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3.53 AVERAGE
3.53 AVERAGE
Silas Marner is a weaver, who spent his youth in an isolated religious community. After a betrayal by a close friend shatters his faith in both God and man, Marner sets out and establishes a new life for himself in the small, far-off village of Raveloe, a place equally isolated from the world in its own way. Here he lives a life of seclusion, replacing human interaction with the monotonous hum of his spinning wheel and a growing love of money; he gets out his hoard of coins and looks lovingly on them each evening - their faces become his only friends, they will never wrong him. Marner “hated the thought of the past”, of his present life he found that “there was nothing that called out his love and fellowship toward the strangers he had come amongst” and, of the future, he anticipated a life that ”was all dark, for there was no Unseen Love that cared for him”.
The villagers, for their part, are more than happy to leave him to his solitude. Simple and indolent folk, they have a deep mistrust of strangers - in Raveloe ”superstition clung easily round every person” who was not from their village, for “how was a man to be explained unless you at least knew somebody who knew his father and mother?” - and this mistrust is exaggerated for any strangers who are skilled or clever in some way, the acquisition of any such talents seeming to be only possible by supernatural means.
And so life goes on for the fifteen years after Marner’s arrival in Raveloe, until two events occur which are to have a dramatic impact on Marner’s way of life. The first of which, the theft of his hoard of gold, leaves him bewildered and desolate, his soul “like a forlorn traveller on an unknown desert”. But soon after this, the strange appearance in his cottage of a seemingly orphaned toddler - whose blonde curls the short-sighted Marner initially mistakes for his gold returned - gives him a chance learn to open himself to the outside world again, and to satisfy his soul with something warmer than gold.
There is a quiet realism to the novel, albeit one which is tinged with an almost fairy-tale or dreamlike quality at times. The novel is set sometime in the early nineteenth century, but there is a certain quaintness to the story, which, alongside the pervading belief in superstitions and the mystical among the villagers, makes its setting feel even earlier. Raveloe is an insular, prosperous place that stands immutable against the march of time.
Silas Marner is the first work of George Eliot’s that I have read. I found her writing style to be quiet formal, and some of her sentences can be somewhat long and convoluted, such as this one describing a party at the local nobleman’s house:
”It was after the early supper-time at the Red House, and the entertainment was in that stage when bashfulness itself had passed into easy jollity, when gentlemen, conscious of unusual accomplishments, could at length be prevailed on to dance a hornpipe, and when the Squire preferred talking loudly, scattering snuff, and patting his visitors' backs, to sitting longer at the whist-table—a choice exasperating to uncle Kimble, who, being always volatile in sober business hours, became intense and bitter over cards and brandy, shuffled before his adversary's deal with a glare of suspicion, and turned up a mean trump-card with an air of inexpressible disgust, as if in a world where such things could happen one might as well enter on a course of reckless profligacy”.
However, despite not really gelling with Eliot’s writing style, I still found the novel overall to be reasonably enjoyable. It is a much slower and subtler novel than the more plot-driven, melodramatic Victorian novels that I tend to read to read and love, yet it still has a quiet charm that drew me into the story.
The villagers, for their part, are more than happy to leave him to his solitude. Simple and indolent folk, they have a deep mistrust of strangers - in Raveloe ”superstition clung easily round every person” who was not from their village, for “how was a man to be explained unless you at least knew somebody who knew his father and mother?” - and this mistrust is exaggerated for any strangers who are skilled or clever in some way, the acquisition of any such talents seeming to be only possible by supernatural means.
And so life goes on for the fifteen years after Marner’s arrival in Raveloe, until two events occur which are to have a dramatic impact on Marner’s way of life. The first of which, the theft of his hoard of gold, leaves him bewildered and desolate, his soul “like a forlorn traveller on an unknown desert”. But soon after this, the strange appearance in his cottage of a seemingly orphaned toddler - whose blonde curls the short-sighted Marner initially mistakes for his gold returned - gives him a chance learn to open himself to the outside world again, and to satisfy his soul with something warmer than gold.
There is a quiet realism to the novel, albeit one which is tinged with an almost fairy-tale or dreamlike quality at times. The novel is set sometime in the early nineteenth century, but there is a certain quaintness to the story, which, alongside the pervading belief in superstitions and the mystical among the villagers, makes its setting feel even earlier. Raveloe is an insular, prosperous place that stands immutable against the march of time.
Silas Marner is the first work of George Eliot’s that I have read. I found her writing style to be quiet formal, and some of her sentences can be somewhat long and convoluted, such as this one describing a party at the local nobleman’s house:
”It was after the early supper-time at the Red House, and the entertainment was in that stage when bashfulness itself had passed into easy jollity, when gentlemen, conscious of unusual accomplishments, could at length be prevailed on to dance a hornpipe, and when the Squire preferred talking loudly, scattering snuff, and patting his visitors' backs, to sitting longer at the whist-table—a choice exasperating to uncle Kimble, who, being always volatile in sober business hours, became intense and bitter over cards and brandy, shuffled before his adversary's deal with a glare of suspicion, and turned up a mean trump-card with an air of inexpressible disgust, as if in a world where such things could happen one might as well enter on a course of reckless profligacy”.
However, despite not really gelling with Eliot’s writing style, I still found the novel overall to be reasonably enjoyable. It is a much slower and subtler novel than the more plot-driven, melodramatic Victorian novels that I tend to read to read and love, yet it still has a quiet charm that drew me into the story.
If there was a minus rating, I would grant it to this book. Awfully slow and painful read that feels like it never ends.
emotional
funny
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I wish there was more of it, Mary Ann Evans has such an effortless writing style and after reading Middlemarch I chose this. Its a lovely story with poignant criticisms, but I would have liked it to be longer so we could delve a bit further into some of the minor characters such as Dolly Winthrop.
I found Eliot's writing style to be a bit tedious and disjointed in the beginning, but once the story got going it became easier to read. I wish there were more of Marner's relationship with Eppie instead of skipping over 16 years so quickly. But overall, I found it to be a satisfying experience and I'm glad I took the time to read it. This was the first work of Eliot's that I have read, and I am still looking forward to delving into her other works. What touched me most about this work is that I am expecting my first child in a couple of months and the idea of a child making such a difference in one's life is close to my heart. I found myself happy for Marner and that is why I wanted more of him and Eppie.
I read it for a bookclub or I might have quit in the middle. Simplistic story line and characters, good behavior vs bad behavior...good behavior ultimately triumphs, challenging vocabulary.
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
It's refreshing for me to read a classic about early 19th century's working class. It took me a while to get used to Eliot's writing style (but English is my second language), but I enjoyed the book. It's almost like a fable: characters with one strong trait, a moral lesson in the end and it's fairly short... And that's what gets me. Everything is rounded up, characters are either good or bad and I would like it more if it were a little bit longer. Deep down I recognize it's a beautiful and sweet piece, maybe I'm just becoming a curmudgeon.
Not sure how to rate the book. On the one hand I rather liked it, but on the other, some parts bored me a little. It's not so bad to delegate it to 3 stars, and it's not as good to get 4 stars. Drat. Goodreads, please give us half stars already. This is definitely 3.5 stars read if I ever read one.