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Exploring Thomas Hardy's Far From the Madding Crowd

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This free course, Exploring Thomas Hardy's Far From the Madding Crowd, is designed to tell you something about Hardy's background, and to introduce you to the pleasures of reading a nineteenth-century novel. Why do we believe in fictional characters and care about what happens to them? You will discover some of the techniques that Hardy uses to achieve an illusion of real people and their relationships in a real world. Through analysing narrative you will think about who the narrator is, and the importance of the narrative point of view in telling the story, as well as understanding how characterisation, the use of dialogue, time and locations work within the novel.

Watch the following video in which Sue Asbee, the course author, introduces the course.

Course learning outcomes

After studying this course, you should be able to:

  • understand the possibilities of third-person narration
  • recognise the role of dialogue in creating character
  • understand how literary techniques combine to create a story.

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First Published: 19/02/2019

Updated: 19/07/2019

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