All Formats & Editions

Adventuress and opportunist Ethelberta reinvents herself to disguise her humble origins launching a brilliant career as a society poet in London with her family acting incognito as her servants. Turning the male-dominated literary world to her advantage she happily exploits the... Read Full Overview

Young Mrs. Petherwin stepped from the door of an old and well-appointed inn in a Wessex town to take a country walk. By her look and carriage she appeared to belong to that gentle order of society which has no worldly sorrow except when its jewellery gets stolen; but, as a fact... Read Full Overview

Opportunistic, shrewd and beautiful, Ethelberta resolves to disguise her humble beginnings and elevate her position in society.

Crafting her career as a society poet and staging her family as her servants, she proves admirably adept at sustaining her own web of... Read Full Overview

Originally published in 1912, this is a satirical work that looks at life from a perspective that was rarely seen at the time of writing, from the servants view. Since its original publication, the social foreground was reversed, and it became increasingly acceptable to present... Read Full Overview

Red joins George Elliott Clarke's previous 'colouring' books--Blue and Black--in which he displays an expansive range of poetic forms and rhetorical poses. Its poems mix the candid sexuality of pre-Christian Rome with the pop sentimentally of Italian screen scores of the 1960s... Read Full Overview

Thomas Hardy was one of the greatest British authors during the Victorian era. Hardy was highly critical of Victorian culture and also focused on the declining rural society. Though Hardy was a great poet it is his classic novels, such as Far from the Madding Crowd, Tess of the... Read Full Overview

The Hand of Ethelberta: A Comedy in Chapters is a novel by Thomas Hardy, published in 1876. It was written, in serial form, for the Cornhill Magazine, which was edited by Leslie Stephen, a friend, and mentor of Hardy's. Unlike the majority of Hardy's fiction, the novel is a comedy,... Read Full Overview

"The Hand of Ethelberta" (1876) was described by Hardy as "A Comedy in Chapters." It bears out fairly well the claims of its sub-title. The heroine, Ethelberta, is a butler's daughter, who, having been educated above her station, marries a young, wealthy, and well-born husband... Read Full Overview

At the beginning of the book, we are told that Ethelberta was raised in humble circumstances but, through her work as a governess, married well at the age of eighteen. Her husband died two weeks after the wedding and, now twenty-one, Ethelberta lives with her mother-in-law, Lady... Read Full Overview