George Eliot

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Standard Name: Eliot, George
Birth Name: Mary Anne Evans
Nickname: Polly
Nickname: Pollian
Self-constructed Name: Mary Ann Evans
Self-constructed Name: Marian Evans
Self-constructed Name: Marian Evans Lewes
Pseudonym: George Eliot
Pseudonym: Felix Holt
Married Name: Mary Anne Cross
GE , one of the major novelists of the nineteenth century and a leading practitioner of fictional realism, was a professional woman of letters who also worked as an editor and journalist, and left a substantial body of essays, reviews, translations on controversial topics, and poetry.
Portrait of George Eliot, seated, after the 1881 painting of Francois Albert Durade.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Cultural formation Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon
By December 1860 BLSB was sufficiently interested in Roman Catholicism (to which Bessie Rayner Parkes later converted) to write about her interest to George Eliot , who responded with sympathy but a clear statement of...
Cultural formation Rose Macaulay
Over the course of her life, RM 's religious practices ranged between Anglican and Anglo-agnostic. She was initially given instruction in the Anglican faith by her mother. As an early adolescent (like George Eliot 's...
death Edith J. Simcox
Her ashes were buried with her mother at Aspley Guise, nine miles south of Bedford. The remains of her friend Elma Stuart lie beside those of George Eliot , an honour which she...
death George Henry Lewes
GHL , writer and partner of George Eliot , died at The Priory, near Regent's Park.
Ashton, Rosemary. G. H. Lewes: A Life. Clarendon Press, 1991.
277
death Augusta Webster
Theodore Watts-Dunton 's tribute in the Athenæum recalled a noble band of women represented by George Eliot , Mrs. Webster, and Miss Cobbe , who, in virtue of lofty purpose, purity of soul, and deep...
Dedications Jane Hume Clapperton
She dedicated the book to the memory of my early teachers, George Eliot and James Cranbrook , as well as her friend the author George Arthur Gaskell .
Clapperton, Jane Hume. Scientific Meliorism and the Evolution of Happiness. Kegan Paul, Trench & Co. , 1885.
v
Education Louisa Baldwin
Following her marriage, she studied German, French, and Italian, as well as the works of Shakespeare and the novels of George Eliot .
Taylor, Ina. Victorian Sisters. Adler and Adler, 1987.
114-15, 127
Education Sarah Orne Jewett
She read extensively as a child, and came early to authors as diverse as Jane Austen , George Eliot , Margaret Oliphant , Henry Fielding , Laurence Sterne , Elizabeth Gaskell and Harriet Beecher Stowe
Education C. E. Plumptre
Though nothing is know of CEP 's early education, in later life she kept an extensive library. On visiting her, Frederick James Gould noted that it was selected and arranged in an impressive order which...
Education Dervla Murphy
Her self-education continued. She had a conversion experience on attending a performance of Hamlet after classroom study had put her off Shakespeare . She read all the works of all the great English novelists,
Murphy, Dervla. Wheels within Wheels. J. Murray, 1979.
167
Education Bernice Rubens
At university, she was President of both the student Music and Socialist societies, as well as a member of the Students' Union Council.
Gilbert, Sarah. “Bernice Rubens”. Cardiff University Magazine, Vol.
1
, No. 1.
BR later found that her education slowed her development as a writer...
Education Alison Uttley
Alice Jane Taylor (later AU ) was a strong-willed child who set her own agenda. She later remembered a trial of wills, at the age of two, with her godmother, which ended not in her...
Education Amy Levy
At some time during her girlhood AL listed her favourite poets as all men, while her favourite prose writers included Charlotte Brontë , Elizabeth Gaskell , George Eliot , and Anne Thackeray Ritchie .
Beckman, Linda Hunt. Amy Levy: Her Life and Letters. Ohio University Press, 2000.
16
Education Mary Gawthorpe
Like all her siblings but one, MG had been taught to read before she went to the local Church of England infants' school, St Michael's, at the age of five.
Gawthorpe, Mary. Up Hill to Holloway. Traversity Press, 1962.
19
The whole family had...
Education Simone de Beauvoir
SB knew her alphabet at three, and learned to read quickly once she suddenly perceived that the letters were symbols.
Beauvoir, Simone de. Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter. Translator Kirkup, James, Penguin, 2001.
20
Later, the scanty resources of my city childhood could not compete with the riches...

