Thomas Hardy and Victorian Communication : Letters

This book explores the relationship between Thomas Hardys works and Victorian media and technologies of communication - especially the penny post and the telegraph. Through its close analysis of letters, telegrams, and hand-delivered notes in Hardys novels, short stories, and poems, it ties together a wide range of subjects: technological and infrastructural developments; material culture; individual subjectivity and the construction of identity; the relationship between private experience and social conventions; and the new narrative possibilities suggested by modern modes of communication.