Thomas Hardy

Return of the Native Illustrated Thomas Hardy

One of Thomas Hardy's most powerful works, The Return of the Native centers on Egdon Heath, the wild, haunted Wessex moor. The heath's changing face mirrors the fortunes of the farmers, inn-keepers, sons, mothers, and lovers who populate the novel. The 'native' is Clym Yeobright, who comes home from a cosmopolitan life in Paris. He, his cousin Thomasin, her fiancé Damon Wildeve, and the willful Eustacia Vye, are the protagonists in a tale of doomed love, passion, and melancholy.