Timeline

About 1349-1351: Giovanni Boccaccio worked at his cycle of...

Writing climate item

About 1349-1351

Giovanni Boccaccio worked at his cycle of tales entitled (from the fact that the stories are told over the course of ten days) the Decameron. It was first translated into English in 1620.
Bozman, Ernest Franklin, editor. Everyman’s Encyclopaedia. 4th Edition, J. M. Dent, 1958, 12 vols.

1495: In a bonfire of the vanities in Florence,...

Writing climate item

1495

In a bonfire of the vanities in Florence, Italy, Girolamo Savonarola destroyed texts by Ovid , Dante , Boccaccio and others.
Langer, William L., editor. An Encyclopedia of World History: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern, Chronologically Arranged. 4th ed., Houghton Mifflin, 1968.
319
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett. “Editorial Materials”. Casa Guidi Windows, edited by Julia Markus, Browning Institute, 1977, p. Various pages.
78

1677: Baruch or Benedictus de Spinoza's Ethics,...

Writing climate item

1677

Baruch or Benedictus de Spinoza 's Ethics, probably his most important text, was published shortly after his death at the age of forty-four.
Rée, Jonathan. “The Brothers Koerbagh”. London Review of Books, 24 Jan. 2002, pp. 21-4.
22, 23

January 1802: The Christian Observer was launched, as a...

Writing climate item

January 1802

The Christian Observer was launched, as a journal Conducted by members of the established church with the aim of combating Methodism and other Dissenting sects as well as radicalism and scepticism.
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

April 1817: The first issue of Blackwood's Edinburgh...

Writing climate item

April 1817

The first issue of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine appeared; founder William Blackwood intended to offer Tory competition to the liberal Edinburgh Review.
Houghton, Walter E., and Jean Harris Slingerland, editors. The Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals 1824-1900. University of Toronto Press, 1966–1989, 5 vols.
1: 7-9, 11
University of Alberta Libraries On-line Catalogue. http://www.library.ualberta.ca/.
Sutherland, John, b. 1938. The Stanford Companion to Victorian Fiction. Stanford University Press, 1989.
69

1826: The English Gypsy, or Roma, population was...

National or international item

1826

The English Gypsy, or Roma, population was grouped by authorities with all nomadic or vagrant peoples, who were estimated by William Cobbett to number around 30,000.
Behlmer, George K. “The Gypsy Problem in Victorian England”. Victorian Studies, Vol.
28
, No. 2, 1 Dec.–28 Feb. 1985, pp. 231-53.
232-3, 240, 243

1828: The first issue of the successful annual...

Writing climate item

1828

The first issue of the successful annual gift book The Keepsake appeared; lavish production and distinguished contributors raised the price of this and other such publications to a guinea.
Adburgham, Alison. Women in Print: Writing Women and Women’s Magazines from the Restoration to the Accession of Victoria. George Allen and Unwin Ltd., 1972.
239-41, 280
Quarterly Review. J. Murray.
381

22 March 1832: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe died at Weimar...

Writing climate item

22 March 1832

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe died at Weimar in Germany in his early eighties.
Chisholm, Hugh, editor. Encyclopaedia Britannica. Eleventh, Cambridge University Press, 1911.

20 March 1839: The Anti-Corn Law League was founded....

National or international item

20 March 1839

The Anti-Corn Law League was founded.
Mitchell, Sally, editor. Victorian Britain: An Encyclopedia. Garland Press, 1988.
29
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett. The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning to Mary Russell Mitford, 1836-1854. Editors Raymond, Meredith B. and Mary Rose Sullivan, Armstrong Browning Library at Baylor University, 1983, 3 vols.
3: 73, 80
Royle, Edward. Chartism. Longman, 1980.
127

1841: Ludwig Feuerbach published Das Wesen des...

Writing climate item

1841

Ludwig Feuerbach published Das Wesen des Christentums, an influential philosophical work demythologising Christianity.
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 5th ed., Oxford University Press, 1985.

1843: Charles Edward Mudie opened his first circulating...

