A review by kdawn999
Far From the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy

4.0

Bathsheba Everdene is a fierce character, and I'm glad to have met her in Hardy's book. She lives up to and surpasses the Biblical portent of her name. She's much more of an Emma than an Elizabeth (bear with me as I interpret everything through Austen), but thankfully Hardy doesn't seek to hammer a lesson to us about women's inconstancy or vanity. Though Bathsheba is vain (our first encounter with her is, like Milton's Eve, as she admires her reflection), her self-love is shown as natural to her beauty. As the Eve of the book, rather than be responsible for Adam's fall, we get to see her temptations from 3 suitors/Satans--one which turns out to be her Adam in the end. Far from the Madding crowd didn't stir up the emotions in me that Tess of the D'Urbervilles did with its tragedy, but Hardy's writing is excellent in it. The book is almost worth reading simply for the pastoral scenes and the hilarious banter between the farmhands.