[hardy-l] Life Imitating Art?

[Betty Cortus]

Yesterday, I happened to be reading the "Annotations"  (p.84)   in  
Pamela Dalziel and Michael Millgate's edition of Thomas Hardy's  
Poetical Matter Notebook, when I came across a draft fragment of a  
recovered erasure in which Hardy outlined a possible future poem:

"Melbury man—very tall:  made his coffin fearing the carpenter would  
not make it long enough.  Kept it under his bed.  His brother, also  
tall, died first: he had it: the Melbury man made another for himself."

This morning, I read an Associate Press article in my local  
newspaper, part of which reads:

"A South Carolina judge Tuesday revoked the license of a funeral home  
where a worker cut the legs off a 6-foot-7 body so it would fit in a  
casket."

I wouldn't mind betting the Hardy would have had fun making something  
of that bizarre factoid!

Betty


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