Middlemarch
George Eliot
1872

Introduction

Subtitled A Study of Provincial Life, George Eliot's novel Middlemarch, published in eight books or installments between 1871 and 1872, is also a study in human nature; a portrait of several memorable characters, the first of whom is Dorothea Brooke; and a historical reflection from the vantage point of the early 1870s on the three years culminating in the passage of the first Reform Bill in 1832. By the time she was writing this novel, Eliot was already a well-established and highly respected author. In her editorial work at the Westminster Review and through George Henry Lewes and their London circle of intellectuals, Eliot was exposed to the leading scientific, medical, and psychological thinking of her day. This novel reflects that exposure and demonstrates the breadth of her reading in English and other languages. Each chapter begins with an epigram (a concise, often satirical poem or witty expression) that is related to the text, sometimes ironically. Some of the epigraphs are attributed to other writers and were taken from a wide range of sources, while the unsigned ones were written by the author herself.

Author Biography

George Eliot was the pseudonym of Mary Ann Evans (later Marian Evans and in the last year of her life Marian Cross), who was born on November 22, 1819, in Arbury, Warwickshire, the daughter of Robert Evans, an estate manager. Her excellent education was first shaped by Christian teachings and then by her conversion to Evangelicalism. In her schooling at Coventry, Evans lost her provincial accent and learned to speak English perfectly in a well-modulated voice. She learned French and German and was adept at playing the piano. Influenced by the German school of thought called Higher Criticism, she came in her twenties to regard sacred texts as historical documents rather than divinely revealed truth. Though she stopped going to church, she remained committed to the values of duty and love, and her writings, which are didactic, provide many positive portraits of clergymen and Dissenters.

After her mother died in 1836, Evans became the mistress of the family home and cared for her widowed father. In addition to housekeeping duties, she pursued her education rigorously, reading widely and furthering her study of foreign languages. In the early 1840s, she and her father relocated to a home outside Coventry, and there she met freethinkers Charles and Caroline Bray. The Brays contributed to Evans's shift from traditional religious thinking, which assumes sacred texts are divinely inspired, to a more radical position, in which she viewed such texts as humanly wrought fictions holding psychological and moral truths, a position to which her father strongly objected. In 1846, Evans published an English translation from the German of David Strauss's Life of Jesus; at the same time, she submerged herself in the work of Spinoza and published essays on various other subjects. After her father died, she traveled with the Brays to Europe, returning thereafter to live in London.

In 1850, she met John Chapman (1821–94), publisher and editor of the Westminster Review. Evans began contributing to this journal and in 1851 boarded temporarily in the home of Chapman and his wife. Evans was infatuated with the handsome, philandering Chapman, and subsequently, as assistant editor of the Westminster Review she became enamored with the scholarly Herbert Spencer (1820–1903), who throughout the coming decades published books on biology, sociology, and evolutionary theory. In 1854, Evans published a translation of Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach's Essence of Christianity. During this time she began to use the pseudonym George Eliot (and it is conventional to use this name when referring to her).

In 1854, Eliot began a long-term intimate union with George Henry Lewes (1817–78), an exceptional thinker with a wide variety of scholarly interests, who was estranged from his wife Agnes yet unable to obtain a divorce at the time he met Eliot. Lewes lived for the rest of his life with Eliot, and his influence on her work cannot be overstated. Among his many works, Lewes published a highly respected Life of Goethe (1853), which he and Eliot researched together in Weimar. Lewes was a constant support to Eliot, and though the irregularity of their relationship caused her initial social discomfort, the couple's London circle gradually accepted them. Indeed, Eliot preferred in social circumstances to be called Mrs. Lewes.

During the next twenty-two years, Eliot produced some of the greatest of all nineteenth-century English fiction. Her most highly respected novels are Scenes of Clerical Life (1858), Adam Bede (1859), The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe (1861), Romola (1863), Felix Holt, The Radical (1866), Middlemarch (1872–73); and Daniel Deronda (1876). Middlemarch is arguably the finest of all these works.

By the time she published Daniel Deronda, Eliot had reached the highpoint of her stellar career and was acknowledged to be the greatest living English novelist. Two years later, Lewes died. In 1880, Eliot married John Walter Cross, her financial advisor whom she had met in 1869 while in Rome. She died in London of heart failure seven months later on December 22.

Plot Summary

Prelude

In the Prelude to Middlemarch, Eliot tells a story about Saint Teresa of Avila (1515–82), a Spanish mystic and founder of religious communities. In the story, the child Teresa and her little brother leave their village in search of martyrdom, but their uncles intercept them and turn them back. This story introduces one central idea in the novel: young people may envision lofty goals that later circumstances or forces beyond their control prevent them from reaching. Eliot writes: "Many Theresas have been born who found for themselves no epic life … perhaps only a life of mistakes, the offspring of a certain spiritual grandeur ill-matched with the meanness of opportunity." Eliot explores this conjunction between character and context. The Prelude introduces the "foundress of nothing" who cries after "an unattained goodness," her high intentions thwarted by immediate obstacles. The suggestion is that the would-be saint of this novel is Dorothea Brooke, since Book I focuses on her.

Book I: Miss Brooke

Like its title, this installment, the first of eight books in the novel, focuses on nineteen-year-old Dorothea Brooke, who aspires to improve the world and ponders how to begin. She and her younger sister, Celia, orphaned a few years earlier, live with their bachelor uncle and guardian, Mr. Brooke, at his home Tipton Grange. In the first chapter, the sisters examine their mother's jewelry, Celia eager to wear it, Dorothea having no interest in adornment. This scene introduces the theme of inheritance and how differently people react to it.

The solicitous baronet, Sir James Chettem, courts Dorothea, trying to win her favor by showing interest in her cottage plans. Myopic in more than a physical sense, Dorothea incorrectly assumes he is interested in Celia. At dinner with their uncle, Sir James is contrasted with Edward Casaubon, rector of Lowick. In this nearly fifty-year-old bookworm, Dorothea mistakenly sees a man on a grand mission, the writing of a philosophical history, a "Key to All Mythologies"; by contrast, Celia sees a mole-dotted, spoon-scraping old man. Mistaken in his own way, Casaubon upon hearing Dorothea's lovely voice imagines the older Brooke sister to be the perfect candidate to be a reader to relieve his tired eyes and a nurse to ease him in his declining years. He proposes, she accepts, and Mr. Brooke admits not being able to make sense of young women.

Mr. Brooke, Dorothea, and Celia visit Lowick. Dorothea is pleased with the old house but disappointed when she hears the tenant farmers are doing quite well. She regrets that "there was nothing for her to do in Lowick," a conclusion truer than she knows, since once married she finds she is also unable to assist Casaubon in fulfilling his goal. One part of their conflictive relationship, over the eighteen months they are married, pertains to the clash between her expectation that he will indeed write the book and his habit of using research to avoid writing and to insulate himself from others.

On this first visit to Lowick, Will Ladislaw, the grandson of Casaubon's aunt Julia, is introduced. Will, a youthful lover of the arts, is also attracted to Dorothea's voice, which for him associates her with the Aeolian harp, a romantic symbol of creative inspiration. Casaubon faults Ladislaw for not working diligently in a serious career.

The wedding trip is planned for Rome. Casaubon intends to bury himself in Vatican manuscripts while Dorothea sees the sights.

A dinner party at the Grange introduces other major characters. Nicholas Bulstrode, the banker who will be disgraced, pontificates that coquetry comes from the devil; his example is his niece Rosamond Vincy, who is a contrast to the unadorned Dorothea. Tertius Lydgate, the recently arrived doctor, is rumored to be connected to a titled Northumberland family.

Media Adaptations

• Middlemarch was adapted in 1994 as a film by Random House and PBS in a co-production with WGBH Boston and BBC Lionheart Television, starring Juliet Aubrey and Douglas Hodge. As of 2005, the DVD is available from Netflix.

By the time Mr. and Mrs. Casaubon are in Rome, Lydgate is fascinated by Rosamond Vincy. For him, being with Rosamond is like "reclining in a paradise with sweet laughs for bird-notes, and blue eyes for a heaven." Rosamond sets her sights on Lydgate because she thinks the doctor can lift her up and out of provincial Middlemarch society. Committed to the practice of medicine in this small town but also a cultivated man who likes nice things, Lydgate is seduced by her because he mistakes her refined manners for docility and her musical training as balm for him after a long day of work. Ironically, the worldly and sexually experienced Lydgate is more mistaken than the inexperienced, provincial Rosamond.

Fred Vincy and Mary Garth are related by marriage to Peter Featherstone: their aunts were Featherstone's two wives, now both deceased. The twelfth chapter in Book I, which is set at Stone Court, introduces Mary Garth, who attends her sickly and cantankerous uncle Featherstone. It also describes the first meeting between Rosamond and Lydgate, during which, significantly, he hands her a whip. In marriage, Rosamond will take charge of Lydgate. Mary Garth is contrasted with Rosamond and Featherstone's sister, Mrs. Waule.

Book II: Old and Young

Money matters affect most characters in this novel. Fred Vincy, in debt for £160 and having talked Caleb Garth into co-signing on the loan, asks Bulstrode for a letter confirming to Featherstone that Fred has not tried to borrow money against the prospect of an inheritance from his uncle. Featherstone gives Fred £100, but Fred misuses that money in a horse deal with Bambridge, and the Garths, with considerable personal hardship, are forced to pay the debt.

