George Eliot

Middlemarch George Eliot

Classics for Your Collection: goo.gl/U80LCr Middlemarch Middlemarch centres on the lives of the residents of Middlemarch, a fictitious Midlands town, from 1829 onwards - the years preceding the 1832 Reform Act. The narrative is variably considered to consist of three or four plots of unequal emphasis: the life of Dorothea Brooke; the career of Tertius Lydgate; the courtship of Mary Garth by Fred Vincy; and the disgrace of Nicholas Bulstrode. The two main plots are those of Dorothea and Lydgate. Each plot happens concurrently, although Bulstrode's is centred in the later chapters. ------- Middlemarch is a novel by the English author George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans), first published in eight instalments (volumes) in 1871-1872. The novel is set in the fictitious Midlands town of Middlemarch during 1829-1832, and follows several distinct, intersecting stories with a large cast of characters. Issues include the status of women, the nature of marriage, idealism, self-interest, religion, hypocrisy, political reform, and education. Despite comic elements, "Middlemarch" is a work of realism encompassing historical events: the 1832 Reform Act, the beginnings of the railways, and the death of King George IV and succession of his brother, the Duke of Clarence (King William IV). It incorporates contemporary medicine and examines the reactionary views of a settled community facing unwelcome change. Eliot began writing the two pieces that would form Middlemarch in the years 1869-1870 and completed the novel in 1871.