Middlemarch: Realism and Symbolic Form Author(s): Brian Swann Reviewed work(s): Source: ELH, Vol. 39, No.

2 (Jun., 1972), pp. 279-308 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2872247 . Accessed: 27/09/2012 05:45
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MIDDLEMARCH:
BY BRIAN SWANN

REALISM AND SYMBOLIC FORM

I SYMBOLIC

FORM:

GENERAL

SURVEY

Unity in essenceis multiplicity in existence. 1 (Feuerbach,Essence of Christianity)

"Middlemarch is a treasure-house of details,but it is an indifferent whole." HenryJamescould not see the one quality whichall of GeorgeEliot's criticstoday are agreedon: the amazingunification of meaning and sensibility in Middlemarch. James, however, had alreadydecidedin Partial Portraits that and when he GeorgeEliot's bent was peculiarly intellectual, came to writehis reviewof the novel forThe Galaxy,he did " Certainly not meet the new novel as a new experience. the greatest minds have the defects oftheir qualities, and as George Eliot'smindis preeminently and analytic, contemplative nothing is morenaturalthan that hermanner shouldbe discursive and expansive.'Concentration'would doubtless have deprived us of manyof the best things in the book. . . . 2 Blackwoodhad " in discussing used the word" panorama and James Felix Holt,3 uses the same wordwhenhe asks " It is not compact; but when was a panorama compact?" He concludes his 1873 review with thesewords: " It sets a limit, we think, to the development of theold-fashioned novel.Its diffuseness, English on which wehave makesit too copiousa doseofpurefiction. If we write touched, "' novelsso, howshallwe write History? James has raisedan important point. The old-fashioned novel a climax in Middlemarch andcouldgo no further, didindeed reach but not forthereasonJames gives,as we shallsee laterin more detail. At thispointwe shouldnotethat George Eliot as social
"

(London, 1854), p. 46. 2 Henry James, The Galaxy, 15 (1873), 424-25. 'John Blackwood to George Eliot, 24 April 1868, in The George Eliot Letters, ed. Gordon S. Haight (New Haven, 1954), IV, 243.
4

' Ludwig Andreas Feuerbach, The Essence of Christianity, trans. Marian Evans

The Galaxy,p. 428.

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historian is all the whilean artistattempting of art new forms in which to embody hervision.Contemporary nineteenth-century criticism was simply notequippedto deal in critical terminology withthat George Eliot was doingin hergreatest novel.5Today, we are stillgroping forterms to describe a workwhichstaysso closeto thetumultuous surface of lifeitself that CalvinBedient " can claimthatMiddlemarch is in effect, all vehicle, all medium, all transparency:dead to itself "; a novel that " wears no aesthetic garment, only the hair shirtof the world." Such an approachwhichdeprecates the " formalmining" of Barbara Hardy and her associatesas being" a littlelike counting the changeat FortKnox,"leavesus witha feeling of dissatisfaction. For Middlemarch is not a slice of life (" the bare beauty of veracity"),noris it trueto say that" nothing in George Eliot's othernovelsprepares 6 Only if us forits strong achievement." one insists on a simplistic approachsuch as Mr. Bedient'scan onemakeout a case for Middlemarch as sui generis. If,as willbe arguedlater,one sees the real uniqueness of the novel,thenone also observes thatthe poetictexture is related to the realism of The Mill on theFloss,forexample, or FelixHolt,or evenAdam Bede. In otherwords,thereis a vivid imagination at work whichhas its eye on the object and on relatedobjects-an " imagination. "esemplastic The traditional wayoflooking at sucha structure has beenin termsof organicunity.7GeorgeEliot herself was constantly referring to this aesthetic In a letterto JohnBlackprinciple. instance, wood,for shedeclines to makea change thatLeweshad in the Middlemarch suggested "I don't see how I manuscript. " becauseI hope thereis can leave anything out," she writes, nothing thatwillbe seento be irrelevant to mydesign, is which to show the gradualactionof ordinary causes ratherthan exand to showthis in some directions ceptional, whichhave not timeimmemorial thebeaten beenfrom path-the Cremorne walks
' Many of the leadingjournalsfoundthemselves baffled by the book, or praisedit forthe wrongreasons. See, forexample,The Spectator (2 December1871), 1458-60; Atheneum(2 December1871), 713-14; Quarterly Review, 134 (April,1873), 336-69; The Times (7 March 1873). FredericHarrison mightseem to be George Eliot's readerfrom the evidenceof a letterhe wrotein 1866 (Letters, perfect IV, 284-85), in whichhe discussesFelix Holt in termsof a poem. ' Calvin Bedient," Middlemarch:TouchingDown," Hudson Review,22 (1969), 71. 7 For a briefand cogent introduction to the topic of organicunity,see Richard Stang, The Theoryof the Novel in England,1850-1870 (London, 1959), pp. 134-35.

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essence of Middlemarch, a novel which includes and transmutes this ancient Aristotelian ideal of organicism. George Eliot herself provides a clue in the above quotation. She intends to take " directions which have not been from time immemorial the beaten path," and in 1863 she had told Richard Holt Hutton that " It is the habit of my imagination to strive after as full a vision of the medium in which a character moves as of the character itself."9 In this letter, George Eliot puts her failure in Romola down to " excess." The " vision " had been too " full." In Mliddlemarch,however, George Eliot realized her ambition. The concept of organic unity has not so much changed as become more subtle and inclusive. Almost every important word findsits sum of meaning increased to the pitch of symbolism, and the most helpful concept for understandingthe enormous richness of Middleimarch that I have found is Kenneth Burke's notion of " symbolic action." Before we can discuss its value in detail, however, a word on what we mean by the terms realism and symbolism in the novel, especially in a novel which came well before symbolism,having pervaded poetry, conquered drama and the novel by being " discreetly camouflaged under a deliberate show of realism." 10 Ursula Brumm has pointed out that the novel is a product of historicism and therefore " agnostic, sceptical, empirical, and secular."1 Along this line of reasoning, therefore,she claims that the novel was originally anti-symbolic," for it is opposed to the entire class of elements to which the symbol belongs. The realistic novel owes its origin to rejecting the paradigms that had for centuries determinedliteraryforms: fable, legend, myth, and the traditional, typical stories and characters from the storehouse of world literature that were constantly being reworked (i. e., the 'archetypes' that have become so popular again today) .12 It is hard to agree with such a selective approach, forit ignores
' 8 August 1863, Letters, IV, 97. (Summer, 1 Ursula Brumm, " Symbolism and the Novel," Partisan Review, 25 1958), 329. "L" Symbolism and the Novel," p. 330. 12 cc Symbolism and the Novel," p. 331.
8 24 July 1871, Letters, V, 168.

8 The concept and shows offiction." oforganic unity had become a commonplace for GeorgeEliot by the time she wrotethis sentence. We mustlookelsewhere fortherealand fresh aesthetic

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theactualworkings of theartistic mind.Even Robinson Crusoe, of that" just history offact,"is structured rounda wholeseries symbolic autobioincidents which, whileanchored in spiritual graphy, floatfreeinto the archetypal. The statement applies Eliot. It is toosimplistic evenlessto George to saythatthenovel is merely concerned and idiosyncratic, that with" theindividual is, the particular in its particular circumstances, withreality as experienced by the individual as constituting the onlygenuine version ofreality." For one,thecoreofGeorge Eliot'sphilosophic position is thatthevoracious egomustaccommodate itself to the of others. needs For another, thereis a stagein her novelsin which,as she told FredericHarrison, a generalidea is more important than " the individual and idiosyncratic," '3 (we remember James thatHenry had observed that" sheproceeds from theabstract to theconcrete ") ." She aimedat a balancebetween the two forces, and had set aside The SpanishGypsybecause "it was in thatstageof Creation or 'Werden,' in which theidea of the characters predominated overthe incarnation." '5 Despitemydisagreement Miss Brumm, with it is she,however, who approaches the position I wouldlike to developwhenshe writeson Ippolito Nievo's forgotten of mid-ninemasterpiece teenthcentury, Confessions of an Octoqenarian.She asserts that " the greatnineteenth-century novelis not the product of an imagination in symbolic working terms.It is a representation oflife, butnota symbolic representation." '6 Miss Brumm shows that,in fact,Nievo's novel cannothelp becoming a symbolic representation of meaning.Details of the castle of Frata are inwhich "components theforms thatshape" theempirical reality and become visible.Fromthispointof viewthey "concentrate are seen to concretize the meaning in reality."That is. sought thecastlecomes a symbol. closeto being As MissBrumm admits, " and particular thecastleis theconcrete oftheideas expression and as suchit can assumethe and forces thatshapethereality, of a symbol.The outstanding functions difference between such and thesymbols ofmodern 'realistic'symbols literature is that, theformer arenotcompact thelatter, unlike thatmakea images
1

" 15 August 1866, Letters, IV, 301. Henry James, Partial Portraits (London, 1899), p. 51. '5 15 August 1866, Letters, IV, 301. 16 " Symbolism and the Novel," p. 333.