Lydgate, now twenty-seven, is assumed to be above the common physician. Orphaned and apprenticed early, with an education in Paris financed by his uncle Sir Godwin, Lydgate aspires to scientific discovery but is hampered by what the narrator calls "spots of commonness," which lie in his prejudices, his tastes in furniture and women, and in his proud assumption "that he was better born than other country surgeons." His past involvement with an actress in Paris who kills her husband foreshadows (or predicts) Rosamond's true character and the ultimate effect on him of his marriage to her.

Reverend Tyke is elected to the newly salaried position of chaplain to the hospital over Reverend Farebrother, who has been serving in that capacity without pay for years. Lydgate breaks the tie between the two by arriving late and casting his vote last. People take the election outcome to confirm the doctor's involvement with Mr. Bulstrode who has urged Tyke's election.

In Rome alone in a museum Mrs. Casaubon accidentally meets Will. She urges her husband to write and realizes that he will not accept her help and that he is full of his own difficulty regarding his book idea.

Book III: Waiting for Death

While at the horse fair, Fred contracts typhoid, and Lydgate treats him in the Vincy home, where the doctor frequently meets Rosamond and soon becomes engaged to her.

Back at Lowick, Mrs. Casaubon sees the house now as shrunken and dark, this new view caused by her honeymoon insights regarding her husband. Casaubon has a fainting spell, and Lydgate tells him to shorten his hours of study. At the end of Book III, Mary sits up with Featherstone one night during which he directs her to burn one of two wills. She refuses to do so without a witness. By morning he is dead.

Book IV: Three Love Problems

This book opens with Featherstone's staged funeral at Lowick. Mr. and Mrs. Casaubon, Mrs. Cadwallader, Sir James, and Celia watch the funeral from inside the rectory. Mr. Brooke joins them, apparently having arrived at Lowick in the company of Will Ladislaw who remains outside. Will's presence in Middlemarch is news to Mrs. Casaubon who, given Casaubon's frail health, directed her uncle to write Ladislaw and urge him not to come to Lowick. Actually, Mr. Brooke has done so, but he saw no problem at the same time in inviting Will to visit Tipton Grange. In his brief bid for a seat in Parliament, Mr. Brooke will enlist Will to serve as editor of the Pioneer, a local paper Mr. Brooke has secretly purchased.

The two Featherstone wills are read the next day. The first leaves £10,000 to Fred and the land to Joshua Rigg; it is superseded by the second will, which leaves both the money and the land to Rigg. Mary realizes that in not complying with Featherstone's direction to burn the second will, she has played a part in disinheriting Fred; this action on Mary's part identifies one of the three love problems referred to in the title of this book.

The second problem pertains to Rosamond Vincy's relentless pursuit of economic gain through attachment to an up-and-coming bachelor. She perceives Lydgate to be just the right choice, given he has aristocratic relatives and in her opinion seems to have a promising career. In this choice, she ironically overlooks the far more prosperous local, Ned Plymdale, who is initially interested in her and stands to inherit his father's manufacturing company. Lydgate misconstrues Rosamond to be submissive when in fact she has more drive to pursue her ambitions than he will prove to have for his.

The third love problem is suggested in the contrast between how Mrs. Casaubon is totally eclipsed by her jealous, mean-spirited husband and how validated and appreciated she feels by Will Ladislaw, who takes her seriously and listens to her ideas. Will meets Dorothea at Lowick while Casaubon is out and meets her again at Tipton. She discovers how Will has been affected by the disinheritance of his grandmother Julia and suggests to Casaubon that as a corrective her husband arrange for her to share her inheritance with Will. This altruistic initiative causes Casaubon to suspect Will has manipulated Dorothea for his own gain. This interpretation causes Casaubon to secretly draft a codicil (or modification) for his will: he leaves his estate to Dorothea; however, if she marries Ladislaw she forfeits her claim to this inheritance. It also causes Casaubon to write a harsh letter to Will insisting that his local work as editor constitutes an embarrassment and he should leave the area. Will writes back that his work is respectable and his choices are his own.

John Raffles shows up at Stone Court, intent on getting money from Rigg, his stepson whom he abused as a child. While at Stone Court, Raffles finds a letter signed by his former employer, Bulstrode, whom he sees as another possible source for money. This action introduces the plot concerning Bulstrode and his past involvement with a coastal pawnshop which has illegal dealings. Bulstrode worked in the place as an accountant, even after he realized it handled stolen goods. When the pawnbroker Dunkirk died, Bulstrode married his widow. When she died, Bulstrode paid off Raffles to remain silent regarding the location of the widow's daughter, Sarah, who by this time had married and had a son. Bulstrode justified his taking possession of the widow's estate with his intention to move elsewhere and henceforth use the money legally. That choice brought him to Middlemarch nearly thirty years earlier. Thus, Bulstrode, Rigg, and Raffles are all connected to the same business, originally run by Will Ladislaw's grandparents.

Book V: The Dead Hand

Lydgate tells Casaubon that his heart trouble may cause sudden death, and, separately, Mrs. Casaubon learns that her husband's condition is serious. At the same time, Lydgate introduces Mrs. Casaubon to his hopes for a new fever hospital and discusses people's objections to his accepting financial contributions from Bulstrode. Townspeople have mixed views of Lydgate, especially since he recommends certain new medical procedures. For example, he thinks autopsy is a logical way to determine the cause of death, and he also believes doctors should be paid for their services and time instead of being compensated only by the profits they make from selling drugs.

Medical reform is part of the spirit for reform that infuses other areas of English life in the late 1820s and early 1830s. In the Houses of Parliament located in London, a Reform Bill is being debated that would redraw voting districts according to current population distribution and extend the franchise further into the Anglican male upper middle class. Mr. Brooke seeks election on a Whig (liberal), pro-reform platform and alludes vaguely to "machine-breaking and general distress." This reference pertains to workers' attacks on machinery in mills and factories that threatened to ruin the cottage industries. These attacks began about 1811 and continued through the 1820s. Regarding Mr. Brooke's bid for election, local people are suspicious: they know his tenants pay high rents and the Tipton cottages are in dire need of repair. Moreover, Brooke's assistant and advocate, Will Ladislaw, who admittedly writes well and argues passionately for poor people's rights, is an outsider to this provincial town. His curious manners cause people to wonder about him: after all, he likes to sprawl on Lydgate's carpet, enjoys children, and is kind to Reverend Farebrother's idiosyncratic maiden aunt, Henrietta Noble.

Casaubon presses his wife to promise to finish his book after he dies, but understandably she hesitates. The following day after breakfast, he takes a walk in the garden, sits down, and dies. Mrs. Casaubon discovers his body, realizes she has arrived too late to reassure him, and is swamped with guilt. However, when Dorothea learns about the codicil, she sees everything differently. She reacts to the codicil as "a violent shock of repulsion from her departed husband, who had had hidden thoughts, perhaps perverting everything she said and did."

Mr. Brooke attempts to give a speech, is egged and mocked, and withdraws from the race, claiming heart problems. Soon he goes to Europe, supposedly for a rest. Fifteen months after Featherstone's death, Rigg Featherstone sells Stone Court to Bulstrode, who hires Mr. Garth to oversee the estate. While Mr. Garth is with Bulstrode, they are approached by John Raffles, who creates a compromising scene for Bulstrode. In fact, Raffles appears three times in Middlemarch, intent on blackmailing Bulstrode. Readers learn later that after this first appearance, Raffles happens to meet Bambridge at a horse fair and tells him about Bulstrode's sullied past.

Book VI: The Widow and the Wife

Mrs. Casaubon spends three months at Freshitt Hall with Celia and Sir James. People in town learn about the codicil. Will visits Mrs. Casaubon and reports his intention to go to London and study law. They part abruptly upon the arrival of Sir James. As it turns out, Ladislaw remains in Middlemarch another two months. Mrs. Casaubon gives Reverend Farebrother the living at Lowick, a promotion which considerably increases Farebrother's income. The good cleric resolves to keep the position of vicar at the poor parish of St. Botolph as he becomes rector of the affluent Lowick parish.

Mr. Garth, now working on the estates of Lowick, Freshitt Hall, and Tipton Grange, decides to apprentice Fred Vincy, who has graduated from college. Fred asks Reverend Farebrother to speak to Mary Garth on his behalf. She confesses her love for Fred, which dashes Farebrother's unexpressed hopes of marrying her himself.

Captain Lydgate, Sir Godwin's third son and a particularly objectionable cousin in Tertius Lydgate's eyes, visits Rosamond and encourages her to go riding with him. Lydgate tells her not to go because she is pregnant, but she goes anyway and thus apparently contributes to the premature birth and death of her first child. Lydgate realizes the limits of his marriage to this woman who subverts his best resolutions and does not even follow his medical recommendation where her own unborn baby is concerned.

Through the Farebrother family, Fred learns about the codicil and takes that information to Rosamond who in turn tells Will Ladislaw. Brothrop Trumball holds an estate auction during which Will is embarrassed that people know about the codicil. He thinks it is "tantamount to an accusation against him as a fellow with low designs." Raffles has returned and recognizes Will Ladislaw at the auction. Then Raffles informs Bulstrode about Ladislaw's relationship to the banker's first wife.

To assuage his guilt, Bulstrode offers Will £500 a year. Will realizes that Bulstrode's money came from a illegal dealings and that the banker knew of Will's mother but intentionally failed to contact her regarding her claim on the estate. Will refuses Bulstrode's money, insisting that to accept would be dishonorable; Will wants "no stain" to contaminate his birth or connections. After they separate, Bulstrode weeps "like a woman."

