An important Victorian Realist author, he is remembered for Tess of the d'Urbervilles, Far from the Madding Crowd, and other novels. Also a significant poet, he published Moments of Vision, Satires of Circumstance, and Winter Words in Various Moods and Metres, among other collections. He was the son of a stonemason and worked for a time as an architect's apprentice before studying at King's College, London.
