The Mayor of Casterbridge

The study employs a qualitative interpretative research strategy divided into five chapters. Chapter I focuses on the introduction, background of the novel, The Mayor of Casterbridge, objectives of the study, research questions, research methodology, and research plan for warming up the reader to know the fundamental questions raised. Chapter II reviews the critical studies on and about the novel to clarify how my approach differs from others, and opens a new avenue of discourse on Hardy and his work. My focus in Chapter III is on Hardy's philosophy of life and its details. Chapter IV deals with the core issue of how his philosophy is symbolically revealed through the texture of The Mayor of prepares Casterbridge. The study concludes in Chapter V with a brief note on my findings and their imaginative significance for reading Hardy including a few core points with regard to what we learn from the whole work. It is pertinent to mention here that human life is in the process of making, and my work adds a drop to the ocean of knowledge, past and present.