Desperate Remedies: Unabridged edition - Paperback

by Thomas Hardy (Author)

Blackmail, murder and romance are among the ingredients of Thomas Hardy's first published novel, and is somewhat influenced by the 'sensation novel' genre. Several perceptive critics praised the author as a novelist with a future when Desperate Remedies appeared anonymously in 1871. In its honest depiction of country life and deep insights into psychology and sexuality it already bears the unmistakable imprint of Hardy's genius and Desperate Remedies became a major commercial break-through for him as an author and let to the subsequent publishing of the string of superb novels over the next 25 years that brought him to the forefront as one of the most popular late Victorian writers. Cytherea has taken a position as lady's maid to the eccentric arch-intriguer Miss Aldclyffe. On discovering that the man she loves, Edward Springrove, is already engaged to his cousin, Cytherea comes under the influence of Miss Aldclyffe's fascinating, manipulative steward Manston who is hiding a sinister secret.

Author Biography

Thomas Hardy, OM (1840 - 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, especially William Wordsworth. Charles Dickens was another important influence. Like Dickens, he was highly critical of much in Victorian society, though Hardy focused more on a declining rural society. While Hardy wrote poetry throughout his life and regarded himself primarily as a poet, his first collection was not published until 1898. Initially, therefore, he gained fame as the author of novels, including Far from the Madding Crowd (1874), The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886), Tess of the d'Urbervilles (1891), and Jude the Obscure (1895). Most of his fictional works - initially published as serials in magazines - were set in the semi-fictional region of Wessex. They explored tragic characters struggling against their passions and social circumstances.