Mrs. Casaubon learns that two months after his supposed departure from Middlemarch, Ladislaw is still in town and spending time with Lydgate's wife, Rosamond. She meets Will accidentally at the Grange and misconstrues his words to mean that he is now leaving because he is in love with Rosamond. As they part, Mrs. Casaubon realizes it is actually she whom Will loves, but Will leaves without figuring out that she returns his devotion.

Book VII: Two Temptations

Rosamond and Tertius have lived beyond their means since they were married and now the bills are due. They are threatened with losing their house and belongings. Lydgate hopes to get the soon-to-be married Ned Plymdale to rent the house and buy its furnishings. Rosamond rigidly opposes this humiliation and secretly interferes to prevent his plan. Lydgate is mastered by her, effectively paralyzed by her obstinate will. While he considers asking Sir Godwin for a loan, Rosamond secretly writes Lydgate's uncle. Three weeks later, Sir Godwin writes angrily to Lydgate with a refusal, criticizing him for apparently delegating to his wife a business matter a man should handle on his own behalf. Desperate, Lydgate experiments with opium and gambling. Farebrother tries to extend himself to Lydgate but is rebuffed.

The first temptation in Book VII concerns Mr. Farebrother who considers looking the other way as Fred engages in some unwise behavior which may cost him Mary's regard. But Farebrother resists this temptation: he interrupts Fred at the billiard hall to remind him of his duty and there discovers Lydgate engaged uncharacteristically in gambling. Fred calls the doctor away from a game he is losing, and Farebrother urges Fred to exercise self-control. Thus, Fred befriends Lydgate as Farebrother is befriending Fred.

As a last resort, Lydgate asks Bulstrode for a loan of £1000 and in their conversation learns that the hostile Bulstrode may be moving away and plans to withdraw his support from the hospital. The banker assures the doctor that Mrs. Casaubon is willing to take over the role of hospital patron.

Terrified of disgrace, Bulstrode tries to placate and remove Raffles. At the same time, the banker prepares for failure in that attempt by planning to leave Middlemarch to live at a "less scorching distance." He asks Caleb Garth to identify a potential tenant for Stone Court, and Garth thinks immediately of Fred Vincy. Then Garth runs into Raffles, who is ill, and takes him to Stone Court. En route, Raffles tells Garth about Bulstrode's past. Later, Lydgate is called to attend Raffles, who is suffering from delirium tremens, and directs Bulstrode to give him opium through the night, but not alcohol. Separately, Bulstrode appears to have a change of heart and gives the doctor a loan of £1,000. That night Bulstrode leaves Raffles in the care of the housekeeper. She asks about giving Raffles brandy, and Bulstrode gives her the key to the liquor cabinet. This action identifies the second temptation of Book VII: Bulstrode so wants Raffles dead that he deliberately ignores the doctor's orders. In the morning, Raffles dies.

The care of Raffles on his deathbed is fraught with irony. It turns out that the care actually given was standard treatment at the time. Lydgate prescribes a new approach to Raffles's condition, which if followed might also have resulted in death. Nonetheless, the fact that the officiating doctor's orders were not followed implicates Bulstrode in the reader's eyes. While the refusal to follow doctor's orders in the case is not discovered by the townspeople, their knowledge that Lydgate was involved in Raffles's care and subsequently has money to pay his creditors implicates both Bulstrode and the doctor in what appears to them to be a wrongful death.

Having heard it at a horse fair, Bambridge repeats Raffles's story about Bulstrode, and Middlemarch buzzes with questions about Bulstrode's role in Raffles's death. Bambridge also distributes information about Will's disinheritance. Gossip energizes the town: inference become fact and suggestion becomes evidence.

At a town meeting to discuss another matter, Bulstrode is confronted directly by Mr. Hawley, who officiated at Raffles's burial. Bulstrode is asked to leave and is visibly shaken as he does so, on the arm of Lydgate, whose aid further incriminates the doctor in the eyes of those present. Mrs. Casaubon returns from a trip to Yorkshire to learn of Bulstrode's disgrace and the accusations against Lydgate; she immediately takes up the doctor's cause.

Book VIII: Sunset and Sunrise

Lydgate realizes that the townspeople think he has taken Bulstrode's money as a bribe. He rides out of town to consider the matter. The scandal reaches Rosamond and Mrs. Bulstrode. Rosamond is faulted now for having married an interloper. After a poor reception from Mrs. Hackbutt and Mrs. Plymdale, Harriet Bulstrode goes to her brother, Mr. Vincy, and learns of the talk about her husband and Lydgate. She goes home and puts on plain clothing and combs her hair simply off her face; her new appearance constitutes the outward sign of her resignation to a life of humiliation. She remains loyal to her husband in the face of his disgrace. By contrast, Rosamond hears the scandal about Lydgate and goes home assuming the worst of her husband.

Lydgate visits Mrs. Casaubon who expresses her faith in him and offers help. She gives him £1,000 to pay back Bulstrode and resolves to visit Rosamond and speak to her on Lydgate's behalf. In the meantime, Rosamond has urged Will to return to Middlemarch for a visit, and when Mrs. Casaubon enters the Lydgate home, she discovers them together in what appears to be an intimate conversation and leaves abruptly. Once Mrs. Casaubon is gone, Will explains to Rosamond that he is in love with Dorothea. After a soul-searching night at Lowick during which Dorothea fears Will is attached to Rosamond, Mrs. Casaubon resolutely returns to the Lydgate home to affirm her faith in the doctor. In this conversation, Rosamond opens up to the generous Dorothea and reassures her of Will's love.

Mr. Brooke announces Dorothea and Will are going to marry. When Sir James says it is wrong of her to do so, Reverend Cadwallader replies it is easy to label as wrong what one does not like in others. Mrs. Bulstrode arranges for Fred to have the tenancy at Stone Court.

The last chapter in Book VIII sums up the "after-years" of these characters. Fred Vincy and Mary Garth, who marry and prosper, have three sons. Rosamond and Tertius relocate to London and the Continent and his practice among the rich flourishes. He writes an essay on gout. But Lydgate dies prematurely of diphtheria; his "hair never became white." Rosamond and their four children are well provided for by a life insurance policy and by her second marriage to a wealthy physician. Dorothea and Will have two children. Their firstborn, a son, inherits Mr. Brooke's estate. They live in London but visit Middlemarch twice a year. Will goes into politics, ultimately gaining a seat in the House of Commons.

Characters

Arthur Brooke

Mr. Brooke, a bachelor of sixty and owner of Tipton Grange, is a justice of the peace. In this capacity, he sentences poor people, without consideration or mercy, who poach illegally because they are starving. In family matters, he is well meaning, though ineffectual. Mr. Brooke is the guardian of his orphaned nieces, Dorothea and Celia Brooke.

Mr. Brooke is said "to have contracted a too rambling habit of mind"; indeed, his speech is vacuous, filled with phrases which in their recommendation of moderation betray his lack of information and refusal to take a position. He faults Mr. Casaubon for not expressing ideas, but Mr. Brooke himself rarely hits upon one. Still, his claim that scholarship can take one "too far" is valid regarding Casaubon.

Mr. Brooke aspires briefly to a seat in the House of Commons. With reform opinions in the wind, he purports to run on a liberal platform, but locals recognize how stingy he is regarding tenants on his own property and how he endlessly postpones making improvements. Self-deluding and dim-witted, Mr. Brooke believes he has more astute insights than he is capable of expressing. When he is mocked by a crowd and pelted with eggs, he retires from the campaign, claiming a heart condition, and flees to Europe supposedly for a rest.

Celia Brooke

Dorothea Brooke's younger sister, seventeen-year-old Celia Brooke does not share her sister's idealism or interest in cottage plans and, while her own narrow and conventional interests preclude concern for local poverty, pretty and docile Celia sees quite clearly Dorothea's blind spots. Celia's nickname for her sister is Dodo.

Dorothea assumes every man who visits the Grange may be interested in Celia, and of the sisters local cottagers prefer the "amiable and innocent-looking" Celia. Sir James Chettam, who owns the adjacent property, initially seeks to marry Dorothea, but as soon as she becomes engaged to Casaubon, Sir James transfers his devotion to Celia, whom he marries. Celia and Sir James have a son, Arthur, named after Mr. Brooke. Celia's devotion to this child eclipses any potential in her for interest in the larger world.

Miss Dorothea Brooke

Given the prefix Miss because she is the older sister, Dorothea Brooke at nineteen is classically beautiful yet myopic. Her exceptional good looks are accentuated by the simplicity of her dress, and her sincere manner of expression by her lovely voice. Idealistic, ardent, devoted to good works, and selfless, Dorothea seeks to accomplish some practical good in the parish of Tipton. Yet the narrator immediately forecasts disaster or martyrdom for her, in part because Dorothea lacks her sister Celia's common sense. The narrator explains the nature of Dorothea's vision: "She was blind … to many things obvious to others—likely to tread in the wrong places, as Celia had warned her; yet her blindness to whatever did not lie in her own pure purpose carried her safely by the side of precipices where vision would have been perilous with fear."

Dorothea is "regarded as an heiress." If she married and had a son, he would inherit Mr. Brooke's estate, a legacy of £3,000 per year. Sir James Chettam, who owns the adjacent property, seeks her hand in marriage, a plan that makes more than financial sense since the good-hearted, cooperative Sir James is eager to carry out Dorothea's cottage plans for his tenants. Inexplicably, Dorothea finds irritating his quick accommodation of her and chooses instead the learned Mr. Casaubon, twenty-seven years her senior, who quietly boasts about a monumental work he is supposedly writing. Latching onto the idea that she can assist in this great work, Dorothea jumps decidedly into the wrong place by marrying Casaubon.