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singlesensual impact,but are oftenextensive and not easily delimitable segments of reality." WithGeorge Eliot we have precisely the samecase, but there are complications. She,forinstance, extends themeaning ofhistoricalrealism, not onlyin the direction of the incorporation of strictly accuratehistorical but by embodying the backgrounds, "mythopoeicaspect of history" which Miss Brummclaims Stendhal, Tolstoy, and other did not nineteenth-century masters concern themselves with. As Jerome Beaty has shown, the Reform movement makesits appearance in Middlemarch not only withthe physicalincidents and structures of the Reform Bill, but is a structural metaphor whichsymbolizes the efforts of the individuals in the novel to evolve,or reform themselves.17 A then, need not onlybe a thing.It can also be an idea. symbol, " GeorgeEliot strivesto realizeis not merely The "medium objective, but spiritual.Not onlyis there" no creature whose inwardbeingis so strong that it is not greatly determined by what lies outsideit,"" but this objectiverealityis neverthe simpleentity Miss Brummassumesreality to be. As earlyas AdamBede, George Eliot had claimed theright to takeas reality that whichis selectedby her consciousness. The mindis not a mirror, nor is realitysimply merely objectiveverisimilitude. While denying the transcendentalism implicitand explicitin she wouldyet have agreedwithhim that " all visible Carlyle, things are emblems," and that " matter existsonlyspiritually Since language is the bodyof thought, and " metaphors are her stuff," man everywhere "findshimself encompassed withsymbols."19 Absoluterealismin the novel can never exist,for,as Jose " is " anti-poetic Ortegay Gasset observes, reality" in itself "; " itsnature is inert and insignificant." can never Reality, indeed, be the subjectof art. Mythcomesfirst, and reality comesfrom its destruction; realitybecomespoetic and hence artisticby "destruction ofthemyth ". which In thisform is of an inert and insignificant reality, nature, is changed quietandmute, intoan activepower acquires movement,
17 "oHistory by Indirection:the Era of Reform in Middlemarch," Victorian Studies, 1 (September, 1957), 173-79. ed. Gordon S. Haight (Cambridge,Mass., 1956), 18 George Eliot, Middlemarch, p. 612. Thoughout, all references are to this edition. 19 Thomas Carlyle,SartorResartus (London,1940), p. 54.

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of aggression againstthe crystalline orb of the ideal. The enchantment of the latter broken,it falls into fine,iridescent dust whichgradually loses its coloursuntil it becomes an earthybrown. We are presentat this scene in every novel. So that strictly speaking,it is not reality that becomes poetic or enters into the work of art, but only that featureor movementof realityin which the ideal is reabsorbed.20 Such realism is best summarized for Ortega y Gasset in Don Quixote which, because it was written against chivalry, bears all the books of chivalry within it, and hence possesses a quality of poetry which complicates surface realism. One cannot call such a novel realistic. " This is what we call realism: to bring things to a distance, place them under a light, incline them in such a way that the stress falls upon the side which slopes down towards pure materiality." This is death, not art. The life of true realism is myth. " The myth is always the starting point of all poetry, including the realistic, except that in the latter we accompany the myth in its descent, in its fall. The theme of realistic poetry is the crumbling of poetry." 21 George Eliot began her writing career with a translation of Feuerbach, the whole impetus of whose work was to destroy supernatural myth and place humanistic values on what had once been regarded as transcendental. Scenes of Clerical Life and Adam Bede are studies, in purely "' provincial " terms, of sin (in these cases, not venal sin, but a kind of atrophy of the heart), punishment,repentance, and forgiveness. The religious or liturgical pattern is clear, but the significancehas changed. In George Eliot the crumbling of the ideal is the construction of the real, but the tradition of the ideal is transformedand incorporated into a new reality. Christian teleology and epistemology are brought down to earth, and become truly " ideal " in Lewes' sense of the word.22 George Eliot's theory and practice of art moved from this "tsimple " realism, to a complex or true realism which comes close to Ortega y Gasset's position that true realism contains the
20

1957), 28. 21 Ortega y Gasset, " The Nature of the Novel," p. 30. 22 "C Art always aims at the representation of Reality, i. e., of Truth; and no departure from truth is permissible, except such as inevitably lies in the nature of the medium itself. Realism is thus the basis of all Art, and its antithesis is not Idealism but Falsism." From "Realism and Idealism," in The Literary Criticism of George Henry Lewes, ed. Alice Kaminsky (Lincoln, Nebrarska, 1964), p. 87.

JosI Ortegay Gasset, "The Nature of the Novel," Hudson Review, 10 (Spring,

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": Realiswm and Symbolic Form "Middlemarch

mythic or poetic. The mythic and poeticare bothsubsumed in the symbol, and in Middlemarch, George Eliot devotesno little space to discussions of the symbolic mode of perception. For instance, Mr.Brooke, whois in many waysa wisefool, a character whooften voicesdramatically George Eliot's ownopinions, says " Everything at onepoint thatinNaumann's painting, is symbolical you know-the higher styleof art." Havingdecidedthis,he concludes his sentence with" I like that up to a certain point, but nottoo far-it's rather straining to keepup with, you know. But youare at homein that,Casaubon. Andyourpainter's flesh is good-solidity, of that sort" (241). transparency, everything In a humorous way,George Eliot is indicating herownposition. " is in the " flesh," The " naturalmeaning its " solidity, transparency." A manhas beenpainted, and notan abstraction. at Mr. Brooke Of course, Eliot is directing George gentle irony of the way Will explained also, sincewe had learned previously the symbolism of his paintingof " Tamburlaine Drawingthe Conquered Kingsin his Chariot."Tamburlaine, says Will,symbolizesthe " tremendous courseof the world'sphysicalhistory " (158), as well as " earthlashingon the harnessed dynasties " and " migrations ofracesand clearings quakesand volcanoes of forests-and America and the steam-engine." Willis also having ofcourse, fun, buthe doesnotseemto takesymbolism seriously, an abilityto respond GeorgeEliot, however, to proper regards is concentrated as important. symbolism Symbolism indication of meaning, and we see how Dorotheais beginning to recover from"the gigantic broken revelations"(143) of Rome, when she realizesthat the symbolic method is morethan " a difficult " kindofshorthand (158). She begins to see meanings belowthe and intellectual surface, to growin aesthetic powerwhenshe in " saintswitharchitectural can see significance modelsin their in their or knives skulls.Somethings hands, accidentally wedged had seemedmonstrous to herweregathering which intelligibility and even a natural meaning" (159). idea of whatGeorgeEliot meantby We can obtaina clearer as "the higherstyleof art" when we extendour symbolism from" China to view, if not as far as Mr. Brooke suggests, thenovelitself, Peru" (370), thenoverand within and eventu-Eliot aimedat creating allyto " NotesOn FormIn Art." George is the primefunction the complete of image)forimage-making Brian Swann 285

