Dinitia Smith has done more than
written a fictionalized biography of George Eliot; she’s recreated the woman
and her world. Eliot- the pen name of Marian Evans, taken because woman authors
were not taken seriously back then- lives and breathes in these pages.
The story is framed by what is
happening in 1880, when Marian is supposed to be enjoying her honeymoon with
John Cross in Venice. She’s not enjoying herself, though; Johnnie- who is
twenty years younger than Marian- is behaving oddly, manic and not his usual
caring and supportive self. During this time, Marian remembers her life,
starting with her girlhood.
Eliot started life in a rural
middle class family. Considered not to be marriage material because of her
plain looks, she was encouraged in her studies as her father felt she could
become a governess. Luck had it that she was given the run of a private library
where she could indulge her joy in reading and learning. She falls in with free
thinkers and polyamorous couples, and has a couple of relationships. But she
want more; she wants a relationship where she is the primary, not an extra.
Then she and George Lewes fall in love, and they have a happy, 26 year
relationship until he dies. The laws would not allow them to marry, even though
his wife had bourn multiple children to her lover. Lewes had allowed the
children to bear his name- which meant he was aware of her adultery, considered
a horrible thing, unlike his own relationship with Marian.
This relationship provided a goad
for Marian to start earning real money. While she had done translating and was
an editor of many works, she had not written her own pieces. Now she did, and
became a best seller. Lewes was an author as well, but not nearly so popular as
Marian, and they had to support not just themselves, and Lewes biological
children, but his wife’s children by her lover, who contributed not a penny to
their upkeep. Thankfully, Marian is able to do this, and put away enough money
for the rest of her life, thanks to the management of John Cross. Cross is
asked by Lewes to take care of Marian. Whether Lewes ever considered that it
would be by marrying Marian, this is how Cross felt he could best do it. He
truly loved Marian, although apparently not in a physical way. Smith presents
him as possibly being gay, as well as having a hereditary form of unipolar
mania.
I felt like I was living in Marian’s
world. Smith truly inhabited Marian as a brilliant but insecure woman who was
told from day one she was not marriage material because of her looks. I loved
the passages describing how she worked and developed her novels before writing them-
I’m always a sucker for descriptions of the artistic process. I’m ashamed to
say I’ve not read Eliot’s work- something I’ll fix soon- but I was very
impressed by her writing procedure and the amount of research that went into
her novels.
The author also did a huge amount
of research, going into mountains of letters written by and to Eliot and
others. Some of her lines are lifted straight from Eliot’s own words. She also
examined biographies not just of Eliot but of the people in her life, as well
as reading Eliot’s work, some of which, while fiction, is also semi-autobiographical.
It’s a solid story as well as an absorbing one.
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I received this book free from the Amazon Vine program.
Neither of these things influenced my opinion or review.
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