Middlemarch
– George Eliot.
Plot
Overview-
Middlemarch is a highly unusual novel. Although it is
primarily a Victorian novel, it has many characteristics typical to modern
novels. Critical reaction to Eliot's masterpiece work was mixed. A common
accusation leveled against it was its morbid, depressing tone. Many critics did
not like Eliot's habit of scattering obscure literary and scientific allusions
throughout the book. In their opinion a woman writer should not be so
intellectual. Eliot hated the "silly, women novelists." In the
Victorian era, women writers were generally confined to writing the
stereotypical fantasies of the conventional romance fiction. Not only did Eliot
dislike the constraints imposed on women's writing, she disliked the stories
they were expected to produce.
Her disdain for the tropes of
conventional romance is apparent in her treatment of marriage between Rosamond and
Lydgate. Both and Rosamond and Lydgate think of courtship and romance in terms
of ideals taken directly from conventional romance. Another problem with such
fiction is that marriage marks the end of the novel. Eliot goes through great
effort to depict the realities of marriage.
Moreover, Eliot's many
critics found Middlemarch to be too depressing for a woman writer.
Eliot refused to bow to the conventions of a happy ending. An ill-advised
marriage between two people who are inherently incompatible never becomes
completely harmonious. In fact, it becomes a yoke. Such is the case in the
marriages of Lydgate and Dorothea. Dorothea was saved from
living with her mistake for her whole life because her elderly husband dies of
a heart attack. Lydgate and Rosamond, on the other hand, married young.
Two major life choices govern
the narrative of Middlemarch. One is marriage and the other is
vocation. Eliot takes both choices very seriously. Short, romantic courtships
lead to trouble, because both parties entertain unrealistic ideals of each
other. They marry without getting to know one another. Marriages based on
compatibility work better. Moreover, marriages in which women have a greater
say also work better, such as the marriage between Fred and Mary. She tells him
she will not marry if he becomes a clergyman. Her condition saves Fred from an
unhappy entrapment in an occupation he doesn't like. Dorothea and Casaubon
struggle continually because Casaubon attempts to make her submit to his
control. The same applies in the marriage between Lydgate and Rosamond.
The
choice of an occupation by which one earns a living is also an important
element in the book. Eliot illustrates the consequences of making the wrong
choice. She also details at great length the consequences of confining women to
the domestic sphere alone. Dorothea's passionate ambition for social reform is
never realized. She ends with a happy marriage, but there is some sense that
her end as merely a wife and mother is a waste. Rosamond's shrewd capabilities
degenerate into vanity and manipulation. She is restless within the domestic
sphere, and her stifled ambitions only result in unhappiness for herself and
her husband.
Eliot's refusal to conform to
happy endings demonstrates the fact that Middlemarch is not meant to be entertainment. She
wants to deal with real-life issues, not the fantasy world to which women
writers were often confined. Her ambition was to create a portrait of the
complexity of ordinary human life: quiet tragedies, petty character failings,
small triumphs, and quiet moments of dignity. The complexity of her portrait of
provincial society is reflected in the complexity of individual characters. The
contradictions in the character of the individual person are evident in the
shifting sympathies of the reader. One moment, we pity Casaubon, the next we
judge him critically.
Middlemarch stubbornly refuses to behave like a
typical novel. The novel is a collection of relationships between several major
players in the drama, but no single one person occupies the center of the
action. No one person can represent provincial life. It is necessary to include
multiple people. Eliot's book is fairly experimental for its time in form and
content, particularly because she was a woman writer.
Reference-
Comments
Post a Comment