or " We are all ofus imaginative theimagination.23 in someform " (237). In hisargument for other, images arethebroodofdesire on these withNaumann, language againstpainting Will defends image,whichis all the grounds: "Language gives the fuller and better forbeingvague. After all, the trueseeingis within; imperfection" (142.). paintingstaresat you withan insistent " within."The complete imageis Knowledge passes intofeeling ofreality.We have something conditioned segment a spiritually " that ideal in thephrasedescribing Eliot's aesthetic likeGeorge but feeling-an idea distinctness whichis no longerreflection of sense,like the solidityof back to the directness wrought pointis made in the later dialogue objects" (157). A similar is to Willand Dorothea.To be a poet,Willpontificates, between " in instantaneously into have a soul passes whichknowledge flashes back as a new organof knowledge" feeling, and feeling (166).24 Symbolicformis not the same as meddlingwith and,to a lesser which symbols, is whatWilldoesin hispainting, form whatNaumanntheNazarenedoesalso. Symbolic is extent, a wholehabit of mindin whichunityis the object-unity of and symbol.Just as knowledge and the personas individual is only Eliot an individual feeling shouldbe one, so forGeorge he sees himself in relation to when others.Every fullyhimself as idea,perception, whether or individual, partof the organism, " " ofall the I would wish term to shouldbecomewhat symbolic 25 others, by way of what KennethBurke calls " synecdoche." the way in whichreality becomes Ortegay Gasset describes of poetic (or symbolic)in termswhichrecallWill's statement back to is wrought the directness the way in whichknowledge of reality or movement to " that gesture in of sense. He refers Kenneth Burke describes whichthe idea is reabsorbed.26 this ofan attitude." as " thedancing 2 this" symbolic act,'" mutuality, and the wholeartefact is concoincide, Language and gesture or of " in E. K. as Brown's terms, George rhythm, structed,
' Lewes, in Principles writesthat Imagination is " simply of Success in Literature, an image-we musthave the images,"and " to imagine-to form the powerof forming relationsof thingspresentto the mind" (Kaminsky,pp. 14-15). numerous Sensibility," "4In "George Eliot and the Unified PMLA, 79 (1964), 130-36,N. N. Feltes suggeststhat GeorgeEliot obtainedthis ideal fromLewes' pioneerwork The Problemsof Life and Mi-nd. of LiteraryForm (Louisiana State, 1941), pp. 26-28. "6 The Philosophy 26 " The Nature of the Novel," p. 28. 2"Philosophy of Literary Form,p. 10. 'f Rhythmin the Novel (Toronto,1950).

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with variation" (7) . Reality,says Eliot has it, "repetition

Ortega y Gasset, is a " generic function"i 29 that is, a cause and not an end. The way in which it takes its primary part in the evolution of a symbolic form gives it value. In Middlemarch, George Eliot has created a new form of fictionwhich, with the remarks of Ortega y Gasset and Kenneth Burke in mind, might be called " symbolic realism." As far as organizing "natural everyday incidents" into a " strictly related " 3 whole is concerned, George Eliot did niothave lo move beyond Scenes of Clerical Life and its achievement. But in her firstnovel, symbolic technique is rudimentaryand relatively unsophisticated. There may be a fervor in the bareness, but the event takes precedence and any symbolism is a bonus. Thus, in " Mr. Gilfil's Love Story," we are told explicitly that the remodelling of Cheveral Manor and the growing-up of Tina are meant to be brought together in our mind. In Middlemrarch, George Eliot speaks occasionally as if a symbol were a kind of substitute for the real event. She can write, for example, that in droughtyyears, " baptism by immersioncould only be performed symbolically" (46) . At other times, in her letters, the symbolic seems superior to the empirical or mundane: " It seems to me that the soul of Christianitylies not at all in the facts of an individual life, but in the ideas of which that life was the meetingpoint and the new starting-point. We can never have a satisfactory basis for the history of the man Jesus, but that negation does not affect the Idea of the Christ either in its historical influence or its great symbolic meaning." 31 Still again, George Eliot speaks of the symbolic as if it were an adjunct of the ideal (and hence an ambiguous ingredientof any realistic presentation). She explains what she considers the failure of Romola: "The various strands of thought I had to work out forced me into a more ideal treatment of Romola than I had foreseen at -theoutset-though the ' Drifting away' and the Village with the Plague belonged to my earliest version of the storyand were by deliberate forecast adopted as romantic and symbolical elements." 32 The romantic element, these final scenes, is meant clearly to summarize and symbolize certain strands of the narrative by way of
29

"cThe Nature of the Novel," p. 30. "George Eliot to Anthony Trollope, 23 October 1863, Letters, IV, 110. 21 George Eliot to Mrs. Alfred Taylor, 30 July 1863, Letters, IV, 95. 32 George Eliot to Sara Sophia Hennell, 15 September 1864, Letters, IV, 103.

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colorful conclusion. The suggestion is that such incidents are climactic, unusual, and thereforea whole novel could not consist of such a symbolic technique. By the time George Eliot wrote Middlemarch, however, matters had become more complex. A symbol is without meaning in itself (as George Eliot realized by having the final scenes in Romola gather all that had gone before). To complicate the matter, a symbol's " many-sidedness 'I 33 is hazardous to strict accuracy, and the meaning of a symbol is not ascertainable, since if it were there would be no need for the symbol. To read Middlemarch correctly,one must be able to hear nuances, reverberationsof a word fromcontext to context, for in this novel everythingis part of symbolic form or action, down to the metaphors themselves. As Mark Schorer has demonstrated, George Eliot's metaphors " tend always to be, or to become, explicit symbols of psychological or moral conditions, and they actually functionin such a way as to give symbolical value to much action, as Dorothea's pleasure in planning buildings ('a kind of work which she delighted in') and Casaubon's desire to construct a ' Key to all Mythologies. Their significancelies, then, not so much in the area of choice (as ' commerce,' or ' natural elements'and' animals') as in the choice of function, and one tests them not by their field, but by their conceptual portent." In a later essay, Mr. Schorer admits that his classification of verbs of unificationand progressive movement which symbolize on a verbal level the movement of the plot (" endless vistas of unending good," "the religion of progress"), is a classification: " I am, of course, arranging the metaphorical material in that pattern." " Nevertheless, his essays are valuable in that they draw attention to a basic principle of construction which, anticipating gestalt, gives fullvalue to the actual unit of construction, the autonomous yet related image or fact. For, in gestalt (which began as a theoryof mind as a repudiation of older ideas imported into the philosophy of mind by analogy with atomic physics), " the elementary and irreducible units of experience are articulated and structured,though unitary, wholes akin rather to the
" George Eliot, " The Progress of the Intellect," in The Essays of George Eliot, ed. Thomas Pinney (London, 1963), p. 28. 84 "cFiction and the Matrix of Aanalogy," Kenyon Review, 11 (Autumm, 1949), 550. Critical of theNovel,"in Middlemarch: 35 " The Structure Approaches to theNovel, ed. Barbara Hardy (Oxford, 1967), p. 20.

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36 forces." patternof structured atom withits internal modern Eliot,in " Notes On FormIn Art,"statesas one of the George that " Form,as an she was evolving, principles new aesthetic must beginwiththe perception of humanexperience, element . . . & thatthings as separate mustbe recognized of separateness as wholescomposedof wholesbeforethey can be recognized partsof as relatively can be regarded thewholes or before parts, that wholes of dynamic whole."Because of thenumber a larger " and formis unlikeness," can make a unity, fundamentally, " everydifference 37 Darrel Mansell,in an is form." therefore states that for of form, articleon GeorgeEliot's conception GeorgeEliot " Form is not outwardappearancebut 'inward' whichGeorgeEliot 38 The concept form of symbolic relations." is relatedto was working towardsis one in whicheverything theactuality itsownquidditas, sacrificing elsewithout everything ofits present existence. Eliot integrates theme, On a morallevel (to showhowGeorge an we so within form), and encompassing on, plot, language, above entailsthe conceptof notethat the ideal outlined might was insisted thatself-sacrifice Eliot always self-sacrifice. George from from self-knoxvledge, a strict farmoreviableif it emanated Mr. FareThus, in Middlemarch, an integrated personality. thatsheis in love with brother givesup Marybecausehe knows that he is realizes own he his because shortcomings, and Fred makeshift" he becomes " onlya decent (130) . By renunciation, and useful Similarly, achieves dignity. more greater Dorothea, notonly finds herlifeon Casaubon'saltar, to sacrifice whowishes her personality, that her desire stems fromher incomplete is an exercise in self-knowledge but that self-sacrifice ignorance, and of the ideas, personal grandiose up large involving giving When she is able to do this,she is able to prideand dignity. of Rosamund to breakdownthe egotism able fully, giveherself Eliot knewas wellas and the reticent prideofLydgate. George " is also a gain, in loss " self-sacrifice the intentional Jungthat it provesthat you possessyour"for if you can give yourself

self."39 The quidditas of the self which sacrifices itself from a

Harold Osborne, "Artistic Unity and Gestalt," The Philosophical Quarterly, 14 (July, 1956), 215. 37 "c Notes On Form In Art," in Essays, pp. 432-33. 5 (1965), 653. 38 "C George Eliot's Conception of Form," SEL, in Pagan and Christian 39 C. G. Jung, "Transformational Symbolism in the Mass," Mysteries, ed. Joseph Campbell (New York, 1933), p. 131.

