The Wisdom of George Eliot

The Philosophical Library presents the most important thinkers through the ages and their most influential writings
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THE WISDOM OF GEORGE ELIOT
 
“No soul is desolate as long as there is a human being for whom it can feel trust and reverence.”
—Romola
 
Virginia Woolf once hailed George Eliot’s masterpiece, Middlemarch, as “one of the few English novels written for grown-up people.” Certainly, Eliot was one of the greatest Victorian novelists, and her celebrated works include such classics as Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner, Adam Bede, and Daniel Deronda.

Born Mary Ann Evans in 1819, George Eliot was an original, almost radical, thinker whose unorthodox lifestyle as a working woman living openly with her lover made her a social pariah and cost her dearly. Yet through her novels, which she called “experiments in life,” she found a huge public following for her gentle empathy and keen social observations. Her work endures, for though her characters’ world may be radically different from our own, they confront the same dilemmas of intellect and spirit that we struggle with today.