After her first husband dies, Mrs. Casaubon marries his second cousin, Will Ladislaw, and together they have two children. Their firstborn, a son, inherits Mr. Brooke's estate.

Nicholas Bulstrode

Middlemarch banker and self-righteous moralizer, the outsider Nicholas Bulstrode is a manipulative, greedy, and self-deluding man. Called "a Pharisee" by some, Bulstrode buys Stone Court to signal his financial eminence and contributes to the new hospital, assuming he will have a say in how it is staffed. For thirty years, local people have endured his superciliousness, ignorant of Bulstrode's shady past.

When he was young, Bulstrode worked as an accountant for a corrupt pawnbroker named Dunkirk and married that man's widow. When she died, Bulstrode maneuvered with the help of John Raffles so that the woman's daughter Sarah, mother of Will Ladislaw, would not be contacted. This action caused Bulstrode to inherit his wife's estate, and with her money, he relocated to Middlemarch, intent on using the funds in legitimate ways (convincing himself that doing so would exonerate him from any wrong doing in preventing the estate from going to its rightful heir).

Guilt-stricken Bulstrode is willing to pay to silence the blackmailer Raffles, and when the truth of Will Ladislaw's claim on the estate is made known, Bulstrode attempts to assuage Will by offering him £500 a year. When Raffles's claims and townspeople's questions regarding Bulstrode's role in Raffles's death surface, Bulstrode is publicly disgraced and professionally ruined. One important point in the Bulstrode plot is that legally the banker might not have been found guilty in a court of law; however, public opinion turns against him, and this social verdict forces him out of Middlemarch.

Elinor Cadwallader

Mrs. Cadwallader, the wife of Rector Cadwallader, is an effective purveyor of neighborhood gossip and enjoys matchmaking, especially on behalf of her friend Sir James Chettam, who at the outset of the novel is a most attractive, eligible bachelor. Mrs. Cadwallader makes memorable remarks, particularly regarding Mr. Casaubon. She quips, for example, regarding his blood: "Somebody put a drop under a magnifying-glass, and it was all semicolons and parentheses." Mrs. Cadwallader informs Sir James before he proposes to Dorothea that she has already accepted Casaubon and thus saves him some embarrassment. Regarding the news of that upcoming nuptial, Mrs. Cadwallader says, "I wish her joy of her hair shirt." Then she directs Sir James's attention to Celia, whom she claims he has already won.

Rector Humphrey Cadwallader

Large, easy-going Rector Cadwallader is an affable sort of man who takes others at face value and whose chief pleasure is fishing. He does not share his wife's desire to meddle and often works to neutralize her reactions to others. Mrs. Cadwallader objects to her husband's accepting nature: "Humphrey finds everybody charming…. He will even speak well of the bishop, though I tell him it is unnatural in a beneficed clergyman." The narrator remarks that he "always saw the joke of any satire against himself." Kindly Humphrey Cadwallader illustrates an all-too-rare live-and-let-live attitude, which provides him with distance and understanding regarding Middlemarch politics and gossip.

Rector Edward Casaubon

Reverend Casaubon, who is past the age of forty-five, lives in the rectory at Lowick and buries himself in the study of religious history. He describes himself as "liv[ing] too much with the dead." Hours of reading are ruining his eyesight, and when he first hears Dorothea speak, he attends more to her pleasant voice than to what she says, because he needs someone to read to him. His purported goal, to reconstruct the world as it once was with the hope of isolating a single principle or truth operating in it (which he intends to entitle the "Key to All Mythologies") inexplicably appeals to Dorothea, a person naturally committed to making practical improvements in the world of the here and now.

Metaphors associated with Mr. Casaubon suggest that he is dried up, that as Mrs. Cadwallader says, he is "a great bladder for dried peas to rattle in!" To marry Casaubon is tantamount to going into the convent. In fact, during courtship with Dorothea, Casaubon "abandon[s] himself to the stream of feeling" and finds it to be "an exceedingly shallow rill." The suggestion appears to be that his marriage to Dorothea is unconsummated.

Moreover, Dorothea's assumption that she can assist him in accomplishing his great work effectively paralyzes Casaubon in his already advanced case of writer's block. He interprets her urging as criticism. Finally, in his rejection of Will Ladislaw and his suspicions of Will's intentions regarding Dorothea, Casaubon proves the degree to which he is undone by the "inward sores" of jealousy, suspicion, self-doubt, and fear of failure.

Mr. Casaubon is married to Dorothea for eighteen months and dies of heart failure, leaving her a widow at twenty-one.

Sir James Chettam

Sir James Chettam, handsome, genial bachelor and baronet, owns Freshitt Hall and the property adjacent to Tipton Grange and is initially a suitor to Dorothea Brooke. He says "exactly" to Dorothea, thus coming across to her as having no mind of his own. In truth, Sir James is willing to take up Dorothea's ideas for improvement and make them a reality. But she buys into Mr. Casaubon's purported ambition instead, seeing in it an avenue for her own aspirations.

Sir James marries Celia Brooke, and they have a son, Arthur. Sir James continues to be protective of Dorothea, and when the codicil to Casaubon's will becomes known to him, he resents the inference that Dorothea is not above reproach regarding Will Ladislaw. While committed to his station and to social appearances and in all a rather conventional man, Sir James is nonetheless good-hearted, and his family loyalty and generosity are constant.

Dodo

See Dorothea Brooke

Reverend Camden Farebrother

Often wearing a threadbare suit, the Reverend Farebrother, about forty, makes £400 a year as vicar of St. Botolph parish. With this money, he supports his widowed mother, Mrs. Farebrother; his aunt, Miss Henrietta Noble; and his unmarried sister, Winifred Farebrother. As his name might indicate, he is fair in his dealings, even when being so is at the expense of his own desires or interests. For example, though he is attached to Mary Garth, he speaks to her on behalf of Fred Vincy, who also wants to marry her. Reverend Farebrother has served at the hospital without pay for many years; however, when the position becomes salaried, Bulstrode wants Tyke to have it. Lydgate among others votes with Bulstrode for Tyke, and yet Farebrother, utterly free of malice, remains the doctor's friend.

Farebrother has only one vice: he gambles. He is good at cards and billiards and uses his skill to supplement his meager income. After Casaubon dies, however, Dorothea gives the living at Lowick to Reverend Farebrother, which substantially increases his income. He remains vicar of St. Botolph as he becomes vicar of Lowick, but his family moves into the much larger vicarage at Lowick, and with this double income he is financially quite comfortable. Now he can easily afford to give up his gambling.

Joshua Rigg Featherstone

See Joshua Rigg

Peter Featherstone

Peter Featherstone is the elderly, wealthy owner of Stone Court. As he lies dying, his siblings and their spouses gather, eager to learn what part of his estate they have inherited. Featherstone's deceased first wife was Mary Garth's aunt; his second wife, now also dead, was Mrs. Vincy's sister. Thus, by marriage, Featherstone is connected to the Garths and the Vincys.

Featherstone's blood relatives, whom the narrator calls "Christian Carnivora," resent and fear these marital connections and hope he decides to leave his estate to them. In one will, Featherstone leaves £10,000 to Fred Vincy; in a subsequent will, he leaves his entire estate to Joshua Rigg, apparently his illegitimate son; in both wills he leaves virtually nothing to his blood relatives.

Caleb Garth

Caleb Garth is an overseer or estate manager, who works hard to support his wife and five children. Mr. Garth is soft-hearted and kindly, even indulgent. He acquiesces to his wife in most things but is absolutely rigid when he decides to help someone despite her wishes to the contrary. His particular pleasure is to ride across an estate, identifying and correcting problems in the buildings, irrigation system, and fencing. He loves his work. A slow speaker and a man who does not engage in gossip, Mr. Garth proves the fine quality of his character by his actions.

Mr. Garth's income increases when he is hired by Sir James to oversee both Tipton and Freshitt estates. Then Bulstrode hires him to take care of Stone Court. However, after Raffles reveals incriminating information about Bulstrode, Mr. Garth refuses to work for the banker. Mr. Garth takes Fred Vincy on as an apprentice and assists in arranging for Fred to rent Stone Court, much against his wife's desires.

Mary Garth

Shrewd and satiric at the age of twenty-two, Mary Garth is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Caleb Garth. One of five children and the oldest girl, Mary is required to work outside the family home in order to contribute to the family income. At first, she attends her uncle, the bedridden Peter Featherstone, and next she helps out in the Farebrother household.

Mary Garth is exceptionally perceptive and free of egoism. Of ordinary appearance but with an interesting face, she is astute about human nature and foibles. The narrator says, "Rembrandt would have painted her with pleasure." Mary has candor and "truth-telling fairness." She is not inclined to self-deluding illusions, and her humor allows her to laugh at herself.

From early childhood, Mary Garth and Fred Vincy have been loyal friends. She is devoted to him but refuses to express it until he makes something of himself in the world. Eventually, they marry and live at Stone Court. Later in life Mary and Fred both become published authors.

Will Ladislaw

Grandson of Casaubon's maternal aunt Julia, Will Ladislaw is repeatedly contrasted to his second cousin. He is young, has light curls, and a bright face. While Casaubon is associated with tombs (perhaps a pun on tomes), vaults, and dimly lit corridors, Will is associated with sunlight and open air. In contrast to Casaubon who buries himself in study, Will calls himself "Pegasus" and thinks "every form of prescribed work 'harness.'" Casaubon blames him for not finding work, for following the arts instead of finding some serious purpose. When Will becomes editor of the Pioneer, he discovers his natural talent for communicating ideas and arguing for reform. This work in Middlemarch leads Will to consider studying law in London and perhaps becoming a politician.