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is relatedto the not of vague benevolence, position of strength, to a truerelation quidditasof each part of the plot. Creating of self-sacrifice is onlypossibleby a knowledge othersthrough sense of self. The individual unit of the plot, in the integral though is "articulated and structured, gestalt terminology, 40 unitary."
II
MIDDLEMARCH:

THE NOVEL

ITSELF

(i) Systole and Diastole: The Scene as Symbolic Center thereseemsto be no ofpublishing, the exigencies Apartfrom is dividedinto eightbooks. organicreason why Middlemarch in of construction is the principle though, What is intentional, each book, for thereis always one scene in whichissues are summarized and evaluatedfromthe widestpossiblepoint of together more a scene bringing view. This scene is generally in the movement and is the larger peoplethan in otherscenes, a symbolic danceofcharacters, center ofconsciousness. Lydgate, certain artistic principles, whoshareswithhis creator important thisdevice: " there to apprehend by which givesus a metaphor he says. That is, in all enquiry," and diastole mustbe a systole and thehorizon the wholehumanuniverse ofan objectbetween glass" (468). For GeorgeEliot thereis no privatelife that has not been scene such as we are influenced by publiclife. Each symbolic is a largebeat in the lifeof the novel,when about to examine ways. We, or clearer issuescome to the forein moredramatic Book 1, Chapter ofthesescenes, shalldeal onlywiththefirst 10, holdsforall the others."4 but the principle 10 we have thepoint, Beaty informs Jerome In Chapter us. at " portion ofthenovel which andwhere the the" Miss Brooke ends, " characters areintroduced. The reason main" Middlemarch why Eliot decidedto fusethe earlier which she had had story George
" Other examples of such scenes are Chapter 18 in Book 2, Chapter 25 in Book 4, Chapter 82 in Book 3, Chapter 51 in Book 5, and Chapters 60 and 63. For a more complete, though different list of what he calls "conglomerate" scenes, see Neil D. Isaacs, "Middlemarch: Crescendo of Obligatory Drama," NCF, 18 (June, 1963), 21-34.
40 Osborne, "Artistic Unity and Gestalt," p. 215.

" a man's mind must be continuallyexpanding and shrinking

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in mindforsome time,withthe otherstoryis that theyhave pointsin common, and George saw Eliot's syncretic imagination " them as essentially partsofthesamestory.Bothare about high idealswhich in both cometo nothing or little more thannothing; casesan unwise and unhappy marriage playsa partin obstructing the realization of theseideals." 42 Moreover, the time element and sceneof the two stories are similar.As the two stories are reallyone story, even the characters seem to be part of one character, partsof an ideal wholewhichexistsin the narrator's consciousness (a pointto be takenup againlater). 10 focusses Chapter initially onWill,butonlyto dismiss himin short space. To balancethisintroduction, Lydgatemakesa brief first appearance at theendofthechapter, andis meant to contrast favorably withthe ephemeral Will. Apartfrom Fred,thesetwo are the onlyyoungmen in the novel,and somereadersas the navel appearedin serial formsaw possibilities of a romance between Lydgateand Dorothea. But GeorgeEliot had a more subtleeffect in mind, and at thispointcarefully keepsDorothea and Lydgate apart (thoughthey seem to have met because Lydgatemakes the fatuousjudgment on page 69 that she is look further thanMiddlemarch. Will the exotichas alreadyleft the small stifling community to findhis way in an area no moreprecisethan the entirearea of Europe" (61), and we nextsee himin Rome,where he meetsDorothea. In Chapter 10 we begin to sense a kinshipbetweenDorothea and Will, for Will's world of "'possibilities" (61) contrastsstrongly with Casaubon's"small taperof learnedtheory exploring the tossed ruins of the world" (61) . Dorothea's dissatisfaction in this chapter is causedby Casaubon'sinsensitive remark thatshe had better take Celia withher,in order to give Casaubonmoretime for hisserious work; theimplication is thatDorothea cannot share his esoterica. Estrangement is already in the air. Most of the men in the novel (except,perhaps, Will) are about the natureof women. This fact is used as a ignorant symbol ofmoraldecayin thetownand in thenationas a whole, forit traverses thelocal squire, from society Mr. Brooke, to " the " ofNorthumberland(69). It pervades Lydgate's therun-of-theof suchmenas Chichely millmoraljudgments whoprefers what
42

" a little too in earnest") . The Dorothea storyis beginning to

JeromeBeaty, Middlemarch fromNotebook to Novel (Urbana, 1960), p. 9.

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he regards as a truly feminine woman, not Dorotheabut Rosa" mund; someonewith a little filigree," "somethingof the coquette" (68) . Lydgatewillbecomethe scapegoat forsharing such ideas. He will attain a kind of tragicdignity by seeing beyondthe mask whenit is too late, and havingto make the bestofit. In this chapter,the "second-linecharacters," Vincys,Bulstrodes, and so on, anchorus firmly " in the prosaic"medium which Dorothea is trying to escape,which and which Willevades, Lydgate, ironically sharing so muchwiththem, has cometo try and improve.This party" before had done its notable Reform part" (65), symbolizes the sheerbulkand weight of the reality facing Dorothea, emphasizes thatany reform which come might to Middlemarch will be dreadfully slow in succeeding.43 This dumpy the same which is testing reality, Dorotheawho triesto crusadeforimproved housingwhileher uncle runs the worst estatein thedistrict, willtestLydgateand hisbrittle self-possession. Lydgatedoesnotknow howto deal with and Middlemarch, the scene is a masterly of way the main characters bringing in orderfor us to see themin the contextof their together invidious environment. (ii) The Scene as Symbolic Embodiment Another of the symbolic vigorous ingredient form of Middlemarch is thosescenes which George Eliot had alwaysused,scenes whichmight be called symbolic sincetheyimbue embodiments, naturalistic incidents with thematic orsymbolic willto stature. In AdamBede, forinstance, themirror Hettybefore is a crudeemblematic version ofthisprincple, while in Daniel Derondathefirst sceneat thegambling casinosymbolizes in beautifully controlled tonestheabrogation will of and abandonment to chancewhich is Daniel's fate untilhe embraces the Zionistcause. The drifting ofDaniel on theThamesis another embodiment ofthesameidea. Middlemarch contains manysuch scenes,and the novelcalls attention to the technique since,like Daniel Deronda,it opens withsucha scene. The richness of Chapter1 precludes analysis in depth, but theprinciple is clear. The " plain dressing"(5) of Dorotheais ironic, and a kind of humorous desperation hangs
4 J. W. Beach, The Twentieth-CenturyNovel (New discusses what he calls these " second-line characters."

York, 1932), pp. 129-30,

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to suppress the " pagan sensuous " (7) strain to over her efforts her character. The discussion with Celia about their mother's jewels symbolizes this dichotomy. "How very beautiful these gems are! "i she exclaims, and then rationalizes her instinctive delight with, " It is strange how deeply colours seem to penetrate one, like scent. I suppose that is the reason why gems are used as spiritual emblems in the Revelation of St. John. They look like fragmentsof heaven " (10) . She attempts to " merge" the sermon'9ssensuous pleasure "in her mystic religious joy." For Dorothea, spiritual emblem and physical fact never quite coincide, however. The marriage to Casaubon is meant to satisfy the spiritual, but at the expense of the physical. Will, like one of the " little fountains of pure colour " (10), is always associated with the play of light, and is meant to suggest that Dorothea at the end of the novel is well on the way to integratingthe dual aspects of her personality," sensuous force controlled by spiritual passion" (141). Dorothea's honeymoon in Rome is another example of symbolic embodiment. All the verbal imageryof ruin and decay which have been associated with Casaubon in the early part of the novel finds physical expression in the Eternal City, city of " stupendous fragmentariness" (143) . Rome corresponds to Dorothea's spiritual confusion as she discovers more about the man she has married; both city and husband are "broken revelations" (143) . Rome undermines her " principles" with its " deep impression" (143), and its confusingsensuousness. " All this vast wreck of ambitious ideals" shocks her out of her English complacency, for she is " tumbled among incongruities" (144). In addition, Rome symbolizes the ruin in Casaubon's personality, where " the large vistas and wide freshair" which Dorothea had hoped to discover in it " were replaced by anterooms and winding passages which seemed to lead nowhere" (145). Dorothea has to drive out to the Campagna " where she could feel alone with the earth and sky, away from the oppressive masquerade of ages" (143). Correspondingly,it is to Will she turns for freshnessof response and open sympathy. The last example of this sort to be examined differsfrom the previous two, in that it is what might be termed " symbolic parody ": " It is a narrow mind which cannot look at a subject fromvarious points of view" (49). Parody, including the narraMr. Brooke's parody of reformand his obsession tor's self-parody,

