I like the slow burn. It gives you some of the feeling of the pace of life, as well as the importance of small, everyday incidents in people's lives. Big things are shifting and moving, but they aren't fully revealed on the surface yet.
I loved the quote you highlighted about religion - my annotation is "what a great question."
My favorite lines come from Mrs. Cadwallader: In observing the funeral and hearing her snide remarks about the attendees/legacy hopefuls, Mr. Brooke reminds Mrs. C that funerals are solemn things, and she replies, "I can't wear my solemnity too often, else it will go to rags."
I loved the leeches comment Tori mentioned as well. Mrs. C is direct and no-nonsense and her comments are a perfect foil to Mr. Brooke's vague half-remarks.
In tracking several ideas triggered by these chapters, one is tugging at me most forcefully. In those chapters that seem to drag with all the political, religious, and even medical conversations, there is a constant undercurrent of imminent change and reform.
This quote clarifies this situation for me:
“The country gentry of old time lived in a rarefied social air: dotted apart on their stations up the mountain they looked down with imperfect discrimination on the belts of thicker life below. And Dorothea was not at ease in the perspective and chilliness of that height.”
Dorothea was introduced to us designing houses for tenants, impatient with her uncle’s way of “letting things be” on his estate, making "her long all the more for the time when she would be of age and have some command of money for generous schemes.”
In this section, Mr. Brooke becomes not quite so benign a character. It might have been seen as eccentricity when he was described in the first chapter where "it was only safe to say that he would act with benevolent intentions and that he would spend as little money as possible in carrying them out." But it is now clear that he is one of those gentlemen living in "rarified social status". He intends to run for political office espousing liberal policies, for example his opposition to hanging. Others call out his hypocrisy because he spends as little as possible on the well being of his tenant farmers. At the end of chapter 39, Brooke's confrontation with the farmer Dagley takes him by surprise. "He had never been insulted on his own land before, and had been inclined to regard himself as a general favorite." Farmer Dagley demands to be seen. He calls to mind the characters from Yonnondio whose work is unseen and unacknowledged by those who benefit. I wonder if Eliot is going to lean into commentary on the social structure that makes possible the lives of the characters of that upper strata that we've been following. The Garths seem to straddle both worlds. I already like this family and this makes me want even more of their story. I'm also uneasy for them. Mr. Garth's emphasis on doing work well rather than getting paid for it leaves the family balanced on a precipice.
And on a personal note, because I am traveling I've found this part of the story very convicting. I see the ways that the ability to travel for pleasure puts me in "rarified social air" and want to actively try to see and acknowledge the workers who make me comfortable while doing so. Haley, your selection of readings to share with us this year is taking me on quite a reflective journey.
Great observations, Maryann. And as to your own privileged travels, isn't it remarkable that a woman writing so long ago influences your perspective now?
Maryann, I’m very interested in what will become of the Garth family. My concern is partly driven by how Eliot presents Mr. Garth’s worldview through his reverence for “business.” As a businessman, his “virtual divinities were good practical schemes, accurate work, and the faithful completion of undertakings.” As we know, he underprices his passion.
The other reason for my concern is his competition in the economic world of Middlemarch. Eliot contrasts Mr. Garth with other economic actors: Bulstrode in banking, or “speckilation” as Featherstone describes it. Bulstrode has shown he will use leverage for his interests; what if the goals of Garth and Bulstrode collide? Featherstone is another type of economic actor, the property owner who, as Featherstone showed, is greedy for real estate, a limited resource, to drive demand and increase value. A third actor is the country gentry, such as Brooke and Chettam; think of them as private equity firms. Through Eliot’s descriptions of Brooke’s landscape art, she externalizes the internal power structure of Middlemarch, with the landed gentry at the apex.
How will the Garth family fare in rightfully pursuing their role as a player in Middlemarch’s economic society?
I'm still struck by the misperceptions the main characters seem to have about their passion (person or work). Just two examples:
Mr. Lydgate has such an idea of Rosamond as the perfect woman who was "instructed to the true womanly limit and not a hair's breadth beyond "and will be "docile and ready to carry out behests which came from beyond that limit." He feels she will admire and venerate him, create order in their home, and play lovely music to ease his stress.
This section also highlights Mr. Brooke's belief that he will make a successful run for political office and cannot see that his shortcomings as a landlord do not support his candidacy on a reform ticket.
I'm wondering if that's why this novel endures as a classic - isn't the big challenge of life to see ourselves and those close to us as we are, not as we wish? The one main character who appears to be gaining in self-awareness is Dorothea - she really seems to be softening in her view of herself and others, while still holding on to her hope for a more just society.
I think Will is also gaining in self awareness. I think you can make a case that his encounter with Dorothea stimulated him to get off his butt and find his own path, supporting himself and trying to make the world better.
