Middlemarch (Signet Classics (Paperback))

by George Eliot

Middlemarch (Signet Classics (Paperback))

published	2003 by Signet Classics
first published	1872
binding	Paperback
isbn	0451529170 (isbn13: 9780451529176)
pages	912
description	Vast and crowded, rich in irony and suspense, Middlemarch is richer still in character, with two of the era's most enduring characters, Dorothea Brook...more [close] Vast and crowded, rich in irony and suspense, Middlemarch is richer still in character, with two of the era's most enduring characters, Dorothea Brooke, trapped in a loveless marriage, and Lydgate, an ambitious young doctor.
date added	12-26-06 edit book

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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 3570)

Nicole

Nicole rated it:

02/13/08

bookshelves: classic

I read this novel for a college class. Why else would I have subjected myself to such a long-winded Victorian piece of literature? My first reading was

from amazon.comwonderful! Since then, I have seen the 1994 miniseries of this literary masterpiece, and I have become interested in comparing the two.

Firstly, I can see how many scenes had to been eliminated to to satisfy a modern audience, who lack the sophistication to appreciate English literature having no desire to endure a pletho...more

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Lucian

Lucian rated it:

02/19/08

Read in February, 2008

Middlemarch is largely the tale of three characters and their struggles with love and their peers, their relations and fellow Middlemarchers. Dorothea, a young woman who dreams of fulfilling a purpose bigger than herself, marries an aging scholar, Mr. Casaubon, only to wrestle with the disappointment she feels with her husband, whom she finds to be less than the great man she had longed to help in his ascent to glory. Fred Vincy lives as a young gentleman, but he lacks the wealth necessary to su...more Middlemarch is largely the tale of three characters and their struggles with love and their peers, their relations and fellow Middlemarchers. Dorothea, a young woman who dreams of fulfilling a purpose bigger than herself, marries an aging scholar, Mr. Casaubon, only to wrestle with the disappointment she feels with her husband, whom she finds to be less than the great man she had longed to help in his ascent to glory. Fred Vincy lives as a young gentleman, but he lacks the wealth necessary to support his own frivolous habits and moreover finds that his inclinations alienate him from the affections of his only love, Mary Garth. And Tertius Lydgate, who arrives from Paris with the highest ambitions of reforming medical practice in provincial Middlemarch, falls for Rosamond Vincy against his better judgment, learning too late that Rosamond loved him first as an instrument to her rise in rank, a love which suffers greatly as the lifestyle her tastes demand swiftly exhausts the meager resources that her husband's practice provide. A number of characters who are woven into the lives of these couples give Middlemarch remarkable death. Most important of them is Will Ladislaw, a younthful distant relative of Mr. Casaubon, of brilliant potential but fickle taste. He and Dorothea have an uncommonly deep understanding of one another. Their affection unjustly rouses the jealousy of Dorothea's husband and the general disapproval of those around them. A great role is also played by Mr. Bulstrode, a wealthy banker, whose belief in his instrumentality in the plans of the Almighty arouses the ire of many of his peers. Yet Bulstrode's self-righteousness rests upon murky foundations, which come to haunt him in the shape of a former associate, Mr. Raffles.

The novel is a penetrating work of insight into the motives and misunderstandings of men, of desire and disappointment, of the nature of love, friendship, and marriage, and of the mirror of society. Eliot draws each character with remarkable clarity and depth. There is little to criticize. My one objection is to her manner of dwelling on the actions or emotions of the characters. She addresses the reader as all-knowing, offering countless observations on human nature, which in many cases might have been left to the reader's inferences. Then again, some of her remarks are striking aphorisms. My own tastes, I must admit, lead me to prefer shorter authorial interjections, and many readers may delight in Eliot's reflections....less

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Laura

Laura rated it:

09/28/07

Read in September, 2007

If there is anyone who knew what makes people tick, it was George Eliot. _Middlemarch_ is flawlessly written with a full town of fleshed-out characters with deep-seated motivations and ambitions. There is not a single character that you can not see crystal clear in your mind. It's a hefty read, but this book has it all: love triangles, shady business dealings, unrequited love, high ambitions, intricate societal maneuverings.... it's a soap opera, in short.