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withhis documents whichparallelsCasaubon'smethod of compilation, and so on, is a larger element in Middlemarch thanin anyoftheother novels.Chapter 23 consists entirely ofa parody ofone of the strands of themainaction.On thenarrative level, thepurpose ofthesceneat thehorse fair which Fred attends with Bambridge and Jiorrocks is clear. Fred trusts to his " luck" in havingthingsturn out well, fashioning events"accordingto " (173). He feels desire thattheuniverse willaccommodate itself to his wishes, a characteristic attitudeGeorgeEliot regards as peculiarly egoistic. Whenhisventure intohorse-dealing turns out fortrusting badly,Mr. Garthhas to pay the penalty him,and a climaxthus comesabout in Fred's relations withMary. On the symbolic level,the factthatFred was sold a viciousanimal which theowner had claimed was a docilebeastparodies partof the larger Lydgate/Rosamund plot. The clue is in the sentence the horse'sviciousness:" Therewas no moreredress describing forthisthan forthe discovery of bad temper aftermarriage whichof courseold companions wereaware of before the ceremony" (177). Fred egoistically choosesa horseby trusting to his " luck"; Lydgatechooses a wife, to his knowledge trusting of women.Justhowmuchhe has learned from withthe experience fairsexwe aremeantto gaugefrom theLaure incident. Lydgate and vulgarly, believes, conventionally thatwomen are fordecoration. His choiceof Fred's sisteris rendered ludicrous whenwe see Rosamundand the vicioushorsesuperimposed to form one image.Onewould haveexpected a reformer andhumanitarian not to trustto appearances, and to have enquired closerinto the qualitiesof his mate before But Lydgatehas " spots marriage. " (111). In George ofcommonness Eliot'snon-tragic these world, flaw. are equivalent to thetragic With such scenesin mind,we shouldpause beforeagreeing with Peter K. Garrett'scontention wholeheartedly that the ccstaple scene" in GeorgeEliot does "not display a notable concentration of meaning." 4 (ii) " The Expanding Symbol" are consciously Some partsof Middlemarch suchas symbolic, the well-known passageon page 578. Dorotheahas cometo the realization that she loves Will and that Lydgatehas a strong
" Scene and SymbolfromGeorgeEliot to JamesJoyce (New Haven, 1969), p. 15.

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claim on her aid and sympathy.She regardsboth men as "objects of herrescue" (577), and "'What shouldI do-how should I act now . . . ? '": was It had takenlongforherto cometo thatquestion, and there light piercing into theroom.Sheopened hercurtains, andlooked out towards thebit ofroadthatlay in view, with fields beyond, outside theentrance-gates. On theroadthere was a manwith a bundle on hisbackand a woman carrying herbaby;in thefield shecouldsee in the figures moving-perhaps the shepherd with his dog. Far off of the bending skywas thepearly light; and shefeltthelargeness world and the manifold wakings of mento labourand endurance. She waspartofthatinvoluntary, and couldneither palpitating life, lookoutonit from herluxurious shelter as a mere spectator, norhide hereyesin selfish complaining. The passageseemsto drawsomeof its powerfrom memories of theEden myth and onewouldnotwantto be much morespecific. to Yet the detailsof the man and the womanseem to refer specific intentions. One couldmake analogies, and say Lydgate is theburdened man,but themethod does notreallywork.The as into the general symbolsare to be understood expanding consciousness we have of the novel at thispoint. Details point to the climactic moment.The factthat Dorothealooks out of thegatesofherhouseis an involuntary the window and beyond altruistic Bundle and baby are the way of the world gesture. " skyis notonly sheis aboutto be inducted into. The " bending an accurate but suggests description, vastness, up the and,taking to an oversuggestion ofthe burdened man,extends the burden of labor. Dorotheais about to leave Middlearching principle shelter." march and her" luxurious is easierto follow.In The secondkind of expanding symbol thenatural is generally a relationship between Eliot there George eventor situation. The symbolic detailand a psychic relationship than the earlier in Midcdlemarch is less emphasized novels,and in The Mill on doesnot expandor dilateas it does,forexample, is strangely theFloss orAdamBede. Landscapein Middlemarch muted,and effective mostlyas delicateanalogy. Thus, when DorotheavisitsCasaubonforthe first and time,it was autumn in the of yellowleaves" (54) was falling " a sparseremnant whatLydgate's married Lowickestate. Again,whenshe realizes her is set lifeis, and that she might help, insight against" the bright greenbuds whichstood in relief againstthe dark ever" In the are green (557). juxtaposition, promiseand tragedy Brian Swann p295

herhoneyfrom gently hinted.Finally,whenDorotheareturns howmoon,it is mid-January, and snowis falling.Generally, The ever,this device of natureas symbolis used sparingly. so muchas a scenein Middlemarch is not the arenaof nature, "mental estate" (207). The point is well made by Quentin Anderson, that what GeorgeEliot surveys "mightbe called a landscapeof opinion, forit is not the naturallandscapethat is seen but things dominant here." The interest is not in " things
feltand believed."' less immediately The thirdkindof expandingsymbolis subtler, of tone, a certainty of nuance. apprehensible;a significance Symbolicuse ofwaterin Middlemarch dependsmoreon the sharpness of the unconsciousmind for its effectthan on conscious of waterslowlycome appreciation.In the novel,wateror streams to symbolizesensibility.This verbal symboldoes not acquire a as it does forexample in The,Mill on the physicalmanifestation Floss or Daniel Deronda (where Grandcourtdrownsin his own " (4), egoism). Such phrasesas " the livingstreamof fellowship
" the stream of feeling'" (46), and the " open-channels" of

" (565) indicatethe symbolicarea Dorothea's " ardentcharacter GeorgeEliot is cultivating.The symbolis pervasiveand seldom stressed. For example, when Dorothea is about to marry " Casaubon, she thinksof his mind as an " ungauged reservoir (17), or as "a lake compared to my little pool" (18). She finds,however,that her marriagein fact cuts her offfromthe great sea of sensibility.She findsthat she is "exploring an enclosed basin " (145) whereCasaubon's soul is "fluttering in the " (206). swampyground in the case of Lydgate,who, The symbolis also used ironically whenhis workis goingwell,exists" in that agreeableafter-glow of when thoughtlapses fromexaminationof a specific excitement sense of its connections object into a suffusive withall the restof our existence-seems,as it were,to throwitselfon its back after vigorous swimmingand float with the repose of unexhausted " (122) . This sense of connectedness, this unity of strength is soon to be dissipatedin beingwhichLydgate possessesbriefly, the divisionhe creates betweenlife and work. Furtherironyis ofLydgate's elementfrom providedby the dwindling "I have the at a Spa " bath" (128). sea to swimin " (128) to practising
in From Dickens to Hardy, ed. Boris Ford 4""George Eliot in Middlemarch," 1960), p. 280. (Harvrmndsworth,

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" (213) . " For like Dorothea had not enteredinto his traditions years after Lydgate rememberedthe impressionproduced in him" by Dorothea's involuntary appeal forhelp (214). This scene with Lydgate also prepares for the scene when Dorothea meets Will in the library. The chink of light that is enough " to read by " anticipates the metaphoric " lunette" which, symbolizing Will, "opened in the wall" of Dorothea's "prison " (265). Lydgate in the firstscene allows Dorothea to open her soul to him, while Will in the second gives her " a glimpseof the sunnyair" (265). The librarythen becomes an ironicsettingbecause of its associationof stalenessand aridity. In addition,the meetingbetweenthe two takes place against a risingstorm,which seems to herald ominouslythe growinginvolvement of Dorothea and Will, or,like the stormin "The Eve of St. Agnes," symbolizes the hostile world outside. When Dorothea makes a motionof revolt,however, beginning to allow her dissatisfaction with Casaubon to rise to the surface by acknowledging that great thoughtsseem to have worn him out, the rain seems to stop soon after. Fairer weather is ahead as Dorothea begins to see truly. The influenceor hold of the libraryseems likewiseto be loosened,its restrictions givingway to freedom. The movement from darkness intolightis continued in Chapter Brian Swann 297

