Abstract: J. Hillis Miller's philosophical elaboration on the concept of community in The Return of the Native hardly touches upon its ideological origin. An analysis of the depiction regarding listening among the members of the community in The Return of the Native, in connection with Thomas Hardy's literary notebooks, essays, and other documents, may reveal that listening functions as a sort of communal imagination for the villagers and the leading characters, and that it leads them to reimagine the emotional connection between each other. The auditory imagination of community might refer to two trains of thought on community after the French Revolution: one is the assumption based on the “Religion of Humanity” of the Comtean positivism and exemplified by Eustacia Vye's “atmospheric listening,” representing an imagination of community that perceives individuals as an emotional medium for abstractions; the other is the tradition based on Wordsworth's writing, namely, using listening as a way of reflecting on sympathy and the relation between individuals, and exemplified by the villagers' sympathy toward Clym's “life story” and their willingness to listen to his sermon, delineating an imagination of community based on real and concrete human emotions.

Key words: listening, The Return of the Native, Thomas Hardy, community