Far from the Madding Crowd keep his appointment with Fanny. Seeing the reason for her failure to meet him, he gently kisses the corpse and tells the anguished Bathsheba, "This woman is more to me, dead as she is, than ever you were, or are, or can be". The next day he spends all his money on a marble tombstone with the inscription: "Erected by Francis Troy in beloved memory of Fanny Robin ..." Then, loathing himself and unable to bear Bathsheba's company, he leaves. After a long walk he bathes in the sea, leaving his clothes on the beach. A strong current carries him
Far from the Madding Crowd neighbour William Boldwood, the faithful shepherd Gabriel Oak, and the thriftless soldier Sergeant Troy. On publication, critical notices were plentiful and mostly positive. Hardy revised the text extensively for the 1895 edition and made further changes for the 1901 edition. The novel was listed at number 48 on the BBC's survey The Big Read in 2003. The book finished 10th on "The Guardian"s list of greatest love stories of all time in 2007. The novel has been dramatised several times, notably in the Oscar-nominated 1967 film directed by John Schlesinger. Gabriel Oak is a young shepherd. With the savings of