Adam Bede - George Eliot

The Wikipedia page on George Eliot states that she is known for her “realism and psychological insight” and that is exactly what struck me while reading Adam Bede.

I know I’ve read Middlemarch, but about fifteen years ago, when I was a child, and so I can’t remember any of it. Other than that, for some unaccountable reason, I haven't read any of her work. But I’m glad to be coming to George Eliot now, almost fresh, a bit more grown up and able to appreciate her. It’s good finding a new author to love. Especially when they've got a back-catalogue of half a dozen classics written and waiting.

The story of Adam Bede is not much more than the story of a carpenter who falls in love. But of course, as a book by a brilliant novelist, it’s much more than that. The characterisation is sublime. Half-way through the first chapter I’d taken the citizens of Hayslope to my heart. I know them better than I know my own neighbours. And the genius of Eliot is that she somehow does all the technical bits – e.g making characters representative “types”; using them as devices to reveal some part of what she wishes to say, or to move the plot along – without them ever seeming anything other than perfectly, naturally human.

Humanity is at the heart of this novel. There are no Kings, no wars, no large disasters, just a small village with its small, everyday tragedies and triumphs. The focus could be parochial; the hero, unusually (think Austen), is poor - a villager, not a landowner, not even a farmer. But Eliot makes us care, and makes us love these people. And I think, or so it seemed to me anyway, that in doing so, perhaps she wants us to look around us and think: well I know people just as unremarkably remarkable as these, perhaps I should love them too?

I left the book at my parents’ house for them to read, so I can’t refer to the text or the introduction is I’d like. But I did read the introduction, and was surprised to learn that a book which revolves so heavily around religious feeling  – it's different forms of expression and different ideas of moral duty – was written by an atheist. Eliot, from my brief research, seems to be a fascinating character: a progressive thinker and liberal.  I’d love to read a biography – especially as her relationship to her atheism is much the same as mine.

Recently, I’ve started to wonder: how does one reconcile atheism with moral duty and social obligation? Who teaches and guides the atheist? It is not enough to feel right; one also has to be good. I don’t hold with passive goodness. This is a discussion for another time, but I am intrigued to learn that Eliot struggled with the same question: in an atheist society, how does one replace the social function of the church?

I look forward to reading more of her work – and more about her – and learning what answers she came up with.