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MIDDLEMARCH
George Eliot (1819-1889) is the pseudonym of Mary Ann Cross, nee Evans. She
was born in 1918 in Nuneaton, Warwickshire and went to several schools there and in
Coventry where she moved with her father in 1841. The result of his education is a solid
knowledge of Greek, Latin, Hebrew, French, German and Italian.
In spite of her provincial background she became one of the most remarkably learned
persons of her age.
! What the novel offers its readers is in fact not only a study of provincial life
as its subtitle says - restricted to a certain territory, but also an epitome of early 19th
century England in which practically every class and quite a lot of professions of
Middlemarch society are depicted - including representatives of middle class, bourgeoisie
and aristocracy, landed gentry and clergy, manufacturers, shopkeepers, publicans, farmers
and labourers. Such people are distributed into several threads of plot cleverly interwoven
to contrast or run in parallel as the novels multitude of characters, about 50 in number,
interrelate with each other and cross these plots in and out. These interrelations are
facilitated by the fact that the network is a closed one, formed within a small community
where people know each other. !
Paramount for such a complex construction is the novels unity and cohesiveness,
skillfully achieved by George Eliots authorial governance not only of the novel but
also of its readers (Neale 55). Her omniscience dominates, supervises and keeps
everything under control.
MISS BROOKE
Dorothea Brooke lies at the core of all relations in the whole novel. She is one of
the noblest characters in literature with her innocence, purity and inborn goodness that
make the other characters better and more honourable that they are. What makes her
noble is, first at all, her trust in her old husband, then her pity and sense of duty and, later
on, her sincere love for Will Ladislaw, for whose sake she gives up her prospects of
inheritance.
Citatul: her physical, moral, intellectual portrait as a version of Saint Theresa a
portrait which Eliot represents with obvious sympathy >Chapter 1.
Everybody expects Dorothea to marry the good-looking, rich and young Sir James
Chettam but the man she wants for a husband is the pedant and elderly Mr Casaubon, in
whom she sees the person able to offer her the possibility to have acces to culture and
widen thus her intellectual horizon two necessary steps which, in her opinion, she has
to climb on her way to emancipation.
citatul: a dialogue between Dorotheea and Mr. Brooke her uncle, states her reasons for
accepting such a surprising marriage).
Citat: the two future spouses matrimonial reasons in a convincing display of George
Eliots omniscience.
MARRIAGE AND MONEY
!! With two exceptions (that of Celia Brook, Dorotheas sister, to sir James
Chettam and Mary Garths marriage to Fred Vincy, a young man who loved her from his
youth), all marriages in the novel are unhappy. !
One of such unhappy marital couples is that of Dr Lydgate with Rosamond Vincy.
Dr Tertius Lydgate is another important character in the novel. He is one of the local
doctors, an ambitious but often unpractical man in love with his profession and with
passion for scientific discovery. Rosamond Vincy is the ambitious but narrow-minded
and egoist daughter of the local Mayor. But, as Jedrzejewski remarks (74), her egoism
has nothing malicious in it, it is mere whim, the direct result of her moral ignorance and
abdication from matters of responsibility.
Citat: a conflicting discussion that the two have. The cause of the conflict is a very
common one - the recurrent problem of money. Because things did not go on too well for
him, Dr Lydgate has run into financial problems which he is trying to explain to his wife,
Rosamond. But the only thing he gets from her is reproaches and self-pitying tears.
Though returned, the love of Dorothea for Will Ladislaw and his for her has been
stifled by social conventions, moral obligations and misunderstandings such as
Dorotheas duty as a wife and then as a widow and Will misinterpretation of her attitude.
Citat: the dialogue which takes place at the end of the novel -> is full of strength of
feeling and represents re-establishment of communication between them, clearing up of
mistakes and misunderstandings, opening of hearts, sincere assertion of love for each
other and liberated optimism.