Middlemarch, by George Eliot
Marriage can murder
Fortunes and dash youthful hopes.
Or it can save them.
Another novel that students of literature are encouraged to read at a time in their lives when it would frustrate rather than delight, Middlemarch is often seen as the lumpy, worthy bedrock of English novels. Solid, fair and philosophically intriguing it may be, but it lacks the sex and murder factor. It deals brazenly with adultery in the form of Rosamund's affair with Ladislaw, but it's no Madame Bovary. A hated character dies in suspicious circumstances, yet it's no Crime and Punishment.
What is it then? Well, Virginia Woolf summed it up (and imprisoned the book in the process) by pronouncing Middlemarch "one of the few English novels written for grown-up people”. And indeed it is. Its central theme is one of making do. As central characters, Dorothea and Lydgate both make bad decisions and have to live with the consequences. In Middlemarch, great plans do not come to fruition, and great energy is channelled into many small exploits instead of magnificent projects.
Perhaps what Virginia Woolf meant (and if only she could write as clearly as she thought - then maybe her novels wouldn't be so fanciful) is that as growing up means accepting that life isn't what you expected it to be. Middlemarch is an experience in triumphs taking their place alongside small and cumulative disappointments.
Sad, but true. Thanks George.
