The phrase “away from the madding crowd” comes from Thomas Hardy’s novel of the same name, which focuses on characters trying to find peace despite impulsive decisions. The title draws inspiration from three poems, including one by Edmund Spenser from 1579. Hardy and Thomas Gray valued pastoral country life, which they feared was threatened by the Industrial Revolution. The meaning of “madding” is debated among literary analysts.
The saying “away from the madding crowd” comes from the novel of the same name which Thomas Hardy wrote and published in 1874. The basic theme of the novel centers on a group of characters who struggle to make life peaceful and content despite their emotion – Driven decisions and impulsive. Some literary analysts argue that Hardy may have titled the novel after him with a touch of irony as a result. The title Far From the Madding Crowd is believed to draw inspiration from three different previously published poems, and the phrase is generally accepted as synonymous with any quiet country place and way of life.
The earliest possible literary inspiration for the phrase “far from the madding crowd” can be found in a poem by Edmund Spenser which he published in 1579. The line of interest refers to a “madding mynde” in the style of written English which was prevalent throughout era time. Another line of poetry that Hardy may have used as a starting point is William Drummond’s “Farre from the madding Worldlings hoarse discords,” which first appeared in 1614. These words perhaps suggest a fuller picture of a quiet life away from worldly hustle and bustle of city life.
Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written Contained a Country Churchyard” is an additional poem often cited as a reference for Thomas Hardy’s initial idea for Far From the Madding Crowd. Scholars often suggest that Gray and Hardy placed a high degree of value on pastoral country life as an ideal place for self-examination and introspective thinking. Since Hardy wrote this novel during a time when the Victorian era was undergoing changes due to the Industrial Revolution, his writing may have reflected an underlying concern that this kind of quiet life might have been threatened by this kind of modernization.
Modern readers of Hardy’s novel often focus on the term “crazy” as a deviation from the more contemporary word “maddening” and speculate as to its exact definition which would have been most accurate in Hardy’s lifetime. Some liken the word to mean “hectic” as it refers to the person’s actions or thoughts. Others believe it is more closely related to anger, but whether it actually means getting angry or being a victim of someone else’s anger is somewhat open to debate among literary critics and analysts. The difference in this wording of “away from the madding crowd” also reflects the rate of change within the English language over a few centuries.
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