B. J. Harrison Reads Barbara of the House of Grebe

"Barbara of the House of Grebe" is a short story from Thomas Hardy's collection "A Group of Noble Dames". It is a dark that intertwines madness and desire. Barbara Grebe is already promised to a wealthy lord when she elopes with another young man, Edmond Willowes. He suffers a terrible disfigurement, and the couple's love begins to falter. Hardy's pessimism is revealed in his total rejection of the idea of eternal love, certain of its ephemerality. He writes a tale of female desire, madness, doomed love, and social roles giving "Barbara of the House of Grebe" immense psychoanalytic depth.