THE WOODLANDERS (Presentation Copy Inscribed By the Author to His Second Wife, Florence Hardy)

Hardy, Thomas. THE WOODLANDERS. London: Osgood, McIlvaine, 1906. With a map of Wessex. Later edition. This is the PRESENTATION COPY of the 1888 novel Hardy considered his finest, which was given by him to his future second wife Florence Emily Dugdale (1879-1937). This inscription was penned during the time Florence first began acting as Hardy's secretary, four years before the death of the first Mrs. Hardy. It is inscribed: "To/ Miss F. E. Dugdale/With the Author's Kind Regards/Christmas 1908." The copy has been well-read by the second Mrs. Hardy as one might expect and shows some wear but little tear, surviving in very good original condition without major flaw. Despite Hardy's formality of inscription, he was already quite intimately drawn to Miss Dugdale by this time, and a more important presentation copy of this title would be hard to find. Dugdale first met Thomas Hardy in 1905 when she was age 26. She stopped teaching in 1908; both to assist Hardy and to begin her own writing career. In 1912, she published her first book, The Book of Baby Birds, with Hardy's uncredited assistance. Hardy's first wife Emma died in 1913, after which Dugdale moved into Hardy's home in Dorchester, Dorset in 1914. They married soon after. Custom slipcase.…