The final expanding symbolis a location. The libraryat Lowickis initially simplya place whereDorothea sets about learning from CasaubontheLatin,Greek, shecraved. andHebrew Thoughout, thelibrary functions as charged background, keeping us Dorothea'sheroicdesireforbook-learning before whichwill substitute for a " coherent social faith" (3). Gradually, as Dorothea substitutesfellow-feeling for book-knowledge, the library accretes othervalues. Dorotheareceives Lydgatein the library, the first time she has beenthere sinceCasaubon'ssickness. The shutters areclosed, " but therewas enough lightto read by from the narrow upper " (212). Even in absence,Casaubon's panes of the windows " is one ofthe epithets presence is felt, since" narrow habitually associatedwithhim. We are reminded that it is through her in her marriage suffering that Dorotheais beginning to under" (353) as stand others. It is in his library, the " caticom calls it thattheprocess Tantripp of rebirth begins forDorothea, and Lydgatebeginsto have his eyes opened, for" women just

48. Dorothea meets Casaubon in "that close library" (352), but he walks into " Yew-Tree Walk" wherehe expectsDorothea to come and tellhimherdecisionabout his proposition.Dorothea never gets the chance, however,to tell him that she will " bind " to him,immuring herself herself herself, effectively fron barring the sunnypresence,for Casaubon is founddead in the summerhouse. After this death, " the air is milder" (394), and the libraryloses some more of its malignity,although " the dead hand" continuesto exert an influence throughthe will. When Dorothea returnsto Lowick afterher sojourn with her uncle, however, the room she stops in longestis the library;but, in the Junesun, " the shutters wereall open . . . and the morning gazed " calmlyinto the library" (392). She seals and closes the Synoptical Tabulation " which Casaubon had left and writeswithin the envelope" I could not submitmy soul to yours" (393). The morningthat shone on the rows of notebooksis likened to the sun shiningon megaliths," the mute memorialof a forgotten faith" (393), and that is preciselywhat the librarynow representsforDorothea. The sun whichshinesso brightly is also Will, who is soon aftershown,not into the library, but intothe neutral withits " two tall mirrors and tables withnothing drawing-room on them" (394), and an open window. A new start seems possible. This " little room," in the words of the Donne poem George Eliot uses as a motto for Chapter 83, the last chapter but threein the novel,has a chance to become " an everywhere" fortheir" walkingsouls" (589). The next time Will and Dorothea meet is in Mr. Brooke's library (Chapter 62). The context is not ominous with the weightof books but lightenedby Will's presence. This second partingis in auspiciouscircumstances, withclear weather. Moreover, the play of ironyover the whole scene is welcomerelease from the heavy serious atmospherepervading the library at Lowick. But the dead hand is not so easily evaded, and the meetingin Chapter 83 takes place in the Lowick libraryagain; and again thereis a stormin the background.Their declaration of love is thus set against the forcesof the past and the " wild 46 Will is entering of the elements." stupidity into " the thickof " (611), and both he and Dorothea are about to enter a struggle
6Jean Giraudoux,Tiger at the Gates, trans.Christopher Fry (New York, 1955), p. 1.

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the adult world,"'the drear outer world" (594). The influence of the libraryis compromised by love. The world,however,is waitingforthe fraywhichwill not be spectacular, but part of a " acts (613). wholeseriesof " unhistoric (iv) The SymbolicAct and Gesture In the Preludeto Middlemarch, the narrator remarks ironically " (3) withwhichthe Supreme on the" inconvenient indefiniteness Power has fashionedthe natures of women. Their varietypre" (4). vents then frombeing treated with " scientific certitude " the indefiniteness Despite scientific investigation, remains,and the limitsof variationare reallymuch widerthan anyonewould imaginefromthe samenessof women'scoiffeur"(4). The same is true of the variationsGeorge Eliot plays on certainordinary gestures and acts to heighten the armoniche.By such means she ePnrichens the trulypoetic textureof the novel. In the wealth of gestures,even the smallest act becomes symbolicin its context,and summarizesthe whole thrustof a characteror situationat that particulartime. QuentinAnderson suggeststhat, afterthe loss of God, George Eliot, aided by her reading in Comte, saw human behavior " as a set of symbolic gesturesexpressiveof individual needs and desires."47Only in Middlemarch,however,is this symbolictechniqueused so deliof this argument, cately and expressively. In exemplification Hilda Hulme writescopiouslyon such a simpledetail as the act of Dorothea in lookingout of a window: Dorothea, " instead of interest to some occupation, settingdown withher usual diligent simplyleaned her elbow on an open book and looked out of the windowat the great cedar silveredwith the damp" (35). Miss Hulme pointsout that the mentionof the cedar is a later manuto Dorothea's emotionalsituation,since scriptaddition referring Casaubon is a Biblical scholar and the cedar has Biblical associations. Dorothea is lookingat the new opportunity of lifewith Casaubon, and the idealism of her virginjudgmentis suggested with Casaubonian links.) One cannot know, says Miss Hulme, Dorothea shares Celia's notion that learningmay come whether frommere physical contact (symbolizedby the elbow on the open book) : " Yet in a novel wherephysicalpostureand physical
47

by the word " silvered." (" Damp " is, of course, another word

"cGeorgeEliot

in Middlemarch," p. 289.

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change, mental stateand emotional represent movement so often the authorwouldhave us set to it is hardto knowwhatlimits 48 in picking up suchsignificances." ourreadiness is the occasionwhen A simpler example of thesametechnique his repulsive relatives. by sickin bed,is visited old Featherstone, we He starts to rub" thegoldknobofhis stick" (78), a gesture and thebrutal sinceall hispower intoemotional terms, translate gameshe playswithit dependon his wealth.All his belligerent is expressed gesture.Mary Garth by thisunconscious triumph and syrup, himwithsoothing supplies ('Dove' in the original), buy. cannot character Featherstone it is Mary who is the only It is this very gold-knobbed stick that he hurlsat Mary in and accept to obeyhismachinations whensherefuses frustration a bribe. Gestures as well as acts and objectscan be ideas " wrought a gesture canl of sense" (157) . Similarly, back to the directness make a narrativepoint concretely.When Rosamund asks up her hair," he sweptup the softfestoons Lydgateto fasten of plaitsand fastened in the tall comb" (426). The husbandry The waythecombis described degrading. act seemssurprisingly and createsa sense of "tall" the action complete makes as Rosamundinviolatein her pristine ego. Lydgate is Heracles (" to such uses his masculinity debilitated, women, amongthe ofhis wife charms in thephysical with do mencome"), ensnared " " before neck the marriage, (426). Again, herLamia-like long Rosamundhad droppedthe "chain" (222), she was knitting He whenLydgatehad come to put an end to the flirtation. "instantaneously stoopedto pick up the chain" (222).,and, on look of distress the first he had ever natural the way up, seeing as ifthe chainhe seenon Rosamund's captured face,is as truly of steel. fact that The weremade had retrieved Lydgatepicked forhis fate. This symbol his ownresponsibility it up symbolizes on a pun. Later,thepunchanges as muchas anything to depends is " another when we learnthatfor Rosamund Lydgate, metaphor ofchainto drag" (543). weight ofa gesture oneis notsureoftheexactsignificance Sometimes, or mysterious. For exstrikes us as moving whichnevertheless from Lowickone day, he has ample,whenMr. Brookereturns
48 Hilda Hulme, " The Language of the Novel," in Middlemarch: Critical Approachesto the Novel, p. 90.

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": Realismand Symbolic "Middlemarch Form

a commission from Casaubon;to deliver the marriage proposal. Dorothea, we are told,sitsby the fire as Mr. Brookebeginshis preamble, and has just been readinga pamphlet on the early " churchwhichCasaubon has sent: She threwoffher mantle and bonnet, and sat downoppositeto him,enjoying the glow, but lifting up her beautiful handsfora screen.They werenot thin hands, or small hands, but powerful, feminine, material hands. She seemedto be holdingthem up in propiation for her passionatedesireto know and to think, whichin the unfriendly mediums of Tipton and Fresshit had issuedin crying " (28). That whichprotects and red eyelids Dorotheais her essentialfemininity whichmakes for " a special moral influshe is lifting thesehandsto Casaubon'sflame, but,as we see,he is unable to appreciate what she is, because of his vulgaridea that Dorotheais a rewardforhis celibacy, and becauseof his jealous prideand fearof beingfoundout. Thus thereis irony inherent in thisgesture.Casaubonis neverassociated withlight or heat,alwayswithdampor dark. The " ardent"Dorotheais morea sourceof life-giving heat than the man she is herself her hands to. But it will be noticedthat she holdsher lifting thatGeorge Eliot wished which handsup as a screen, us suggests of negativethought to note some cross-current in the gesture is unaware of. Onlythereader wiser which herself Dorothea after is not a event realizes that the the gesture wholly positive comthat Dorothea'sflame mitment. We know,forexample, is " fed " I feed too " (3), that Casaubon acknowledges, fromwithin " sources (13), and that Will'ssmileis " a muchon the inward
ence." 49 In time to come it will be most needed. Presumably,

gush of inwardlight" (152).

