On Hardy's Poetry Of Nature

Hardy is a great writer in British literary history. His life spanned two centuries, from the 19th century to the 20th century. So, some critics call him a transitional writer. Hardy is famous for his novels, but his true love is poetry. When he was young, he began to write poems. When he did not succeed in poetry-writing in his early years, he turned to write novels. Yet, he never gave up writing poems. In 1895, he was criticized severely because of the publication of Jude, the Obscure. Then he determined to stop his novel writing, and turned back to his first and last love—poetry. All his life, Hardy published eight volumes of poetry including over one thousand poems.The themes of Hardy's poems are abroad, including war, love, marriage, death and Nature. Hardy's poems always reveal his profound thought and emotions. The form of Hardy's poetry is either traditional or innovative. He often breaks the traditional rules and tries new ideas. Influenced by the different philosophies of his time, the style of his poems is different in different periods of his life. In his early years, Hardy was influenced by romanticism, later he inclined to realism and finally his later poems showed some characteristics of modern poetry. Through the analysis of Hardy's natural poems, this thesis attempts to reveal the changing process of his philosophy which moved gradually from romanticism to modernism.This thesis consists of five parts.The first part gives a brief introduction to the life and career of Hardy.Chapter One introduces the early romantic style of Hardy's poetry of Nature and reveals that the cause is the rural life and the influence of romanticism. In order to prove the ideas, the author puts up some poems as examples.Chapter Two analyzes the sources of Hardy's transformation from romanticism to realism. The transformation of his philosophy influences the style of his poetry of Nature.Chapter Three introduces the modern features of Hardy's poetry of Nature.The last part is conclusion. In this part, the thesis concludes that Hardy's concern with Nature is connected with his concern with human beings. He considers that the tragedy of human beings is similar to the fate of the natural objects. He reveals the miserable life of human beings in his poetry of Nature in order to remind the humans of their fate. He exposes and criticizes the miserable reality in the world to call for the better development of human beings. He expresses his hope in his poetry that if human beings want to ameliorate the world, they should bravely confront the adversity and misery in the life.