Wessex Tales facts for kids

First edition title page

Wessex Tales is a collection of stories written by an English author named Thomas Hardy. He wrote these stories in 1888. Many of them take place even before Hardy was born in 1840.

In these short stories, Hardy writes about life in the 1800s. He shows how marriage worked and the rules people had to follow. He also explores how people used language and the big differences caused by social class. The stories also look at the role of women in society. Hardy also writes about how even small sicknesses could be very serious. This was because doctors didn't have all the medicines we have today. A main idea in all the stories is how rules from society could make people unhappy. These rules sometimes led to unwanted marriages. They also made people hide their real feelings, which made them sad.

Stories in the Collection

When Wessex Tales first came out in 1888, it had five stories. All of these stories had been printed in magazines before.

• "The Three Strangers" (1883)
• "The Withered Arm" (1888)
• "Fellow-Townsmen" (1880)
• "Interlopers at the Knap" (1884)
• "The Distracted Preacher" (1879)

For a new printing in 1896, Hardy added a sixth story:

• "An Imaginative Woman" (1894)

But in 1912, he changed his mind. He moved "An Imaginative Woman" to another one of his collections called Life's Little Ironies (1894). At the same time, he moved two stories from Life's Little Ironies into Wessex Tales. This made a final total of seven stories in Wessex Tales.

• "A Tradition of Eighteen Hundred and Four" (1882)
• "The Melancholy Hussar of the German Legion" (1890)

TV Show Adaptations

Six of the short stories from Thomas Hardy's works were made into TV dramas. These shows were part of a BBC2 series called Wessex Tales.

• "The Withered Arm" was shown on November 7, 1973. It was adapted by Rhys Adrian and starred Billie Whitelaw.
• "Fellow-Townsmen" was shown on November 14, 1973. It was adapted by Douglas Livingstone and starred Jane Asher.
• "A Tragedy of Two Ambitions" was shown on November 21, 1973. This story came from Hardy's collection Life's Little Ironies. It was adapted by Dennis Potter and starred John Hurt.
• "An Imaginative Woman" was shown on November 28, 1973. It was adapted by William Trevor and starred Claire Bloom.
• "The Melancholy Hussar" was shown on December 5, 1973. It was adapted by Ken Taylor and starred Ben Cross.
• "Barbara of the House of Grebe" was shown on December 12, 1973. This story came from Hardy's collection A Group of Noble Dames. It was adapted by David Mercer and starred Nick Brimble and Ben Kingsley.