgrimage.  S...

Major Malley's Reel was a well-, known traditional Irish reel - a lively dance tune in quick time. Reels were extremely popular throughout Britain and Ireland in the eighteenth and nineteenth-centuries, especially at fairs, inns and country gatherings.  The tune evokes the festive atmosphere of Greenhill Fair. The dancers are old bent men. Despite their age they are energetically dancing a cheerful reel.  The lively music forms a striking backdrop to the much darker events unfolding nearby, where Troy secretly meets Pennyways after snatching the note from Bathsheba.  Hardy often places moments of private tragedy against scenes of public merriment.  Major Malley's Reel is a popular country dance tune, easily recognised by Victorian readers. 

In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd, the 'sinuosities of her little ear" is one of Thomas Hardy's painterly description of Bathsheba.  Sinuosities mean the curves, winding outlines and delicate folds.   Little ears refers simply to small and finely shaped ears. So, the phrase means graceful curves and intricate folds of her small ears.  Hardy is drawing attention to  tiny details of her anatomy that influenced sergeant Troy and that attracts him to return to her and the comforts of her home and the village. Hardy often pauses the narrative to paint a character almost as if they were the subject of a portrait.  The word sinuosity comes from Latin the sinuosus, meaning full of bends and curves.  It is commonly used to describe winding rivers, roads, or ornamental shapes, and Hardy applies here to the delicate natural curves of the human ears. 

Penetralia is the innermost part of a place. The term is derived from Latin adjective penetralis meaning innermost.  Etymology: Derived from the Latin word penetrare  (meaning to penetrate or pierce).When used as a noun, penetrale often referred to an inner shrine. Penetralia is the most common English derivative. It is generally used in plural form to describe sanctuaries, hidden or private or hard to reach chambers. In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd it is used to qualify a premium makeshift resturant in the innermost space allotted for refreshment booths, where Host Trencher, the premium resturant is set, and where Troy comes in search of Pennyways.

Prefiguring is the present participle of prefigure.  It means to show, suggest, or foreshadow something before it actually happens. It can also mean imagining, or visualising an event beforehand. Depending upon the context, the term has specific applications in literature, sociology, and everyday use.  In art and storytelling, prefiguring acts as an early hint or a symbolic precursor of a future event. The author's description of the dark storm at the beginning of the book is prefiguring of the tragic ending. In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd, Sergeant Troy in the dressing room of the tent where he is to play as Turpin's Ride within a few minutes peep at his wife Bathsheba Everdene on her raised seat. Troy is in the makeup of Turpin. He is confident that his wife will not recognise him.  But he visualises the consequences of her recognising him by his voice.

Rembrandt Harmenszoom Van Rijn, known mononymously as Rembrandt was a Dutch Golden Age painter, who lived between 16th July 1606 to 4th October 1669. He is one of the great painters of the 17th century. He was born into a well-to-do family; his father was a miller and mother was daughter of a baker.  He was apprenticed to Jacob Isaacsz. van Swanenburg, a Dutch painter, and then to Pieter Lastman, and with Jacob Pynas  In 1625, Rembrandt, together with his friend and colleague Jan Lievens began to accept students   At the end of 1631 he moved to Amsterdam, and began to practice as a professional portraitist. In Amsterdam he stayed with an art dealer, Hendrick van Uylenburgh, who helped him to launch his career. Later he married Saskia van Uylenburgh, the cousin of Hendrik Van Uylenbirhurgh. She was his model for some of his paintings.  Later, the couple moved to Jodenbreestraat, a street in Amsterdam.  The mortgage to finance the purchase of the house in Jod...

Prancing is the action of moving with energetic springy steps, often characterised by high kicks lively bounding, or a proud, strutting gait. The word is most frequently used to describe animals such as horses, but can also refer to spirited human movement.  The term stems from the 14th century Middle English word "prauncen" and is often related to the Old Danish "pransk" (lively/spirited) or German "prangen" (to show off or be in a splendour) In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd, Boldwood use this in his dialogue to Bathsheba, "Hark! What's that prancing?" It merely means: "What's that galloping or stamping about outside?"  Hardy often uses horse related verbs very precisely, and here prancing  evokes the image of an animal stepping high and energetically, drawing attention by its movement and noise.

