Dec 30, 2009

Middlemarch | Character Analysis

Arthur Brooke

Mr. Brooke, a bachelor of sixty and owner of Tipton Grange, is a justice of the peace. In this capacity, he sentences poor people, without consideration or mercy, who poach illegally because they are starving. In family matters, he is well meaning, though ineffectual. Mr. Brooke is the guardian of his orphaned nieces, Dorothea and Celia Brooke.

Mr. Brooke is said "to have contracted a too rambling habit of mind"; indeed, his speech is vacuous, filled with phrases which in their recommendation of moderation betray his lack of information and refusal...