Will's maternal and paternal antecedents experienced disinheritance. Thus he has been disinherited on both sides of his family. His father was the son of Casaubon's aunt Julia and her husband, a Polish teacher. Casaubon's mother's family disinherited Julia because she married this foreigner. Now that Julia and Will's father are dead, Will has some claim to Casaubon's estate. When Dorothea learns this connection, she recommends to her husband that Will share her inheritance, an idea that prompts the suspicious Casaubon to accuse Will of manipulating Dorothea. Casaubon writes a codicil, or modification, to his will that stipulates Dorothea will forfeit her inheritance as his widow if she marries Will.

Will's mother, Sarah Dunkirk, was the daughter of a seashore pawnbroker and his wife. Sarah ran away from home to pursue a life on the stage. After the pawnbroker Dunkirk died, the widow became Bulstrode's first wife. After Sarah's mother died, Bulstrode withheld information concerning Sarah's whereabouts in order to take possession of his wife's estate. Thus, Sarah's son, Will, was disinherited through Bulstrode's circumvention. Ladislaw's first name points to this family pattern regarding inheritance.

Dr. Tertius Lydgate

In his late twenties when he appears in Middlemarch, proud, naïve Tertius Lydgate is an idealistic doctor who arrives in this provincial town with new ideas and a lack of tact that causes him unwittingly to alienate and antagonize the more conventional local doctors. The narrator states that Lydgate shines with an "unreflecting egotism … called commonness." He envisions discovering the fundamental tissue in all life forms, aspires to establishing a fever hospital with enlightened treatment, and assumes despite his habit of spending beyond his means that his bills will be met. Though he has no initial intention of marrying, he becomes infatuated with the ambitious, materialistic, and completely egoistic Rosamond Vincy and is eventually derailed by her obstinacy and selfishness. He is drawn off course in the current of others' willfulness and pays dearly for his passivity.

John Raffles

The blackmailer, alcoholic John Raffles, age sixty, shows up first in Middlemarch to claim money from Joshua Riggs, his stepson whom he abused as a child, and on a second occasion to get money from Mr. Bulstrode, his former employer, of whom he knows entirely too much for Bulstrode's comfort. The florid, whiskered Raffles is a presumptuous opportunist, who uses what he knows to get money from those who would wish him silent and residing at a great distance. Raffles dies from alcohol poisoning under circumstances that implicate Mr. Bulstrode and Dr. Lydgate, who attends the drunkard in his final illness. When news of Raffles is announced by the horse dealer Mr. Bambridge, gossip about the banker's past and questions concerning the manner of Raffles's death ignite across Middlemarch. Raffles's appearance in Middlemarch contributes directly to the downfall of Nicholas Bulstrode.

Joshua Rigg

The illegitimate son of Peter Featherstone and also the stepson of John Raffles, cool and composed Joshua Rigg is unknown in Middlemarch when he appears for the reading of Featherstone's will, and its contents are apparently no surprise to him. According to Mrs. Cadwallader, Joshua is "frog-faced" with his prominent eyes and slicked-back hair. In accordance with the second will, Joshua Rigg, henceforth to be called Rigg Featherstone, inherits Stone Court and all property attached to it. His goal is to acquire money, so he sells Stone Court quickly and moves to a seashore town where he wants to establish himself as a moneylender and pawnbroker.

Fred Vincy

The brother of Rosamond and son of Lucy and Walter Vincy, Fred Vincy is a young man in leisurely search of a career who along the way falls into the typical traps set by unscrupulous horse dealers and gamblers. Fred has a long-term devotion to Mary Garth, and though she argues against it, he is under his father's edict to go to college and become a clergyman. Fred is disappointed in his hopes of inheriting a sizeable sum from Peter Featherstone, and this turn of events drives him to complete his education. Fortunately, an accident causes him to help Mr. Garth and that incident leads the overseer to take Fred on as an apprentice. Eventually, Fred takes on the tenancy of Stone Court and marries Mary Garth.

Rosamond Vincy

Sister of Fred and daughter of Lucy and Walter Vincy, Rosamond Vincy is a product of a typical nineteenth-century finishing school for girls. She has acquired the social graces, refined dress, and proper pronunciation designed to help her snare a suitable husband, which means someone who can improve her middle-class standard of living. She is ashamed of her mother's lack of breeding and indifferent to her father's demands. Headstrong, self-centered, and vain, Rosamond does exactly what is necessary to get what she wants. She lights on Dr. Lydgate as her ticket up and then out of Middlemarch, assumes his distant wealthy uncle will provide for him, and moves as smoothly and as inconspicuously as a spider toward entrapping him. She marries Lydgate, and their combined appetite for nice things drives them into debt and then threatens them with bankruptcy. She pursues her flirtation with her husband's cousin, Captain Lydgate, at the risk of her pregnancy, and after an episode out riding, gives birth prematurely and the baby dies. Next she flirts with Will Ladislaw. In her one selfless act, she tells Dorothea that Will loves her.

Eventually, Rosamond and Tertius relocate to a seashore town, and they have four children. After he dies at age fifty, Rosamond marries an older, wealthy man who leaves her with a comfortable inheritance.

Themes

Marriage

Middlemarch intertwines three courtship and marriage plots. The courtships of two couples, Dorothea and Casaubon and Rosamond and Lydgate, illustrate how the illusions, impressions, and expectations reached during courtship are shattered by the day-to-day familiarity and difficulties of married life. The initial misconceptions these characters have regarding their partners lead them to project onto their partners the qualities they seek in marriage. Dorothea wants entry into the world of male knowledge, and she sees Casaubon's book project as a worthy cause to serve in her hunger for action that will improve the world. Casaubon seeks a nurse, secretary, and reader, all menial jobs he believes Dorothea can handle. Rosamond seeks wealth and prestige through aristocratic alliance and believes that Lydgate offers the means by which she can be lifted out of the embarrassingly unrefined society of her family and social circle. Lydgate thinks Rosamond's physical charms and musical skills will create a perfect haven in which he can rest after a long day of medical practice and scientific research. In his eyes, Rosamond's submissive manner indicates that she is a woman who knows the man is boss in marriage and will rely on his good judgment. Once married, each person learns much more about the partner and sees that person more accurately. Sadly, for these couples, that subsequent clearer vision proves the marriage union cannot fulfill initial expectations.

In each case, others see quite easily the early signals the infatuated person fails to recognize. One illustration occurs in the first exchange of letters between Casaubon and Dorothea. His marriage proposal, which consists in his affirming her "fitness" to supply his needs, shows in every convoluted sentence his solipsistic concern for his own welfare. But Dorothea, eager to hear what she longs for, reads this letter as a confirmation of her hopes. Her direct and far more concise response begins: "I am very grateful to you for loving me," which in fact he never said he did, and he is unable to do. Another irony here is that he is a scholarly author, but she at nineteen writes far better. At the news of this sudden engagement, the less ambitious but in some ways more perceptive Celia responds with "shame mingled with a sense of the ludicrous."

While Dorothea and Casaubon have a cerebral and probably unconsummated union, sexual chemistry colors the courtship and early marriage of Rosamond and Lydgate. Regarding this self-deluding intoxication, the narrator comments: "Young love-making—that gossamer web! Even the points it clings to … are scarcely perceptible." The educated and sexually experienced Lydgate should know better, but even he "fell to spinning that web from his inward self," and Rosamond "too was spinning industriously." Still, Mr. Vincy cautions Rosamond that Lydgate does not have the potential of a good income, and the connection to his uncle cannot be depended upon to compensate for it. Older women in Rosamond's circle recognize Ned Plymdale, a local man from a manufacturing family, as far more financially well placed. But Rosamond's desire to move up and out of Middlemarch blinds her to the reasonableness of marrying Ned. Mr. Brooke says of marriage, "It is a noose, you know," but these two couples do not hear him.

The third couple stands in contrast to the first two because the plain and sturdy Mary Garth has long understood she is not the center of the universe. She believes "things were not likely to be arranged for her peculiar satisfaction." Moreover, Mary sees "life very much as a comedy in which she had a … generous resolution not to act the mean or treacherous part." She is loyal to Fred Vincy because he alone has from childhood been kind to her, but she holds off courtship with the self-awareness that she needs a partner who is as independent and hard-working as her father. She does not want a person who enters the clergy as a last resort or hangs on the promise of inheritance and wastes his talents and money in the meantime. In short, she awaits Fred's maturation. Thus, Eliot maps out the kind of pitfalls that lie ahead of the idealistic, the self-seeking, and the infatuated when it comes to selecting a mate. In Mary Garth, Eliot dramatizes how self-awareness, common sense, and lack of egoism all help a person find the partner and choose the time that portend a happy marriage.

