Tess of the D’Urbervilles: Hardy’s Take on 19th Century Values

  Jay’s entry this week to his list of the 100 Most Lovable Novels in the English Language is Thomas Hardy’s 1892 novel Tess of the D’Urbervilles, and it raises issues 21st century readers are still grappling with. Chaos Reader discusses her reading goals for 2026. A NOTE ON THE SOUND: We discovered a mic issue after we recorded, so we know the sound is off on this one, but it wasn’t possible to fix in editing. We apologize and hope you’ll stick with this episode anyway.