Middlemarch

I do not say this lightly: I have never read a more brilliant novel than Middlemarch in my whole life. In detail, scope, character dilineation, complexity, humanity, loveableness and sheer mind-blowing intelligence, this is a book that exceeds any other I've yet read. The irony is, I'm a reluctant convert. I tried to read it twice before this time around - the second time I plugged away at least two thirds of the way through, and it was just a chore. And then, this time, wow. The scales fell from my eyes and shattered forever.

This is a book where in every character, from noble, ardent, innocent Dorothea to self-absorbed, shallow Rosamond; from the generous high principles of Lydgate to the blind self-deception of Bulstrode, we can see show more shades and echoes of ourselves. Eliot is not merely holding a mirror up to our lives, she is presenting us with a distillation of the parts of ourselves we don't even realise are there, until we read about them in her characters with a faint shock of recognition. It's a constant wonder to me, how George Eliot can have known so much about people - how she can have known so much about me in things I never knew before must be universal.

Such is her depth of understanding of people that she doesn't point out people's faults wittily, like Jane Austen; nor even present them as a quiet tragedy, like Kazuo Ishiguro (both of whom give wonderful insights into the way people tick). All her characters, even the worst of them (with the possible exception of Raffles), she paints with the kind of compassion that only comes with a full understanding of why they are the way they are, and the complexity of motive, thought and feeling behind even the worst acts. Also the commonplace acts, and the noble acts, and the acts that would have been noble, but failed.

Eliot shows us the tragedy of commonplace things - the silence instead of the right word spoken, the good intentions that go wrong, the misinterpretation of someone's words or actions, the harsh words spoken in the night. She shows us, as W.L. Collins says in his contemporary review at the back of The Modern Library edition, that "It is better to fail than succeed, if the aim has been noble in one case, and mean in the other." It's a novel of failures in many respects, yet leaves us with the impression that to fail in a worthy cause is a worthwhile thing to do.

Physically, this is written on a small scale - we never leave provincial Middlemarch, except on a brief honeymoon to Rome. But such is the vastness of the human soul, that the true landscape of this book is enormous. The complexities of every character's life interweave with each other, each link in the chain affecting all the others - and there is no feeling of contrivance or artificiality, even in the end, though some might argue with that. Everything, once it happens, seems inevitable, because it was done by that person, for the multitude of reasons that makes them the way they are.

This is a frustrating 'review' to write - there is too much to say, and never have my words seemed so inadequate. In brief then, this is the book I will compare all others to in future - my personal gold standard of literature. show less

On a quest to read all the classics that my woefully inadequate public school education failed to provide for, I recently finished, in the words of Virginia Woolf, "one of the few English novels written for grown-up people.” George Eliot’s Middlemarch did not disappoint. WOW!

Described as a novel of provincial life in early 1830s England, Middlemarch is a rich, character-laden, sprawling, epic novel that explores the themes of education, class, self-delusion, and the imperfection of marriage and, most importantly, I think, the changing role of women. At the heart of the novel: marriage, in all its various forms. Because its scope is so grand, Middlemarch presents a real challenge to review. At 800 pages, divided into 8 Books and 87 show more chapters it almost calls for each Book to be reviewed individually, an impossibility.

Miss Brooke, Dorothea, has her own opinions on the subjects of both marriage and the role of women in society. She is a strong, independent young woman born in the wrong century. She is not interested in a vapid young man, wealthy though he is. She chooses, instead, to marry Mr. Casaubon, many years older than she but with an intellectual capacity that she believes will allow her to grow as well. She realizes, too late, that he is more caught up in his own narrow view of things than in sharing this life with Dorothea, whom he really considers to be a secretary. She, on the other hand, is an idealist who wants to enrich her world:

“By desiring what is perfectly good, even when we don’t quite know what it is and cannot do what we would, we are part of the divine power against evil---widening the skirts of light and making the struggle with darkness narrower.” (Page 374)

Eliot exposes the powerful class struggle at this time in England’s history and the early beginnings of the middle class. Certainly the proper English young lady preferred to marry a member of the landed gentry, but we also see Miss Rosamond Vincy marry the newly arrived young doctor, and her undisciplined but kind-hearted brother Fred accept a reduction in class in order to marry the woman he loved, who insisted he become a responsible wage-earner.

It’s Eliot’s rich character development that allows her to expound on her complex themes. She exposes the English upper crust to be dreadfully greedy and ambitious through these delightfully full characters. Even the names she gives them tells us a lot about them: Rev. Farebrother, Mrs. Cadwallader, Mr. Featherstone, Mr. Raffles are all so descriptive. Not a one-dimensional character within the 800 pages. And these characters think. Brilliant!

