THE THOMAS HARDY ASSOCIATION
LINKS

DIRECTOR: ROBERT SCHWEIK
© 2000-2004

TIMES EDUCATIONAL SUPPLEMENT--HARDY

DESCRIPTION:

Address: http://www.talkingto.co.uk/ttth/index.asp
Contact: Unidentified (editor@talkingto.co.uk)
Date: 07/01/04

This "Talking to Thomas Hardy" site was originally one of a series of "Talking to" web sites maintained by TLS Education, London, and intended as a public service for use by students and others interested in getting information from "leading experts on Hardy." The opening page originally allowed four choices:

1. "Ask a Question" presented boxes in which to type the inquirer's name, email address, name of school attended (when applicable), age group, and the query. Questions--"if selected"--were promised to be answered within five days. This feature is now no longer operative, so that only the remaining services are provided:
2. "Answers" leads to a page where one can browse answers already supplied to previous questions; these are arranged in various categories such as "Latest Answers," "Novels," "Private Life," and "Hardy's World." The answers are given as if provided by Hardy himself and signed, "Yours, Thomas."
3. "Links" enables two connections: one to a page that provides a timeline of Hardy's life (see our Link (A 22) and the other to this TTHA site.
4. "Search" enables a user to search the archived answers for terms or phrases and presents one or more of the archived answers to previous questions as the response to the search.

COMMENT:

The answers to questions published on this site provide solidly informed and authoritative information on all aspects of Hardy's life, work, and historical context. The format and goals of the Times Educational Supplement page unfortunately do not allow for documentation or citations for further reading to be included, and, inevitably, adjustments to the age level of the inquirer can sometimes limit discriminations, qualifications, and sophisticated development of a response to a question. But, although the format is playful, and the tone and detail of the answers adjusted to the maturity of the questioner, the information available from this site is encyclopedic in scope, highly reliable as to matters of fact, and in matters of judgment critically acute.

For responses to a specific questions, use the "Ask a Question" feature which--provided the question is selected--will yield an apposite and detailed answer. The "Search" feature may be used to see if a specific topic has been already covered--e.g., "ghosts" or "Lyonnesse"--but this function is likely to be hit-or-miss: a search for "money," for example, yields the texts of responses to three previous questions, each of which is given simply because the answer somewhere contained the word money. In any case, the "Answers" pages are well worth browsing for anyone interested in Hardy.

Among the most important topics for which one or more answers have been provided are the following:"Far from the Madding Crowd," "Film Adaptations," "Hardy's Private Life," "Hardy's Working Life," "Hardy's World," "Jude the Obscure," "The Mayor of Casterbridge," "The Return of the Native," "Short Stories," "Tess of the d'Urbervilles," "Under the Greenwood Tree," and "Wessex Poems."

SUMMARY:

An authoritative source of reliable information and informed critical opinion on all aspects of Thomas Hardy.