Set in the magical Wessex landscape so familiar from Thomas Hardy's early work, Tess of the D'Urbervilles is unique among his great novels for the intense feeling that he lavished upon his heroine, Tess-a pure woman betrayed by love. Written in an era of considerable social change, the journey of hardships faced by Tess and her family reflects Hardy's observations of the disparate social classes and the fading aristocracies of nineteenth-century England. Hardy poured all of his profound empathy for both humanity and the rhythms of natural life into this story of Tess's beauty, goodness, and tragic fate. In doing so, he created a character who, like Emma Bovary and Anna Karenina, has achieved classic stature.