Silas Marner by George Eliot (1861)
Finished: 5/6/21
Rating: 3/5 (I Liked It)
Review: An enjoyable if meandering novel; Eliot’s prose, particularly in her descriptions of the human experiences of solitude and rejection, is delightful and the novel’s anti-climatic end pleased my confrontation-hating self greatly. The final conversation between Silas Marner and the Cass’s was such an edge-of-your-seat moment for me and Eliot’s characterisation of Dunsey Cass as a nefarious spectre falsely haunting the plot turned out invoke both pleasant shock and dramatic irony in me. Nevertheless, this book does have it’s faults; the plot seems a bit directionless, at least to me and my perception, and multiple scenes in this novel feel irrelevant to the plot as a whole — why were they added, what are they doing here!! This directionless narrative direction, though it may have been Eliot’s motive to focus on building a sense of narrative place rather than fixing a solid narrative path, left the book a bit tiring and difficult to get through until the latter half of the novel. All in all, it was a light, surprising tale with a happy, idyllic conclusion — unlike any other Victorian novel I have read thus far! Looking forward (?) to my inevitable reading of Middlemarch.
Analysis:
- Godfrey and Silas are narrative mirrors of one another; they both suffer from respective great losses and gains however Silas’s loss-and-gain is his moral salvation whilst Godfrey’s loss-and-gain could be interpreted as his moral damnation.
- Godfrey’s two wives could each be narrative mirrors for Silas’s two ‘treasures’ — Eppie and his gold.
- Dramatic irony of Dunstan’s character in the shocking revelation of his death
- Five main events: Lantern Yard robbery, the gold robbery, Eppie’s arrival, the return of Silas’ gold and Godfrey’s attempt to claim his child. The latter 4 events exist fall into pairs with one another (perhaps Eppie symbolises the loss of the gold?) whilst the first two events are symbolically linked in Silas’s thoughts.
Context:
- Eliot grew up in a country house in Warwickshire, a setting much like that of Silas Marner. She was schooled in a devout Christian boarding school though she came to reject the dogmas of Christianity as she matured and discovered atheism. She only returned to Christianity at the behest of her father, who refused to speak to his atheist daughter. Eliot also eloped with a married man after her father’s death, a man who encouraged her writing greatly despite not ultimately being her husband. These circumstances may have contributed to many themes present in Silas Marner.
- In particular, two ideas that are expressed in Eliot’s letters of about the time of her writing Silas Marner are that “the idea of God . . . is the ideal of a goodness entirely human,” and that “no man can begin to mould himself on a faith or an idea without rising to a higher order of experience.” Eliot believed strongly in the interdependence of humanity, and in all her novels she is greatly concerned to discover what might be considered good and what bad in social relationships. Silas Marner is no exception. Eliot said of the book: “it sets — or is intended to set — in a strong light the remedial influences of pure, natural human relations.
Criticism:
- Reflects Comtean philosophy
- Acts as a ‘Moral Fable’ — Similarity to folklore and fairy tales
- Highlights the necessity of women and the domestic family dynamic
- Employs Silas’s catelepsy to illustrate Victorian medicine customs
- The ecologically problematical nature of Lantern Yard vs. the ecologically thriving nature of Raveloe
- Silas’s psychological trauma and possible Oedipus complex
- Marxism and materialism re: Silas’s weaving
- The dual structure of Godfrey and Silas’s storylines
