With The Mayor of Casterbridge, we should ask, "What's up with the endings," because there is more than one version of it! Hardy first published the novel in serial form (small installments, like episodes of a HBO series) in a magazine called The Graphic. Later it was released in traditional book form, but with significant changes. And just like with J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books, there were differences between the American and British versions. Magazine editors changed the serial versions slightly (mostly because of space constraints), but Hardy himself had a hand in editing and changing later book editions.