A Pair of Blue Eyes

A Pair of Blue Eyes, the third published novel by English author Thomas Hardy, and the first to be published under his own name, his previous works, Desperate Remedies and Under the Greenwood Tree having been published anonymously. A Pair of Blue Eyes was serialized in the periodical Tinsley’s Magazine from September 1872 to July 1873, and was well received.

Hardy’s novels, which from the fourth, Far From the Madding Crowd, are mostly set in a fictionalized Dorset that Hardy christened Wessex, are known for their magnificent scenic descriptions, which evoke the emotional aspects of the characters’ situations to great effect. The attachment of such importance to the environment stems partly from the deterministic world-view, influenced by the scientific theories of Charles Darwin and Isaac Newton, which Hardy shared with the European Naturalists and that pervades much of his work.

The novel is perhaps Hardy’s most autobiographical, drawing on his own experiences as an architectural apprentice sent to survey a church in Cornwall, and his meeting with Emma Gifford, who was to become his first wife. Stephen Smith, a young architect, has arrived in Endelstow, Cornwall, to restore the church tower. He falls in love with the vicar’s daughter, Elfride Swancourt, but is not considered to be of sufficiently high social class by the vicar himself. Stephen therefore runs away with Elfride; she, however, cannot commit herself to marriage, and Stephen takes up a post in India. His old friend Henry Knight then meets Elfride; she saves his life, and they become engaged. When Henry learns of her apparent elopement with Stephen, however, he is outraged and breaks off the engagement. Elfride eventually marries Lord Luxellian, but despite the kindness of his family remains unhappy. The misunderstanding is discovered when Stephen and Henry meet again, but tragically it is too late; their train to Endelstow is also, unbeknown to them, carrying home the dead body of Elfride.