In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd, the word brig refers to a two-masted sailing vessel.  A brig was a common merchant and naval ship in the 18th and 19th centuries, having square sails on both masts.  To Victorian readers, a brig would immediately suggest a vessel engaged in coastal or overseas trade.  Since Troy is believed to have drowned after entering the sea, references to ships and seafaring matters help create the uncertainty surrounding whether he is dead or alive.  In modern usage the word brig can also mean a naval prison.  Hardy is using it in the nineteenth-century sense.  A small two-masted sailing ship. 

In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd, when Jan Coggan says:  ".... if only I could get out of this cheese-wring ....", he is using a dialect for an extremely tight squeeze or a crush of people.  A cheese-wring (more commonly spelled cheesewring or cheesering) originally meant a device used in cheese making.  After curds were placed in a mould, a press squeezed them to force out the whey and compact the cheese.  By extension the word came to mean any situation in which a person is compressed from all sides.  In Chapter 50 Jan Coggan and Joseph Poorgrass are being pushed forward by the crowd trying to enter the circus tent at Greenhill Fair.  Hardy describes Coggan as being "Jammed as in a vice."  Surrounded by people and unable to move, Coggan humurously compares the crowd to a cheese press.  The image is particularly impressive. Hardy often gives rustic characters vivid farming and dairy-farming metaphors drawn from village life.  The ...

Turpin's Ride to York, formally stylized as The Royal Hippodrome Performance of Turpin's Ride to York and the Death of Black Bess -- is a legendary 19th century Equestrian melodrama written by Henry M Milner.  It dramatized the real life 1738 legend of English Highwayman Dick Turpin, who rode his mare, Black Bess, on the epic 200 mile escape from London to York.  Equestrian Origin  Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, it was a staple of travelling circuses, Hippodromes, and amphitheatres across UK including Leeds, Cambridge and Coventry.  The performance was renowned for its thrilling acts of horsemanship performed in circular rings, including heart-pounding scenes like Turpin  leaping over a tollgate to avoid pursuing vigilantes.  The play was captured in Thomas Hardy's classic novel Far From The Madding Crowd, where Sergeant Troy performs as Turpin at the Greenhill Sheep Fair.  While travelling Hippodromes and 19th century equestrian melodra...

In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd, Hardy's phrase "vermiculated horns" refers to horns that are twisted, coiled, or marked with winding worm-like curves. The adjective vermiculated comes from Latin vermiculus  meaning little worms.  In art and natural descriptions it means having irregular winding lines, convolutions, or worm-like patterns. When Hardy speaks of sheep or rams with vermiculated horns, he is drawing attention to the intricate special shape of their horns, which seem to curl and twist like worms or tendrils.  The word adds a vivid visual detail and reflects Hardy's habit of describing rural life with almost scientific precision. The description is characteristic of Hardy's rich descriptive vocabulary, turning an ordinary feature of sheep into a striking visual image.

In Chapter 50 of Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy qualifies Greenhill as Nishni Novgorod of Wessex. Nijni or Nishni means lower, and Novgorod means Newtown. There is Veliky Novgorod, meaning Upper Newtown in Russia. Nishni Novgorod Fair was very famous in Europe during the days of Thomas Hardy. The Fair was also called Makaryev Fair.  The fair is held annually every July on the banks of River Volga. Hardy compares  Greenhill Fair humourously with Nishni Novgorod Fair.  Greenhill Fair is much smaller than the Nishni Novgorod Fair. During 18th and 19th century, the fair was one of the largest trading events in Europe and Russia, attracting merchants, goods, livestocks, and buyers from distant places. 

The later autumn and the winter drew on rapidly.  Leaves lay thick upon the turf of glades and the  mosses of the woods.  Bathsheba was not clear what would happen to her person and Farm in the light of the death of Troy.  So she waited for the emergence of a clear picture, and put a hold on her feelings.  So she was quiet.  Whether Troy was alive or not she was sure that she had lost him.  She kept the farm going, raked in her prfits without caring keenly about them, and expended on ventures.  Oak was Installed as bailiff.  Boldwood lived secluded and inactive. Much of his wheat and all his barley of that season had been spoilt by the rain.  It sprouted, grew into intricate mats, and was ultimately thrown to the pigs in armfuls.  This strange neglect by Boldwood to take care of his produce became a talk among all the people round.  Boldwood approached Gabriel Oak and requested him to take care of Lower Farm. Gabriel took this...

