The Novelist (1870-1898)
If we disregard for the moment the influence of German philosophical writers upon his later work, it will be found that in the field of German the extent of his acquaintance is of about the same scope as his acquaintance with the French. Dare, of course, shows off his cosmopolitanism by saying: Hörensagen ist halb gelogen; Mrs. Charmond is said to have a weltbürgerliche nature; the Melancholy Hussar speaks of his Heimweh; and Alec D'Urberville gets back his old Weltlust after his temporary “conversion” has spent itself. The quaint lines of the lyric Lieb' Liebchen (in translation) are employed as an index to the agitating emotions of Lady Constantine's heart, and Börne's observation, Nichts ist dauernd als der Wechsel, made famous by its employment as the motto of Heine's Harzreise, is used to make clear the author's conception of the elusiveness of the objects of idealistic love.
If it were not for the very definite evidences of Hardy's reading in the German philosophers encountered in the novels from the year 1887 onward, one might be justified in denying to him anything but the merest smattering of German. But The Woodlanders contains unmistakable evidences of the influence of the Nineteenth Century transcendentalists; in Tess of the D'Urbervilles one can follow out with some degree of accuracy the path of Schopenhauer's inroads on Hardy's thought and its expression; and in Jude the Obscure, Humboldt and others come to the fore.
It would be pointing out the very obvious to show in any detail Hardy's familiarity with the great English writers, from Sir Thomas Wyatt to Swinburne. Not
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