Book Review: ‘Middlemarch’

British 19th-century masterpiece of penetrating insights

Dorothea Brooke and Will Ladislaw from "Middlemarch" by George Eliot. Will, a headstrong idealist, is in love with Dorothea, one of the novel’s main characters, but he keeps his feelings secret. This illustration is from the book, which was published by The Jenson Society, 1910. Public Domain

I recently met up with one of my literary friends. We both like to read and discuss books. At one point, he shared with me that he’d read Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” three times. “I liked it that much,” he said.

Tolstoy’s novel was published in 1869 and came in at more than 900 pages. George Eliot’s novel was published in 1872 in four volumes, and depending on which version you’re looking at, also came in at more than 900 pages. My friend and I are fairly prolific readers. Most novels these days come in at an average of 350–400 pages. Tackling more than that takes a die-hard reader. But I suspect that many of you would be up to the challenge.

Nom de Plume

As you probably know from your high school days reading “Silas Marner,” George Eliot is a pen name for Mary Ann Evans. This author was a maverick. She wanted to be taken seriously in the literary world, so she took on a man’s name. Many of her contemporaries were writing fluffier, fairytale romance pieces, and she didn’t want to be pigeonholed with them.