Topics for Further Study

• Select a footnote in the Norton Critical Edition of Middlemarch on an historical person or event and conduct further research on this subject. Then write an essay on the passage in the novel which the footnote helps to elucidate, explaining how your research increases your understanding of the passage and its relevance to the novel as a whole.
• Read about the Renaissance thinker Isaac Casaubon (1559–1614) and his cosmology (theory of the universe), then write a compare and contrast paper on him and Edward Casaubon. Conclude your paper by theorizing about how this comparison gives a reader fuller understanding of Edward Casaubon's research topic and his character.
• Consult books on the history of fashion and photo histories that contain pictures of people in Victorian dress. Use photocopies of some of these photographs to create a poster. Choose pictures that may approximate what Eliot's characters wear in certain scenes: for example, a morning dress worn by a middle-class woman at home, riding outfits for a woman and for a man, mourning attire for a formal funeral, a servant's dress, and the dress of a parish priest and rector. Make a presentation to your class on fashion during the Victorian period, contrasting it with dress in the early 2000s. Include discussion of how clothing styles influence behavior.
• Read about medical developments in England between 1830 and 1870. You may want to begin by checking relevant footnotes in the Norton Critical Edition, for example, on the stethoscope, blood letting, and fever treatments, in order to narrow your research. Next, write a paper which attempts to assess Dr. Lydgate's training and expertise in light of your research.
• Do some research on grave robbers and the nineteenth-century practice of autopsy and on the practice of autopsy in the early 2000s. Write a contrast paper explaining why autopsy was a crime in the early nineteenth century but is used to solve crimes in the early 2000s.

Inheritance

Matters of inheritance constitute an important part of Middlemarch, a novel that repeatedly illustrates how land and money transfer upon death from one man to another. Patriarchy, male privilege and power, and paternity, all perpetuate this centuries old pattern. In each story behind the double disinheritance of Will Ladislaw, a woman is cut off from inheritance. Sarah Dunkirk Ladislaw, daughter of the widow Dunkirk who was Bulstrode's first wife, was Will's mother. In the legal transmission of the Dunkirk estate, Sarah's son Will would be the rightful heir. Bulstrode, however, kept the daughter's whereabouts and the existence of her son a secret, and by this maneuver he gained control of the Dunkirk estate. In the second story, Casaubon's aunt Julia ran away from her family, married, and had a son, Will's father. Because she married without family approval, her father disinherited her. This fact explains why Casaubon takes the initiative to pay for Will's education and perhaps justifies Casaubon's disappointment that Will did not take up some more respectable area of study than the arts. In Dorothea's view, Aunt Julia was unjustly disinherited and that action unfairly revoked Will's right of primogeniture (the law under which the eldest son in the most direct line of descent inherits the estate).

In the case of Peter Featherstone, because he remained childless in both his marriages, his relatives logically assume he is dying without a direct heir. In this situation they know he could designate blood relatives and relatives by marriage as inheritors. He chooses in both versions of his will to place his estate away from his siblings. In the first will, he gives some of the estate to his illegitimate son, Joshua Rigg, and a large sum of money to his second wife's nephew, Fred Vincy. In the superseding will, Featherstone designates most of the estate to Rigg.

The early scene in which Dorothea and Celia divide their deceased mother's jewels initiates the novel's exploration of female rights to inheritance, which are established by law only in lieu of a male heir. Rosamond Vincy has attended Miss Lemon's finishing school and been raised with tastes above her class in the expectation that she will marry a wealthy man. Marrying up in this way is believed to be her only way of achieving financial security because Fred will inherit their father's inconsequential estate. Rosamond is conditioned to use her physical beauty, her etiquette, and her musical training to attract an appropriate suitor. She does not think beyond this system, but she has not been encouraged to do so, and she has a face and figure she can market.

But what of a middle-class ordinary woman who does not marry, for example, Reverend Farebrother's elder sister, Winifred? This woman is dependent first on her father and, when he dies, on her brother (or any other male relative) for support. In this case, indeed, Farebrother supports his widowed mother; his maiden aunt, Henrietta Noble; and his spinster sister. Without his provision for them, these women would be what was called redundant (meaning without male support). In addition, money available for education in middle-class families was spent on behalf of the sons' professional advancement. For example, the Garths save money for the formal education or apprenticeship of their sons while the home-schooled Mary must work and offset the family's expenses. Similarly, Mr. and Mrs. Vincy send Fred to college, in hopes that he will enter the clergy and thus secure a permanent income, but Rosamond only goes to a finishing school. Her social refinement and charm will secure a husband who can provide for her.

Style

Epigraph and Allusion

Each chapter in Middlemarch begins with an epigraph that has relevance, sometimes ironic, to surrounding text. For example, the epigraph that heads chapter X is a quotation from Thomas Fuller: "He had catched a great cold, had he no other clothes to wear than the skin of a bear not yet killed." This statement points humorously to Casaubon's vulnerability to criticism; he is so filled with suspicion and self-doubt he needs to use the prospect of writing a great work to compensate for his inadequacies. Thus, he uses the promise, writing a definitive work to bolster his self-image. He also holds himself above others by talking about a work he in fact will never write. The enormous demands of this magnum opus (or great achievement) are a screen or defense mechanism that insulates him from experiencing life directly and from being intimate with fellow human beings. Casaubon reads without overview, gets lost in details, and thus avoids writing the book. Will labels the problem this way: "the … long incubation producing no chick." Fear reinforces procrastination: Casaubon privately believes critics would be harsh if they reviewed even his research. He senses a scholarly "chilling ideal audience which crowd[s] his laborious uncreative hours." Even Mr. Brooke can spot some trouble. When he asks Casaubon how he organizes his documents, Casaubon replies: "In pigeon-holes partly," to which Brooke replies, "Ah, pigeon-holes will not do." The unstated question that apparently confounds Casaubon is how does one organize a vast, comprehensive study; craft an outline; and then write. (Sad to say, the question Casaubon does not consider is whether his medieval study has any relevance for readers in the 1830s; according to Will Ladislaw it does not.)

Allusions (references to other works of literature or to historical persons or events) create a cultural framework within which the text gains meaning. For example, chapter LXVI begins with a quotation from William Shakespeare's Measure for Measure: "'Tis one thing to be tempted, Escalus, / Another thing to fall.'" Readers familiar with this play recognize the puritanical magistrate Angelo justifying himself for having sentenced to death the young Claudio for impregnating his fiancée. The irony is that Angelo, who boasts here never to have sinned, will shortly be undone by Claudio's beautiful sister, the nun Isabela. Sexually attracted to the pure Isabela, Angelo offers her a corrupt bargain: if she agrees to have sex with him, he will release her brother. He is willing to make a serious exception to the law in order to engage in illicit sex with this virgin. Angelo's hypocrisy, then, provides a clue for how readers should assess Bulstrode's hypocrisy. The banker has been the self-appointed, self-righteous judge of his neighbors on small matters when he is himself guilty of much more serious wrongdoing.

Other allusions in the novel refer to historical persons and events. Some of these references serve to locate the action in the three years prior to the passage of the first Reform Bill. For example, to place Mr. Brooke's bid for election in the wider political framework of the time, Eliot writes: "By the time that Lord John Russell's measure was being debated in the House of Commons, there was a new political animation in Middlemarch." Lord John Russell (1792–1878) was prime minister and a sponsor of the Reform Bill, which was debated in Parliament in 1831 and passed the following year. Mr. Brooke wants people to think he is progressive, but actually he tries to say only enough of what townspeople want to hear in order to win their votes. In his upbringing and his current lifestyle, Mr. Brooke is a Tory (conservative) at heart. While he says he is for reform, he does not see the contradiction in wishing "somebody had a pocket-borough to give … Ladislaw." In other words, while he speaks publicly in support of a bill that would eliminate pocket-boroughs, privately he thinks they are useful for placing certain men in office. Eliot contrasts the self-serving landed Mr. Brooke with the aristocrat yet socially minded reformer, Lord Russell.

Point of View

Eliot uses limited omniscient point of view in Middlemarch, which means the narrator uses the third person and reveals the thoughts of some but not all the characters in the novel. The action of the novel is presented through the shifting points of view. By controlling the point of view, the narrator can provide or withhold information, often for purposes of characterization. For example, in the scene in which Dorothea goes to the Lydgate home to convey her faith in the doctor to his wife, the reader sees with Dorothea's poor eyesight that Rosamond and Will are sitting close together in intimate conversation. Even the maid does not know Mrs. Lydgate is at home and so has not announced Dorothea's entrance. Dorothea leaves with the faulty impression that Will is attached to Rosamond. Next, the reader learns the truth, as Eliot keeps the third person point of view located in the Lydgate home and Will confesses that no other woman exists for him besides Dorothea. Then the reader is allowed to observe the mistaken Dorothea as she ponders during a wakeful night. She decides that, despite her apparent loss of Will's love, it is right for her to return the next day to complete her original purpose, affirming her confidence in Lydgate. This decision expresses Dorothea's belief that doing good in order to ease another's distress is more important than withdrawing in despair over one's own private loss. During the conversation that ensues the next morning, Rosamond rises reflexively to Dorothea's generous action by informing Dorothea of Will's devotion. Thus the handling of point of view distinguishes Dorothea from those who recoil in discouragement or broadcast their neighbors' shortenings based on negative perceptions or gossip. In contrast to them, Dorothea acts kindly despite her negative impressions of the situation. The boon in this action is that it elicits reciprocal kindness, in this case from the habitually unkind Rosamond.

Point of view is also used to dramatize people's inner struggles. For example, the scene in which Featherstone's wills are read shows the listeners' reactions. The detached Mary Garth "could see all complexions changing subtly," except for Joshua Rigg, who sits in "unaltered calm." However, when the second will is read, which designates the whole estate to Rigg, Mary turns away. She cannot look at Fred. Mary provides a reliable or neutral view of the participants because she does not listen in blind self-interest. While not involved directly in the assignment of wealth, Mary is able to observe the comic selfishness of others. However, when she realizes that by not burning the second will she in effect helped disinherit Fred, her view of the scene is no longer detached. Now, she is self-conscious and fears Fred's distress. She avoids looking at his face. As Mary averts her eyes, the reader learns more about Mary's feelings. Yes, she wants Fred to develop himself and, in her opinion, gaining an inheritance might prevent that. Yet she would not knowingly stand in the way of his receiving one. She faces the irony that in doing the right thing by refusing Featherstone his request, she inadvertently blocked a huge inheritance for Fred. Thus, in the handling of point of view, the scene shifts from focusing on outward expressions of the self-seeking relatives to the inner, quite selfless struggle of the well-intentioned Mary Garth.

