Scan barcode
caterinaanna's review against another edition
4.0
I enjoyed it even more than I thought I would, and got through the five and a half hundred pages in half a working week. Having seen only the very final scenes of a television adaptation some years ago, I knew the end, but it was very interesting seeing how that came to pass.
This is a 9/10 version of 4/5 - couldn't justify it going to 5/5since, had it been absolutely brilliant I would have done a more detailed review when I wrote the above, a few months after reading it.
This is a 9/10 version of 4/5 - couldn't justify it going to 5/5since, had it been absolutely brilliant I would have done a more detailed review when I wrote the above, a few months after reading it.
olivia6790's review against another edition
4.0
I had a really hard time getting into this book because the first half was mostly introductory and none of the characters (aside from Mrs. Poyser) were that interesting. However, the more I read, the more the story was developed and the more I wanted to keep reading. This was my first time reading George Eliot, and I can't wait to read more of her novels because I liked this one so much. I definitely recommend it to anyone interested in stories about morality and the unintended consequences human actions tend to have.
pgchuis's review against another edition
4.0
More of a 3.5* really - there were long boring bits and large sections written with in dialect and in dialect pronunciation, which were tiresome to get through. My favourite explanatory note concerns John Wesley's approval of women preachers. I am also grateful to the notes for explaining the significance of Hetty's neckerchief being left at the Hermitage.
There were some good characters: Mrs Poyser, Dinah and Arthur were particularly well-drawn. The description of living as a tenant on a big estate and identifying with the squire was interesting. Hetty and Adam were a bit of a problem for me. I found his love for her hard to understand when she was so vacuous and unencouraging. The pace picked up quite a lot from the time Hetty left home and the section describing Adam and Dinah falling for one another was sweet and convincing. Overall very sad; it's not going to be my favourite Eliot novel.
There were some good characters: Mrs Poyser, Dinah and Arthur were particularly well-drawn. The description of living as a tenant on a big estate and identifying with the squire was interesting. Hetty and Adam were a bit of a problem for me. I found his love for her hard to understand when she was so vacuous and unencouraging. The pace picked up quite a lot from the time Hetty left home and the section describing Adam and Dinah falling for one another was sweet and convincing. Overall very sad; it's not going to be my favourite Eliot novel.
sarah42783's review against another edition
4.0
What a fantastic read! The 19th century English litterature lover that I am had been wanting to read this book for ages. I really enjoyed Eliot's beautiful writing and her depiction of Maggie & Tom's relationship.
witskee1's review against another edition
3.0
Overall this was a good book. It got preachy at times. And I wanted to hear a little more of Hetty's story. It was hard to understand what was going on with her story as much because in that era you have to gloss over some of the "unpleasantness".
And I didn't like that Dinah and Adam ended up together. I don't think that Seth would have been happy with that in real life. It was kind of cheap that Seth is always okay with everything going to Adam and him getting left behind. That's not how real people act.
And I didn't like that Dinah and Adam ended up together. I don't think that Seth would have been happy with that in real life. It was kind of cheap that Seth is always okay with everything going to Adam and him getting left behind. That's not how real people act.
lnatal's review against another edition
3.0
This is the story of Adam Bede, a carpenter who lives in the countryside and falls in love with Hetty Sorrel, a maid who lives with the Poysers, uncle and aunt of Adam.
In reality, the plot involves the love story among the four main characters: Adam, Hetty Sorrel, Arthur Donnithorne, a young squire who seduces Hetty, and Dinah Morris, Hetty's cousin and an itinerant Methodist preacher.
After have been seduced by Arthur, Hetty's life become a turmoil of tragic events.
The first movie based on this story was made in 1918. In 1992, BBC produced a television version of this famous work by George Eliot.
In reality, the plot involves the love story among the four main characters: Adam, Hetty Sorrel, Arthur Donnithorne, a young squire who seduces Hetty, and Dinah Morris, Hetty's cousin and an itinerant Methodist preacher.
After have been seduced by Arthur, Hetty's life become a turmoil of tragic events.
The first movie based on this story was made in 1918. In 1992, BBC produced a television version of this famous work by George Eliot.
blushing_unseen's review against another edition
3.0
Are there more frustrating central characters in literature than the Tullivers?? Found the whole thing irritating, overblown and massively over-written. Not for me this one, despite having loved Middlemarch.
eddie's review against another edition
5.0
I studied the art history and the literature of the 19th century at university, but this is my first reading of Adam Bede, George Eliot’s debut novel (1859). It very much feels like the missing clue to decode a civilisation - the absolute nerve centre of Victorian Britain’s obsession with the status of women in society. Extraordinary to read it in the same year as ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ and ‘The Testaments’: truly, Eliot’s book is an authentic document from Gilead in England’s green and pleasant land.
So much later literature is indebted to this novel - Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd & Tess of the D’Urbevilles, and EM Forster’s Howard’s End for starters - John Foyles’ French Lieutenant’s Woman in more recent times too. Tess is virtually a rerun of Adam Bede (with Tess like Hetty in AB a milkmaid by profession, ‘ruined’ by an upper class landlord ) - but it’s interesting that Tess almost ended Hardy’s career despite it being written almost 40 years later. Hardy’s rerun takes the issues raised by Adam Bede and recasts them in the most confrontational form possible.
