1. Reading and Writing Skills for
Students of Literature in English: The
Victorian Period
Enric Monforte
Jacqueline Hurtley
Bill Phillips
2. George Eliot
(Mary Ann, or
Marian Evans)
1819-1880
http://z.about.com/d/womenshistory/1/0/J/1/geo
rge_eliot_2_400w.jpg
3. Mary Ann Evans
was born in Astley
near Coventry. Her
father, Robert
Evans, was the
Warwickshire
estate agent at
Arbory Park for the
Earl of Lonsdale
http://i35.tinypic.com/2wnr1jc.jpg
4. Mary Anne Evans’s
birthplace, South Farm
Griff House, her
childhood home
http://www.picturesofcove
ntry.co.uk/jpgl/c00014.jpg
http://thesecondpass.com/uploads/george_eliots_bir
thplace_-_south_farm_-_arbury_project_-
_gutenberg_etext_19222.jpg
http://www.warwicks
hire.gov.uk/Web/gra
phics/graphics.nsf/gr
aphics/Eliot+Child+h
ome-medium/
$file/Eliotchildhome
_medium.jpg
5. She briefly became an Evangelical, favouring Jean
Calvin's Doctrine of the Elect.
John Calvin
1509-1564
http://cruciality.files.wordpress.com/2008/
12/john-calvin-portrait-by-titian1.jpg
6. 1836 her mother died
1841 she and her father moved to Coventry where she
met a group of free thinkers leading her to become
strongly anti-religious. She briefly refused to attend
Anglican Church. She kept house for her father until his
death in 1849.
A school in
1850s
Coventry
http://search.visitbritain.com/media/images/0/b/0b96e6c3-4f96-45a9-
a893-29dcf3260fee/0b96e6c3-4f96-45a9-a893-29dcf3260fee.jpg
7. Wednesday the 30th May, 1849, the day her
father died, Mary Anne wrote in her diary.
"Where shall I be
without my Father? It
will seem as if a part
of my moral nature
were gone. I had a
horrid vision of myself
last night becoming
earthly sensual and
devilish for want of
that purifying
restraining influence." http://literaturecompass.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/466px-
george_eliot_2.jpg
8. 1849 Her father leaves her an annuity
of £100.
1850 she travels in Europe.
1851 becomes assistant edior of the
prestigious Westminster Review.
1852-4 lives at 142, The Strand,
London
1854 translates Feuerbach's Essence
of Christianity. Sets up home with
George Lewes, one of the editors
Westminster Review
1857 Scenes of Clerical Life
9. Novels
1859 Adam Bede
1860 The Mill on the Floss
1861 Silas Marner
1863 Romola
1866 Felix Holt, the Radical
1871-2 Middlemarch
1874-6 Daniel Deronda
http://www.lang.nagoya-
u.ac.jp/~matsuoka/GIF-
Eliot-1.gif
10. 1878 Lewes dies
1880 Marries John Walter Cross,
dies, and buried next to Lewes in
Highgate Cemetery
George
Henry
Lewes
1817-1878
http://gerald-
massey.org.uk/holyoake/images/george_
henry_lewes_2.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commo
ns/5/53/Eliot_George_grave.jpg
11. “She had a low forehead, a dull grey eye, a vast
pendulous nose, a huge mouth full of uneven teeth and
a chin and jawbone qui n'en finissent pas... Now in this
vast ugliness resides a most powerful beauty which, in a
very few minutes steals
forth and charms the mind,
so that you end, as I
ended, in falling in love with
her. Yes behold me in love
with this great horse-faced
bluestocking.”
Henry James
http://mural.
uv.es/ankay
/georgeeliot
.jpg
13. “In the days when the spinning-wheels hummed
busily in the farmhouses--and even great ladies,
clothed in silk and thread-lace, had their toy
spinning-wheels of polished oak--there might be
seen in districts far away among the lanes, or
deep in the bosom of the hills, certain pallid
undersized men, who, by the side of the brawny
country-folk, looked like the remnants of a
disinherited race.” SM Ch. 1
Who are these men and
what is their connection to
the ladies’ spinning
wheels? Weavers
http://www.grasslandtrader.org/1spinw1.jp
14. When is Silas Marner set?
When were “the days when the spinning-wheels
hummed busily in the farmhouses”? In what
year, more or less, does it begin?
1790-1821
1800
16. “In this way it came to pass that those scattered
linen-weavers--emigrants from the town into the
country--were to the last regarded as aliens by their
rustic neighbours, and usually contracted the
eccentric habits which belong to a state of
loneliness.” SM Ch.1
Why were there emigrants from the town
into the country?
