The Literature Book

183

See also: Pride and Prejudice 118–19 ■ The Three Musketeers 122–23 ■ Vanity Fair 153 ■ Les Misérables 166 – 67 ■

Crime and Punishment 172 –7 7 ■ War and Peace 178 – 81 ■ Tess of the D’Urbervilles 192–93

DEPICTING REAL LIFE

Through the intertwining story lines

of a large cast of characters—who

live in the provincial English town

of the title—Middlemarch explores

tensions between marriage and

vocation. In particular, it focuses

on the dreams of two idealistic

individuals, the intelligent and

philanthropic heiress Dorothea

Brooke, and the talented but naive

doctor Tertius Lydgate.

A world of hard choices

Eliot steers clear of conformist

happy endings—a fantasy that she

considered the territory of “silly”

lady novelists. Her ambition was to

create a portrait of the complexity

of ordinary human life: minor flaws

and failings, small tragedies, quiet

triumphs, and moments of dignity.

It is the omniscient voice that

regularly turns our focus back to

this ambition.

Eliot admired the German writer

Johann Wolfgang van Goethe, and

also shared his philosophy that the

efforts of each single individual are

essential to the overall progress of

humankind. In Middlemarch she

refines and fictionalizes this tenet,

proposing that women play a

unique and significant role in the

trajectory of progress and change.

In particular, Eliot (as omniscient

narrator) poses the question of how

to do this as a woman in the real

and changing world.

An invitation to think

There are many discussions about

the role of women, between the

novel’s characters, as well as in the

authorial asides. Male characters

describe a range of qualities that

are expected of women, from

Dorothea’s husband Mr. Casaubon’s

ideal of “self-sacrificing affection”

to Lydgate’s daydream of beautiful

companionship, “reclining in a

paradise with sweet laughs for

bird-notes.” Yet there is a reluctance

to promote a single, conclusive

opinion regarding women’s lot in

society. Instead, the authorial

voice invites us to reach our own

conclusions by posing questions

such as, “Was [Dorothea’s] point

of view the only possible one with

regard to this marriage?”

Although Eliot has been accused

by critics of authorial bullying—

Henry James read the novel as

“too clever by half”—she succeeds

in sustaining a discursive tone,

particularly in interjections by

the omniscient narrator.

George Eliot remains faithful

to her own conviction that we

must concern ourselves with real-

life issues by inviting readers to

perceive their own interconnected

web of complex and often opposing

tendencies in all people, whether

those people are fictional or real. ■

George Eliot George Eliot was born Mary Ann

Evans in 1819 in Warwickshire,

England. Unusually for a girl,

she was educated at private

schools until the age of 16; after

her mother died in 1836, she

became housekeeper for her

father. After his death, in 1849,

Eliot traveled to Geneva, then

London, where she settled and in

1851 became editor of John Bray’s

journal, The Westminster Review.

She formed a number of

unreciprocated attachments,

including to philosopher Herbert

Spencer, but found true love with

fellow intellectual George Henry

Lewes, who was separated but

could not divorce. In 1854, they

chose to live together openly,

and Evans began writing her

novels, using a male pseudonym

to lend authority to her work.

Her writing ended after Lewes

died in 1878. In 1880 she

married John Walter Cross, but

died just seven months later.

Other key works

1859 Adam Bede

1860 The Mill on the Floss

1861 Silas Marner

1876 Daniel Deronda

What do we live for, if

not to make life less

difficult to each other?

Middlemarch

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