The relationship between man and trees is a recurrent theme in Hardys work: variations on it appear in such poems as The Ivy-Wife, Logs on the Hearth and In a Wood. InThe Woodlandersit is as though oppressive verticality can have a comparable effect. InThe Return of the NativeClym Yeobright is troubled by the oppressive horizontality of the landscape. Their lives and their various struggles are tacitly inter-connected with those of the trees in whose shadow they pass their days.
Once again Hardy created a striking and defining context: his characters live, and in many cases work, in a remote area of woodland, centred on Little Hintock. Macmillan published a three-volume version in March 1887. It was serialised in monthly instalments inMacmillans Magazine, running from May 1886 to April 1887. He completedThe Woodlandersin February 1887. Not for another ten years, however, was this conception developed into a novel. According to theLifeHardy had the idea for a woodland story as early as 1875.
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