Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928 / Dorchester / England)

poet Thomas Hardy
#47 on top 500 poets

Quotations

  • ''Yet I would bear my shortcomings
    With meet tranquility,
    But for the charge that blessed things
    I'd liefer not have be.
    O, doth a bird deprived of wings
    Go earth-bound wilfully!''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Impercipient (l. 25-30). . . The Complete Poems of Thomas Hardy. James Gibson, ed. (1978) Macmillan.
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  • '''Yes; quaint and curious war is!
    You shoot a fellow down
    You'd treat if met where any bar is,
    Or help to half-a-crown.'''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Man He Killed (l. 17-20). . . The Complete Poems of Thomas Hardy. James Gibson, ed. (1978) Macmillan.
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  • ''"Michael Henchard's Will
    "That Elizabeth-Jane Farfrae be not told of my death, or made to grieve on account of me.
    "& that I be not bury'd in consecrated ground.
    "& that no sexton be asked to toll the bell.
    "& that nobody is wished to see my dead body.
    "& that no murners walk behind me at my funeral.
    "& that no flours be planted on my grave.
    "& that no man remember me.
    "To this I put my name.
    "Michael Henchard"''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Mayor of Casterbridge, ch. XLV (1886).
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  • ''Dialect words—those terrible marks of the beast to the truly genteel.''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Mayor of Casterbridge, ch. 20 (1886).
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  • ''The victors and the vanquished then the storm it tossed and tore,
    As hard they strove, those worn-out men, upon that surly shore;
    Dead Nelson and his half-dead crew, his foes from near and far,
    Were rolled together on the deep that night at Trafalgar!''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Night of Trafalgar (l. 15-18). . . The Complete Poems of Thomas Hardy. James Gibson, ed. (1978) Macmillan.
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  • ''"Come; see the oxen kneel,

    "In the lonely barton by yonder coomb
    Our childhood used to know,"
    I should go with him in the gloom,
    Hoping it might be so.''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Oxen (l. 12-16). . . The Complete Poems of Thomas Hardy. James Gibson, ed. (1978) Macmillan.
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  • ''Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
    "Now they are all on their knees,"''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Oxen (l. 1-2). . . The Complete Poems of Thomas Hardy. James Gibson, ed. (1978) Macmillan.
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  • ''A well-proportioned mind is one which shows no particular bias; one of which we may safely say that it will never cause its owner to be confined as a madman, tortured as a heretic, or crucified as a blasphemer. Also, on the other hand, that it will never cause him to be applauded as a prophet, revered as a priest, or exalted as a king. Its usual blessings are happiness and mediocrity.''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Return of the Native, book third, ch. II (1878).
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  • ''A whole village-full of sensuous emotion, scattered abroad all the year long, surged here in a focus for an hour. The forty hearts of those waving couples were beating as they had not done since, twelve months before, they had come together in similar jollity. For the time Paganism was revived in their hearts, the pride of life was all in all, and they adored none other than themselves.''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Return of the Native, book fourth, ch. III (1878).
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  • ''The instincts of merry England lingered on here with exceptional vitality, and the symbolic customs which tradition has attached to each season of the year were yet a reality on Egdon. Indeed, the impulses of all such outlandish hamlets are pagan still: in these spots homage to nature, self-adoration, frantic gaieties, fragments of Teutonic rites to divinities whose names are forgotten, seem in some way or other to have survived mediaeval doctrine.''
    Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), British novelist, poet. The Return of the Native, book sixth, ch. I (1878).
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The Dream-Follower

A dream of mine flew over the mead
   To the halls where my old Love reigns;
And it drew me on to follow its lead:
   And I stood at her window-panes;

And I saw but a thing of flesh and bone
   Speeding on to its cleft in the clay;
And my dream was scared, and expired on a moan,
   And I whitely hastened away.

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