Hardy’s classification of his own novels.

Justify the title of Bernard Shaw’s play Arms and the Man. 

Explain the significance of the symbols employed in ‘Morte d’Arthur’.

The ‘Porter Scene’ in Macbeth.

Tennyson as a representative poet of Victorian England

Discuss Hardy’s approach to the natural world, as expressed in Far from the Madding Crowd. 

Explain the following passages with reference to the context.

1. “Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more.
By Sinel’s death I know I am Thane of Glamis;
But how of Cawdor? The Thane of Cawdor lives,
A prosperous gentleman; and to be king stands not within the
prospect of belief,
No more than to be Cawdor. Say from whence
You owe this strange intelligence? Or why
Upon this blasted heath you stop our way
With such prophetic greeting.”

2. “Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee: -
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight? Or art thou but
A dagger of the mind? A false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?”

3. “How strange it is to be talked to in such a way! You know, I’ve
always gone on like that. I mean the noble attitude and the thrilling
voice. I did it when I was a tiny child to my nurse. She believed in
it. I do it before my parents. They believe in it.”

4. “The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
And God fulfils himself in many ways,
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.
Comfort thyself: what comfort is in me?
I have lived my life, and that which I have done
May He within himself make pure!”

Thomas Hardy and the fictional region of Wessex