There were so many passages t...more If there is anyone who knew what makes people tick, it was George Eliot. _Middlemarch_ is flawlessly written with a full town of fleshed-out characters with deep-seated motivations and ambitions. There is not a single character that you can not see crystal clear in your mind. It's a hefty read, but this book has it all: love triangles, shady business dealings, unrequited love, high ambitions, intricate societal maneuverings.... it's a soap opera, in short.

There were so many passages that I wanted to mark with my pen because I thought, "Yes! That's exactly it!" But here I will only share with you a few of my favorites:

[context: the young Dorothea is preparing to be engaged with the much elder Mr. Causabon]

"Dorothea's faith supplied all that Mr. Casaubon's words seemed to leave unsaid; what believer sees a disturbing omission or infelicity? The text, whether of prophet or of poet, expands for whatever we can put into it, and even his bad grammar is sublime........
'How should I be able now to persevere in any path without your companionship?' said Mr. Casaubon, kissing her candid brow and feeling that heaven had vouchsafed him a blessing in every way suited to his peculiar wants. He was being unconsciously wrought upon by the charms of a nature which was entirely without hidden calculations either for immediate effects of for remoter ends. It was this which made Dorothea so childlike, and according to some judges, so stupid, with all her reputed cleverness; as, for example, in the present case of throwing herself, metaphorically speaking, at Mr. Casaubon's feet and kissing his unfashionable shoeties as if he were a Protestant Pope. She was not in the least teaching Mr. Casaubon to ask if he were good enough for her, but merely asking herself anxiously how she could be good enough for Mr. Casaubon." (p. 51-52)

Now.... if THAT doesn't say it all......

Here's another one.... ;)

"'...Because he only wishes what is for your own good. And, of course men know best about everything except what women know better.'" (p. 714)

Feminism rears its head!

And, finally, I leave you with this:
"Men and women make sad mistakes about their own symptoms, taking their vague, uneasy longings sometimes for genius, sometimes for religion, and oftener still for a mighty love." (p. 731)
...less

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Phil

Phil rated it:

10/10/07

recommends it for: The jackanapes and mongrels who need to learn that people aren't so bad as they seem.

When I finished reading this book, I wrote in the front of it that 'This is the most rewarding book you will ever read' and left it on a bookshelf in Fiji, dreaming that someone would go through the effort of reading the whole thing based only on my comment. I doubt anyone's picked it up since then; Fiji is a strange and frightening place.

I spake the truth, though. It strikes me that most of those who've read Middlemarch these days are hapless souls who resent it as the mammoth task some cro...more When I finished reading this book, I wrote in the front of it that 'This is the most rewarding book you will ever read' and left it on a bookshelf in Fiji, dreaming that someone would go through the effort of reading the whole thing based only on my comment. I doubt anyone's picked it up since then; Fiji is a strange and frightening place.

I spake the truth, though. It strikes me that most of those who've read Middlemarch these days are hapless souls who resent it as the mammoth task some crooked professor set them at university. I read it for myself, unwittingly, and was pleasantly surprised. George Eliot conjures a massive spectrum of characters, and gets into the head of every major player in the novel. We are shown what motivates the most despicable figures as well as those we are drawn to, and as a result there is no one in this book who you cannot relate to in some way or another, or at the very least understand. In my opinion that is what makes it such a grand read: George Eliot understood people. She shows you that everyone thinks in their own way, and it makes it hard to judge anyone when you can observe this.

Though it is that lasting impression of how we might perceive one another that really makes Middlemarch stand out, the story itself is continually interesting for its sheer breadth. George Eliot set out to give a panoramic view of a provincial town, and she achieves this incredibly. It is a long read, but every step in the story builds up to the picture of the whole. Sometimes I found myself confused as to how I'd ended up in a situation where I was reading what should essentially have amounted to little more a 19th Century soap opera, but what confused me was that I was enjoying it so much. I was desperate to know what would become of these marriages and debts and everything inbetween. This is such a detailed character study that you become genuinely interested in their lives, no matter how mundane the details might appear if you stepped back and really thought about it.

