Description

Jude the Obscure, the last of Thomas Hardy's novels, began as a magazine serial and was first published in book form in 1895. The book was burned publicly by William Walsham How, Bishop of Wakefield, in that same year. Its hero, Jude Fawley, is a working-class young man who dreams of becoming a scholar. The two other main characters are his earthy wife, Arabella, and his cousin, Sue. Themes include class, scholarship, religion, marriage, and the modernisation of thought and society.