Hardy started work on The Mayor of Casterbridge in the spring of 1884, after a three-year pause.[2] He completed it in a little over a year, and it was first issued in weekly parts in January 1886, followed by full publication in May 1886.[5] A reader for the publisher, Smith, Elder & Co. was not impressed and complained that the lack of gentry among the characters made it uninteresting. It was issued with a small print run of only 750 copies.[6]
Hardy himself felt that in his efforts to get an incident into almost every weekly instalment he had added events to the narrative somewhat too freely, resulting in over-elaboration.[7] However, he was deeply affected, telling a friend that the novel was the only tragedy that made him weep while writing it.[8]
