ABSTRACT
W.M. Parker I should like to support Mr Hadland Davis’ contention1 that Thomas Hardy had obvious traits of the peasant in him. Mr St John Ervine, in his talk on Hardy (The Listener, September 8),2 seems to contradict himself. After stating that ‘there was nothing in Thomas Hardy’s physique or manner of speech to suggest that he was a peasant’; he then says in a sentence or two later: ‘He had some of the peasant’s reticence and reserve’, which surely means his manner. As evidence of his peasant origin, I may say that when I visited Hardy at Max Gate in 1921 I certainly detected a flavour of personal intonation, if not accent, in his speech.3