I think this is a great point about *Middlemarch*, Chris: "isn't the big challenge of life to see ourselves and those close to us as we are, not as we wish?" Yes! I do think one of the virtues of this very oddball Victorian novel (by a bohemian female author using a male pseudonym) is that it presents both sides — or more than one side — of different characters as observed by themselves and by others.
Many of these characters seem deluded about who they are, often in comical ways. Others are very clear about their position in society, and the women especially can be quite cynical and tart-tongued: Mary Garth and Mrs. Cadwallader. I like the cynical ones, for sure, but Dorothea's progress in becoming more self-aware about her own dissonant feelings, including the mistakes she's made and will likely make again, compels me as a reader. She is a protagonist in Eliot's petri dish, and at this point, it's not quite clear how much she'll change and evolve. For me, that's a narrative hook.
This book might just be perfect for me timing wise because I like every section more and more. I kept wondering how prevalent this kind of will reading was at this time. Clearly the stakes are high depending on the economic class of those involved but thematically again, Eliot really nails it with all the dynamics of the players. The building of the resentments and everyone justifying for themselves why they deserve the money was the stuff of any funeral you have to attend for someone deeply unliked. The single weirdo gambler uncle/cousin who got the gold cane and then wandered into the ether was delightfully absurd.
I had a few favorite lines from this week:
pg 327, Mrs Bulstrode says, "She believed that her husband was one of those men whose memoir should be written when they died" which I took to be funny. Better to write the narrative of his memories and life after he's long gone and the narrative can be handled by someone who isn't him.
pg 338, Mr Brooke saying that Ladislaw is like Shelley but "I don't mean as to anything objectionable - laxatives or atheism, or anything of that kind..."
and then pg 369, I ended up on Haley's wavelength because my favorite line was Will's response to Dorothea's question about religion in which he says his belief system is "To love what is good and beautiful when I see it". From a purely personal standpoint for me this line spoke to me in such a way, and I intend to use it from now on.
I liked all these quotes, too, and I agree that the social nuances do matter in this section. Parts of it were a slog to read for me, but I also think those sections would have felt very different to Eliot's main audience in the late 1800s. One of the reasons I like returning to big fat Victorian novels on occasion (or even works by E.M. Forster or modernists like Woolf) is that they force me to change my 21st-century reading pace. It's like building muscle these days, reading more slowly and closely, as Haley invites us to do.
Even sections on "Reform" that require footnotes for contemporary readers to figure out: e.g., the tenant who argues angrily and drunkenly with careless Mr. Brooke conveys a lot about social and economic context. There are many times when I'm reading current literary novels or thrillers that I long for the same nuances. I find that many younger students, brought up on digital screen reading, tend to think too much about individual behavior or circumstances rather than the larger social context. All of us online have been trained to do so by these platforms, but I like to break free sometimes :-)
I was taken with (and disappointed by) Mr. Brooke’s poor treatment of his tenants. I wonder how he escaped Dorothea’s interventions? And as much as Casauban grumps around, he does better by his tenants. I’m a little suspicious of Will…his interest is stronger than seems socially acceptable and I worry for poor naive Dodo. I found this section to be better than the beginning chapters and I’m looking forward to next week’s reading!
Dorothea is in her blue and green room reflecting on the decorations there:
"Even the pale stag seemed to have reminding glances and to mean mutely, ‘Yes, we know.’ And the group of delicately-touched miniatures had made an audience as of beings no longer disturbed about their own earthly lot, but still humanly interested."
I found this incredibly sad, but also comforting that she has some sense of company. I have had many lonely days in my life.
This quote is from when Dorothea and Will are talking about religion. I think I read somewhere that Dorothea was not originally part of the book. She is a definite favorite of mine.
" ‘Please not to call it by any name,’ said Dorothea, putting out her hands entreatingly. ‘You will say it is Persian, or something else geographical. It is my life. I have found it out, and cannot part with it. I have always been finding out my religion since I was a little girl."
I am so struck by how she knows what is precious to her and stands up for it. I feel it inside my soul when she asks Will not to label something that is uniquely hers... "It is my life."
What I Have Learned About Myself:
1. I love shorter chapters. These are right on the border of being longer for me. I can read anything even if it is dull to me, so long as I know there are other topics ahead.
2. Reading a limited amount of certain books each day is magical for me. It helps me stay excited and interested. I can handle 1 chapter at a time that maybe is dull or the language is dense for me. I have more excitement about reading Middlemarch than any of my other reading right now because of the 1 chapter a day limitation!
Yes, this quote from Dorothea is one of my very favorites so far: "It is my life. I have found it out, and cannot part with it. I have always been finding out my religion since I was a little girl." Also much of the exchange with Will that follows. We see her beginning to become herself, to acknowledge her uncertainties, and I like that Eliot provides a more leisurely pace for these key insights.
