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3.53 AVERAGE
3.53 AVERAGE
This is an amazing rendition of this classic treasure. The attention to the language and customs, which may have been much of Eliot's point in writing, is beautiful, intense and revealing. If the sweet, moral happy ending strains credulity, the actual relationships of the characters are true as steel. Sending me over to listen to J.D. Vance "Hillbilly Elegy" which bears this out. As do the very personal rants of "Redneck Liberal" Trae Crowder. Altogether serendipitous.
Silas Marner is the classic novel that is far more interesting to discuss than to read. (I often mention these types of novels in my reviews because they are so common.) While trudging through the chapter where local townsfolk are chatting at an inn, my mind began to drift to Raymond Williams' The Country and the City, in which he famously describes the "knowable community" in Eliot as a record of common life that is most often expressed through everyday language. And suddenly, I desired not to finish reading Silas Marner, but to return to Williams! And that's the problem with these kinds of novels: they are perfect for engaging discussions of literary and cultural theory, but who the hell wants to read them? I found myself tossed between alternating chapters of mush (Silas/Eppie) and boredom (the peripheral characters and events who surround them and eventually connect to their stories). I eventually slogged my way to the predictable conclusion.
This is also a great example of the infamous "short novel that feels very long." I am just finishing up a 500-page gothic novel (Le Fanu's Uncle Silas--a random coincidence in title!), which took me less time to read than Eliot's much shorter novel. In the end, Silas Marner certainly had a memorable plot. (I'm trying to be kind here.) It was worth reading for a better understanding of Eliot's place in the canon and all the literary criticism on the Victorian industrial/pastoral divide, but that's about the best thing I can say for it.
This is also a great example of the infamous "short novel that feels very long." I am just finishing up a 500-page gothic novel (Le Fanu's Uncle Silas--a random coincidence in title!), which took me less time to read than Eliot's much shorter novel. In the end, Silas Marner certainly had a memorable plot. (I'm trying to be kind here.) It was worth reading for a better understanding of Eliot's place in the canon and all the literary criticism on the Victorian industrial/pastoral divide, but that's about the best thing I can say for it.
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
“It was okay”
I really try to stick to the “hate, dislike, okay, like, and loved” star system for myself. So while this book has merits outside of my reading enjoyment, I’m largely going to ignore them in my rating. This book was an okay read.
Overall, I’m not sure that the lesson that “love triumphs over material wealth” is a compelling lesson- I think time and experience has shown that this is an oft shared idea between people with material wealth.
The mystery lags, and the plot stagnates a few times during this relatively short novel. For a book that was only 190 pages it took me months to read because I couldn’t force myself to care about the story, characters, or “day in the life” vibes. The last 50 pages were pretty good and wrapped things up nicely (I was even caught unawares by a big plot twist concerning the MCs gold).
So...it was okay!
I really try to stick to the “hate, dislike, okay, like, and loved” star system for myself. So while this book has merits outside of my reading enjoyment, I’m largely going to ignore them in my rating. This book was an okay read.
Overall, I’m not sure that the lesson that “love triumphs over material wealth” is a compelling lesson- I think time and experience has shown that this is an oft shared idea between people with material wealth.
The mystery lags, and the plot stagnates a few times during this relatively short novel. For a book that was only 190 pages it took me months to read because I couldn’t force myself to care about the story, characters, or “day in the life” vibes. The last 50 pages were pretty good and wrapped things up nicely (I was even caught unawares by a big plot twist concerning the MCs gold).
So...it was okay!
challenging
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
inspiring
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I think I really like the writing style. It takes me longer to read than most books, but I loved how George Eliot was able to both convey a lot of information in few pages and give you pages of characterisation and pretty discriptions without either seeming out of place. I'm not sure I'm ready for her longer works, though.
While I think the story itself could have used expensions on some aspects, like the time Eppie is actually in the story, I was very much intruiged in what we did get. The two protagonists, Silas and Godfrey, were a great contrast for each other. One simple man brought into the situation by the hand of others, one man from higher ranks living with the consequences of his mistakes. I also liked the portrayal of rural life in "simpler times". The book is heavy on themes without feeling heavy at all and I enjoyed my time with it a lot.