Eliot makes use of the literary device known as authorial intervention and it can take you by surprise because it’s not something modern writers make much use of. But, quite regularly, Eliot would insert her own thought and opinions into the story making you stop and think, “What was that?” However, after a few of these you instead say to yourself, “Oh, she’s so right about that.”

Wonderful prose, intelligent ideas, an excellent view of 19th century English society, years ahead of her time, I will be seeking out more George Eliot. Very highly recommended. show less

(a very few spoilers) How does one really go about writing a review for a novel like Middlemarch? There’s just so much here, a great cast of characters, good story, beautiful--if difficult--prose, preternaturally acute observations about human and individual nature, philosophy, politics, religion, art, science, family relations, marriage… and the list goes on. I enjoyed this novel immensely and place it among my top 3 favorite novels. I finished it over a week ago but haven’t stopped flipping back through it yet.

The action of the novel takes places from 1829 to 1832, about 40 years before the writing of the novel. This was a time of great change in England that must have been very disorienting—the Catholic Emancipation in 1829, show more the death of George IV in 1830, the spread of the railways, the outbreak of cholera in 1832, and the domestic unrest leading up to the First Reform Act of 1832 (the novel closes in the spring of 1832—the Act was passed in the summer).

Against this backdrop of uneasy change we find a number of characters who yearn to do great things, though they don’t all know exactly what, and to establish a sense of order and meaning in their lives and the world around them. Mr. Casaubon works on his “Key to All Mythologies,” a scholarly volume which will elucidate the universal principles that lie behind all religions; Tertius Lydgate wants to find “the one primitive tissue” that makes up all living things; Dorothea wants to find a way to connect her life in the present with the great scholars of the past, and to connect here and now with people who need help. In reading of their quests, I was reminded of a dear professor who used to speak of a search for unity (in all its various guises—we were speaking of music theory) in connection with a search for God and ultimate meaning. This is the feeling that I get when I read about the characters’ struggles, and when Dorothea tells Will, “I have always been finding out my religion since I was a little girl.”

None, I daresay, of the characters reach the true heights of the good that they want to do in the world. Very few of us do. But in Middlemarch, this doesn’t come off as tragedy. George Eliot, describing herself, said that she was neither an optimist, nor a pessimist, but a “meliorist.” She believed that humans were making progress toward a better, more equal society, and that the world could be improved through human action. Though our (and their) individual lives may not seem to add up to much, Eliot writes of Dorothea, “…The effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.” I find this to be a great consolation.

I’ve tried and so far failed to wrap my head around the structure of the novel. But I can say that the whole thing appears to be a big, criss-crossing web of relationships. Any given character can be tied to most of the other characters in the novel—sometimes practically all of them. The “diffusive” effect that Eliot describes in speaking of Dorothea applies to the other characters as well; a single action often travels along the threads of the web and affects multiple characters. The idea of unity is expressed by making each character and group a part of a greater whole.

Eliot clarifies the moral aspect of each individual as a single part of a whole by juxtaposing selfless characters against self-centered characters. The finest characters in the novel are fine not because they are perfect, but because they are clear-eyed about themselves and sympathetic toward others. The characters who suffer most often bring their pain on themselves through their egoism and lack of self-perception. One character is so egoistic that she can’t imagine that she is ever in the wrong; another character believes that God Himself sanctions all his actions and breaks into a panic (with drastic moral consequences) when it appears that his moral failings may be revealed to the town. Dorothea and Edward Casaubon’s marriage is ruined in great part because of his fear that she is inwardly criticizing him and his jealousy of another man; as well, he has lived by and for himself for so long that once he marries Dorothea, he finds that he simply doesn’t have room for her in his life. The tragedy of this marriage is all the more maddening because Mr. Casaubon so needlessly drives a stake between himself and Dorothea—you sense that if he could just get outside of himself, the troubles would be over.

Speaking of marriages, I very much enjoyed reading about the different marriages in Middlemarch. The novel doesn’t end in weddings, like so much 19th century Brit Lit—the weddings are only the beginning, and then the real work happens. The marriages aren’t all bad, either; for one, I found very much to admire in Mr. and Mrs. Garth’s marriage. They complement each other well; they accept each other’s faults cheerfully, and they never speak ill of each other to their neighbors. The Garths, including their daughter Mary, may well be my favorite characters in the novel. (But it’s so hard to choose!)