I started tracking misunderstandings because there were so many per page! Not just Lydgate & Rosamund but Chettam thinking Casaubon didn’t try to interfere in Ladislaw’s employment, Dorothea & Casaubon to the end of their days…
I’ve been tracking hypocrisy throughout the book and these pages were rife with it. The way it calls him out for being a bad landlord who doesn’t live the reformist principles he’s running on!
1. There's a lot going on beneath the surface with Casaubon, none of it good. We learned before (from Will) that Casaubon's scholarship isn't very good. In this part we learn that Casaubon realizes this at some semiconscious level. That's why he publishes almost nothing, that's why he won't hire a secretary: he's afraid of being found out. And that's one reason he dislikes Will - Will is young, energetic, and brilliant, and even though he's very careful when he speaks to Casaubon, Casaubon surely suspects that Will doesn't have a high opinion of his work. But now things are taking a turn for the worse. Will has made himself financially independent so Casaubon no longer has that hold on him, which makes him more of a threat. Will has decided to stay in the area so Casaubon can't put him out of his mind. And, of course, Will's friendship with Dorothea threatens Casaubon both intellectually and personally. The man is a boiling pot full of resentment and jealousy.
2. There are interesting parallels between Will and Lydgate. They are both young men in a hurry. Lydgate wants to reform medicine, Will wants to reform society. They are both trying to achieve their goals by allying themselves with somewhat questionable establishment figures - Lydgate with Bulstrode, Will with Brooke. But their core personalities are very different.
3. Peter Featherstone has devoted the years of his life to developing an elaborate scheme for humiliating his own family *after his own death*. First with the funeral arrangements, then with the two wills - first giving the family something (though far less than the recipients expected) then taking it away. (I'm assuming here that this is why Featherstone kept both wills, instead of destroying the first one, just to twist the knife in that much further. An alternative explanation is that he kept them both so that he could change his mind if he felt so inclined, which is in fact what he did but too late.) Just think how much sheer malice was in that man. Even if you think that most of the family members deserved a little comeuppance, he could at least have given a hundred pounds or so to the Garths, who after all were also related to him.
Casaubon is being eaten alive by self-doubt and jealousy. I have to admit that most of the time when he appears I can't help but picture him as Rumpelstiltskin. It doesn't hurt the comparison to think that he has entrapped a beautiful woman with an untenable contract.
And your parallels between Lydgate and Ladislaw are interesting. I've thought of them both as wildcards in Middlemarch society, but not about how similar their paths have become.
I like the Rumpelstiltskin comparison very much - I’ve found out of all the characters, that I have a really defined image of Casaubon in my mind - and it’s not a pretty sight!!
1. <3 the offhand reference to Lydgate falling into love-making in spite of "medicine and biology... the inspection of macerated muscle or of eyes presented in a dish (like Santa Lucia's)" - Saint Lucy was known for plucking out her own eyes so as not to be tempted by the physical attractions of her fiancé! (well, according to the footnote in my book, but other sources say it was to discourage a suitor who liked her eyes)
2. Casaubon - He's absolutely emotionally abusive to Dorothea, but our narrator manages to explain the insecurity and shame and pride underneath enough to make me feel compassion for him too
3. Mary/Fred - the interesting bit here is her flirting with guilt over refusing to burn the will and how drastically her choice affected Fred's fortunes in life
4. Reform - it's Brooke's hypocrisy that gets me. But I also disagree with Dorothea saying "we have no right to come forward and urge wider changes for good, until we have tried to alter the evils which lie under our own hands." Yes of course, Brooke should not only politically push for good but also in his own life do better by others! But also, we can't let failure to do good in one way stop us from trying to do good in another. Let not the perfect be the enemy of the good.
5. Dorothea saying "Oh, my life is very simple... I am always at Lowick" was totally depressing and also got Simon & Garfunkel's "Slip-Sliding Away" stuck in my head
6. One phrase confused me - what is a "winter-worn husband"?
7. I also loved Dorothea's line, "What is your religion... the belief that helps you most?" Now I want to go through each of the major characters here and try to define what we know so far about what their religion may be!
Dorothea - "desiring what is perfectly good"
Ladislaw - "To love what is good and beautiful when I see it"
but what about Lydgate? Rosamond? Brooke? Casaubon? the rest? perhaps-
Lydgate - pursuit of truth and progress above all else, and beauty in service to that end?
Rosamond and Fred are maybe the same - enjoy the little things, the rest will sort itself out just fine?
Brooke - sort of a cross between Dorothea and Fred?
Casaubon - youch, I don't think anything much is serving him, he's so sad. His big belief seems to be that even if he's gone down the wrong path, he must follow where it leads him and can't change course. But is your religion your big belief, your belief that you think helps you, or your belief that actually helps you?
I agree with your point about not letting failure in one endeavor prevent an attempt to do good elsewhere. Relatedly, Brooke’s political opponents seem to be planning a “what-about” strategy using those failures. Your perspective accepts human failings as part of who we are, but not all of what we are. Maddeningly, the world of politics still uses that to justify a winner-take-all world.
