[Abstract] The description of Nature in Hardy`s Wessex novels is characteristic of Hardy`s style. The description of Nature not only serves as a setting, but also becomes a vital part of Hardy`s novels. He focuses on the interrelations between human, Nature and society. Nature in his novels is personated and melted with the characters together. Hardy believed firmly that man was part of Nature, a guardian of Nature and should always remain true to their closeness with Nature. In all Hardy`s Wessex novels, the characters, who can live in harmony with Nature all deserve a good ending, while those who cannot are by all means go ruining. The conflict between man’s aspirations and his environment is the central unifying force of Hardy`s tragic novels. It stresses that human should live in harmony with Nature.
[Key Words] Hardy; Nature; Wessex people; fate; harmony

【摘 要】哈代的威塞克斯小说中的自然景物描写风格独特。自然景物的描写在他的这些小说中已不仅仅起着舞台背景式的作用，而是成为小说中的一个有机组成部分。他的小说侧重于探讨人、自然、环境及其相互间的关系。在他笔下，自然被人格化了，并和人熔为一体。在其威塞克斯系列小说中，凡能与自然和谐相处的人物都能获得一个美好的结局;反之，都无一例外地走向毁灭。主人公心中的抱负和其所处环境的矛盾是促成哈代悲剧小说的根源所在。哈代坚信人类是自然的一部分，是自然的守护者，且应总是和自然同存共进。他强调人应该与大自然和谐共存。
【关键词】哈代; 自然; 威塞克斯人; 命运; 和谐

1. Introduction

The world of Nature, for Hardy, is just that: a society, in which exploitation, solidarity, and the struggle for survival are experienced quite as keenly as they are in urban settings. The interpretation of the novels will focus on their obeisance to pastoral convention.
Hardy`s “Wessex,” as he himself explains, was taken from an old English history; he gave it to a district that was once part of an Anglo-Saxon kingdom. It is generally confined to the area of Dorsetshire. It was more than just a location for him; he prized the manners and customs that formed a part of its social order. He mourned the passing of these native customs and the changing character of the villages during England’s rapid industrialization. He found a way to preserve the old order by capturing it in his novels. His novels achieve a high degree of universal significance through his keen discernment of the intimate relations between character and Nature. In most of his Wessex novels, Nature is personated and melted with characters, and is pictured as a hard, unrelenting force. On the one hand, the characters who can live in harmony with Nature all deserve a good ending; while those who can not are by all means go ruining. What’s more, the development of the plots in these novels are set in the environment without exception and shown by their attitude towards Nature. On the other hand, they were all disturbed and confused by their surroundings, natural and social environments. Hardy regards Nature as something that provides people with a permanent source of strength and stresses that human should live in harmony with Nature.
This is the central theme in The Return of the Native, The Mayor of Casterbridge, Tess of the d`Urbervilles, and Jude the Obscure. These four tragic novels, compared with Hardy`s earlier novels, which on the whole, are of a happier tone in Nature description, are typical so far as the description of Nature is concerned. The four novels make full use of the Nature description as the setting of the characters` life and activities. In them, Hardy tactfully presents how Nature influences the forming of the characters` tragedy. So, the following is an exploration of Hardy`s four tragic novels, showing how Hardy`s description of Nature influences the characters` fate.
To begin with, it is necessary to learn about this great novelist—Hardy`s life and his intimate relationships with Nature.
 
2. Influence of Nature on Hardy and his novels

2.1 Hardy`s Life 
Thomas Hardy (1840—1928) was born into Victorian England, in a small thatched cottage in the hamlet of Higher Bockhampton three miles from Dorchester. It was a picturesque place. There were several quaint-looking houses with trees, clipped hedges, orchards and white gate-post-balls, in the avenue of cherry trees which led to the cottage, and behind it stretched the vast expanse of Egdon or Puddletown Heath. So Hardy is always considered a Victorian novelist. With the selection of Wessex as the setting for his novels, Hardy assured his success as a novelist. The area was familiar to him from his childhood. His walk to school took him along country lanes, and so he became familiar with rustic scenes. The “Wessex” includes those southern countries from Surrey in the east, to the Bristol Channel and the Dovenshire—Cornwall border on the west. It is rich in legend in the history of England.
Even as a boy and a young man Hardy was being modified by his reading of English literature, the classics, and history, by his careful study of architecture, by his interest in pictures and in acting, by his disturbing contacts with Charles Darwin, Herbert Spencer, and by his puzzled study of

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