The Mayor of Casterbridge
by Thomas Hardyliterary work· published 1886
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<p>Like many of <a href="https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/thomas-hardy">Hardy’s</a> novels, <i>The Mayor of Casterbridge</i> is set in the fictional county of Wessex in the mid 1800s. It begins with Michael Henchard, a young hay-trusser, drunk on rum, auctioning off his wife and baby daughter at a village fair. The next day, overcome with remorse, Henchard resolves to turn his life around. When we meet Henchard eighteen years later, temperance and hard work have made him wealthy and respectable. However, he cannot escape his past. His secret guilt, his pride, and his impulsive temper all serve to sabotage his good name.</p> <p><i>The Mayor of Casterbridge</i> was published in 1886, first as a magazine serial and then later that year as a book.
Adaptations (4)
The Mayor of Casterbridge has been adapted 4 times, across film and television film, from 1921 to 2003.
The Mayor of Casterbridge1921 · film · dir. Sidney Morgan · IMDb ↗A man sells his wife and child to a sailor, remarries on becoming mayor, and learns his daughter is actually the sailor's.
The Mayor of Casterbridge1978 · film · 1 min · IMDb ↗IMDb7.9The Mayor of Casterbridge is a 1978 BBC seven-part serial based on the eponymous 1886 book by the British novelist Thomas Hardy. The six-hour drama was written by dramatist Dennis Potter and directed by David Giles, with Alan Bates as the title character. Michael Henchard, an out-of-work hay-trusser, gets drunk at a fair and, for five guineas, sells his wife and child to a sailor. When the horror of his act finally sets in, Henchard swears he will not touch alcohol for twenty-one years. Through hard work and acumen, he becomes rich, respected, and eventually the mayor of Casterbridge. But eighteen years after his fateful oath, his wife and daughter return to Casterbridge, and his fortunes steadily decline.
The Claim2000 · film · 120 min · dir. Michael Winterbottom · IMDb ↗A prospector sells his wife and daughter to another gold miner for the rights to a gold mine. Twenty years later, the prospector is a wealthy man who owns much of the old west town named Kingdom Come. But changes are brewing and his past is coming back to haunt him. A surveyor and his crew scouts the town as a location for a new railroad line and a young woman suddenly appears in the town and is evidently the man's daughter.
The Mayor of Casterbridge2003 · television film · 196 min · dir. David Thacker · IMDb ↗IMDb7.7Adaptation of Thomas Hardy's novel. At a country fair, young hay-trusser Michael Henchard quarrels with his wife Susan, and in a drunken fit decides to auction off his wife and baby to a sailor for five guineas. The next day, realising his loss, he swears not to touch liquor again for as many years as he has lived so far. Eighteen years later, Henchard has become Mayor of Casterbridge, a man well respected but not well liked. The unexpected return of his wife and daughter Elizabeth Jane sets off a turn of events that force him to face the consequences of his selfish impulses and violent temper.
