The Day After the Fair is based on Hardy’s story "On the Western Circuit". Anna, a young uneducated country girl is being ‘improved’ by her employer, Edith Harnham, a woman who escaped from her penniless state three years earlier to marry middle-aged bachelor Arthur Harnham. For Edith, the childless and loveless marriage to Harnham, a brewer with no apparent interest in life outside his own business deals, is a dull one.

When Anna meets a young man at the local fair and strikes up a romantic acquaintance with him, her employer, mindful of the girl's lack of social grace and education, takes on the role of go-between, writing letters to the London based barrister on behalf of her wayward charge. A well meaning interference, with tragic and dramatic consequences.

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Letty and Arthur Argue over Edith's behaviour

Letty

Sarah teases Anna over her love letters

Edith gives Letty money to distribute to her poor tenants

Anna

Edith writes the first letter to Charles for Anna

Anna puzzles over what to write in the letter

Edith and Arthur

Edith

Arthur begins to suspect all is not well with Edith

Arthur

Letty is unsympathetic to Anna's plight

Edith

Edith and Letty Argue over who is to receive Charles

Edith discusses Anna's future with Charles

Sarah

Charles invites Edith to read "Anna's" letters to him

Sarah teases Anna over her efforts to learn to write

Edith and Anna agonise over their situation

Edith and Anna realise they are both in trouble

Letty receives the happy couple

Edith, bereft, ignores Arthur's pleas for attention