It is easy to label the point of view in a given work, but it is often unwise to assume it is only handled one way throughout the text. Point of view is the author's chosen camera lens. In directing this lens, the author chooses frame by frame what information is delivered in the text and what information is not. The lens of point of view contributes substantially to the meaning the reader sees in the work as a whole.

Meaning of Names

Some names in Middlemarch seem to have extra meaning. First, Lowick is the name of Casaubon's parish and house. Given the darkness in his house, "his Lowick library," and the catacombs in which he wanders "taper in hand," it seems a very low wick indeed and only faintly illumines both his location and his thinking. Second, Celia calls her sister Dodo. A dodo is an extinct, flightless bird or a stupid person. Celia may intend only the diminutive of her sister's full name, but this nickname implies negative aspects of Dorothea's personality. She is flightless so long as she is tied to Casaubon, and one could also say she is stupid in marrying him in the face of her eagerness to draw up cottage plans in order to directly improve tenants' lives. Dorothea is wholeheartedly committed to doing good, to helping others, and this impulse is antithetical to Casaubon's mean-spirited nature and self-protective choices. So the nickname directs readers' attention to limitations in Dorothea she is slow to recognize. A third example may be found in the last name of Tertius Lydgate. "Lid" and "gate" are two mechanisms of enclosure, so his last name is composed of words that suggest obstruction, confinement, and limit. These may be cues that foretell the defeat of his aspirations.

Descriptions of characters are often metaphoric in this novel. For example, Will Ladislaw describes himself as an unfettered "Pegasus." Will thus compares himself to a mythological creature, the flying horse. This figure underscores the difference between Will and Casaubon, who studies mythology in subterranean vaults. Will's similarity to the fanciful air-bound creature is apparently positive; in fact, Mr. Brooke describes Will this way: "he is trying his wings. He is just the sort of young fellow to rise." So here the winged creature is interpreted to be one who will succeed.

Historical Context

Reform

Eliot deliberately locates the action of this novel in the three years that culminated with the passage of the Reform Bill of 1832. Following the American and French Revolutions, demands for political reform increased in England. There was a growing belief in the rights of all Englishmen to participate in government, whether they were property holders or not. Anglican clergy and landowners were the two groups staunchly opposed to this development. Against weakened Tory (conservative) opposition and rising agitation outside Parliament, the first of three nineteenth-century reform bills was passed in 1832. The Reform Act eliminated so-called rotten boroughs (voting districts that had far fewer residents than others yet had equal political representation), redrew voting districts in light of current population distribution, and extended the franchise further into the property-owning middle class. With the passage of this act the aristocracy's political monopoly was broken forever, and about half of all land-owning, middle-class Anglican men received the right to vote.

Writing in the early 1870s with the clarity of hindsight regarding a time forty years earlier, Eliot knew how medical science evolved during the middle decades of the nineteenth century. Her novel touches on several issues and discoveries that were important during those years. First, as a result of land enclosures, populations suddenly increased in mill and factory towns as rural, landless workers sought urban employment. Slums developed in major cities that were ill equipped to handle this influx of people. Many writers, both scientific and literary, described the actual conditions faced by thousands. For example, Friedrich Engels (1820–95) presented eyewitness accounts of London and Manchester in The Condition of the Working Class (1845), and Charles Dickens (1812–70) in Bleak House (1852–53) described a London slum and the cholera and typhoid fevers that spread through it. So it is not surprising that Dr. Lydgate comes from Paris and London particularly aware of urban crowding and epidemics. That he believes in autopsy as a valid procedure for determining cause of death makes sense, too. Particularly in the first half of the century, doctors performed illegal autopsies on corpses sometimes procured by grave robbers. This double crime existed because doctors wanted to learn about the human body but were prevented by law from dissecting it. But Middlemarchers are suspicious of a man who cannot identify the physical problem and treat it in order to prevent death and then wants permission to cut apart the body in hopes of identifying what he should have known in the first place.

Estate law was another area of reform, and the issue of primogeniture was debated throughout most of the century. The longstanding right of the first-born male to inherit the estate protected land from being subdivided among siblings and also assured familial continuity in membership of the House of Lords. The succession of certain titled individuals perpetuated aristocratic dominance by concentrating wealth in one descendent, and it prevented large land tracts from subdivision. One change came in the passage in 1870 of the Married Woman's Property Act, which provided that a married woman retained control of property she brought into marriage. Despite this small gain for women's rights, throughout the century the vast majority of women were, in terms of wealth, satellites of males to whom they were attached by blood or law, and this relationship determined their financial circumstances.

Critical Overview

Middlemarch appeared in eight books or volumes between December 1871 and December 1872. In 2000, W. W. Norton published a second edition of its Norton Critical Edition of the novel.

Compare & Contrast

• 1832: Doctors are not paid for their time and their services. Rather, their income derives from the profits they obtain through selling drugs.
  
  Today: Doctors charge for their time, their services, and their medical opinions. Patients obtain medicine with a doctor's prescription from a licensed pharmacy. In addition, in the United States, pharmaceutical companies advertise directly to consumers, and their sales representatives canvass doctors' offices, distributing free samples of new drugs to be given out to patients.
• 1832: A candidate with no credentials other than money and influence may run successfully for election to the House of Commons.
  
  Today: In Britain, as in many democracies in the world, the most important factor in the success of a candidate is his party affiliation. A candidate for the House of Commons stands little chance of being elected unless he is adopted by one of the three major parties, Labour, Conservative, or Liberal Democrat.
• 1832: Many middle-class, educated young men enter the clergy, seeking a sinecure (a permanent, respectable job requiring little work and providing a steady income).
  
  Today: The Church of England finds it increasingly difficult to recruit suitable candidates for the clergy. A similar problem is faced by the Catholic Church in the United States, and many churches share priests. There is a debate among Catholics in the United States about the ordination of women.

In her journal for January 1, 1873, Eliot reported on the initial response to Middlemarch: "No former book of mine has been received with more enthusiasm." Indeed, the Saturday Review, for December 7, 1872, stated: "as a didactic novel it has scarcely been equaled." It also pointed out: "The quarrel with humanity in Middlemarch is its selfishness." By contrast to this widespread human failing, it stated that "Dorothea is so noble and striking a character—her charm grow[s] upon us as the story advances." Once the complete novel had been published, Sidney Colvin, writing for Fortnightly Review on January 19, 1873, called Middlemarch "the chief English book of the immediate present" and "the ripest" of all Eliot's novels to date. Colvin further stated that the novel shows a "powerful knowledge of human nature" and demonstrates its author's "studies in science and physiology."

Henry James agreed and disagreed. In his March 1873 review, which appeared originally in Galaxy, James argued that the characterization was uneven. He acknowledged that Mr. Brooke, along with the Garth and Farebrother families, among others, were deftly handled, but James found the portrait of Will Ladislaw to be "a failure." James also wrote that the subject of the novel as defined by "the eloquent preface" is "a young girl framed for a larger moral life," yet after Casaubon dies, the entire plot having to do with Dorothea centers on whether she will marry Ladislaw. Thus, in James's view, the high ideal of taking action to improve the world dissipates disappointingly in a somewhat conventional marriage plot.

Regarding the Norton Critical Edition 2000 second edition of Middlemarch, the Contemporary Review praised its "wealth of additional material" but singled out as "[p]erhaps most valuable" the explanatory notes that allow a reader to understand many references in the text itself.

Criticism

Melodie Monahan

Monahan has a Ph.D. in English and operates an editing service, The Inkwell Works. In the following essay, Monahan explores how Eliot's parable of the pier glass explains the limitation of characters' points of view and implies those limitations can be surpassed.

George Eliot's Middlemarch has as its title the name of a fictional town in the English Midlands; the novel presents a picture of provincial life during a little less than three years, from September 30, 1829, to May 1832. This broad subject is narrowed by Eliot's focus on characters whose romantic and professional lives are interconnected. Four courtships (two of which involve the main character, Dorothea Brooke) are dramatized, along with the professional struggles of the newcomer Dr. Lydgate and the sudden disgrace of the well-established banker, Nicholas Bulstrode. These plots show various angles on several themes, chief among which perhaps is the way that egoism (self-interest or an inflated sense of self-importance) affects characters' actions. Given the limited omniscient point of view, readers see the action through the characters' subjective perceptions, their thoughts, their interpretations, and their interests, and they also see through the lens of the narrator (the voice in the text that relates the story as distinct from George Eliot the author). The narrator frequently stops relating the story in order to analyze it by pointing out discrepancies and contradicting evidence and by contrasting characters' views of particular events. In this way, the narrator shows repeatedly how subjective human understanding is and how likely that understanding is to be limited by self-interest or personal motive. Characters are distinguished by their different interpretations and by their actions, which express their motives and beliefs. In the world of this novel, it may be safe to say that most people act out of self-interest, but some individuals are able to see beyond themselves and act on behalf of others. Individual gestures of kindness, especially those which require some form of personal sacrifice, constitute for Eliot true heroic acts; however small or seemingly inconsequential, these moral actions in incremental degrees improve the world this novel depicts.