Middlemarch is not a book for everyone, I imagine. The insight George Eliot shows might bore rather interest many. But it interests me like hell, so a pox on the naysayers....less

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1 comments

John

John rated it:

09/01/07

bookshelves: favorites

Read in January, 1993

recommends it for: people who like late nineteenth century novels, or books with incredible detail

This is one of my favorite books, although I admit that is has been a few years since I read it last. I was first introduced it in college by one of my favorite professors, Clark Rodewald, who unfortunately is no longer with us. In the one quarter course we read all the works of Eliot and Jane Austen, except for a few that we didn't have time to get to. Rodewald described Eliot in a way that has sort of stuck with me: "She seems so smart in her books." It may be a bit of an understatem...more

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Stephanie

Stephanie rated it:

09/27/07

bookshelves: favorites, greatfnwriting

Read in January, 1997

I'm thoroughly embarrassed to admit that this book was first recommended to me by my stalker. Subsequently, I avoided MIDDLEMARCH like the plague, because it became associated with this creepy guy who thought the fastest way to my heart was to stare at me, follow me home, and leave obscene messages on my voice mail.

Flash forward 2 years, when I'm purusing yet another of my favorite tomes, THE BOOK OF LISTS. I'm intrigued to see that the one book that consistently turns up on the "Ten F...more

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Inder

Inder rated it:

(review of isbn 0141439548)

05/02/08

bookshelves: 1001-books, alltimefaves, to-reread, victorian

Read in January, 1992

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

I read this in high school, mostly to prove that I could. Back then, I was known to read to impress. And I've been riding on it ever since - "No, I've never read War & Peace; no, I've never read Faulkner; no, I've never read Gravity's Rainbow; but I have read Middlemarch."

It's a daunting book, no question. Big. Very big. Philosophically as well as physically (at 800 or so pages).

This is Victorian realism at its best. George Eliot's ideas on marriage and femininity were far ...more

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Casey

Casey rated it:

05/03/08

Read in April, 2008

It took a while for me to get into Middlemarch. The first quarter of this massive tome is entirely filled up with introducing new characters & then abandoning them, as the author repeatedly becomes more interested in what the neighbors are doing. For quite a while it feels like a collection of unconnected, inconclusive short stories about people who happen to live in the same geographical region, and when characters do start to reappear well into the book I found myself having to st...more

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relyt

relyt rated it:

05/06/08

bookshelves: classics

Read in September, 2007

I got through this 850-pager faster than I thought. It's a good reading of good literature. One thing I noticed is the way the author examines the inner thoughts of the characters. This I'd contrast with the "external" character development in Vanity Fair, which was also set at about the same periood. I've read that the novel explores "all parts" of society in an English town, but this isn't correct. It does, however, give an excellent cross-section of the upper and middl...more

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Skylar

Skylar rated it:

01/05/08

bookshelves: classics

Having been slightly bored by Silas Marner, I was not expecting much gratification from this massive tome. But I had heard good things about Middlemarch from others, so I steeled myself and dug in. I was quite figuratively blown-away by the quality of writing. It is not just that Eliot is an excellent satirist, but that she makes penetrating psychological insights and crafts very well-developed, imminently human characters, who are sympathetic despite their faults. She also exhibits a brilli...more

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Kelly

Kelly rated it:

(review of isbn 0192834029)

05/23/07

bookshelves: brit-lit, fiction

Read in March, 2006

recommends it for: women, particularly feminists, brit lit dorks

I would not have read this if it were not for a class I took last spring. I will admit that. It had always intimidated me. Large size and dense, winding prose will tend to do that to one.

