Jude the Obscure

Thomas Hardy's bleakest, boldest novel follows a stonemason who longs to be a scholar and loves against the rules, only to be crushed by class, marriage and the indifference of the age.

At a glance A country boy stares at the distant spires of a great university and dreams himself into… What it's about Jude the Obscure follows Jude Fawley, a self-taught stonemason who… Trapped by an early marriage, hemmed in by poverty and convention, Jude and Sue attempt… Themes The novel rages against the barriers of class and money that lock the poor out of…

Jude the Obscure follows Jude Fawley, a self-taught stonemason who aspires to a scholar's life in the city of Christminster, and who falls in love with his freethinking cousin Sue Bridehead.