It is true that we have ranged against us critics of
distinction, such as Mr Lascelles Abercrombie and Mr Robert Lynd, and
that it may savour of impertinence to suggest that the case could have
been unconsciously pre-judged in their minds when they addressed
themselves to Mr Hardy's poetry. Nevertheless, we find some significance
in the fact that both these critics are of such an age that when they
came to years of discretion the Wessex Novels were in existence as a
_corpus_. There, before their eyes, was a monument of literary work
having a unity unlike that of any contemporary author. The poems became
public only after they had laid the foundations of their judgment. For
them Mr Hardy's work was done. Whatever he might subsequently produce
was an interesting, but to their criticism an otiose appendix to his
prose achievement.
It happens therefore that to a somewhat younger critic the perspective
may be different. By the accident of years it would appear to him that
Mr Hardy's poetry was no less a _corpus_ than his prose.
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