The Greenhill Fair is the great public event that Hardy introduces in Chapter 49 of Far From The Madding Crowd, and develops fully in Chapter 50.  It was one of the largest sheep fairs in the Southwest England during the nineteenth century. The venue of the fair was Greenhill in the Dorset village of Sturminster Newton.  Hardy's portrayal was based on a real local institution familiar to him.  Hardy gives us a view of the economic life of Wessex, in which farmers, shepherds, traders, entertainers, and villagers gather from many miles around. Farming, trading, entertainment, and gossip converge here. Farmers and traders mingle with circus performers and general crowds.  The fair brings back the "dead" sergeant Troy alive. Troy had been working with a travelling performance company, appearing in the spectacle of "Turpin's Ride to York"  and the "Death  of Black Bess" Greenhill Fair is the opposite of the quiet fields of Weatherbury, which represents ...

In Chapter 49 of Far From The Madding Crowd Boldwood finds relief in the Biblical story of Rachel and Jacob and decides to wait for the termination of Bathsheba's waiting period.  The Biblical Story  Jacob fell in love with Rachel and wished to marry her.  Rachel's father Laban, agreed on the condition that Jacob work for him for seven years. Jacob gladly accepted because of his love for Rachel.  However, after the seven years were completed, Laban deceived him and gave him Rachel's elder sister, Leah as his wife.  To marry Rachel as well, Jacob had to serve Laban for another seven years. Thus, Jacob served twice seven years for the woman he loved. In the novel Bathsheba never proposes to Boldwood. Instead, Boldwood secretly extracts Bathsheba's intention from her maid Liddy. Boldwood finds relief in this piece of information, and hopes that after twice the seven years Bathsheba would marry him.  Boldwood's waiting is based on his whim, and not based on any...

In Chapter 49 of Far From The Madding Crowd, Bathsheba says that she intends to remain unmarried for seven years.  The seven year period mattered so much in the 19th century England. A person missing for seven years was commonly presumed dead under English law.  Bathsheba, somehow was aware of this legal safeguard available to a person who remarry after the 7years period. Troy had disappeared and was presumed drowned, but there was no absolute proof. In the nineteenth-century a person missing for seven years was commonly presumed dead under English law.  Bathsheba's choice therefore corresponds to the traditional period after which all doubts about Troy's survival would effectively vanish.

The phrase "strut enough to be cut up into bantam cocks" was a part of Susan Tall's gossip about Gabriel Oak.  Bantam cocks is a small rooster, well known for its proud, swaggering chest-out manner.  "To strut like a bantam cock"  means to behave with excessive self-importantnce or vanity.  Susan is saying that Gabriel has become prosperous -- wearing polished boot and tall hat - and seems to carry himself with more confidence than before.  She humourously exaggerates: strut enough to be to be cut up into bantam cocks: that means, swagger round proudly so that he could be divided into many little swaggering roosters.  The image is comic and rustic.  Hardy is reproducing the colourful dialects of rural Wessex.  Susan's opinion is not entirely fair. Gabriel's circumstances have improved, but Hardy tells us that he still lives simply, mends his own stockings, and keeps his old habits. The villagers mistake his increasing success and self- possession ...

An idiom meaning using one's position, opportunities, or resources to enrich oneself, often in a selfish and dishonest style.  The image comes from a bird lining its nest with feathers to make it comfortable.  Applied to people, it  suggests someone is making their own situations comfortable or profitable at others expenses. In Hardy's novel Far From The Madding Crowd, the phrase usually carries a critical or disapproving tone, implying greed, self-interest, or abuse of trust. It is general opinion of the parish people that Gabriel Oak was feathering his nest using the resources of Boldwood and Bathsheba. 

Mosses (Bryophyta) are ancient non-vascular plants.  They lack true woody tissues, roots or circulatory system.  In woodland they thrive on decaying logs and tree trunks.  They utilise these surfaces syrictly for structural support and moisture, rather than drawing nutrients from the wood itself.  Wood dewlling mosses act as natural sponges.  They absorb and slowly release moisture into the microclimate.  They provide habitat for diverse woodland insects, amphibians, and fungi and create natural seedbeds for other plant life to germinate.

Far From The Madding Crowd Chapter 49 Open spaces or clearings within a wood or forest, often grassy and pleasant-looking, are called glades. The term comes from the landscape vocabulary of rural England.  A glade is not completely open, rather it is a break in trees where light enters, creating a sheltered, picturesque opening.  With glades Hardy creates mood and symbolism.  A glade can suggest a momentary opening among darkness and confusion.  It is a spot of beauty and tranquility.  The nature is being carpeted with dead leaves. Every part of the woodland was blanketed with fallen leaves.