Your point about Casaubon is what makes him so interesting. It's very hard to convey pity or sympathy for a character like that, and I do think Eliot intended readers to feel both sympathy for his failed efforts and outrage at his treatment of Dorothea. He is not just an unpleasant "type," in the Dickens mold, and this complicated, unsuccessful, abusive marriage is part of what's always made *Middlemarch* so interesting to me.
I also highlighted the quote you shared about Dorthea's question about religion. And I loved the line just before where Dorthea says she's been working out her religion since she was a child. I think anyone who has been raised with one set of beliefs and has found those beliefs changing in adulthood can relate.
One scene that stood out for me occurred just before the confrontation between Dagley and Brooke. Eliot combines her painterly eye with what I think of as a documentarist’s lens. This occurs after the narrator has characterized the color scheme of the landscape portrait of Freemen’s End homestead as “a perfect study of highly-mingled subdued color” (394).
This scene snaps into documentary reality through Mr. Dagley. Initially a “figure in the landscape,” he
becomes a real person representing the context of the world outside the painting, having heard stories about “the new King” and seen “the numerous handbills on the walls.”
Eliot flips the reader’s view of the art as something with self-contained meaning to texture deriving its meaning from the world outside of itself. It represents the power of the landed gentry over the working class, not a scene of idyllic timelessness.
This is one of my favorite passages so far. As the narrator says, an observer can be "under that softening influence of the fine arts which makes other people’s hardships picturesque". I want to keep that in mind for future art viewings.
Hi all, I agree, this was a long and not that exciting part of the book. But hey, nobody says it was going to be easy! I am taking it as a learning process. And I agree, these Casaubon is an insecure man, and even though Eliot tries to defend him so much, she also show us the real Casaubon at the end of chapter 38: "All through his life Mr Casaubon had been trying not to admit even to himself the inward sores of self-doubt and jealousy. And on the most delicate of all personal subjects, the habit of proud suspicious reticence told doubly".
My favourite quote is this: "That by desiring what is perfectly good, even when we don't quite know what it is and can not 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". We can use these lines for ourselves when we are tired of long complex phrases in the book, but we keep with our commitment of reading Middlemarch together to widen the skirts of our intellectual light :-)
I have to admit, I laughed out loud when Celia commented that Dorothea “is fond of melancholy things and ugly people.” I can't tell if this is a fair assessment of Dorothea or not. She counters with her own explanation, "I am fond of knowing something about the people I live among", but this seems like a canned response. On some level, I do think Dorothea fell in love with Casaubon because he is sad and (maybe?) plain in appearance. Dorothea is definitely seeing how her marriage with Casaubon is turning out.
I hope that Dorothea will be able to see her architectural plans for the tenant cottages come to fruition. I think that if she has a purpose outside of Casaubon, she will be able to bear her unhappy marriage a bit easier.
I can't believe that Casaubon bans Will from coming to Lowick! That is some lowdown stuff!
- The gaggle of relatives at the funeral and reading of the will
- The extended description of Mr Vincy and the Vincy family dynamics especially manipulative Rosamond
- All the thinking if I do this then what, I can’t talk to ”x” because “y”, if I say “x” he’ll think “z” - Dorothea does it constantly, Ladislaw and Mr V this week, Fred last week. Showing I think the webbing of their social circles, marriages and families, how each of them think, why and what they finally decide to do and say or not.
- The Reform movement brought down to “this is my life” level. Not as a big picture London-based movement, but this is what it is for me and mine and you’re the worst kind of landlord. The difference between them not the “picturesque” version favored by snooty do-gooders. Freeman’s End indeed. I admire Eliot for bringing in all facets of society, not just writing the easy stories.
Conundrum of week
Who the heck is Joshua Rigg (Featherstone), why is he in the story and why do we know nothing about him? A real example of how people are just appearing in Middlemarch without prior announcement? Like Lydgate did?
I am also amazed at how Eliot keeps the story moving, every chapter revolves the wheel…think you know what’s what with these characters…haha think again. And these chapters added depth to the characters as they sink a little deeper into their lives in Middlemarch, interact with each other, find their places in the place they choose to live in the times they are given. It’s fascinating.
One of the things that really stuck out to me in this section was how Lydgate and Rosamund are both going into their marriage with completely inappropriate expectations. It saddens me, because I think they really love each other (or at least, the idea that each has of the other) but I think there are very bumpy roads ahead for them.
I love Mrs Cadwallader's one-liners. This week it was "I wouldn't talk of phlebotomy, I would empty a pot of leeches upon him."
I also liked this one in chapter 37: "we mortals have our divine moments, when love is satisfied in the completeness of the beloved object."
I'm actually enjoying the slow burn!
I like the slow burn. It gives you some of the feeling of the pace of life, as well as the importance of small, everyday incidents in people's lives. Big things are shifting and moving, but they aren't fully revealed on the surface yet.
