George Eliot combined a formidable intelligence with imaginative sympathy and acute powers of observation, and became one of the greatest and most influential of English novelists. Her choice of material widened the horizons of the novel and her psychological insights radically changed the nature of fictional characterization.
— A.S. Byatt, Selected Essays, Poems and Other Writings
Andrea’s fifth, sixth and seventh slides brought us to the setting for The Mill on the Floss, fictionally known as St. Ogg’s, with four photographs from the magazine article referenced above. Pictured were Gainsborough (twice), the River Trent, Lincolnshire, South Farm, Griff House, the Old Red Mill and Norton Hall, often associated with the type of house Maggie’s Aunt Glegg may have occupied. I also found a book by Charles Sumner Olcot available at Google Books called George Eliot: Scenes and People in Her Novels (1911) with some great photographs.
Andrea moved on to Eliot’s literary background and her interest in attempting a realistic ‘history of unfashionable families.’ Eliot claimed the ‘art of fiction told a truth of its own.’ She often wrote about people who would go unnoticed. She believed the sense of self, duty and morality were based on one’s ties to family and community. Andrea took a few minutes to read from Book IV “The Valley of Humiliation”, Chapter 1 “A Variation of Prostestantism Unknown to Bossuet” (p. 282 of the Penguin Classics edition). [There was an end note associated with ‘Bossuet’ which stated Jacques Bénigne Bossuet, Bishop of Meaux, Histoire des variations de Églises protestantes (1688). ]
Andrea spoke next on Eliot’s artistic vision, her intent on presenting life as a slow, organic growth that might be observed scientifically. Andrea read again from Book IV, Chapter 1, illustrating Eliot’s belief that we are a product of our environments.
The habit of close observation coupled with a marvelous memory enabled her to recall with remarkable minuteness of detail the exact scenes and all the particulars of a tale in which the chief characters were intimate friends and neighbors of her father and mother.
— Charles S. Olcott, ‘Real Life in George Eliot’s Novels’ New Outlook (1907)
Eliot wish her readers to understand Tom and Maggie and the tragedy summed up in the narrator’s meticulous recalling of the Dodsons and the Tullivers. Andrea read again from Book IV, Chapter 1 (middle of p. 285 starting with the sentence ‘The Dodsons were a very proud race, …’).
Andrea talked about life in rural England and the tremendous industrial progress evident in 1860. Eliot worried people would forget rural England from thirty years prior. For example, Dorlcote Mill was water powered (slow), not steam powered (quick). Items were bought and sold at the St. Ogg’s weekly market and people’s livelihoods were based on agrarian activities like farming, herding, milling grain, fishing and dairying. Her writing portrayed the difficult shift from pre-Industrial values to modern Industrial ones. Andrea offered Mrs. Tulliver up for inspection, observing she would have been as comfortable at home in Renaissance England as she was at Dorlcote Mill in the 1820s/30s. Andrea read a passage from Book I “Boy and Girl” Chapter 6 “The Aunts and Uncles are Coming.” The emphasis is repeatedly on housewifery, the keeping of implements that make life civilized when it comes to meals: tea sets, china, casters, crystal, linens, silverware.
Andrea’s next topic centered on class in rural Victorian England. Land ownership begins to matter less. The gentry are still healthy, but the middle class is on the rise. Eliot uses Mr. Glegg, a retired wolf-stapler, and Mr. Deane, a merchant and a banker, to demonstrate the up and coming middle class. Andrea read from Book III “The Downfall” Chapter 5 “Tom Applies His Knife to the Oyster” and the scene where Mr. Deane quizzes Tom about his education. Mr. Tulliver, Tom’s father, doesn’t understand a University education and Mr. Deane takes out his derision of Mr. Tulliver upon Tom, a case of class snobbery, where the aristocracy squander their eduction and do nothing of any use.
Andrea touched on the Victorian elements found in The Mill on the Floss, including the didactic tone used to teach readers a wider sympathy. And great story telling, conforming to narrative structures that we immediately recognize: having a beginning, middle and end; chronological ordering of events; and, a story teller. Victorians felt a duty to be realistic with a focus on ordinary events of everyday life.
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