While I think the story itself could have used expensions on some aspects, like the time Eppie is actually in the story, I was very much intruiged in what we did get. The two protagonists, Silas and Godfrey, were a great contrast for each other. One simple man brought into the situation by the hand of others, one man from higher ranks living with the consequences of his mistakes. I also liked the portrayal of rural life in "simpler times". The book is heavy on themes without feeling heavy at all and I enjoyed my time with it a lot.
hopeful
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Despite its sentimental, Dickensian cover and premise – an outcast weaver is drawn back into society by the arrival of an orphaned child in his life – this short novel is yet more evidence of Eliot’s ability to create the impression of distance in her fictions. Eliot’s mastery of the bourgeois novel is of a similar kind and order to Milton’s mastery of the epic poem; the devil, as always, is in the details and how they’re relayed.
It’s worth comparing Marner’s transition over the first part of this novel with Scrooge’s in A Christmas Carol in order to better understand Eliot’s method. Dickens is one of the all time great narrators, and he trusts that the effects he has conveyed so spectacularly throughout his ghost story will linger with both his notorious outcast and miser and the reader even after he’s allowed the illusion to collapse in on itself:
Compare the drama of Dickens’s line to the ever-shifting emphasis of this paragraph from the final bloom of Silas Marner‘s first volume:
In Eliot’s hands a seemingly romantic conceit – a child’s improving effect on an alienated adult – is nevertheless established to be effective only inasmuch as Marner’s continued obligations to the child necessitate a continued interaction with society as a whole. This is typical of Eliot’s approach, which emphasises connection and consequence over the triumph of kind hearts and stirring rhetoric.
This comparison is, however, not offered in order to disparage Dickens, whose busy narration looks simultaneously backward to the jarring shifts of the best English poetry and forward to the juddering machinery of modern comedy. And if it’s true that those same novels are premised on a call to individual kindness that overlooks the necessity for any broader or more systematic change then that does not diminish their effectiveness in making vivid the muck and dirt of unreformed reality.
The simple truth is that Eliot’s talents are slightly different in nature, and their magnitude does not need to be exaggerated by the disparagement of other novelists even if they may be better understood in light of the comparison.
Staying mindful of the example of Dickens, it occurs that the subject of the novelist vs. the social order that produced them is a curious one when applied to Eliot’s work. The form of the bourgeois novel she so excels at may in itself may replicate bourgeois values by way of its sheer confidence, but Eliot interrogates these conventions through the startling depth and clarity of her narrative judgements, which contrast with the narrative itself in a way that can’t help but provoke quiet inquiry.
The introduction to the edition I read makes up for any awkwardness its cover may engender by virtue of an astute introduction by R.T. Jones (an Honorary Fellow of the University of York, apparently), in which Jones tracks some of the juxtapositions that exist in Silas Marner‘s framing story, arguing that for all Eliot’s narration chides Godfrey for foolishly hoping that all would work out well when he didn’t claim his secret child, the story bears out his actions more than it does her words:
Silas Marner ends on a statement of total happiness that somehow fails to ring false, but the novel never once lets you forget that fairy-tale conclusion has been built on a series of disappointments, lies, and betrayals, and it is Eliot’s ability to keep both of these seemingly contradictory positions in perspective that gives the truest account of her peculiar genius in this short novel.
It’s worth comparing Marner’s transition over the first part of this novel with Scrooge’s in A Christmas Carol in order to better understand Eliot’s method. Dickens is one of the all time great narrators, and he trusts that the effects he has conveyed so spectacularly throughout his ghost story will linger with both his notorious outcast and miser and the reader even after he’s allowed the illusion to collapse in on itself:
For the first time the hand appeared to shake.
“Good Spirit,” he pursued, as down upon the ground he fell before it: “Your nature intercedes for me, and pities me. Assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life!”
The kind hand trembled.
“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!”
In his agony, he caught the spectral hand. It sought to free itself, but he was strong in his entreaty, and detained it. The Spirit, stronger yet, repulsed him.
Holding up his hands in a last prayer to have his fate reversed, he saw an alteration in the Phantom’s hood and dress. It shrunk, collapsed, and dwindled down into a bedpost.
Compare the drama of Dickens’s line to the ever-shifting emphasis of this paragraph from the final bloom of Silas Marner‘s first volume:
Silas began now to think of Raveloe life entirely in relation to Eppie: she must have everything that was a good in Raveloe; and he listened docilely, that he might come to understand better what this life was, from which, for fifteen years, he had stood aloof as from a strange thing, with which he could have no communion: as some man who has a precious plant to which he would give a nurturing home in a new soil, thinks of the rain, and the sunshine, and all influences, in relation to his nursling, and asks industriously for all knowledge that will help him to satisfy the wants of the searching roots, or to guard leaf and bud from invading harm. The disposition to hoard had been utterly crushed at the very first by the loss of his long-stored gold: the coins he earned afterwards seemed as irrelevant as stones brought to complete a house suddenly buried by an earthquake; the sense of bereavement was too heavy upon him for the old thrill of satisfaction to arise again at the touch of the newly-earned coin. And now something had come to replace his hoard which gave a growing purpose to the earnings, drawing his hope and joy continually onward beyond the money.