Building item

1843

Charles Edward Mudie opened his first circulating library .
Feather, John. A History of British Publishing. Croom Helm, 1988.
154
Altick, Richard D. The English Common Reader. 2nd ed., Ohio State University Press, 1998.
295-6

March 1848: Chartist uprisings took place in London,...

National or international item

March 1848

Chartist uprisings took place in London, Glasgow, and Manchester.
Royle, Edward. Chartism. Longman, 1980.
40-3

1851: French medical researcher Charles-Edouard...

Building item

1851

French medical researcher Charles-Edouard Brown-Séquard experimented with the effects of blood transfusion on the responsiveness of nerves in human corpses.
Flint, Kate. “Blood, Bodies, and The Lifted VeilNineteenth-Century Literature, Vol.
51
, No. 4, 1997, pp. 455-73.
463-465

January 1852: Publisher John Chapman purchased the Westminster...

Writing climate item

January 1852

Publisher John Chapman purchased the Westminster and Foreign Quarterly and began issuing it as the Westminster Review (which, twenty-eight years and several mergers back, had been its original name).
Houghton, Walter E., and Jean Harris Slingerland, editors. The Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals 1824-1900. University of Toronto Press, 1966–1989, 5 vols.
3: 546-7, 617

July 1855: Alfred Tennyson published Maud and Other...

Writing climate item

July 1855

Alfred Tennyson published Maud and Other Poems.
Tennyson, Alfred. Tennyson’s Poetry. Editor Hill, Robert W., Jr, W. W. Norton, 1971.
213
Eliot, George. Essays of George Eliot. Editor Pinney, Thomas, Columbia University Press, 1963.
197

Texts

Eliot, George. Adam Bede. 1st ed., W. Blackwood, 1859, 3 vols.
Eliot, George. Daniel Deronda. W. Blackwood, 1876, 4 vols.
Eliot, George. Daniel Deronda. Editor Cave, Terence, Penguin, 1995.
Eliot, George. “Editorial Materials”. Essays of George Eliot, edited by Thomas Pinney, Columbia University Press, 1963, p. various pages.
Eliot, George. Essays of George Eliot. Editor Pinney, Thomas, Columbia University Press, 1963.
Eliot, George. Felix Holt. W. Blackwood, 1866, 3 vols.
Eliot, George. Felix Holt. Editor Thomson, Fred C., Clarendon, 1980.
Eliot, George. George Eliot’s Life as Related in her Letters and Journals. Editor Cross, John Walter, W. Blackwood, 1885, 3 vols.
Eliot, George. Impressions of Theophrastus Such. W. Blackwood, 1879.
Eliot, George, and Katharine S. Macquoid. Letter to Katharine S. Macquoid.
Eliot, George. Middlemarch. W. Blackwood, 1872, 4 vols.
Eliot, George. Middlemarch. Editor Haight, Gordon S., Riverside Edition, Houghton Mifflin, 1968.
Eliot, George. Middlemarch. Editor Carroll, David, Clarendon, 1986.
Eliot, George, and Felicia Bonaparte. Middlemarch. Editor Carroll, David, Oxford University Press, 1997.
Eliot, George. “Preface”. The George Eliot Letters, edited by Gordon S. Haight, Yale University Press, 1954, p. 1: ix - lxxvii.
Eliot, George. Romola. Smith, Elder, 1863, 3 vols.
Eliot, George. Romola. Editor Brown, Andrew, Clarendon, 1993.
Eliot, George. Scenes of Clerical Life. W. Blackwood, 1858, 2 vols.
Eliot, George. Scenes of Clerical Life. Editor Noble, Thomas A., Clarendon, 1985.
Eliot, George. Silas Marner. W. Blackwood, 1861.
Eliot, George. “Silly Novels by Lady Novelists”. Westminster Review, Vol.
66
, pp. 442-61.
Eliot, George. “Silly Novels by Lady Novelists”. A Victorian Art of Fiction, edited by John Charles Olmsted, Garland, 1979, pp. 277-98.
Feuerbach, Ludwig. The Essence of Christianity. Translator Eliot, George, J. Chapman, 1854.
Eliot, George. The George Eliot Letters. Editor Haight, Gordon S., Yale University Press, 1978, 9 vols.
Eliot, George. The Journals of George Eliot. Editors Harris, Margaret and Judith Johnston, Cambridge University Press, 1999.