The Trumpet-Major.: A Tale.

London: Smith, Elder & Co.,, 1880. His critically successful historical novel First edition in book form of the author's great novel set in the Napoleonic war, written to commemorate the 75th anniversary of Trafalgar, and incorporating comic elements to move away from its darker predecessor The Return of the Native (1878). Hardy compiled in the work the three separate strands which at that time most affected his life. One strand was his own Dorset background, and in particular the idea of a family reminiscence; another is the strand of historical study, and in particular the concentration he was then giving to the years 1804-5 and the effect of the then recent French Revolution. "These two strands... are firmly woven into the construction of the novel, and give it remarkable unity and a steady sense of reality. Hardy was determined that the charges of unreality, brought against 'The Return of the Native', should not be repeated" (Gittings, p. 397). The third strand, natural in that Hardy was then writing with an idea of how his books might appear onstage, is that the characters are "universal figures from the traditional rituals of the theatre". "It was an inspired time to begin dramatic work. Ellen Terry had joined [Henry] Irving as his leading lady in 1878... Hardy's concentration in 1879 on theatrical matters held a great importance for the novel he was writing... The pattern of the book, embracing nearly every major character, derives from the old Italian Comedy of Masks, whose debased form, the harlequinade, was showing in nearly every Victorian theatre, burlesque and ballet" (ibid.). It was published on 26 October before the conclusion of the slightly bowdlerized serial in Good Words, which ran from January to December 1880. Three volumes, octavo (182 x 121 mm). Contemporary red half morocco, spines lettered and ruled in gilt, floral gilt device in compartments, sides and corners ruled with twin gilt fillets, marbled sides and endpapers, top edges gilt. Bound with half-titles. A little rubbing and occasional spot of wear to extremities, neatly retouched, foxing to outer leaves, occasional marks to contents, still very good indeed. Purdy, pp. 31-5; Sadleir 1115; Woolf 2995. Robert Gittings, Thomas Hardy, 2001.