Hello, I'm David Kern.

I'm Heidi White.

I'm Karen Swallow Pryor.

And you are listening to Closer Reads, a podcast for the Incurable Reader on which we are going to be discussing Thomas Hardy's novel tests of the Dervillevils.

Now, okay, let's start here.

Karen, before I even welcome you to the show,

make sure we're pronouncing the name of this book correctly.

About any pronunciations, but I do say Derbervilles. Now, of course, it's supposed to be,

you know, it's a decline of a French name, which would be like Debevy, I guess.

But the novel is set in England.

So the English would not pronounce it that way.

But we also have a clue because the ancient name has declined even further to Derby Field.

So I think any approximation works.

Okay.

So as long as we're in the area, we'll be fine.

Well, Karen, this is great.

This is, I think, your fourth time on the show.

Is that right?

I think so. That's right. I sent out an email that I said

third and I think I had forgotten Frankenstein maybe because you came on for sense and

sensibility. Frankenstein. We did Jane Eyre. You came on for that right. And then now

tests. So four times. That's right. That's right. Four out of six of the books in the series.

...