However. It did have some things to say, and on the scale of feminine writing of the time period, it just towers over anything else in its seriousness. the problem, of course, is that most of the subject matter it tackles- marriages, love, children, the various problems of country life (though there is a das...more

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Michelle

Michelle rated it:

02/19/08

Read in February, 2008

So I finally finished Middlemarch. And it is amazing. It just wasn't one of those books that I was dying to finish. It was one of those that I felt like, Ah, I'll read thirty pages today, and maybe some more tomorrow if I'm in the mood. So it took a while. I probably never would have read it except I voted to read it for my book club, and once I voted, well, I kind of locked myself in. (I tried reading it on my own for fun and gave up after probably five pages, so hey, whatever you need to do to...more

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Tim

Tim rated it:

(review of isbn 0141439548)

01/02/08

I admit it. I didn't finish "Middlemarch", for which I'm a little ashamed. But Lord knows I tried. It's considered, of course, an all-time, must-read classic, and as such I respect it and certainly understand how people could love it; Eliot's writing is so under-the-radar clever.

But I slogged to page 220, realized to my horror that I had 500 pages to go, and decided saying I had read "Middlemarch" was not the point; enjoying the experience was, and as such, and with the...more

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Casandria

Casandria rated it:

02/07/08

Read in January, 2001

I have to put this book in the top 3 I have ever read. George Eliot is simply one of the most realistic writers of all time. Her characters feel so real and flawed and human, I still feel that I know them. I recently picked it up again and found that I have to read slowly simply to appreciate all of the detail.

Someone once said that everyone should read Middlemarch before getting married and I completely agree. This book follows several different couples through the process of meeting, ...more

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Sandy

Sandy rated it:

03/15/08

It took me surprisingly long to read Middlemarch – three months to be precise.
I remember loving Dorothea’s story and then being a bit flummuxed when Eliot suddenly pushes it to the backburner and picks up another thread. I began seeing this as a collection of great set pieces but an indifferent whole, till I read up that Middlemarch was released in parts – in small installments sold separately over a period of time. That explained its soap opera-like format. For all its undeniable merit...more

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Beth

Beth rated it:

01/14/08

Read in October, 2007

This book was touching, inspiring, sad, and challenging. I cried and laughed aloud at many points. It is the story of an English town and the complexities of relationships and characters that arise in that town. The characters are truly complex and relatable and though their stories of failures and struggles are heart-wrenching at times they are also stories of great strength and honor in the face of lifes harsh realities. I think of all books I’ve ever read it contains one of the most truly b...more

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melissa

melissa rated it:

09/06/07

bookshelves: favorites

My friend Jesus' college writing teacher/mentor told him Middlemarch was the female version of Ulysses. (My modification: replace "female" with "better".) Eliot's happily quite-long (not long enough?) tale of lovers and neighbors is densely layered - with voices, vistas both inward and outward, musings, personalities, rhythms, images, feelings, moods, possibilities, modes of seeing the world & of experiencing life...on and on. Within the framework of a classic 19th centur...more

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rachel

rachel rated it:

04/03/07

This is one of my two all-time favourite books (the other is Lolita). I could gush about it for hours. George Eliot is so delightfully snotty, observant, and sensitive. Every time I read it (uh, I think this is my 6th time through) I notice something new, sympathize with a new character, catch a new allusion, etc.
I think the best thing about the book is the complete picture Eliot paints of each of her characters' personalities. There are no heroes or badguys, and even the most sympathetic ...more

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Jill

Jill rated it:

04/08/08

Read in April, 2008

So I read this book because the teacher who taught me The Brothers Karamazov (my favorite book of all time) said it was up there as one of the top 5 books ever written. I started it and liked it, but then for about 400 pages slogged through excruciating detail and description of this town of Middlemarch and lots of different characters who weren't doing all that much. I almost put it down, but I was sick one day and decided to soldier on through. By page 500, these meticulously detailed chara...more

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Eric

Eric rated it:

11/09/07

Read in November, 2007

I enjoyed this book. It had some great moments and some amazing characterizations. One thing I loved about this book is the sympathy the author has for each character. She often pulls back to offer an insight into the characters motivation lest the reader judge too harshly. What this amounts to in many cases is a reminder that it's not the individual but the system that is being proven deficient. Religion and marriage (both important and positive parts of my own life) get knocked around a bit h...more

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avg rating (this edition): 4.09 (1879 ratings)
number of reviews: 401

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