Far from the Madding Crowd (1967 film) and rural life to be "splendid". His strongest criticism is that the film missed the point of the small society of rural life: Thomas Hardy's novel told of a 19th century rural England in which class distinctions and unyielding social codes surrounded his characters. They were far from the madding crowd whether they liked it or not, and got tangled in each other's problems because there was nowhere else to turn. It's not simply that Bathsheba (Julie Christie) was courted by the three men in her life, but that she was courted by ALL three men in her life. The
The Frogs Who Desired a King of a new reign", a study of Russia written in 1895 by the political assassin Sergey Stepnyak-Kravchinsky, using the pen-name S. Stepniak. The book contrasts the policy of the reactionary Tsar Alexander III with the likely policy under Nicholas II, who had only just succeeded to the throne. There is a passing reference to the fable in the title of Alyse Gregory's feminist novel "King Log and Lady Lea" (1929), whereas one of Margaret Atwood's four short fictions in a 2005 issue of the magazine "Daedalus" engages with it directly. Entitled "King Log in Exile", it features the deposed king