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Middlemarch | 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.

Middlemarch 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.

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... » Complete Middlemarch Summary