Machines had replaced the weavers in the
industrial towns.
17. “You Gentlemen are Agreed to Beat down the
Price of the Weavers. Work is already so Low
They Cannot get A livelyhood like Almost any
Other Trade...Youre Lives As Well as Our are
Not Insured One Moment...Prepare your selves
for A Good Bonfire at Both Ends At Each Your
Dwellings...I May as well Dey [die] with a
Houlter [halter] As Be Starved to Death”
Letter from weavers to their employers in
Newbury, 1787
Hibbert, Christopher. The English; a Social History 1066-1945.
London: Collins, 1987. p.478
18. The Combination Acts of 1799 and 1800 ...
Made illegal the association of two or more
people for the purpose of obtaining wage
increases or improving working conditions.
Offenders against the Acts could be sentenced
to three months’ imprisonment...”
Hibbert 480
19. “...it was nothing but right a man should be looked
on and helped by those who could afford it, when
he had brought up an orphan child, and been father
and mother to her--and had lost his money too, so
as he had nothing but what he worked for week by
week, and when the weaving was going down too--
for there was less and less flax spun--and Master
Marner was none so young.” SM Ch. 16.
The countryside where Silas lives seems
unaffected by industrialisation until he is older:
“‘Fifty-five, as near as I can say, sir,’ said Silas.”
SM Ch. 19.
20. In 1785 Edmund Cartwright patented the first
power loom. in 1801, Glaswegian John
Monteith built a weaving shed for 400 looms.
Edmund Cartwright
1743 - 1823
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story/chapters/IR/images/10
1107002.jpg
21. James Findlay's weaving mill in Catrine, Ayrshire,
began operating in 1805 and more opened in
Manchester, Stockport and Westhoughton in 1806.
By 1818, there were 14 weaving mills in the
Manchester region containing 2000 looms. Three
years later, the total was 32 mills with 5,732 looms,
a figure that had passed 10,000 by 1823.
http://www.lva.virginia.gov/public/archivesmonth/2005/VHS/img/V
HS_6.jpg
23. “…the rude mind with difficulty associates the ideas
of power and benignity. A shadowy conception of
power that by much persuasion can be induced to
refrain from inflicting harm, is the shape most easily
taken by the sense of the Invisible in the minds of
men who have always been pressed close by
primitive wants, and to whom a life of hard toil has
never been illuminated by any enthusiastic religious
faith. To them pain and mishap present a far wider
range of possibilities than gladness and
enjoyment...” SM Ch. 1.
The religion of the country people
24. “His life, before he came to Raveloe, had been
filled with the movement, the mental activity, and
the close fellowship, which, in that day as in this,
marked the life of an artisan early incorporated in
a narrow religious sect, where the poorest layman
has the chance of distinguishing himself by gifts of
speech, and has, at the very least, the weight of a
silent voter in the government of his community.”
SM Ch. 1
25. “One of the most frequent topics of conversation
between the two friends was Assurance of salvation:
Silas confessed that he could never arrive at
anything higher than hope mingled with fear, and
listened with longing wonder when William declared
that he had possessed unshaken assurance ever
since, in the period of his conversion, he had
dreamed that he saw the words "calling and election
sure" standing by themselves on a white page in the
open Bible.” SM Ch. 1
Predestination
John Calvin
1509-1564
http://samuelatgilgal.files.wordpre
ss.com/2008/10/john-calvin.jpg
26. “To adopt a child, because children of your own had
been denied you, was to try and choose your lot in
spite of Providence: the adopted child, she was
convinced, would never turn out well, and would be
a curse to those who had wilfully and rebelliously
sought what it was clear that, for some high reason,
they were better without. When you saw a thing
was not meant to be, said Nancy, it was a bounden
duty to leave off so much as wishing for it.”
“…it's the will of Providence.” SM Ch.17
The Church of England also subscribes, in theory,
to the doctrine of predestination.
27. from Article 17 of the 39 Articles of
Religion of the Church of England:
Of Predestination and Election.
“Predestination to Life is the everlasting purpose
of God, whereby (before the foundations of the
world were laid) he hath constantly decreed by his
counsel secret to us, to deliver from curse and
damnation those whom he hath chosen in Christ
out of mankind, and to bring them by Christ to
everlasting salvation, as vessels made to
honour.”
28. Non-conformists
Non-conformists did not accept the
organisational structure of the established
Church of England, believing that all Christians
are equal, and replacing priests by ministers.
29. John Wesley 1703-91
Methodism was
started by John and
Charles Wesley and
George Whitefield as
a movement within
the Church of England
in the 18th century.