Yes, her zingers just keep coming in that chapter.
"If you put him [Brooke] a-horseback on politics, i warn you of the consequences. It was all very well to ride on sticks at home and call them ideas."
I loved the quote you highlighted about religion - my annotation is "what a great question."
My favorite lines come from Mrs. Cadwallader: In observing the funeral and hearing her snide remarks about the attendees/legacy hopefuls, Mr. Brooke reminds Mrs. C that funerals are solemn things, and she replies, "I can't wear my solemnity too often, else it will go to rags."
I loved the leeches comment Tori mentioned as well. Mrs. C is direct and no-nonsense and her comments are a perfect foil to Mr. Brooke's vague half-remarks.
In tracking several ideas triggered by these chapters, one is tugging at me most forcefully. In those chapters that seem to drag with all the political, religious, and even medical conversations, there is a constant undercurrent of imminent change and reform.
This quote clarifies this situation for me:
“The country gentry of old time lived in a rarefied social air: dotted apart on their stations up the mountain they looked down with imperfect discrimination on the belts of thicker life below. And Dorothea was not at ease in the perspective and chilliness of that height.”
Dorothea was introduced to us designing houses for tenants, impatient with her uncle’s way of “letting things be” on his estate, making "her long all the more for the time when she would be of age and have some command of money for generous schemes.”
In this section, Mr. Brooke becomes not quite so benign a character. It might have been seen as eccentricity when he was described in the first chapter where "it was only safe to say that he would act with benevolent intentions and that he would spend as little money as possible in carrying them out." But it is now clear that he is one of those gentlemen living in "rarified social status". He intends to run for political office espousing liberal policies, for example his opposition to hanging. Others call out his hypocrisy because he spends as little as possible on the well being of his tenant farmers. At the end of chapter 39, Brooke's confrontation with the farmer Dagley takes him by surprise. "He had never been insulted on his own land before, and had been inclined to regard himself as a general favorite." Farmer Dagley demands to be seen. He calls to mind the characters from Yonnondio whose work is unseen and unacknowledged by those who benefit. I wonder if Eliot is going to lean into commentary on the social structure that makes possible the lives of the characters of that upper strata that we've been following. The Garths seem to straddle both worlds. I already like this family and this makes me want even more of their story. I'm also uneasy for them. Mr. Garth's emphasis on doing work well rather than getting paid for it leaves the family balanced on a precipice.
And on a personal note, because I am traveling I've found this part of the story very convicting. I see the ways that the ability to travel for pleasure puts me in "rarified social air" and want to actively try to see and acknowledge the workers who make me comfortable while doing so. Haley, your selection of readings to share with us this year is taking me on quite a reflective journey.
Great observations, Maryann. And as to your own privileged travels, isn't it remarkable that a woman writing so long ago influences your perspective now?
Maryann, I’m very interested in what will become of the Garth family. My concern is partly driven by how Eliot presents Mr. Garth’s worldview through his reverence for “business.” As a businessman, his “virtual divinities were good practical schemes, accurate work, and the faithful completion of undertakings.” As we know, he underprices his passion.
The other reason for my concern is his competition in the economic world of Middlemarch. Eliot contrasts Mr. Garth with other economic actors: Bulstrode in banking, or “speckilation” as Featherstone describes it. Bulstrode has shown he will use leverage for his interests; what if the goals of Garth and Bulstrode collide? Featherstone is another type of economic actor, the property owner who, as Featherstone showed, is greedy for real estate, a limited resource, to drive demand and increase value. A third actor is the country gentry, such as Brooke and Chettam; think of them as private equity firms. Through Eliot’s descriptions of Brooke’s landscape art, she externalizes the internal power structure of Middlemarch, with the landed gentry at the apex.
How will the Garth family fare in rightfully pursuing their role as a player in Middlemarch’s economic society?
I'm still struck by the misperceptions the main characters seem to have about their passion (person or work). Just two examples:
Mr. Lydgate has such an idea of Rosamond as the perfect woman who was "instructed to the true womanly limit and not a hair's breadth beyond "and will be "docile and ready to carry out behests which came from beyond that limit." He feels she will admire and venerate him, create order in their home, and play lovely music to ease his stress.
This section also highlights Mr. Brooke's belief that he will make a successful run for political office and cannot see that his shortcomings as a landlord do not support his candidacy on a reform ticket.
I'm wondering if that's why this novel endures as a classic - isn't the big challenge of life to see ourselves and those close to us as we are, not as we wish? The one main character who appears to be gaining in self-awareness is Dorothea - she really seems to be softening in her view of herself and others, while still holding on to her hope for a more just society.
I think Will is also gaining in self awareness. I think you can make a case that his encounter with Dorothea stimulated him to get off his butt and find his own path, supporting himself and trying to make the world better.
I agree — I think the meeting between Dorothea and Will is the most interesting part of this section, and it will have consequences going forward.
