Hardy's biography and Return of the Native

Thomas Hardy was born in England, in a small parish not unlike Egdon Heath. He attended King's College in London, but he never felt at home in the city. He was always acutely aware of class differences, as can be seen in Return of the Native. An advocate of social reforms, the focus on lower class people in his novel reflects this. Several authors who wrote on class divisions and social reform during this period, who happened to influence Hardy's later novels, include John Stuart Mill, Charles Fourier, and Auguste Comte. In 1874 he married Emma Gifford, whose death, although after they became estranged, had a traumatic effect on him. This could be the inspiration for the death of several characters in his novel as well as his initial desire to end the book immediatly after these deaths.