`To his Well-Beloved he had always been faithful; but she had had many embodiments.`
Set partly in London but mostly in Portland, Hardy`s `Isle of Slingers`, `The Well-Beloved` follows the search by Jocelyn Pierston, a sculptor, for his ideal in womanhood (`The Well-Beloved` of the title) - a search which leads to his courtship of a Portland woman, her daughter, and her granddaughter, among others. Hardy`s skills at depicting a landscape, at describing the activities of the local people, and at evoking the spirit of the past are evident in this novel.
First appearing in serial form in 1892, between `Tess of the d`Urbervilles` and `Jude the Obscure`, in its much revised form this was the last of Hardy's novels to be published, giving it a special significance which is now being explored by Hardy scholars after a long period of neglect. This edition is the first to recover in the text Hardy`s final intentions and to include his last revisions.