Gone to earth

Hazel Woodus is a creature of the wild. Daughter of a Welsh gypsy and a beekeeper she is happiest living in her forest cottage in the remote Shropshire hills where she is at one with the winds and the seasons and protector and friend of the wild animals she loves. Mary Webb's Shropshire is as anthropomorphic as Thomas Hardy's Wessex, the natural elements that pervade the hills surrounding Hazel's home are spirited, bewitched. Like Tess of the D'Urbervilles, Hazel Woodus has a beauty and innocence that is an irresistible magnet to men. Edward Marston, the gentle minister offers her human companionship and love. Jack Reddin, the local squire, awakens her to the deeper, more physical elements of human nature. Blinded by passion, both of these men fail to comprehend Hazel's essence. Like any natural being, she cannot be harnessed; her dark fate unfolds relentlessly. Mary Webb was born in 1881 in Leighton Cressage, Shropshire, the setting of all her novels. Among her best-known works are Precious Bane and The House in Dormer Forest. Admiring contemporaries—among them Rebecca West, Walter de la Mare, and Arnold Bennett—described her as a "strange genius" and "one of the best living writers." She died in London in 1927.