Two on a Tower

Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.8

Word count: 536K words
Chapters: 54

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Two on a Tower by Thomas HardyAuthor: Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Mar 1, 2002

Editor's review

Often counted among Hardy's more lyrical works, Two on a Tower revolves around the meeting and emotional entanglement of a young woman and a young man with ambitions in astronomy in a tower, setting the quiet of astronomical observation against the turbulence of human feeling. Hardy explores here the tensions between class difference, marital choice and personal aspiration; the tone is gentler than in some of his longer novels, yet scrutiny of social constraint is by no means absent. The free Project Gutenberg edition is a good choice for readers who want a Hardy work leaning toward plot while retaining literary depth. While reading, note how the tower recurs as a spatial image and how the astronomical observation scenes mirror the characters' shifting moods. It suits continuous reading over a longer holiday, and also reading alongside Hardy's other novels.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in Hardy who want one of his less famous novels
Literature lovers who enjoy emotional stories mirrored through science or observation scenes
Readers concerned with Victorian marriage and class issues
Intermediate and advanced learners who need an English original novel for extensive reading practice

Not a good fit for

Genre-fiction readers who prefer strong plotting and fast pacing
Readers wholly unwilling to engage with nineteenth-century English long sentences and descriptive passages
Those who want only Hardy's best-known works and have no interest in his minor novels

Reading tips

First read through the plot-summary chapters to grasp the character relationships, then go back and read closely the tower and astronomy scenes.
Mark passages where the tower appears and observe how the same space carries different emotional charges at different stages.
After each stage, summarize in one sentence the respective situations and motives of the hero and heroine.
If time is limited, concentrate on the emotional turning-point chapters and skim the rest to keep the thread.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

Is this book easier to read than Hardy's other novels?

Compared with some of Hardy's longer novels known for tragedy, this book moves at a slower pace and keeps its emotional threads more concentrated, making it moderately difficult to enter. But the original is still nineteenth-century English, with many long sentences and descriptive passages, and requires some patience.

What does the 'tower' in the title refer to in the story?

The tower is the story's central space: both a place for astronomical observation and the stage where the two protagonists spend time and their feelings develop. At different stages it carries multiple meanings—loneliness, intimacy and estrangement—and it is worth noting its repeated appearances as you read.

Can I understand it without knowledge of astronomy?

Yes. The astronomy in the book mainly serves atmosphere and the characters' interests and does not require specialist knowledge. You can skip over the terminology and focus on the relationships and changing circumstances.

Does this electronic edition have notes or an introduction?

The Project Gutenberg edition mainly provides the original text and usually contains no systematic notes or introduction. It is advisable to keep your own notes on character relationships, or consult reliable Hardy scholarship for background.

Comments

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About the author

Hardy, Thomas, 1840-1928 Author

Thomas Hardy (1840–1928) was an English novelist and poet whose career spanned the Victorian era and the twentieth century. The library holds 31 of his works, including representative titles such as Tess of the d'Urbervilles, Far from the Madding Crowd, The Return of the Native, The Mayor of Casterbridge, Jude the Obscure, and the poetry collection Late Lyrics and Earlier, with Many Other Verses. His novels are mostly set in the rural southwest of England, portraying ordinary people struggling against fate, social custom, and emotional entanglement in a somber yet compassionate tone. After the controversy surrounding Jude the Obscure, he turned mainly to poetry. Hardy's work has had a lasting influence on later English fiction. Public information about his life and nationality is limited, so this note is based on the works held and general literary knowledge.