In Eliot’s hands a seemingly romantic conceit – a child’s improving effect on an alienated adult – is nevertheless established to be effective only inasmuch as Marner’s continued obligations to the child necessitate a continued interaction with society as a whole. This is typical of Eliot’s approach, which emphasises connection and consequence over the triumph of kind hearts and stirring rhetoric.
This comparison is, however, not offered in order to disparage Dickens, whose busy narration looks simultaneously backward to the jarring shifts of the best English poetry and forward to the juddering machinery of modern comedy. And if it’s true that those same novels are premised on a call to individual kindness that overlooks the necessity for any broader or more systematic change then that does not diminish their effectiveness in making vivid the muck and dirt of unreformed reality.
The simple truth is that Eliot’s talents are slightly different in nature, and their magnitude does not need to be exaggerated by the disparagement of other novelists even if they may be better understood in light of the comparison.
Staying mindful of the example of Dickens, it occurs that the subject of the novelist vs. the social order that produced them is a curious one when applied to Eliot’s work. The form of the bourgeois novel she so excels at may in itself may replicate bourgeois values by way of its sheer confidence, but Eliot interrogates these conventions through the startling depth and clarity of her narrative judgements, which contrast with the narrative itself in a way that can’t help but provoke quiet inquiry.
The introduction to the edition I read makes up for any awkwardness its cover may engender by virtue of an astute introduction by R.T. Jones (an Honorary Fellow of the University of York, apparently), in which Jones tracks some of the juxtapositions that exist in Silas Marner‘s framing story, arguing that for all Eliot’s narration chides Godfrey for foolishly hoping that all would work out well when he didn’t claim his secret child, the story bears out his actions more than it does her words:
…the novel leads us to conclude that if Godfrey had done the right thing, acknowledged his first wife and her baby as his, Nancy would not have married him; Eppie (under a different name, of course) would have grown up in the Red House with no mother and a resentful father; so Godfrey, Nancy and Eppie would have had very little oppotunity for happiness, and of course Silas Marner would have remained an exile from human society.
Silas Marner ends on a statement of total happiness that somehow fails to ring false, but the novel never once lets you forget that fairy-tale conclusion has been built on a series of disappointments, lies, and betrayals, and it is Eliot’s ability to keep both of these seemingly contradictory positions in perspective that gives the truest account of her peculiar genius in this short novel.
3/5 for Silas Marner by George Eliot.
Silas Marner is a story of loss, redemption and regret. It is a story of a young man who was betrayed by his bestfriend and framed for theft. As consequence, he lost boh his fiancee and faith.
Okay, this book is quite plain and a bit boring for my liking. It is very slow and somewhat tedious (it hurts my brain), until we meet Eppie (which annoyingly doesnt happen until the last 50 pages)
The overall plot was good, ada a few unexpected scenes, but I just wish there had been more.
P/S: George Eliot is a woman. She used a male pen name to escape the stereotype of people during her era that women only write lighthearted romances/not serious works. Power tak power.
Silas Marner is a story of loss, redemption and regret. It is a story of a young man who was betrayed by his bestfriend and framed for theft. As consequence, he lost boh his fiancee and faith.
Okay, this book is quite plain and a bit boring for my liking. It is very slow and somewhat tedious (it hurts my brain), until we meet Eppie (which annoyingly doesnt happen until the last 50 pages)
The overall plot was good, ada a few unexpected scenes, but I just wish there had been more.
P/S: George Eliot is a woman. She used a male pen name to escape the stereotype of people during her era that women only write lighthearted romances/not serious works. Power tak power.
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I thoroughly enjoyed this victorian novel :). Even though this was for a class, we did little discussion, and we pretty much just read it individually for the most part. This was enchanting, funny, and charming. I really liked how the characters were down-to-earth and relatable, while the plot was sort of cartoonish, in a self-aware and light-hearted way. The way Elliot weaves herself into the narrative is also very interesting, and I like how that draws attention to the narrator's perspective of watching a story unfold. There were a few chapters where there'd be paragraphs upon paragraphs of descriptions and dialogue that didn't contribute much to the plot or characters, and they made me a little impatient about the actual story, but honestly, it wasn't a huge problem for me. But yes I had a great time and the last 3 chapters were such highlights even though I pretty much predicted what was going to happen.