A review by rachelb36
The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot
3.0
This was just okay. While Eliot certainly can write, and I liked the insights into human nature and personalities that she included, I didn't particularly like the story or any of the characters.
I felt the author was a bit harsh when it came to the character of Tom, painting him as only terribly selfish and immature, with very little redeeming qualities; when it came to Maggie, she was too merciful, making her out to be a wonderful person even when she acted completely thoughtlessly, just because she "had a good heart." Since I learned this account was somewhat autobiographical for the author, based on her turbulent relationship with her own brother, this made sense, but didn't make for an objective story.
There were multiple love triangles (which always make me roll my eyes), and the ending was very abrupt and ridiculous. It just felt like a cop-out.
However, I did like some of it, and here are a few quotes in particular that struck me:
"...conscientious people are apt to see their duty in that which is the most painful course..." p 587
"There is something sustaining in the very agitation that accompanies the first shocks of trouble, just as an acute pain is often a stimulus, and produces an excitement which is transient strength. It is in the slow, changed life that follows - in the time when sorrow has become stale, and has no longer an emotive intensity that counteracts its pain - in the time when day follows day in dull unexpectant sameness, and trial is a dreary routine - it is then that despair threatens; it is then that the peremptory hunger of the soul is felt, and eye and ear are strained after some unlearned secret of our existence, which shall give to endurance the nature of satisfaction." p 313
I felt the author was a bit harsh when it came to the character of Tom, painting him as only terribly selfish and immature, with very little redeeming qualities; when it came to Maggie, she was too merciful, making her out to be a wonderful person even when she acted completely thoughtlessly, just because she "had a good heart." Since I learned this account was somewhat autobiographical for the author, based on her turbulent relationship with her own brother, this made sense, but didn't make for an objective story.
There were multiple love triangles (which always make me roll my eyes), and the ending was very abrupt and ridiculous. It just felt like a cop-out.
However, I did like some of it, and here are a few quotes in particular that struck me:
"...conscientious people are apt to see their duty in that which is the most painful course..." p 587
"There is something sustaining in the very agitation that accompanies the first shocks of trouble, just as an acute pain is often a stimulus, and produces an excitement which is transient strength. It is in the slow, changed life that follows - in the time when sorrow has become stale, and has no longer an emotive intensity that counteracts its pain - in the time when day follows day in dull unexpectant sameness, and trial is a dreary routine - it is then that despair threatens; it is then that the peremptory hunger of the soul is felt, and eye and ear are strained after some unlearned secret of our existence, which shall give to endurance the nature of satisfaction." p 313