Other editions of book A Pair of Blue Eyes

The book describes the love triangle of a young woman, Elfride Swancourt, and her two suitors from very different backgrounds. Stephen Smith is a socially inferior but ambitious young man who adores her and with whom she shares a country background. Henry Knight is the respectable, established, older man who represents London society.Elfride finds herself caught in a battle between her heart, her mind and the expectations of those around her - her parents and society. The novel is notable for the strong parallels to Hardy and his first wife Emma Gifford. When Elfride's father finds that his guest and candidate for his daughter's hand, architect's assistant Stephen Smith, is the son of a mason, he immediately orders him to leave.This was the third of Hardy's novels to be published and the first to bear his name. The term "cliffhanger" is considered to have originated from this novel, which was first serialised in Tinsley's Magazine between September 1872 and July 1873. At one stage Hardy leaves Henry Knight literally hanging off a cliff staring into the stony eyes of a trilobite embedded in the rock.Includes a biography of the Author

Elfride Swancourt, the daughter of a rector, is loved by Stephen Smith and starts to elope with him, but changes her mind and returns home. Later she falls in love with Henry Knight, but Mrs. Jethway, a spying neighbor, writes Knight of Elfride’s former experience … So begins a tragic series of events culminating in a heart-wrenching climax steeped in the devastating romantic irony typical of Hardy. Published in 1873 and first serialized between September 1872 and July 1873, A Pair of Blue Eyes was Hardy's third novel, but the first to bear his name on publication.

Hardy’s Love Triangle“There are disappointments which wring us, and there are those which inflict a wound whose mark we bear to our graves. Such are so keen that no future gratification of the same desire can ever obliterate them: they become registered as a permanent loss of happiness.” - Thomas Hardy, A Pair of Blue EyesElfride Swancourt, a beautiful young woman, is caught between the love of two men: Stephen Smith, a low-born architect who wants to make a name for himself and Henry Knight, an older, respectable and established man. The two are friends and don’t know about each other’s feelings towards Elfride. How will they react when they find out? This Xist Classics edition has been professionally formatted for e-readers with a linked table of contents. This ebook also contains a bonus book club leadership guide and discussion questions. We hope you’ll share this book with your friends, neighbors and colleagues and can’t wait to hear what you have to say about it.Xist Publishing is a digital-first publisher. Xist Publishing creates books for the touchscreen generation and is dedicated to helping everyone develop a lifetime love of reading, no matter what form it takes Get your next Xist Classic title for Kindle here: http://amzn.to/1A7cKKl Find all our our books for Kindle here: http://amzn.to/1PooxLl Sign up for the Xist Publishing Newsletter here. Find more great titles on our website.

Elfride Swancourt is the daughter of the Rector of Endelstow, a remote sea-swept parish in Corwall based on St Juliot, where Hardy began A Pair of Blue Eyes during the beginning of his courtship of his first wife, Emma. Blue-eyed and high-spirited, Elfride has little experience of the world beyond, and becomes entangled with two men: the boyish architect, Stephen Smith, and the older literary man, Henry Knight. The former friends become rivals, and Elfride faces an agonizing choice.Written at a crucial time in Hardy's life, A Pair of Blue Eyes expresses more directly than any of his novels the events and social forces that made him the writer he was. Elfride's dilemma mirrors the difficult decision Hardy himself had to make with this novel: to pursue the profession of architecture, where he was established, or literature, where he had yet to make his name. This updated edition contains a new introduction, bibliography, and chronology.About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

This edition incorporates an original introduction from Moorside Press, including a biography, a critical discussion of Hardy's place in the history of British Literature and a short contextual discussion of the book.Published in 1873 by the Tinsley Brothers, A Pair of Blue Eyes was Hardy's third novel in print and was his third in three years. The plot describes a love triangle comprising Elfride Swancourt and her suitors, the down at heel Stephen Smith, an architect's assistant (and son of a mason) with a country background, and the well-off society gentleman, Henry Knight. Naturally Smith is at a disadvantage – he is thrown out of the house when Elfride's father discovers his background), but this doesn't mean necessarily that Knight will have his way. This is perhaps the most autobiographical of Hardy's novels and certainly provides an indication of how his courtship of Emma Gifford was progressing at this point. The profusion of early novels, four in four years, can be seen as evidence of Hardy's attempts to prove himself a worthy match for his prospective bride and certain scenes in the novels have been assigned parallels in his own experience. As it is, the novel becomes a tragedy that his life, at that time or any time, certainly wasn't.

• The book includes 10 unique illustrations that are relevant to its content.The book describes the love triangle of a young woman, Elfride Swancourt, and her two suitors from very different backgrounds. Stephen Smith is a socially inferior but ambitious young man who adores her and with whom she shares a country background. Henry Knight is the respectable, established, older man who represents London society.

"A Pair of Blue Eyes" was one of Thomas Hardy´s earliest books, originally serialised in Tinsley’s Magazine from September 1872 to July 1873 and it is considered one of his best."A Pair of Blue Eyes" is the story of Elfride Swancourt, a vicar’s daughter living in a remote corner of England, who is forced to choose between two very different men. One of these, Stephen Smith, is a young architect whom she meets when he is sent by his employer to survey the church buildings. At first, the vicar approves of Stephen and encourages his daughter to spend time with him. It soon emerges, however, that Stephen has been hiding an important secret from the Swancourts; something that could put his relationship with Elfride in jeopardy. Later in the book, another man arrives at Endelstow Vicarage – Henry Knight, an essayist and reviewer from London – and Elfride has to make a difficult decision.Written at a crucial time in Hardy's life, "A Pair of Blue Eyes" expresses more directly than any of his novels the events and social forces that made him the writer he was. Elfride's dilemma mirrors the difficult decision Hardy himself had to make with this novel: to pursue the profession of architecture, where he was established, or literature, where he had yet to make his name.

A Pair of blue eyes is a love triangle of a young woman, Elfride Swancourt, and her two suitors. Stephen Smith is an ambitious young man who adores her and with whom she shares a country background. Henry Knight is the respectable, established, older man who represents London society. Although the two are friends, Knight is not aware of Smith's previous liaison with Elfride. Elfride finds herself caught in a battle between her heart, her mind and the expectations of those around her – her parents and society. When Elfride's father finds that his guest and candidate for his daughter's hand, architect's assistant Stephen Smith, is the son of a mason, he immediately orders him to leave. Knight, who is a relative of Elfride's stepmother, is later on the point of seeking to marry Elfride, but ultimately rejects her when he learns she had been previously courted. Elfride, out of desperation, marries a third man, Lord Luxellian. The conclusion finds both suitors travelling together to Elfride, both intent on claiming her hand, and neither knowing either that she is already married or that they are accompanying her corpse and coffin as they travel. This edition is a part of ‘Global Classics’ series.