Wikipedia page about this book: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wessex_Tales

Release date is 2002-02-01

An imaginative woman -- The three strangers -- The withered arm -- Fellow-townsmen -- Interlopers at the Knap -- The distracted preacher.

David Price

"Wessex Tales" by Thomas Hardy is a collection of short stories published in 1888. Set in nineteenth-century England, these tales explore the constraints of marriage, rigid class structures, and the limited position of women in society. Hardy examines how social expectations force individuals into unwanted marriages, suppress genuine emotions, and trap people within the narrow confines of Victorian respectability. Each story reveals how these pressures diminish human contentment and freedom, painting a portrait of lives shaped—and often constrained—by the era's strict social codes. (This is an automatically generated summary.)

Original publication data not identified