I think this is a great point about *Middlemarch*, Chris: "isn't the big challenge of life to see ourselves and those close to us as we are, not as we wish?" Yes! I do think one of the virtues of this very oddball Victorian novel (by a bohemian female author using a male pseudonym) is that it presents both sides — or more than one side — of different characters as observed by themselves and by others.
Many of these characters seem deluded about who they are, often in comical ways. Others are very clear about their position in society, and the women especially can be quite cynical and tart-tongued: Mary Garth and Mrs. Cadwallader. I like the cynical ones, for sure, but Dorothea's progress in becoming more self-aware about her own dissonant feelings, including the mistakes she's made and will likely make again, compels me as a reader. She is a protagonist in Eliot's petri dish, and at this point, it's not quite clear how much she'll change and evolve. For me, that's a narrative hook.
This book might just be perfect for me timing wise because I like every section more and more. I kept wondering how prevalent this kind of will reading was at this time. Clearly the stakes are high depending on the economic class of those involved but thematically again, Eliot really nails it with all the dynamics of the players. The building of the resentments and everyone justifying for themselves why they deserve the money was the stuff of any funeral you have to attend for someone deeply unliked. The single weirdo gambler uncle/cousin who got the gold cane and then wandered into the ether was delightfully absurd.
I had a few favorite lines from this week:
pg 327, Mrs Bulstrode says, "She believed that her husband was one of those men whose memoir should be written when they died" which I took to be funny. Better to write the narrative of his memories and life after he's long gone and the narrative can be handled by someone who isn't him.
pg 338, Mr Brooke saying that Ladislaw is like Shelley but "I don't mean as to anything objectionable - laxatives or atheism, or anything of that kind..."
and then pg 369, I ended up on Haley's wavelength because my favorite line was Will's response to Dorothea's question about religion in which he says his belief system is "To love what is good and beautiful when I see it". From a purely personal standpoint for me this line spoke to me in such a way, and I intend to use it from now on.
I liked all these quotes, too, and I agree that the social nuances do matter in this section. Parts of it were a slog to read for me, but I also think those sections would have felt very different to Eliot's main audience in the late 1800s. One of the reasons I like returning to big fat Victorian novels on occasion (or even works by E.M. Forster or modernists like Woolf) is that they force me to change my 21st-century reading pace. It's like building muscle these days, reading more slowly and closely, as Haley invites us to do.
Even sections on "Reform" that require footnotes for contemporary readers to figure out: e.g., the tenant who argues angrily and drunkenly with careless Mr. Brooke conveys a lot about social and economic context. There are many times when I'm reading current literary novels or thrillers that I long for the same nuances. I find that many younger students, brought up on digital screen reading, tend to think too much about individual behavior or circumstances rather than the larger social context. All of us online have been trained to do so by these platforms, but I like to break free sometimes :-)
I was taken with (and disappointed by) Mr. Brooke’s poor treatment of his tenants. I wonder how he escaped Dorothea’s interventions? And as much as Casauban grumps around, he does better by his tenants. I’m a little suspicious of Will…his interest is stronger than seems socially acceptable and I worry for poor naive Dodo. I found this section to be better than the beginning chapters and I’m looking forward to next week’s reading!
2 Favorite Quotes:
Dorothea is in her blue and green room reflecting on the decorations there:
"Even the pale stag seemed to have reminding glances and to mean mutely, ‘Yes, we know.’ And the group of delicately-touched miniatures had made an audience as of beings no longer disturbed about their own earthly lot, but still humanly interested."
I found this incredibly sad, but also comforting that she has some sense of company. I have had many lonely days in my life.
This quote is from when Dorothea and Will are talking about religion. I think I read somewhere that Dorothea was not originally part of the book. She is a definite favorite of mine.
" ‘Please not to call it by any name,’ said Dorothea, putting out her hands entreatingly. ‘You will say it is Persian, or something else geographical. It is my life. I have found it out, and cannot part with it. I have always been finding out my religion since I was a little girl."
I am so struck by how she knows what is precious to her and stands up for it. I feel it inside my soul when she asks Will not to label something that is uniquely hers... "It is my life."
What I Have Learned About Myself:
1. I love shorter chapters. These are right on the border of being longer for me. I can read anything even if it is dull to me, so long as I know there are other topics ahead.
2. Reading a limited amount of certain books each day is magical for me. It helps me stay excited and interested. I can handle 1 chapter at a time that maybe is dull or the language is dense for me. I have more excitement about reading Middlemarch than any of my other reading right now because of the 1 chapter a day limitation!
Yes, this quote from Dorothea is one of my very favorites so far: "It is my life. I have found it out, and cannot part with it. I have always been finding out my religion since I was a little girl." Also much of the exchange with Will that follows. We see her beginning to become herself, to acknowledge her uncertainties, and I like that Eliot provides a more leisurely pace for these key insights.