Egoism is the belief that self-interest determines a person's actions. The idea here is that people value themselves (and their own drives and goals) over others, and self-interest determines how they interpret their circumstances and choose to act. Of the main characters, the highly egoistic are Rosamond Vincy, Edward Casaubon, and Nicholas Bulstrode, and to a lesser extent Tertius Lydgate. By contrast, those who are able to see beyond personal desire and act on behalf of others, even when it requires personal sacrifice or going against public opinion, are Dorothea Brooke, Reverend Farebrother, Mary Garth, and Caleb Garth, along with the minor characters Humphrey Cadwallader and Henrietta Noble.

In the key passage about the pier glass, Eliot employs a scientific illustration as an analogy (or comparison) in order to explain how the egoist sees the world. The narrator describes something empirical (that can be tested through material means) in order to explain something psychological (in this case, how self-interest affects interpretation). This passage appears at the beginning of Chapter XXVII:

Your pier-glass or extensive surface of polished steel … will be minutely and multitudinously scratched in all directions; but place now against it a lighted candle … and lo! the scratches will seem to arrange themselves in a fine series of concentric circles round that little sun. It is demonstrable that the scratches are going everywhere impartially, and it is only your candle which produces the flattering illusion of a concentric arrangement…. These things are a parable. The scratches are events, and the candle is the egoism of any person.

The surface patina of a rubbed pier glass (a large mirror on a wall, often placed between two windows) or polished steel is covered with tiny scratches that go in every direction. When a lighted candle is brought close to the surface, its scratches appear to take on a concentric organization because only concentric scratches catch the light. The illusion of concentricity exists despite the "demonstrable" fact that the scratches go "everywhere impartially." The narrator then explains the analogy: "The scratches are events, and the candle is the egoism of any person." This scientific illustration is meant to explain how an inflated sense of self-importance causes a person to see events as having a flattering order and meaning, whereas in fact that order is superimposed by his own wishes or interests. The character that most engages in this self-serving distortion is Rosamond Vincy, daughter of an indulgent mother and graduate of a typical female finishing school, who has been conditioned to believe her physical beauty and social refinement are sufficient to garner her a rich husband and speedy transit to a class above that of her birth family.

The pier glass illustration suggests that a person who wants to see beyond the blind spots of egoism can learn about the world by testing immediate impressions against impartial empirical evidence. The reliance on empirical evidence is in line with Victorian thought of Eliot's own day, a time in which scientists and enthusiastic amateurs engaged in scientific experimentation and data collecting. That Mr. Farebrother, for example, shows his personal collection of insects and other found objects to a visitor to his home and is interested in Dr. Lydgate's formal experiments reflects a quite widespread, middle-class interest in the empirical world. Moreover, Mr. Farebrother's decision to seek information from Mary Garth about her feelings for Fred Vincy before Mr. Farebrother expresses his own interest in her shows how a person can act considerately in the wider realm despite personal longing. The conceited and willful Rosamond assumes she is a star and all else orbits her. When contrary evidence presents itself (for example, Lydgate's inability to pay his debts), Rosamond disregards it, relying on tears and deliberate manipulation to pursue her social-climbing aspirations.

Similar self-delusion can confound even a person trained in objective analysis. For example, during courtship the infatuated Dr. Lydgate misreads the nature and intention of Rosamond Vincy: Lydgate's ability for "inspection of macerated muscle or of eyes presented in a dish … and other incidents of scientific inquiry" is not sufficient to correct the distortions generated by sexual attraction and "poetic love." Lydgate is charmed by Rosamond's demure manner, her sweet voice, and her taste for fine things. He assumes these attributes will soothe him after a long day of work, and he completely misconstrues as love for him her statement rejecting her father's objection to their engagement. If he could see more objectively, he would recognize as ominous her admission that she never gives up anything she decides to do. But he thinks he is superior and she submissive; thus, he misconstrues her obstinacy as devotion to him.

In contrast to these egoistic characters, some characters are more able to see from others' perspectives and are good to others as a result. Their altruism (the unselfish regard for and commitment to the welfare of others) affects their interpretation of events and their behavior. The leading person in this group is Dorothea Brooke, whom the Prelude suggests is one of "[m]any Theresas," saintly women who try "to shape their thought and deed in noble agreement." Dorothea explains the belief behind her kind actions this way:

[B]y 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.

What Do I Read Next?

• Readers who enjoy Middlemarch may find Eliot's Mill on the Floss (1860) also interesting, especially regarding insights on the schooling of children according to gender rather than ability and the way fashion in clothing affects female behavior. This novel also deals with bankruptcy and the ways in which a love relationship can sabotage aspirations.
• Charlotte Brontê's romantic novel Jane Eyre (1847) traces the education and professional development of a young woman without family or financial support.
• Tim Dolin's 2005 biography George Eliot, part of Oxford University's Authors in Context series, studies Eliot's life within its larger social and intellectual context. The final chapter of this book comments on television adaptations of Middlemarch.
• For a contrast to Middlemarch in so many ways, readers may enjoy the American study of small town life provided in Sherwood Anderson's brief novel, Winesburg, Ohio (1919).

Dorothea acts on this belief as soon as she understands what to do. For example, she overrides her great disappointment in the apparent romantic involvement of Will Ladislaw with Mrs. Rosamond Lydgate in order to affirm her confidence and trust in Dr. Lydgate. Dorothea is quick to defend Lydgate, and when Sir James Chettem and Mr. Brooke urge her to remain uninvolved, Dorothea responds: "What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other?" When Lydgate benefits from her generosity he concludes that Dorothea has "a heart large enough for the Virgin Mary," and he calls her "a fountain of friendship towards men." Dorothea is willing to put her money and her faith in Lydgate, despite the townspeople's belief that his risk of bankruptcy comprised his ethics in dealings with Bulstrode and in the treatment of Raffles. Given what happens to both the doctor and the banker, the townspeople may be understood as more correct than Dorothea.

Readers may ask what is the sum of Dorothea's achievement or in the larger scheme of things what effect does her kind action have. The answer near at hand is given in the scene in which Mr. Farebrother acts altruistically toward Fred Vincy. The narrator explains that such "a fine act … produces a sort of regenerating shudder through the frame, and makes one feel ready to begin a new life." Rosamond is permanently affected by Dorothea's kindness: Rosamond "never uttered a word in depreciation of Dorothea, keeping in religious remembrance the generosity which had come to her aid in the sharpest crisis of her life." Thus, Eliot might assert, the tiny increments of good assist in the slow evolution of human community. However, whether those increments are sufficient to identify a latter-day saint, the novel does not explicitly affirm.

Art that depicts human kindness can serve the high moral purpose of "enlarg[ing] men's sympathies," Eliot explained in a letter to Charles Bray. The small acts of characters in a fiction serve to direct attention to the importance of seeing beyond egoism to the world as it is and making efforts to do good in that world. Eliot put her faith in gradual amelioration (slow improvement), and Middlemarch, while it dramatizes the narrow field of human egoism and altruism, brings its readership to contemplate the wider ways in which the enlightenment of the incremental good mitigates, however imperceptibly, the darkness of self-interest.

Source: Melodie Monahan, Critical Essay on Middlemarch, in Novels for Students, Thomson Gale, 2006.

Sources

Colvin, Sidney, Review of Middlemarch, in Middlemarch, Norton Critical Edition, Norton, 2000, pp. 575-78; originally published in Fortnightly Review, January 19, 1873, pp. 142-47.

Eliot, George, Journals, in Middlemarch, Norton Critical Edition, Norton, 2000, p. 535; originally published in George Eliot's Life as Related in Her Letters and Journals, Vol. 3, edited by J. W. Cross, Blackwood, 1885, pp. 191-92.

―――――――, Letter to Charles Bray, dated July 5, 1859, in Middlemarch, Norton Critical Edition, Norton, 2000, p. 526; originally published in The George Eliot Letters, Vol. 3., edited by Gordon S. Haight, Yale University Press, 1954–1955, pp. 110-11.

―――――――, Middlemarch, Norton Critical Edition, Norton, 2000.

James, Henry, "George Eliot's Middlemarch," in Middlemarch, Norton Critical Edition, Norton, 2000, pp. 578-81; originally published in Galaxy, March 1873, pp. 424-28.

Review of Middlemarch, in Middlemarch, Norton Critical Edition, Norton, 2000, pp. 573-75; originally published in Saturday Review, December 7, 1872, pp. 733-34.

Review of the Norton Critical Edition of Middlemarch, in Contemporary Review, Vol. 277, No. 1617, October 2000, p. 255.

Further Reading

Beer, Gillian, Darwin's Plots: Evolutionary Narrative in Darwin, George Eliot, and Nineteenth-Century Fiction, Cambridge University Press, 2000.

This synthesis of nineteenth-century intellectual thought and art traces the effects of Darwin's evolutionary narrative on diverse texts, both fictional and scientific. Chapter 5 is specifically on Middlemarch.

Cox, Gary W., Randall Calvert, and Thrainn Eggertsson, The Efficient Secret: The Cabinet and the Development of Political Parties in Victorian England, Cambridge University Press, 2005.

This analysis of institutional changes in parliamentary government in nineteenth-century England concentrates on the period between the first and third Reform Acts. It is an overview of the political and historical context in which these changes occurred.

Holcombe, Lee, Wives and Property: Reform of the Married Women's Property Law in Nineteenth-Century England, University of Toronto Press, 1982.

This important history of English common law focuses on the evolution of nineteenth-century women's legal rights over their own property.

Shaw, Harry, Narrating Reality, Cornell University Press, 2005.

This book examines works by George Eliot and others, providing a close analysis of the role of the narrator in realist fiction.