George Eliot's novel Middlemarch has been graded as one of the most significant novel in the English literature. The novel was published in 1871 and 1872 in eight volumes. The story focused on the inhabitants of the Middlemarch, a fictional town in Midland England. Eliot has covered the important aspects of human life as education, religion, politics, social status of women and marriage. Believing in rationalism Eliot has raised real life issues in the novel. Middlemarch is not meant for entertainment she elaborates the results of taking the wrong decisions. The novel is mainly centred on lives of two characters Dorothea Brooke and Tertius Lydgate. Dorothea is an intelligent, wealthy, young women who married Edward Causa on, an elderly scholar, seeking wisdom and enlightenment herself. In the other hand, young doctor, Tertius Lydgate marries mayor's daughter Rosamond Vincy to get support of his dedicated wife to fulfil his dreams. But both faced cruel reality, their dreams shattered. Dorothea gets rejection from her husband and Lydgate is unhappy to see Rosamond's selfishness and egoism.
One of the leading English novelist of the Victorian era, George Eliot was the pen name of Mary Ann Evans. She was born on 22 November 1819, in rural Warwickshire. Her father Robert Evans was a estate manager and mother's name was Christiana Evans. She was influenced by her family's Methodist religious faith. She got an opportunity to read books in estate library and acquired good knowledge. For early education she studied at a local school and after that in a boarding. After her mother's death she left the school to help her father. While living in Coventry Eliot came in contact with Charles and Caroline Bray, their influence revolutionized her thinking and she became a rationalist. Her love partner George Henry Lewes encouraged her for fiction writing. Under the pen name of George Eliot her first novel Adam Bede was published in 1859. Her most notable literary works are- Adam Bede, The Mill on the Floss, Middlemarch, Silas Marne, Daniel Deronda etc. She was died in 1880. She has been appreciated for realistic view of life, psychological insight, ethical exploration and accomplished story theme.
