THOMAS HARDY The Hardy cottage in Higher Bockhampton

THOMAS HARDY

The Hardy cottage in Higher Bockhampton, Dorchester

Hardy at the age of 26

Hardy’s work as an architect

Thomas Hardy and his wife, Emma Gifford, in 1874

Hardy with his dog

Hardy in 1894

Hardy and his bicycle

Hardy meets Florence Dugdale (1907)

Hardy and his second wife, Florence, in 1914

Stinsford Churchyard

Provincialism (n. ) • 1. a manner of speech characteristic of a province or local area (tájszólás) • 2. attachment to one’s own province or local area (lokálpatriotizmus) • 3. provincial character, manner, mode of thought esp. regarded as unsophisticated or uncultured (vidékiesség)

Provincial (adj. ) • • 1. regional <> national 2. local <> cosmopolitan 3. rural <> urban, metropolitan 4. parochial, small-minded, bigoted, uncultured <> cultured

Derogatory sense • The opposite of: – Urban, metropolitan – Cosmopolitan, international – Of universal significance – Advanced – Cultured – Often associated with regions outside the capital

Neutral sense • ‘Anything that’s local and stays local’ (Douglas Dunn)

Modernism • Has been regarded as: – Exclusive, elitist movement – Oxbridge education – Metropolitan, international in its outlook

Modernism • More recently: – Inclusive and subversive – First signs of provincialism (1 st and 2 nd meanings) – Outsiders and incomers (from the provinces, from other classes, from abroad)

Modernism • Now: – Subversion of the dominance of metropolitan culture – Celebration of the peripheral, idiosyncratic, individual, marginal

A term of praise • ‘Now, provincialism … may indeed be the chief source of [a writer’s] strength. ’ (EM Forster) • ‘From the perspective of literature … it’s a commonplace view that you have to be local before you can succeed in being universal. ’ (Douglas Dunn)

Agnosticism • A n. A person who holds the view that nothing can be known of the existence of God or of anything beyond material phenomena. Also, a person who is uncertain or non-committal about a particular thing. M 19. B adj. Of or pertaining to agnostics or agnosticism. L 19. • Coined by T. H. Huxley (OED); but occurs earlier in a letter of 1859 from Isabel Arundell. • agnostical a. L 19. agnostically adv. L 19. agnosticism | -sz()m | n. the doctrine or tenets of agnostics, an agnostic attitude L 19. (OED)

Agnosticism • (from Greek, agnostos, 'unknown'), a term coined in 1869 by T. H. Huxley (1825 -95), the British biologist and supporter of Darwin's theories of evolution, to indicate his position with regard to orthodox religious belief. Influenced by modern scientific thought, the agnostic holds that phenomena which cannot be proved or disproved by material means (such as the existence of God) cannot be the subjects of belief or disbelief. The term is also popularly used to imply scepticism about, or indifference to, religious matters, but it should not be confused with atheism, which is the denial of the existence of God or any supernatural being. (OIE)

Are agnostics atheists? ‘No. An atheist, like a Christian, holds that we can know whether or notthere is a God. The Christian holds that we can know there is a God; the atheist, that we can know there is not. The Agnostic suspends judgment, saying that there are not sufficient grounds either for affirmation or for denial. At the same time, an Agnostic may hold that the existence of God, though not impossible, is very improbable; he may even hold it so improbable that it is not worth considering in practice. In that case, he is not far removed from atheism. His attitude may be that which a careful philosopher would have towards the gods of ancient Greece. If I were asked to prove that Zeus and Poseidon and Hera and the rest of the Olympians do not exist, I should be at a loss to find conclusive arguments. An Agnostic may think the Christian God as improbable as the Olympians; in that case, he is, for practical purposes, at one with the atheists. ’ (Bertrand Russel)