Middlemarch ranks with Les Misérables as the finest moral fiction I’ve read. When Dorothea speaks of finding out her religion, she says that the belief that comforts her is this: “That by desiring what is perfectly good, even when we don't quite know what it is and cannot do what we would, we are part of the divine power against evil--widening the skirts of light and making the struggle with darkness narrower." Later, she will say, “What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?” The self-examination and struggle for meaning that many of the characters go through is truly inspiring, and there’s much to learn from this novel. Eliot writes during one scene (bless the intrusive narrator!), “Some one highly susceptible to the contemplation of a fine act has said, that it produces a sort of regenerating shudder through the frame, and makes one feel ready to begin a new life.” Fred Vincy felt it, and so did I. And Eliot’s finely-tuned and finely-timed sympathy always shows up just when you are ready to pronounce a final judgment on a character—just as you’re about to say, what a bad guy!, her intrusive narrator intervenes and says, but hey, look at what he has going on inside him—don’t you sympathize?—and really, are you sure that you’re the one to judge him? Don’t you do the very same thing sometimes? And you have to say, well, by gum, I do.

And to add to all the above (seriously, if you haven’t read this novel, just stop reading my review and go read Middlemarch instead!), there is a magic to George Eliot that transcends character and plot. Just one example: each chapter has its own epigram. One chapter is preceded by a lovely bit of verse (written by Eliot) describing the sympathetic resonance of a bell. To determine the pitch of a bell, Eliot explains, one need not strike it directly; one can instead play a flute into the bell, and when it hits the right pitch, the bell will vibrate in unison with it. The chapter then describes how one character ends up falling with another quite instantly. He has up to this point flirted with her but resisted any serious attachment; but at the falling of her tears, his heart is touched, and it “[shakes] flirtation into love.” I read this scene with the idea of the sympathetic resonance in mind, and the power, the thrilling awe and beauty of the integrated experience has been burned into my brain forever.

Read Middlemarch. Read it now. show less

Middlemarch is primarily the story of Dorothea Brooke - a woman who wants to make the world a better place at a time when women were not encouraged to have ideas outside of their own homes. This ardent desire leads her to make some poor choices, and some admirable ones.

This book is also a story about marriage. We see how Dorothea's marriage turns out - her sister Celia's marriage (Celia is the typical woman of her day), Rosamund's (the spoiled town beauty) marriage, and the marriage prospects of Mary Garth, a poor working girl.

The author helps us to get inside the minds of her characters, which helps us to decide if we like them or not, or if we've made similar choices too. Often I found myself sympathizing with a character I initially show more disliked, because I was helped to see their emotions.

It's very much a grown up book. If I had read this in my teens I would not have gained as much from the reading. There's no "and they lived happily ever after" here - Eliot keeps the story grounded.

If I had to sum up [Middlemarch], I'd say Eliot gives us an inside view of the lives of women in her day. There's also quite a bit of political talk, helping us see what it must have been like to live in England while so much was starting to change.

For me, this book was just about perfect. One day I'd like to re-read it because I know there are some things I missed this time around. show less

I'm amazed (and annoyed with myself) that it took this long for me to read anything by George Eliot. I had long heard she was one of the greatest female novelists--indeed, one of the greatest writers of either gender. Her Middlemarch is on a list of "100 Significant Books" in Good Reading. There are only 27 novels on that list, and the only other one by a woman is Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. Eliot was never assigned me in high school or college and from somewhere I got the idea she was insufferably stuffy. It turned out, at least in the case of Middlemarch, that couldn't be farther from the case.

It was a slow read, and by that I don't mean it was a slog, which is what I usually mean by that. I didn't feel as if the book badly show more needed an editor--either to cut away massive digressions such as the case in novels by Henry Fielding, Victor Hugo, Leo Tolstoy and Herman Melville or because it read like a rough first draft afflicted with parts that went nowhere or a rushed ending. (Defoe, Melville and Twain, I'm looking at you.) No, this is as well-structured a novel as any I've read. But it is dense--very packed and you can't speed through this prose. This is very much in the Victorian style of novel-writing. Several pages can go without dialogue, and there is a lot devoted to internal thoughts, and at times the narrator intrudes with "I" statements to comment on her characters. I remember Jane Austen, a great favorite, as better in balancing and integrating exposition and scene, more flowing in narrative and prose style and faster paced. Yet, although in lesser hands Eliot's style has aspects I often deplore in others as too "tell, not show," I can't complain of it here; Eliot isn't flabby--she's taut and you feel as if every word and scene was carefully shaped. And I didn't just love the novel, I enjoyed the process of reading it--truly it was a pleasure.