(v) Characteras Symbol Finally, one ought not to overlook the role played in the symbolicaction by a cast of characterswho are so intimately related by blood or theme that, as Mark Schorerputs it, " the major characterizations depend on a singlevalue, or perhaps we should say, a single contrast: the quality and kind of social idealismas opposed to self-absorption50 The way Mr. Schorer in the characters phrasesthe fact,however,does not distinguish
"' George Eliot to Emily Davies, 8 August 1868, Letters, IV, 468.
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" (18), " irradiations." 52 In many cases, the characspondence ters seem to be composed all of the same flesh,an aboriginal tissue. of Dreams, talks about the way in Freud,in The Interpretation a of personcan be created by " identifiwhichthe dream-image cation" of a numberof disparate elements. Such identification in the dream-content to onlv "consists in givingrepresentation one or more personswho are related by some commonfeature." worksis by " compoThe other way in whichthe dream-image sition,"that is, " when personsare combined,there are already featureswhich are characteristic of, presentin the dream-image but not commonto, the personsin question,so that a new unity, a compositeperson,appears as the result of the union of these and what features."The two ways do not seem vitallydifferent, " representation happensin each is thatthe ego is given" multiple an extrain the dream. " By means of severalsuch identifications ordinary amount of thought material may be condensed."53 in any way to soundas ifI werepsychoanalysing Withoutwishing I think it is possible to see a similarity between George Eliot, the dream structureFreud describes here with its composite symbolforthe ego, and the curiousway in whichthe characters of Middlemarch interact with each other, autonomously,yet consciousness of the narrator, the " colwithinthe overarching 54 lective mind," the " ego " who creates them all and is a part of them. From George Eliot's conscious point of view, the narrator's ofhumanlots " in which aim is to show" the stealthy convergence fromone life on another" we see " a slow preparationof effects
" Barbara Hardy, The Novels of GeorgeEliot, p. 93. in the Novel, p. 27, is the sourceof this term. 62 Brown, Rhythm "' TheInterpretation trans.A. A. Brill (New York, 1950), pp. 306-08. ofDreams, " J. Hillis Miller, in The Formof Victorian Fiction(Notre Dame, 1968), p. 81, work of George Eliot, Dickens, Meredith,Trollope, writes that the characteristic " when the novelist"choses to play the role not Thackeray,"comes into existence who is an actor in the drama,and not even the role of an of a first personnarrator with an individualconsciousness, who may be identified anonymous storyteller but in mind" (my italics). the role of a collective

thosein the earlynovels: the issuesin all Middlemarch from intosucha division.Whatdistinguishes ofthem can be resolved " life "'51 in its characters; Middlemarch is the senseofexpanding from an archetypal splittings-off how theyall seem stock,sym"reflected bolizations of a largerconsciousness, lightof corre-

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(70). Even " inconsistency" and, with the Raffles plot in mind, coincidence are part of the "living myriad " (380), where each and all are related, as George Eliot put it in Adam Bede, " in my mind." 5 Thus, it is curious that many of the characters in Middlemarch are orphans (Celia, Dorothea, Will, Bulstrode, Lydgate), and that there is not one "interloper" (554), but two, Bulstrode and Lydgate. To stress that her main characters are orphans means that George Eliot can symbolize man's existential situation in more dramatic fashion. Orphans in the universe, men have to turn to other men; " to mercy, pity, peace, and love / All pray in their distress" (556). In an 1861 letter to Sara Sophia Hennell, George Eliot expressed the desire for " a temple besides the outdoor temple-a place where human beings do not ramble apart, but meet with a common impulse." 56 From her " quarry " for Middlemarch, we can see how George Eliot attempted to meet this need in her novel, with her lists of character inter-connectionsunder the In the novel's multiform rubric, "Relations to be developed." connective tissue, all parts linked by the symbol of reform,each character possesses something of each of the others. They are " various small mirrors" (62) reflectingeach other, and " one life." Dorothea and Will are kept in conjunction down to the smallest verbal unit, Will's " innerlight " (152) complementingDorothea's "inward fire" (10) . To find Casaubon and Bulstrode linked in this way however is somewhat of a surprise,since on the narrative level they have virtually no connection. Nevertheless, we find that Casaubon has the desire for Dorothea to " irradiate the gloom which fatigue was apt to hang over him" (46), and then we learn that Bulstrode kept " a kind of moral lantern " (91) over the lives of Middlemarchers. Casaubon wants Dorothea to be a diversion, somethingof an amusement not to be taken overseriously after he has been wandering around in mental gloom with " his taper" (147). Bulstrode is a false light to his people, driven by that religious egoism which George Eliot had condemned in her essay on the poet Young. Casaubon's pride, egoism, and blindness are equal to Bulstrode's, and both men
56

"Adam Bede, ed. GordonS. Haight (New York, 1960), p. 178. 1861, Letters,III, 4592. 18 September " Anna Theresa Kitchel,Quarryfor Middlemarch(Berkeley, 1950), p. 45.

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are essentially ofthesamekind.Each usespeopleto feedhisown selfish needs. Will enjoys" the verymiscellaneousness of Rome,"becauseit " (157). makes " the mind flexible with constantcomparison Such a mindis neededto readMiddlemarch and one adequately, despairs ofeverpicking up all thestructural most The nuances. abstrusecomparisons, almostbizarrecomparisons, resultfrom placingthecandleof our attention to the scratches of eventson thepier-glass and thissection (194-95). Justone example, must be concluded.George Eliot had difficulty in connecting thestory ofFred and his troubles withtheother important she plots. *Yet clearly intended Fredas a kindoffoilto Will. Bothareunsteady, go through a periodof trialand apprenticeship forthe hand of thewoman and her. they love, finally Eliot intends marry George us to keep the comparison in mind,and summarizes constantly the theme: " to Will, a creature who cared littleforwhat are calledthesolidthings oflifeand greatly forits subtler influences, to have within himsucha feeling as he had towards Dorothea, was like the inheritance of a fortune" (344). Will had been becauseofhismother's disinherited imprudent marriage. Similarold Featherstone's ly, Fred's chancesof inheriting fortune had beenlost,and he setsaboutmaking hisownfortune with thehelp of Mary and Caleb. (vi) Form: Some Conclusions By the timeGeorge Eliot wrote Middlemarch, DarrelMansell whichher kind of fiction says: "The diversity can includeis onlylimited thinks sheis able to find by whatsheherself together in a wholeness in herownmind." Hence," The morevariedthe relations in herfiction, she can present the higher the degree of formshe can attain if she is successful in binding everything in a wholeness." As Mr. Brookesagaciously together pointsout, " Life isn'tcast intoa mould-notcut out by ruleand line,and thatsortof thing" (30). George Eliot intends to refract lifein all its multiplicity; but, since the humanmind will no more chaos any morethan a " moralchaos" (80), acceptan artistic in thenovelbetween a tension is created refraction and selection. not on " explicit Resolution relations" (the kindfound depends in the earlier morefrequently novels),but on "obscureimplicit. 58 thusapproaches ones." The structure multiplicity and verges
58

