“Enchased and lettered”: Thomas Hardy’s American readers and the nature of place

Thomas Hardy may seem an unusual subject for discussion under the rubric of Transatlantic Literary Ecologies . Through his life and work, he appears to offer both the expression and embodiment of a British exceptionalism, rooted (the word is chosen deliberately) in “Wessex,” his carefully calculated depiction of a quintessentially “English” rural society. Almost by definition, therefore, “Wessex” denies the need for any form of expansive, transatlantic dialogue. Hardy himself repeatedly declined invitations to “cross the pond” and, as Robert Gittings observed, “most characteristically” included a poem about the fact in one of his collections (505). Nevertheless, there was and is an American dimension to Hardy’s work. As I also hope to show, there is an ecological element to it, and more specifically, to Wessex.