Thomas Hardy’s Poetry
Assessment for learning: use comments only from AOs then students return with their next essay,
with the band and mark added (making use of some oral feedback).
FSL will be included in discussion throughout.
Prep, Essay titles
Deadline in next lesson
Week 1 (CFCH) / 2 (KG)
Read the short introduction
to the Everyman edition of
Hardy’s poems and create
five questions to test their
classmates’ knowledge next
lesson.
PLUS
Select the two of the poems
studied in class, which you
feel link most closely in terms
of form, structure and
language and explore how.
(400 words).
Week 2/3
‘Hardy was right that his
ballad narratives were his
“most successful” poems.’
To what extent do you agree?
121 Hap
157 The Oxen
144 When I set
out for Lyonesse
128
Ruined Maid
129
A Trampwoman’s
Tragedy
140
One We Knew
136
The Curate’s
Kindness
132
A Sunday
Morning
Tragedy
167
We Fieldwomen
Week 3 (CFCH)/ 4 (KG)
One critic has written that
‘Hardy’s poetry contains a
plainness and directness not
easily to be found in English
poetry after the 17th century’.
This directness often results
in a bleak absence of hope
and optimism, but it is
nonetheless realistic.
To what extent do you agree?
Week 4 / 5
‘Hardy’s war poetry is so
remote from the action that it
is powerless.’ To what extent
do you agree?
126
The Darkling Thrush
157
The Blinded Bird
143
Convergence of the
Twain
137
1967
141
The Man he killed
125
Christmas Ghost
125
Drummer Hodge
142
Channel Firing
Week 5/6 and 6/7
Prep 1 Preparation of paired
task analysis leading to
presentation by students of
one poem. The two students
represent the two side of the
argument. Is this poem about
love… or not?
Prep 2 ‘In the poems about
148
Under the waterfall
155
At Castle Boterel
150
Your Last Drive
149
The Going
154
Beeny Cliff
151
The Walk
121 Neutral Tones
169
He resolves to
say no more
162
In Time of the
Breaking of
Nations
124
War Office
152
I Found Her Out
There
156
Where the
Picnic Was
Emma, the dominant emotion 161
expressed is love’. To what
The Shadow on the
extent do you agree?
Stone
Week 7 (CFCH)/ 8 (KG)
‘Hardy’s poetry shows he felt
haunted long before his
wife’s death.’ To what extent
do you agree?
153
After a Journey
151
The Voice
144
Wessex Heights
165
Voices From Things
Growing in a
Churchyard
127
Levelled
Churchyard
122
Friends Beyond
159
The Last Signal
123
Thoughts of
Phena
Week 8 (CFCH)/9 (KG)
‘Hardy’s poetry is more
about nostalgia than actual
experience.’ To what extent
do you agree?
79
Weathers
138
Roman Road
168
Dead Wessex
146
Beyond the Last
Lamp
Week 9 (CFCH)/ 10 (KG)
‘Hardy’s poetry suggests his
principle preoccupation was
with the passage of time and
its power. ‘
To what extent do you agree?
160
Old Furniture
139
After the Last
Breath
145
My Spirit Will
Not Haunt the
Mound
124
I look into my
glass
138
A Church Romance
163
Afterwards
119
The Photo
BALLADS
RICH TASK/LEARNING ACTIVITY
1. Read ‘The Trampwoman’s Tragedy’
2. In three groups complete the following tasks and rotate through the three
GEOGRAPHY
Use OS map of
Dorchester/Weymouth and
surrounding area + photocopied
comparable maps of Hardy’s
Wessex and actual area + OS
references for places in the poem.
Answer the following:
1. How far is it between
Winyard Gap and the
King’s Stag?
2. How far between the
Mendip Hills and
Bredy Knap (above Port
Bredy)?
3. How does the sense of
place affect your reading
of the poem?
CHARACTER
4. Who would you cast
as the four leads in a
film? Why?
5. For whom do you feel
most sympathy?
6. What do you make of
the class of the
characters?
STORY
7. What happens in the
story?
8. Mark the changes
when the events and
the mood turn form
positive to negative.
9. Where are the key
emotional moments?
See also http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/hardy/pva 238.html for text and
http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/hardy/gallery.html for photos