I have just read "The Three Strangers" (1883) by Thomas Hardy - one of the stories in the collection Stories by English Authors.
In the pastoral, rain drenched world of night outside Casterbridge unfolds the mysterious connection of three strangers who drop by a shepherd's hut!
A beautiful short story etched with the subtle tensions of questions!
Quotes
Description bristles with substance - Five miles of irregular upland, during the long, inimical seasons, with their sleets, snows, rains, and mists, afford withdrawing space enough to isolate a Timon or a Nebuchadnezzar;
Atmospheric alliteration - surging hiss of the flying rain on the sod
Always get the feeling with Hardy that a passing comment on Nature has another level of foreshadowing or "insinuation".
The house was thus exposed to the elements on all sides.
First stranger - light satire - his gait suggested that he had somewhat passed the period of perfect and instinctive agility,
Suspicious riddles keep the mystery flowing - The man at the table took up the hedge-carpenter's remark, and added smartly, "True; but the oddity of my trade is that, instead of setting a mark upon me, it sets a mark upon my customers."
Beautiful imagery - Beyond all this winked a few bleared lamplights.
A reality becomes a legend - In brief, the bass-voiced man of the chimney-corner was never recaptured.
Imagine singing
By a fire with a hangman
One rainy deep night
GOODREADS REVIEW
The Three Strangers, and an Imaginative Woman by Thomas HardyMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
I have read the short story The Three Strangers (1883).
In the pastoral, rain drenched world of night outside Casterbridge unfolds the mysterious connection between three strangers who drop by a shepherd's hut!
A beautiful short story etched with the subtle tensions of suspicious connections, a wheelwright, a hangman and another all gathered round a fireplace of questions!
Another glorious vignette of Hardy's Wessex!
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