None of the great Victorian novels is more vivid andreadable than The Mayor of Casterbridge. Set in theheart of Hardy's Wessex. the partly real, partly dreamcotintry' he founded on his native Dorset, it charts therise and self-induced downfall of a single man ofcharacter. The fast-moving and ingeniously contrivednarrative is Shakespearian in its tragic force, andfeatures some of the authors most striking episodesand brilliant passages of description.