Non-conformist sects
Many sects sprang up in
the 17th century:
Adamites, Baptists,
Barrowists, Behmenists,
Brownists, Familists, Fifth
Monarchy Men, Free-will
Men, Gindletonians,
Muggletonians, Quakers,
Ranters, Sabbatarians,
Seekers
http://www.stmarksum
cva.org/images/johnw
esley.jpg
30. He was puzzled and anxious, for Dolly's word
"christened" conveyed no distinct meaning to him. He
had only heard of baptism, and had only seen the
baptism of grown-up men and women. SM Ch. 14
How is Raveloe religion compared to that of
Lantern Yard?
Lantern Yard is more intolerant
http://www.woodburybaptist.org/im
ages/sikakaneBaptism.jpg
http://www.stlawrencelechlade
.org.uk/images/baptism.jpg
31. "O father, I'm like as if I was stifled," said Eppie. "I
couldn't ha' thought as any folks lived i' this way, so
close together. How pretty the Stone-pits 'ull look when
we get back!"
"It looks comical to me, child, now--and smells bad. I
can't think as it usened to smell so."
Here and there a sallow, begrimed face looked out from
a gloomy doorway at the strangers, and increased
Eppie's uneasiness, so that it was a longed-for relief
when they issued from the alleys into Shoe Lane, where
there was a broader strip of sky. SM Ch.21
Is there any significance in this description of Silas’s
old home?
Lantern Yard is unhealthy and corrupt
32. George Eliot’s beliefs
“Behind Silas Marner is her own translation, in 1854
as Marian Evans, of Ludwig Feuerbach’s Essence
of Christianity (1841). This book was a vital
contribution to the century’s ever-increasing
humanization of religion as something naturally
present in human life without formal dogmas. It was
also part of the process that converted Marian
Evans, Evangelical turned non-believer, into George
Eliot, realist novelist, instead.”
Davis, Philip. The Oxford English Literary History. Vol. 8 The Victorians.
Oxford: OUP, 2002. p.147
33. Silas Marner as fairy tale
“the mythic substitution of
child for gold in a healing
inversion of the Midas myth
(where Midas unwittingly turns
his little daughter into a gold
statue) … The figure of Silas,
bent and isolated, has
overtones of Rumplestiltskin,
another male weaver with a
penchant for babies.”
Beer, Gillian George Eliot Brighton: The
Harvester Press, 1986. p.126.
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_MIruAtQ5
abU/SPViCLOB-
sI/AAAAAAAAAX4/22erghIht28/s40
0/rumplestiltskin.jpg
34. The Napoleonic
Wars and the
Economy
Bonaparte 1769 - 1821
http://gingerbitters.files.wordpre
ss.com/2008/12/napoleon.jpg
35. “It was still that glorious war-time which was
felt to be a peculiar favour of Providence
towards the landed interest, and the fall of
prices had not yet come to carry the race of
small squires and yeomen down that road to
ruin for which extravagant habits and bad
husbandry were plentifully anointing their
wheels.” SM Ch. 3
Why is “war-time” referred to as “glorious”?
Landowners did well out of the war
36. “And that fool Kimble says the newspaper's talking
about peace. Why, the country wouldn't have a leg
to stand on. Prices 'ud run down like a jack, and I
should never get my arrears, not if I sold all the
fellows up.” SM Ch. 9
Why is Squire Cass worried about peace?
He will lose money
37. The Corn Laws which the farming industry
imposed on the country in 1815 were not
designed to save a tottering sector of the
economy, but rather to preserve the abnormally
high profits of the Napoleonic war-years, and to
safeguard farmers from the consequences of
their wartime euphoria, when farms had
changed hands at the fanciest prices, loans and
mortgages had been accepted on impossible
terms.
Eric Hobsbawm, Industry and Empire: The Birth of the Industrial
Revolution New York: The New Press, 1999, p. 175.
The Corn Laws
38. The Corn Laws stated that no foreign corn
could be imported into Britain until domestic
corn cost 80/- per quarter. The high price
caused the cost of food to increase and
consequently depressed the domestic market
for manufactured goods because people
spent the bulk of their earnings on food rather
than commodities. The Corn Laws also
caused great distress among the working
classes in the towns.
Most voters and Members of Parliament were
landowners who benefited from the laws.
39. “The old gentleman had been talking with Godfrey
about the increasing poor-rate and the ruinous times,
and had not heard the dialogue between his
daughters.” SM Ch. 17
“...by 1812 the annual expenditure on poor rates
had grown from about 2 million pounds in 1780
to 8 million.” Hibbert 481
The cost of poor relief had increased by 75.5%
during the French Wars
1802-3, £5.3 million
1813, £8.6 million
1817-18, £9.3 million
40. “His first intention was to
hire a horse there and ride
home forthwith, for to walk
many miles without a gun
in his hand, and along an
ordinary road, was as
much out of the question
to him as to other spirited
young men of his kind.”