It’s jaw-dropping that Eliot published this at the height of Victorian prudishness and performative morality - a tale of illicit sex, pregnancy outside marriage, and infanticide - and not only survived to tell the tale but was immediately catapulted into the premier league of Victorian novelists, with the book being hailed as a masterpiece across the board.
How did she do it? On my reading of Middlemarch and Adam Bede, Eliot had a genius for creative ambiguity on these live-wire issues. She knew exactly how far she could push her culture, and when and exactly how to defend from attack her controversial points.
She carefully soothes patriarchy’s sensitivities while simultaneously leaving the subversive questions she raises about patriarchy and class exploitation hanging in the air for the alert reader to consider.
2019 is the 200th anniversary of the birth of George Eliot.
So much later literature is indebted to this novel - Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd & Tess of the D’Urbevilles, and EM Forster’s Howard’s End for starters - John Foyles’ French Lieutenant’s Woman in more recent times too. Tess is virtually a rerun of Adam Bede (with Tess like Hetty in AB a milkmaid by profession, ‘ruined’ by an upper class landlord ) - but it’s interesting that Tess almost ended Hardy’s career despite it being written almost 40 years later. Hardy’s rerun takes the issues raised by Adam Bede and recasts them in the most confrontational form possible.
It’s jaw-dropping that Eliot published this at the height of Victorian prudishness and performative morality - a tale of illicit sex, pregnancy outside marriage, and infanticide - and not only survived to tell the tale but was immediately catapulted into the premier league of Victorian novelists, with the book being hailed as a masterpiece across the board.
How did she do it? On my reading of Middlemarch and Adam Bede, Eliot had a genius for creative ambiguity on these live-wire issues. She knew exactly how far she could push her culture, and when and exactly how to defend from attack her controversial points.
She carefully soothes patriarchy’s sensitivities while simultaneously leaving the subversive questions she raises about patriarchy and class exploitation hanging in the air for the alert reader to consider.
2019 is the 200th anniversary of the birth of George Eliot.
claraa1999's review against another edition
3.0
I may have to come to terms with the fact that I don't understand classic English literature. Either that, or the English didn't understand the concept of novels until recently? No but seriously. Whenever I take on a classic English novel to read I know that the story will go basically as follows:
- Main character is introduced at a certain point in their life (often childhood, but not necessarily). Things happen to main character, there's a certain arc, then that part of the story ends.
- Main character is reintroduced many years later, more completely unrelated things happen to them, and the story ends abruptly (sometimes main character dies suddenly and for no reason, but not necessarily).
- Bonus points if the novel is titled after the house the character lived in, or wants to live in, or (more irritatingly) never actually lived in or even visited but heard about through a sibling (hi there Howard's End).
I understand that I'm just an ignorant foreigner and maybe I should be an English major to fully understand and enjoy The Mill On The Floss, Howard's End, Brideshead Revisited or Wuthering Heights, but I'd also argue that I'm a classic literature geek and I don't have any trouble understanding and enjoying Russian, French, Portuguese and Spanish novels of the same time period which follow a more sensible structure, namely:
- Main character is introduced at a point in their life that's actually relevant to the story. Things happen to them that constitute a clear and sensible arc, and the story ends in a logical way. Also houses are just places where people live not some mystical locations.
So yeah. The Mill On The Floss is basically another classic English novel. You already know what you're getting into before reading it. If that's your thing then you might actually enjoy it.
- Main character is introduced at a certain point in their life (often childhood, but not necessarily). Things happen to main character, there's a certain arc, then that part of the story ends.
- Main character is reintroduced many years later, more completely unrelated things happen to them, and the story ends abruptly (sometimes main character dies suddenly and for no reason, but not necessarily).
- Bonus points if the novel is titled after the house the character lived in, or wants to live in, or (more irritatingly) never actually lived in or even visited but heard about through a sibling (hi there Howard's End).
I understand that I'm just an ignorant foreigner and maybe I should be an English major to fully understand and enjoy The Mill On The Floss, Howard's End, Brideshead Revisited or Wuthering Heights, but I'd also argue that I'm a classic literature geek and I don't have any trouble understanding and enjoying Russian, French, Portuguese and Spanish novels of the same time period which follow a more sensible structure, namely:
- Main character is introduced at a point in their life that's actually relevant to the story. Things happen to them that constitute a clear and sensible arc, and the story ends in a logical way. Also houses are just places where people live not some mystical locations.
So yeah. The Mill On The Floss is basically another classic English novel. You already know what you're getting into before reading it. If that's your thing then you might actually enjoy it.
emmach's review against another edition
4.0
after a slow first half, this story and its enchanting heroine had me gasping with delight. I am still verklempt about maggie's character, her choices, her nature and the intensity of her feelings and how they echo through her past and her relations.
the last passage had me in tears.
the last passage had me in tears.