Eliot's characters came alive on the page in a way I rarely find in fiction. I would grow annoyed or irritated or outraged with them as if they were real people I knew. (Believe me, there were plenty of times I would have loved to give Dorothea Brooke or Fred Vincy a good shake.) Her characters are more rounded, more people I can imagine meeting than what I've read in say, Dickens, as vivid as his characters are, they rarely felt as real. And unlike Dickens and many another 19th century author, Eliot in Middlemarch never overstepped into melodrama or treacly sentimentality. Her psychological penetration and insight into character is as profound as in any author I've ever read. She finely depicts the shaping of moral character in critical but seemingly small moments. Middlemarch really has only one out and out villain, a minor character who appears half-way into the novel. Others are more carefully shaded. Bad things happen more because of what characters do to themselves, their foolish choices, than the malice of others. Not that Eliot is gloomy--she isn't a Thomas Hardy--for which, much thanks.

I found not just the moral but spiritual dimension of the novel very interesting. Religion is very important to her characters--but never in a preachy way. I couldn't tell, at least not from Middlemarch, whether Eliot was an orthodox Christian or an atheist. Dorothea is certainly partly a victim of a dream of martyrdom; Fred is pressured to become a clergyman, a career for which he has no vocation; Bulstrode is a narrow religious bigot--but one vicar, Farebrother, is presented as very likable. I couldn't say if Eliot finds religious belief admirable or deplorable. At best I can say I suspect she's sympathetic as to people's spiritual aspirations but wary of how it can be abused. But I just couldn't pin Eliot down that easily: her treatment of the theme is too complicated and subtle.

That said, not all five star ratings are equal--not for me. I admire this book and the writing more than I can express--but I'm not sure that Eliot will ever be the favorite Jane Austen is for me. I cry and laugh with Austen and reading her I feel all is right with the world and am warmed. I could imagine Austen as a friend I could gossip with over tea. Eliot is more... forbidding. This is not to say she is without humor--she often displayed a caustic wit. I don't know that I could say Austen is more good-natured. Eliot judged her characters with an evident compassion. But I didn't fall in love with Eliot's characters the way I have with characters of Austen. Maybe that's what made the difference with me. I can feel for Eliot's characters: I certainly can't say I admire any of them. They're true to life, but not larger than life or in any way heroic or very gifted or even (with the exception of Mary Garth) someone I could imagine wanting as a friend. Mind you, the above criticism feels a mere quibble, my trying to process a complex reading experience and before my memory fades fix my impressions in this review. But I can say it has been years since I've been so impressed with a novel--and I read a lot. I'll definitely be reading more of Eliot in the future and imagine Middlemarch is a novel it will pay to revisit. show less

I read this book on a recommendation from my local library when I was looking for some classics to read last summer. I haven't read much Victorian fiction yet, so it took me a while to become accustomed to the writing style, but by the end I found it to be one of the most rewarding reading experiences I've ever had. I read it as an ebook, and I found myself regularly making notes on little passages that I enjoyed. Many of those notes were basically me just repeating that I love the way the book was written; it is quite possibly the most well-written book I have ever read - George Eliot showing a complete mastery of both the English language and the human condition. I don't know how best to describe it, other than that the book really show more feels "alive" in a way that I've rarely felt with books. I can easily see myself coming back to this book eventually, and I feel like it will be even more rewarding on subsequent reads.

One final little note: as a longtime fan of the progressive metal band Dream Theater, I was delighted when I recognized a little quote from late in the book: "Our deeds still travel with us from afar, And what we have been makes us what we are", which the band paraphrased in their song "Beyond This Life" from the 1999 album "Scenes from a Memory" as "Our deeds have travelled far / What we have been is what we are". I had never seen this mentioned anywhere before, so it was a really wonderful little surprise. show less

I remember enjoying this book in college, and I always meant to read it again when I had more free time and was less sleep deprived. Which is why I picked it up again this year.

But after a few months of chipping away at this book 10 pages at a time, I've come to the conclusion that it was the class discussions I enjoyed. Because the book on its own is wicked boring. And most of the characters are idiots, so basically I have zero incentive to get invested in their lives.

I plowed through longer than I should have anyway because I was hoping to remember why I liked this book at one point—answer: I was caught up in my life as a pretentious English major; no one is immune—but life's too short to waste on books you don't like, ESPECIALLY show more IF YOU'VE ALREADY READ THEM. show less