"t

of Form,"pp. 656-58. GeorgeEliot's Conception

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on inconsequence (as Jameshinted). But the symbolic action providesa complicated and unifying dance of motifs.George Eliot's own metaphor of the web to describe of the structure society and the structure of the novelis slightly as a misleading definition of the aesthetic principle becauseit evokes, in fact,a " cut out by rule and line." The metaphor structure of the connective thread (153) is better, but the criticis saferif he duplicatesthe methods of Lydgate'senquiry, as he looks for " (122), Eliot maybe " enamoured George of arduousinvention but hertriumph is thatthe resultappearscompletely spontaneous. In Caleb Garth'swordsdescribing something well-made, "Things hang together" (297). Middlemarch also enactsin its structure a truthit preaches. on the qualityand breadth "Our gooddepends of the emotion " a phrase which (345), she writes; sounds as though it couldhave come fromc" Notes On Form In Art." GeorgeEliot's perfect readerwillforce like Dorotheaafter himself, herinterview with "to dwellon everydetail and its possiblemeaning" Ladislaw,, " are smallmeasurable (577) . Signs,however, but interthings, " (18) . That is one barrier pretations are illimitable to a perfect reading.Anotheris that all of us, attempting to describea Ccsign" " get our thoughts in metaphors, tangled and act fatally " (63). Fully to understand on the strength of them how the concept of symbolic in Middlemarch actionworks we mustpay strictattention to the individual detail and then evaluate its " qualityand breadth."Details meanmorethanthemselves. In a structure symbolic vibrates withsignificance. action, If, as I said earlier,GeorgeEliot was writing beyondthe criticalacumen,and theircritical capacitiesof contemporary vocabulary was inadequateto deal withMiddlemarch, today, whenMiddlemarch is at last appreciated as themasterpiece it is, have sucha vocabulary. we might Unfortunately, however, even on the question ofplot thereis widespread disagreement, not to of Northrop The followers say confusion. Frye, for example. thenovelas a longpoem,and attempt regard to see " thewhole of the workas a unity.It is now a simultaneous design pattern not a out from narrative radiating in time." center, a moving 59
" Northrop Frye, "Literary Criticism," in The Aims and Methods of Scholarship in Modern Languages and Literatures, ed. James Thorp (New York, 1963), pp. 63-65.

c"new connections " (110). and hitherto hiddenfactsof structure

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" a criticsearching forsubtleties." 64 Apartfrom anything else, who is to say that the " subtleties"a sensitive criticfinds are, in fact, notthere? One has to ask oneself if thereis any real insurmountable difference betweenthe neo-Aristotelian criticand the symbolic forinstance, we notein Middlemacrh critic.When, the" meticulouslycounterpointed of Lydgateand Dorothea, A65 stories each an orphanwith a Continental each well-born education, but a each are disregarding we reformer, falsifying ourreaction rank, to say thatliteralplot pattern becomessymbolic of someideal GeorgeEliot had in mind? How else can we suggest that the is morethanmerecoincidence? doublepattern Again,whenwe note the Aristotelian as the roles of Dorothea and peripeteia, he becoming the patient,and she the Lydgate are reversed, of rolesrepeated doctor;whenwe see this inversion in various
60"Imagery: From Sensationto Symbol,"Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 12 (September, 1953), 31. *' "Criticism and the Novel," Antioch Review, 18 (1958), 344. 62 " Criticism and the Novel," p. 345. 63 CcCriticism and the Novel," p. 347. 64 " Criticism and the Novel," p. 370. "6U. C. Knoepflmacher,Religious Humanism and the Victorian Novel (Princeton, 1965), p. 76.

interpretation," and "what happens in the literal action" to

63

Neo-Aristotelian on theother the lead of critics, hand,following R. S. Crane,whilenot denying that plot is no simplematter, prefer not to give undueemphasis to what NormanFriedman 60 calls " theimages in fiction, Ad can be characters).Mr. (which, " Friedman finds unfortunate thefailure ofmanycritics todayto takeseriously, on a material level,thevarious unifying principles which may shapein a novelactionand thewayit is handled." 61 The trouble is that we have " no commonly of acceptedbody terms, principles, and distinctions forgrasping the satisfactorily literalactionof a novelas it functions in the wholeof whichit. is a palpablepart."62 In thisessay, I have attempted to reconcile both schoolsof criticism, the fact that literaland by stressing " can possess are not exclusive; symbolic thatthe " literalaction the qualitiesof a longpoem. In my discussion on Middlemarch I have tried to show, in fact, thatGeorge Eliot'sstyle transmutes the literalplot,whichnevertheless existsfully in its own right. Mr. Friedmandemonstrates a loosenessof criticalvocabulary whenhe bluntly opposes" the factsof the case" to " symbolic

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wayswith other characters, with Willand Bulstrode, for instance, we needa terminology which willdistinguish literal or traditional plotfrom theway George Eliot usesit in Middlemarch. Thereis a sense,even,in which plot turnsout to be whatWalterNaumann termsa "pseudo-structure ": "George Eliot has an incredibly easy effortless manner, the manner of the spinner of taleswhopassesfrom one chapter to thenext, from oneobjectto anothereven whenremote, without the slightest 66 difficulty." he claims, Such a technique, does not use plot as structure; the " orchestrated " themes. novelworks becauseof its slow-moving Or again,alongsimilar RichardS. Lyonshas remarked, lines, in an intensive studyof onlyone chapter of Middlemarch, that at " plotand character a certain point, become inseparable, forplot becomesthe growth in consciousness by whichcharacter is de67 Clearly, fined." then,plot is no simplematter.And by now, it shouldbe obviousthat the symbolic approachto plot and texture is not a gameof symbol-hunting. Sincein Middlemarch " correspondence there is a complicated ofone plotwithanother. related butdifferent Theyarenottenuously versions ofthe parts, 68 it is not stretching samestory," theconcept ofsymbolic action to call each plot a symbolic of the other, representation and all foursymbolic of an overallconsciousness. Mr. Friedman himself givesus a clue to the fullmeaning of a which becomes form whileretaining symbolic, the appearance of a plot-outline. He asks, " What,then,is a symbol?An image
alive with an idea; a fact saturatedin value." 69 The surfaceor " approachis then a vital part of any criticalevalua" superficial tion which stresses symbolism, since we must emphasize "the dependenceof symbolon particularsensationand feeling." 70 Of of a risk we run the scene or course, hardening gesturewhen we abstract it fromits field of expressivemeaning,but so we do when we abstractthe plot element. The critic'sjob, however,is easier in GeorgeEliot's case because of the happy made slightly tendencyof places and people " quietly and easily" to " gather emotional value and meaning, become charged with natural
66 of George Eliot's Novels," Modern Language Quarterly, "The Architecture 9 (1948), 38. 67 C" The Method of Middlemarchh"NCF, 21 (June, 1966), 38. 68 Barbara Hardy, The Novels of George Eliot, p. 99. 69 " Imagery: From Sensation to Symbol," p. 40. 70 Barbara Hardy, "The Surface of the Novel," in Middlemarch: Critical Approaches to the Novel, p. 152.

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piety,"71 when " a given poet's preoccupationwith certain settings, situations,and characterswill be seen, when viewed in the perspectiveof his total achievementto act as a symbolic key to his ultimatevisionin life,just as his recurrent metaphors, when systematically inspected,will do." 72 Withoutwantingto claim that everything in Middlemarchis symbolic (i. e., not itself),I would like to insistthat everything is part of a symbolicaction, for " there are practical acts, and there are symbolicacts," and " the symbolicact is the dancing of an attitude."78 Symbolic acts are "representativeacts "7 acts. GeorgeEliot's symbolicmethodin Middlemarchdoes more than "reinforce and lend emotional values to other kinds of a criticaljudgmentthat has become commonplace meaning," . thoughnone the less popular. Symbolicimagery, in fact,is only part of the total effect whichincludesplot, character, and so on, and transmutesthem into somethingrich and strange. This totalityis so rich,in fact, that one comes away fromthe novel with a feelingof dangerous frustration; "dangerous" because and the discoveriesone had set leads to dogmatism, frustration out to " whisper" freezeinto assertions, lose theirelastic tentativeness, and thus distort. One retains a sense of the tough delicacyof Middlemarchby not shouting; by beingsatisfied with whichprovide,in Frost's definition thoughtsand observations of " a temporary poetry, stay against confusion."
PrincetonUniversity

which only receive their full and most potent force from other

72

71 Jerome Thale, The Novels of George Eliot (New York, 1959), p. 158.

76 Mention of poetry reminds me of Charles Olsen's revolutionary program for "Projective Verse," one of the prescriptionsfor which concerns " the Kinetics of the thing." That is, " the poem must, at all points, be a high-energyconstruct and, at " FIELD COMPOSITION," all pointsan energydischarge."Stressing Olsen comes to the conclusion (not unlike the conclusion Darrel Mansell comes to about Middlemarch), OF CONTENT." that "FORM IS NEVER MORE THAN AN EXTENSION In other words, form is anything the poem will hold within its field of force. In these essential aesthetic points, Middlemarch anticipates an importantaesthetic movement of twentieth-century American poetry! See "Projective Verse," in The New American Poetry, ed. Donald M. Allen (New York, 1960), pp. 386-97.

Burke,The Philosophy of Literary Form,p. 10. Burke,The Philosophy of Literary Form,p. 25. Thale, The Novels of GeorgeEliot, p. 158.

Friedman, " Imagery: From Sensation to Symbol," p. 31.

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