The Well-Beloved Lib/E: A Sketch of a Temperament

Jocelyn Pierston, a successful sculptor, is helpless in the face of 'the well-beloved' the manifestation of perfect womanhood that seems to move like a will-o'-the-wisp from one acquaintance to the next. It shapes his whole life. Where his artistry involves permanence - cold stone objects - his heart is caught by ephemeral beauty. After years spent in London, a return to his rocky birthplace, the Isle of Slingers, sparks Pierston's extraordinary involvement with three generations of the Caro family. As a reworking of his earlier The Pursuit of the Well-Beloved, it is the last novel that Hardy wrote, in 1897 - not a realist work, but instead a rather fantastical exploration of male desire.

Thomas Hardy (1840-1928), English poet, dramatist, and novelist, was born on the Egdon Heath in Dorset. He studied in Dorchester and apprenticed to an architect before leaving for London, where he began to write. Unable to find a public for his poetry, which idealized the rural life, he turned to the novel and met with success as well as controversy. The strong public reaction against some of his darker themes turned him back to writing verse. Today several of his novels are considered masterpieces of tragedy.