ABSTRACT
In his 1842 essay “Nathaniel Hawthorne: Twice-Told Tales,” Edgar Allan Poe, one of the first commentators on the short story form, argues, “Truth is often, and in very great degree, the aim of the tale . . .” (537). Thomas Hardy wrote most of his short stories for magazine publication, subject to the editors’ demands for moral appropriateness, but he revised his stories constantly, demonstrating his desire to express Truth as he understood it. In another comment relevant to Hardy’s short stories, in his 1846 essay “The Philosophy of Composition,” Poe states that in order to “impart . . . to a work of art so much of that richness . . .” two things are required: “first, some amount of complexity, or more properly, adaptation; and, secondly, some amount of suggestiveness – some undercurrent, however indefinite of meaning” (24). In his shorter fiction Hardy meets Poe’s requirement of complexity – he addresses various aspects of patriarchal social and cultural traditions, the customs, values, and behaviors accepted by the community of his Wessex characters (and his readers) while telling entertaining tales. In addition, he uses humor to highlight these traditions, the “undercurrents” of his short stories. This humor is featured in many of Hardy’s tales, for example in some stories from A Group of Noble Dames, including “The First Countess of Wessex” (1888-89), several tales in A Few Crusted Characters, especially “Tony Kytes, The Arch-Deceiver” and “Absent-Mindedness in a Parish Choir” (Life’s Little Ironies, 1890-91), the uncollected “The Thieves Who Couldn’t Help Sneezing” (1877), and several from Wessex Tales, including “The Three Strangers.” The focus of this chapter is his wide-ranging use of comedic features like humor, satire, and farce in some of his earliest tales which depict his Wessex folk, including “Destiny and a Blue Cloak” (1874), “The Distracted Young Preacher” (1879) (renamed “The Distracted Preacher” in the 1888 Wessex Tales), “Fellow-Townsmen” (1880), and his later “Old Mrs Chundle” (1888-90).
