Cirrus@Austlit

Author's abstract: 'John Frow's analysis of Power without Glory is often regarded as one of the seminal pieces written on Hardy. Frow provides a rigorous defence against institutional literary histories which have relegated Hardy to the status of 'non-writer' and Communist 'propagandist' and in so doing discovers new dynamics within Hardy's realist writings which have been ignored by critics of the social realist novel. Nevertheless ... Frow's account still only provides a limited and indeed under-theorised account of the importance of Hardy's writings and the multiple forms of determination which need to be considered in a literary history.' (Southern Review, p.86)