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Conclusion
In this dissertation I have examined George Eliot’s exceptional life, and how her personal experiences influenced her as a writer. I have explored Eliot’s aesthetic and literary ideas as they shaped her earlier pieces of fiction. Her early novels while following Eliot’s concept of moral realism, as shown by the depictions of limitations of the characters of Adam Bede, and the siblings dynamics of The Mill of the Floss, present some exceptions, as for example the mythologic ending of the Tullivers’ siblings at the end of The Mill on the Floss. It may be also noticed that after her strong appeal to truthfulness in Adam Bede, Eliot wrote about mesmerism and phrenology in her next piece of fiction, The Lifted Veil. Very few realistic traits are present in this short story, as it focuses more on Latimer’s visions and culminates with the revivification experiment at the end of the short story. The Gothic traits of this short story strongly contrast with the realism of Adam Bede, and also the broader worldview of the European setting of the The Lifted Veil further distances Eliot for the rural setting of her previous short stories and Adam Bede, which had become a prominent feature of her writing. The Lifted Veil may be considered an exception in George Eliot’s writing career, as she would not return to Gothicism in her following pieces of fiction. As a matter of fact, with her next novels, The Mill on the Floss and Silas Marner, she returns to her initial rural settings, although in both these novels some mythological and mysterious traits are present. In The Mill on the Floss, it is through the legendary story of St Ogg’s and the Floss that myth is conveyed. In particular the Floss has a powerful symbolic function, as in the end it washes away all the past mistakes of both Maggie and Tom and reunites them forever. In Silas Marner, instead, there is mystery that comes for Silas’s past, which is unknown to the community of Raveloe, and it is enforced by Silas’s job as a weaver, which modernity and industrialization were swiping away. But also the mysterious forces which are working around Silas, and his cataleptic fits, enforce the fairy-tale aura around him, although Eliot eventually adjusts it through the realistic story of Godfrey Cass. Differently from The Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner presents some fabulous traits. Silas’s loss of faith and subsequent isolation seem to be punished through the loss of his comforting coins, although he has a chance to prove what he is really like when his gold symbolically returns to him in the shape of a golden-haired baby girl, for whom he instantly 121 feels a strong fondness. Thus the apparently unfriendly Silas finds the true value of life, and is able to reveal his sympathetic side to the community of Raveloe. Even more fabulous then Silas Marner, is Eliot’s next short story, Brother Jacob, where Eliot’s appeal to truthfulness is at the minimum, if only for the reference to the colonies, which may be considered as the only realist trait of the short story. Thus, Eliot further distances herself from her previous rural settings, although the British country is still present in David Faux’s hometown and the town he moves to once he returns from the West Indies, to Grimworth. But the way the story unfolds has nothing of the rustic realism of Eliot’s previous fiction, as David remains unrepentant of his misconduct, he does not want to acknowledge his limitations, and up until the end, he is willing to do anything in his power to achieve his own goals. He does not remain unpunished, though, as his reward comes from the person he did wrong the most, i.e. his brother Jacob. It is precisely in David’s colonial adventures and his final reward that his story resembles a fable, more than a story of rustic realism such as that of Adam Bede. Even Eliot’s concept of sympathy changes throughout her earlier pieces of fiction. In Adam Bede sympathy is conveyed through Dinah Morris and Seth Bede, who, although differently, display sympathetic traits in their approach towards the people around them. Dinah’s sympathy comes from her Methodist beliefs and her abstraction of the momentary sufferings of the others, which brings her closer to people, although she cannot fully ‘suffer with’ others. Seth Bede’s sensitivity and piousness, instead, render him the most selfless character in Adam Bede, thus he eventually gives up on proposing to Dinah, and remains a bachelor by the end of story, gladly helping his brother and sister-in-law in raising their children.
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