HARDY'S “FIRST HOVEL"

Evening Star, Issue 22004, 13 April 1935, Page 27

HARDY'S “FIRST HOVEL"

PUBLICATION IN AMERICA What is described as Thomas Hardy's first novel, rescued from oblivion by Mr Paul Lemperly, a Hardy enthusiast, of Lakewood, Ohio (United States), has just been published by the Jones Hopkins Press under the title_ “ An Indiscretion in the Life of an Heiress,” with an introduction by Professor Carl .1. Weber, of Colby College. This novel, written in 1867 and 1868, is mentioned in no list of Hardy’s writings in England or abroad. Its existence was discovered by Mr Lemperly in 1910, when Alexander Macmillan published his ‘Life and .Letters,’ in which wero his comments on a Hardy novel he had rejected. Reading Macmillan, Lernporly saw a curious likeness between the novel Macmillan described and a story by a Thomas Hardy in the ‘New Quarterly Magazine ’ for July, 1878, a copy ot which he has in his possession. He soon convinced himself that ifce rejected and supposedly unborn novel was substantially the story in the magazine. He wrote to Professor Weber, another Hardy enthusiast, and told him of his belief. Professor Weber thereupon set to work with the persistence and ingenuity of a Sherlock Holmes and proved to his own satisfaction that Mr Lemperly was right. It is believed that only three persons ever saw the manuscript—George Meredith. John Morley, and Alexander Macmillan. Sir Edmund Gosse said at the time of Hardy’s death that the latter had told him he had destroyed all -but a few pages of it. Mrs Hardy wrote afterwards that Hardy could not remember what he had-done with it. and Vere Collins reported Hardy as saving: “When I was moving I got rid of it.” * New Pathways in Science,’ a new hook by Sir Arthur Eddington, is announced for publication by the Cambridge University Press, tt is based on a course of lectures delivered at Cornell University last year.