The novel The Return of the Native is entirely set on Egdon Heath, and it is also referred to in The Mayor of Casterbridge and the short story The Withered Arm.
[8] Hardy had died three weeks earlier, on 11 January, and in tribute to him, an extract from The Return of the Native was read out by Paul Leyssac at the first performance.
[9] The audience applauded loudly, but according to the anonymous reviewer in The Times, it was from respect for the composer rather than from "that spontaneity which shows that a piece of music has come home to the hearers".
[10] The Manchester Guardian's critic agreed that the reception was "respectful rather than enthusiastic", but declared that nevertheless, "there is not the smallest doubt that Egdon Heath will long outwear The Planets.
In 1934 Edwin Evans speculated on why the public had not yet shared the composer's assessment: Its chromaticism verges on the atonal – there are many passages to which it is difficult to assign a definite tonality.