SM Ch. 4
Why won’t Dunstan walk along a road without a gun?
People and Class
Gentleman don’t walk except, perhaps, when
they’re out shooting (hunting).
Ben Marshall -
Gentleman on Bay
Hunter 1806
http://www.encore-
editions.com/dogs/dog2/dandh2/thm_thm_b
enmarshallgentlemanonbayhunter1806.jpg
41. “…the glazier's wife, a well-intentioned woman,
not given to lying, and whose house was
among the cleanest in the village, was ready to
declare, as sure as ever she meant to take the
sacrament the very next Christmas that was
ever coming, that she had seen big ear-rings,
in the shape of the young moon, in the pedlar's
two ears...” SM Ch. 8
Is George Eliot being sarcastic
here?
Probably. She is suggesting that a woman who keeps
her house clean could not possibly lie.
http://www.ladyhawkstreasures.co
m/CelticCrescentMoonEarrings.jpg
42. “I've no opinion o' the men, Miss Gunn--I don't know
what you have. And as for fretting and stewing
about what they'll think of you from morning till night,
and making your life uneasy about what they're
doing when they're out o' your sight—as I tell Nancy,
it's a folly no woman need be guilty of, if she's got a
good father and a good home: let her leave it to them
as have got no fortin, and can't help themselves. As
I say, Mr. Have-your-own-way is the best husband,
and the only one I'd ever promise to obey.” SM Ch.
11
Is Priscilla Lammeter’s view of men typical?
Maybe. A woman needs a men like a fish needs a
bicycle.
43. “…she would go in her dingy rags,
with her faded face, once as
handsome as the best, with her little
child that had its father's hair and
eyes, and disclose herself to the
Squire as his eldest son's wife. It is
seldom that the miserable can help
regarding their misery as a wrong
inflicted by those who are less
miserable. Molly knew that the cause
of her dingy rags was not her
husband's neglect, but the demon
Opium to whom she was
enslaved,body and soul…” SM Ch. 12
Is George Eliot sympathetic towards Molly Cass? No
A Bar at the
Folies Bergere,
1881-82 by
Edouard Manet
http://jerryandmartha.co
m/yourdailyart/images/
manet2.jpg
45. “As for the child, he would see that it was cared for:
he would never forsake it; he would do everything but
own it. Perhaps it would be just as happy in life
without being owned by its father, seeing that nobody
could tell how things would turn out, and that--is there
any other reason wanted?--well, then, that the father
would be much happier without owning the child.” SM
Ch. 13
What kind of father is Godfrey Cass? How are
other fathers portrayed in Silas Marner?
“And that other child--not on the hearth--he would not
forget it; he would see that it was well provided for.
That was a father's duty.” SM Ch. 15
47. “Godfrey was silent. He was not likely to be very
penetrating in his judgments, but he had always had
a sense that his father's indulgence had not been
kindness, and had had a vague longing for some
discipline that would have checked his own errant
weakness and helped his better will.” SM Ch.9
48. Godfrey and Molly Eppie
Dolly and Ben Winthrop Aaron
Mr Lammeter Priscilla and
Nancy
Silas Eppie
Parents and Children in Silas Marner
Parents Child
Squire Cass Godfrey
Dunstan
50. "Why, that's the draining they've begun on, since
harvest, i' Mr. Osgood's fields, I reckon. The
foreman said to me the other day, when I passed
by 'em, "Master Marner," he said, "I shouldn't
wonder if we lay your bit o' waste as dry as a
bone." It was Mr. Godfrey Cass, he said, had
gone into the draining: he'd been taking these
fields o' Mr. Osgood.“ SM Ch. 16
What is the result of the drainage?
Duncan’s body is discovered with the gold
51. “The tankards are on the side-table still, but the
bossed silver is undimmed by handling, and there
are no dregs to send forth unpleasant
suggestions: the only prevailing scent is of the
lavender and rose-leaves that fill the vases of
Derbyshire spar.” SM Ch.17
How has the Red House
changed since Squire
Cass died?
It has been gentrified,
a process lamented by
many writers, such as
William Cobbett.
http://www.alpacasilverstorebl
og.com/wp-
content/uploads/2008/06/pew
ter-tankard.jpg
http://www.christies.com/lotf
inderimages/d51934/d5193
447l.jpg
Silver
tankard Pewter tankard
