Tess of the d'Urbervilles
Thomas Hardy
Play
Length 17 h 52 min
Chapters 56
First published 1891
One of the greatest English tragic novels, TESS OF THE D’URBERVILLES (1891) is the story of a “pure woman” who is victimized both by conventional morality and its antithesis. Born near Dorchester, Thomas Hardy (1840-1928) set most of his stories in the region between Berkshire and Dorset in the fictional county of Wessex. He was a controversial writer whose work often showed the result of flouting the rigid Victorian moral code — his novel JUDE THE OBSCURE was (allegedly) burned by the Bishop of Wakefield for its shocking content. Hardy was an unflinching observer and in TESS has left us some unforgettable vignettes of rural life in late 19th-century England: the slow death of a flock of wounded pheasants, the monotony of field labour under an iron gray sky, and the itinerant farm worker’s seasonal round. (Summary by Adrian Praetzellis)
Chapters
1
Chapter 1 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 13:39
2
Chapter 2 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 20:11
3
Chapter 3 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 17:28
4
Chapter 4 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 27:58
5
Chapter 5 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 24:15
6
Chapter 6 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 12:13
7
Chapter 7 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 11:55
8
Chapter 8 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 11:50
9
Chapter 9 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 14:44
10
Chapter 10 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 23:11
11
Chapter 11 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 15:16
12
Chapter 12 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 22:07
13
Chapter 13 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 9:27
14
Chapter 14 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 33:57
15
Chapter 15 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 8:13
16
Chapter 16 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 14:58
17
Chapter 17 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 20:06
18
Chapter 18 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 19:50
19
Chapter 19 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 20:35
20
Chapter 20 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 11:12
21
Chapter 21 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 16:02
22
Chapter 22 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 8:03
23
Chapter 23 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 18:20
24
Chapter 24 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 10:55
25
Chapter 25 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 24:06
26
Chapter 26 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 17:15
27
Chapter 27 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 15:40
28
Chapter 28 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 13:54
29
Chapter 29 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 15:34
30
Chapter 30 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 17:31
31
Chapter 31 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 24:56
32
Chapter 32 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 16:42
33
Chapter 33 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 25:36
34
Chapter 34 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 26:39
35
Chapter 35 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 23:19
36
Chapter 36 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 28:05
37
Chapter 37 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 23:48
38
Chapter 38 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 13:06
39
Chapter 39 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 17:15
40
Chapter 40 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 17:31
41
Chapter 41 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 19:10
42
Chapter 42 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 13:32
43
Chapter 43 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 27:21
44
Chapter 44 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 24:57
45
Chapter 45 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 23:42
46
Chapter 46 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 28:33
47
Chapter 47 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 22:29
48
Chapter 48 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 16:00
49
Chapter 49 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 19:53
50
Chapter 50 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 18:47
51
Chapter 51 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 19:43
52
Chapter 52 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 19:41
53
Chapter 53 – Chapter 54 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 24:08
54
Chapter 55 – Chapter 56 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 23:11
55
Chapter 57 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 16:31
56
Chapter 58 – Chapter 59 Read by Adrian Praetzellis 26:53
From LibriVox, read by volunteers and in the public domain. LibriVox page (opens librivox.org) , the text (opens gutenberg.org) , all files on the Internet Archive (opens archive.org) .
