{"product_id":"2940012385833","title":"FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD","description":"CONTENTS\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e            Preface\u003cbr\u003e         I. Description of Farmer Oak--An Incident\u003cbr\u003e        II. Night--The Flock--An Interior--Another Interior\u003cbr\u003e       III. A Girl on Horseback--Conversation\u003cbr\u003e        IV. Gabriel's Resolve--The Visit--The Mistake\u003cbr\u003e         V. Departure of Bathsheba--A Pastoral Tragedy\u003cbr\u003e        VI. The Fair--The Journey--The Fire\u003cbr\u003e       VII. Recognition--A Timid Girl\u003cbr\u003e      VIII. The Malthouse--The Chat--News\u003cbr\u003e        IX. The Homestead--A Visitor--Half-Confidences\u003cbr\u003e         X. Mistress and Men\u003cbr\u003e        XI. Outside the Barracks--Snow--A Meeting\u003cbr\u003e       XII. Farmers--A Rule--An Exception\u003cbr\u003e      XIII. Sortes Sanctorum--The Valentine\u003cbr\u003e       XIV. Effect of the Letter--Sunrise\u003cbr\u003e        XV. A Morning Meeting--The Letter Again\u003cbr\u003e       XVI. All Saints' and All Souls'\u003cbr\u003e      XVII. In the Market-Place\u003cbr\u003e     XVIII. Boldwood in Meditation--Regret\u003cbr\u003e       XIX. The Sheep-Washing--The Offer\u003cbr\u003e        XX. Perplexity--Grinding the Shears--A Quarrel\u003cbr\u003e       XXI. Troubles in the Fold--A Message\u003cbr\u003e      XXII. The Great Barn and the Sheep-Shearers\u003cbr\u003e     XXIII. Eventide--A Second Declaration\u003cbr\u003e      XXIV. The Same Night--The Fir Plantation\u003cbr\u003e       XXV. The New Acquaintance Described\u003cbr\u003e      XXVI. Scene on the Verge of the Hay-Mead\u003cbr\u003e     XXVII. Hiving the Bees\u003cbr\u003e    XXVIII. The Hollow Amid the Ferns\u003cbr\u003e      XXIX. Particulars of a Twilight Walk\u003cbr\u003e       XXX. Hot Cheeks and Tearful Eyes\u003cbr\u003e      XXXI. Blame--Fury\u003cbr\u003e     XXXII. Night--Horses Tramping\u003cbr\u003e    XXXIII. In the Sun--A Harbinger\u003cbr\u003e     XXXIV. Home Again--A Trickster\u003cbr\u003e      XXXV. At an Upper Window\u003cbr\u003e     XXXVI. Wealth in Jeopardy--The Revel\u003cbr\u003e    XXXVII. The Storm--The Two Together\u003cbr\u003e   XXXVIII. Rain--One Solitary Meets Another\u003cbr\u003e     XXXIX. Coming Home--A Cry\u003cbr\u003e        XL. On Casterbridge Highway\u003cbr\u003e       XLI. Suspicion--Fanny Is Sent For\u003cbr\u003e      XLII. Joseph and His Burden--Buck's Head\u003cbr\u003e     XLIII. Fanny's Revenge\u003cbr\u003e      XLIV. Under a Tree--Reaction\u003cbr\u003e       XLV. Troy's Romanticism\u003cbr\u003e      XLVI. The Gurgoyle: Its Doings\u003cbr\u003e     XLVII. Adventures by the Shore\u003cbr\u003e    XLVIII. Doubts Arise--Doubts Linger\u003cbr\u003e      XLIX. Oak's Advancement--A Great Hope\u003cbr\u003e         L. The Sheep Fair--Troy Touches His Wife's Hand\u003cbr\u003e        LI. Bathsheba Talks with Her Outrider\u003cbr\u003e       LII. Converging Courses\u003cbr\u003e      LIII. Concurritur--Horae Momento\u003cbr\u003e       LIV. After the Shock\u003cbr\u003e        LV. The March Following--\"Bathsheba Boldwood\"\u003cbr\u003e       LVI. Beauty in Loneliness--After All\u003cbr\u003e      LVII. A Foggy Night and Morning--Conclusion\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePREFACE\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn reprinting this story for a new edition I am reminded that it was\u003cbr\u003ein the chapters of \"Far from the Madding Crowd,\" as they appeared\u003cbr\u003emonth by month in a popular magazine, that I first ventured to adopt\u003cbr\u003ethe word \"Wessex\" from the pages of early English history, and give\u003cbr\u003eit a fictitious significance as the existing name of the district\u003cbr\u003eonce included in that extinct kingdom.  The series of novels I\u003cbr\u003eprojected being mainly of the kind called local, they seemed to\u003cbr\u003erequire a territorial definition of some sort to lend unity to their\u003cbr\u003escene.  Finding that the area of a single county did not afford a\u003cbr\u003ecanvas large enough for this purpose, and that there were objections\u003cbr\u003eto an invented name, I disinterred the old one.  The press and the\u003cbr\u003epublic were kind enough to welcome the fanciful plan, and willingly\u003cbr\u003ejoined me in the anachronism of imagining a Wessex population living\u003cbr\u003eunder Queen Victoria;--a modern Wessex of railways, the penny post,\u003cbr\u003emowing and reaping machines, union workhouses, lucifer matches,\u003cbr\u003elabourers who could read and write, and National school children.\u003cbr\u003eBut I believe I am correct in stating that, until the existence of\u003cbr\u003ethis contemporaneous Wessex was announced in the present story, in\u003cbr\u003e1874, it had never been heard of, and that the expression, \"a Wessex\u003cbr\u003epeasant,\" or \"a Wessex custom,\" would theretofore have been taken to\u003cbr\u003erefer to nothing later in date than the Norman Conquest.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eI did not anticipate that this application of the word to a modern\u003cbr\u003euse would extend outside the chapters of my own chronicles.  But the\u003cbr\u003ename was soon taken up elsewhere as a local designation.  The first\u003cbr\u003eto do so was the now defunct _Examiner_, which, in the impression\u003cbr\u003ebearing date July 15, 1876, entitled one of its articles \"The Wessex\u003cbr\u003eLabourer,\" the article turning out to be no dissertation on farming\u003cbr\u003eduring the Heptarchy, but on the modern peasant of the south-west\u003cbr\u003ecounties, and his presentation in these stories.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47081255567600,"sku":"2940012385833","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012385833_p0.jpg?v=1763568012","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012385833","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}