R. Knight's "Thomas Leaf" in Thomas Hardy's "Under the Greenwood Tree"

Thomas Leaf

R. Knight

1878

Wood engraving

14 cm high by 10 cm wide

Eighth illustration for Hardy's Under the Greenwood Tree, facing page 144 (recto, where signature k meets signature l in the gatherings).

Passage illustrated: “Finally came a weak lath-like form, trotting and stumbling along with one shoulder forward and his head inclined to the left, his arms dangling nervelessly in the wind as if they were empty sleeves. This was Thomas Leaf.” [Part the First, "Winter," Chapter 1, "Mellstock Lane," p. 6]

See commentary below.

Photograph, caption, and commentary by Philip V. Allingham

[You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image and (2) link your document to this URL in a web document or cite the Victorian Web in a print one.]

Commentary

Although the figure of the well-intentioned but inept village fool is mere window dressing in the cast of characters who constitute the Mellstock Quire, Hardy develops this type into a fully realised individual whose character interacts with the principals and affects the course of the plot — Abel Whittle in The Mayor of Casterbridge (1886). A virtual skeleton in a smock-frock, Thomas Leaf is the surviving member of thirteen siblings, and, given his extreme leanness, probably is the character in the book lowest on the social scale, a member of the "labouring folk" elevated by his musical ability to become a named member of the Mellstock Quire.

Bibliography

Hardy, Thomas. Under The Greenwood Tree. A Rural Painting of the Dutch School (1870). Il. R. Knight. London: Chatto and Windus, 1878.

Hardy, Thomas. Under The Greenwood Tree, or, The Mellstock Quire — A Rural Painting of the Dutch School (1872). Ed. Anna Winchcombe. Houndmills, Basingstoke, and London: Macmillan Education, 1978. [All citations from the 1878 Chatto and Windus edition have been checked against this following readily available paperback edition.]

Millgate, Michael. Thomas Hardy: A Biography Revisited. Oxford: Oxford U. P., 2004.

Pinion, F. B. A Hardy Companion: A Guide to the Works of Thomas Hardy and Their Background. Trowbridge, Wiltshire, and Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1968, rpt. 1984.

Purdy, Richard Little. Thomas Hardy: A Bibliographical Study. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 1954, rpt. 1965.

Wright, Sarah Bird. Thomas Hardy A to Z: The Essential Reference to His Life and Work. New York: Facts On File, 2002.

Last modified 24 June 2014