I started tracking misunderstandings because there were so many per page! Not just Lydgate & Rosamund but Chettam thinking Casaubon didn’t try to interfere in Ladislaw’s employment, Dorothea & Casaubon to the end of their days…
I’ve been tracking hypocrisy throughout the book and these pages were rife with it. The way it calls him out for being a bad landlord who doesn’t live the reformist principles he’s running on!
1. There's a lot going on beneath the surface with Casaubon, none of it good. We learned before (from Will) that Casaubon's scholarship isn't very good. In this part we learn that Casaubon realizes this at some semiconscious level. That's why he publishes almost nothing, that's why he won't hire a secretary: he's afraid of being found out. And that's one reason he dislikes Will - Will is young, energetic, and brilliant, and even though he's very careful when he speaks to Casaubon, Casaubon surely suspects that Will doesn't have a high opinion of his work. But now things are taking a turn for the worse. Will has made himself financially independent so Casaubon no longer has that hold on him, which makes him more of a threat. Will has decided to stay in the area so Casaubon can't put him out of his mind. And, of course, Will's friendship with Dorothea threatens Casaubon both intellectually and personally. The man is a boiling pot full of resentment and jealousy.
2. There are interesting parallels between Will and Lydgate. They are both young men in a hurry. Lydgate wants to reform medicine, Will wants to reform society. They are both trying to achieve their goals by allying themselves with somewhat questionable establishment figures - Lydgate with Bulstrode, Will with Brooke. But their core personalities are very different.
3. Peter Featherstone has devoted the years of his life to developing an elaborate scheme for humiliating his own family *after his own death*. First with the funeral arrangements, then with the two wills - first giving the family something (though far less than the recipients expected) then taking it away. (I'm assuming here that this is why Featherstone kept both wills, instead of destroying the first one, just to twist the knife in that much further. An alternative explanation is that he kept them both so that he could change his mind if he felt so inclined, which is in fact what he did but too late.) Just think how much sheer malice was in that man. Even if you think that most of the family members deserved a little comeuppance, he could at least have given a hundred pounds or so to the Garths, who after all were also related to him.
Casaubon is being eaten alive by self-doubt and jealousy. I have to admit that most of the time when he appears I can't help but picture him as Rumpelstiltskin. It doesn't hurt the comparison to think that he has entrapped a beautiful woman with an untenable contract.
And your parallels between Lydgate and Ladislaw are interesting. I've thought of them both as wildcards in Middlemarch society, but not about how similar their paths have become.
I like the Rumpelstiltskin comparison very much - I’ve found out of all the characters, that I have a really defined image of Casaubon in my mind - and it’s not a pretty sight!!
You’ve said everything I came to say about Casaubon. You can smell his fear through Eliot’s words.
1. <3 the offhand reference to Lydgate falling into love-making in spite of "medicine and biology... the inspection of macerated muscle or of eyes presented in a dish (like Santa Lucia's)" - Saint Lucy was known for plucking out her own eyes so as not to be tempted by the physical attractions of her fiancé! (well, according to the footnote in my book, but other sources say it was to discourage a suitor who liked her eyes)
2. Casaubon - He's absolutely emotionally abusive to Dorothea, but our narrator manages to explain the insecurity and shame and pride underneath enough to make me feel compassion for him too
3. Mary/Fred - the interesting bit here is her flirting with guilt over refusing to burn the will and how drastically her choice affected Fred's fortunes in life
4. Reform - it's Brooke's hypocrisy that gets me. But I also disagree with Dorothea saying "we have no right to come forward and urge wider changes for good, until we have tried to alter the evils which lie under our own hands." Yes of course, Brooke should not only politically push for good but also in his own life do better by others! But also, we can't let failure to do good in one way stop us from trying to do good in another. Let not the perfect be the enemy of the good.
5. Dorothea saying "Oh, my life is very simple... I am always at Lowick" was totally depressing and also got Simon & Garfunkel's "Slip-Sliding Away" stuck in my head
6. One phrase confused me - what is a "winter-worn husband"?
7. I also loved Dorothea's line, "What is your religion... the belief that helps you most?" Now I want to go through each of the major characters here and try to define what we know so far about what their religion may be!
Dorothea - "desiring what is perfectly good"
Ladislaw - "To love what is good and beautiful when I see it"
but what about Lydgate? Rosamond? Brooke? Casaubon? the rest? perhaps-
Lydgate - pursuit of truth and progress above all else, and beauty in service to that end?
Rosamond and Fred are maybe the same - enjoy the little things, the rest will sort itself out just fine?
Brooke - sort of a cross between Dorothea and Fred?
Casaubon - youch, I don't think anything much is serving him, he's so sad. His big belief seems to be that even if he's gone down the wrong path, he must follow where it leads him and can't change course. But is your religion your big belief, your belief that you think helps you, or your belief that actually helps you?
