Thomas Hardy

Jude the Obscure (1895) Novel by Thomas Hardy

Jude the Obscure is the last of Thomas Hardy's novels, begun as a magazine serial and first published in book form in 1895. The book was burnt publicly by the Bishop of Exeter in that same year. Its hero Jude Fawley is a lower-class young man who dreams of becoming a scholar. The two other main characters are his earthy wife, Arabella, and his intellectual cousin, Sue. Themes include class, scholarship, religion, marriage, and the modernisation of thought and society.