I agree with your point about not letting failure in one endeavor prevent an attempt to do good elsewhere. Relatedly, Brooke’s political opponents seem to be planning a “what-about” strategy using those failures. Your perspective accepts human failings as part of who we are, but not all of what we are. Maddeningly, the world of politics still uses that to justify a winner-take-all world.
Your point about Casaubon is what makes him so interesting. It's very hard to convey pity or sympathy for a character like that, and I do think Eliot intended readers to feel both sympathy for his failed efforts and outrage at his treatment of Dorothea. He is not just an unpleasant "type," in the Dickens mold, and this complicated, unsuccessful, abusive marriage is part of what's always made *Middlemarch* so interesting to me.
I also highlighted the quote you shared about Dorthea's question about religion. And I loved the line just before where Dorthea says she's been working out her religion since she was a child. I think anyone who has been raised with one set of beliefs and has found those beliefs changing in adulthood can relate.
Rather "finding" out her religion, not working
One scene that stood out for me occurred just before the confrontation between Dagley and Brooke. Eliot combines her painterly eye with what I think of as a documentarist’s lens. This occurs after the narrator has characterized the color scheme of the landscape portrait of Freemen’s End homestead as “a perfect study of highly-mingled subdued color” (394).
This scene snaps into documentary reality through Mr. Dagley. Initially a “figure in the landscape,” he
becomes a real person representing the context of the world outside the painting, having heard stories about “the new King” and seen “the numerous handbills on the walls.”
Eliot flips the reader’s view of the art as something with self-contained meaning to texture deriving its meaning from the world outside of itself. It represents the power of the landed gentry over the working class, not a scene of idyllic timelessness.
This is one of my favorite passages so far. As the narrator says, an observer can be "under that softening influence of the fine arts which makes other people’s hardships picturesque". I want to keep that in mind for future art viewings.
Hi all, I agree, this was a long and not that exciting part of the book. But hey, nobody says it was going to be easy! I am taking it as a learning process. And I agree, these Casaubon is an insecure man, and even though Eliot tries to defend him so much, she also show us the real Casaubon at the end of chapter 38: "All through his life Mr Casaubon had been trying not to admit even to himself the inward sores of self-doubt and jealousy. And on the most delicate of all personal subjects, the habit of proud suspicious reticence told doubly".
My favourite quote is this: "That by desiring what is perfectly good, even when we don't quite know what it is and can not 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". We can use these lines for ourselves when we are tired of long complex phrases in the book, but we keep with our commitment of reading Middlemarch together to widen the skirts of our intellectual light :-)
I loved this quote also.
I have to admit, I laughed out loud when Celia commented that Dorothea “is fond of melancholy things and ugly people.” I can't tell if this is a fair assessment of Dorothea or not. She counters with her own explanation, "I am fond of knowing something about the people I live among", but this seems like a canned response. On some level, I do think Dorothea fell in love with Casaubon because he is sad and (maybe?) plain in appearance. Dorothea is definitely seeing how her marriage with Casaubon is turning out.
I hope that Dorothea will be able to see her architectural plans for the tenant cottages come to fruition. I think that if she has a purpose outside of Casaubon, she will be able to bear her unhappy marriage a bit easier.
I can't believe that Casaubon bans Will from coming to Lowick! That is some lowdown stuff!
Things I liked tis week
- Ladislaw refuses to be intimidated by Casaubon
- Mrs Cadwallader calling Casaubon “Aquinas”
- The gaggle of relatives at the funeral and reading of the will
- The extended description of Mr Vincy and the Vincy family dynamics especially manipulative Rosamond
- All the thinking if I do this then what, I can’t talk to ”x” because “y”, if I say “x” he’ll think “z” - Dorothea does it constantly, Ladislaw and Mr V this week, Fred last week. Showing I think the webbing of their social circles, marriages and families, how each of them think, why and what they finally decide to do and say or not.
- The Reform movement brought down to “this is my life” level. Not as a big picture London-based movement, but this is what it is for me and mine and you’re the worst kind of landlord. The difference between them not the “picturesque” version favored by snooty do-gooders. Freeman’s End indeed. I admire Eliot for bringing in all facets of society, not just writing the easy stories.
Conundrum of week
Who the heck is Joshua Rigg (Featherstone), why is he in the story and why do we know nothing about him? A real example of how people are just appearing in Middlemarch without prior announcement? Like Lydgate did?
I am also amazed at how Eliot keeps the story moving, every chapter revolves the wheel…think you know what’s what with these characters…haha think again. And these chapters added depth to the characters as they sink a little deeper into their lives in Middlemarch, interact with each other, find their places in the place they choose to live in the times they are given. It’s fascinating.
One of the things that really stuck out to me in this section was how Lydgate and Rosamund are both going into their marriage with completely inappropriate expectations. It saddens me, because I think they really love each other (or at least, the idea that each has of the other) but I think there are very bumpy roads ahead for them.