Reading Middlemarch

Does what it says on the tin: I'm reading Middlemarch by George Eliot

[readingmiddlemarch]

It was Celia's private luxury to indulge in this dislike. She dared not confess it to her sister in any direct statement, for that would be laying herself open to a demonstration that she was somehow or other at war with all goodness. But on safe opportunities, she had an indirect mode of making her negative wisdom tell upon Dorothea, and calling her down from her rhapsodic mood by reminding her that people were staring, not listening. Celia was not impulsive: what she had to say could wait, and came from her always with the same quiet staccato evenness. When people talked with energy and emphasis she watched their faces and features merely. She never could understand how well-bred persons consented to sing and open their mouths in the ridiculous manner requisite for that vocal exercise.

I.iii. Middlemarch The "dislike" referred to at the beginning is Celia's dislike of notions, which I made a separate post for. In this paragraph, I particularly enjoyed "somehow or other at war with all goodness," both because it is funny and because it's a familiar feeling, when you're thinking of objecting to someone who is self-righteous, or in whatever way convinced of their own correctness. I also loved "reminding her that people were staring, not listening," as that is something I have to frequently remind myself. It seems almost a modern sentiment, despite the fact that plenty of 19th c novels (and earlier!) refer to "droners"--boring people who talk on when no one wants to listen. However, this is more subtle than character the protagonist--and thus the readers--can all agree is boring. Rather, we can laugh a little, with Celia, while also understanding that the problem with Dorothea is that she is too intense about the things in which she is interested, which narrows the social circle who might enjoy her company considerably. Like someone who is really intense about comics, or someone on the spectrum. I mention the spectrum partly because I initially read, "she watched their faces and features merely," as a trait of someone on the opposite end. One characteristic of those on the spectrum is an inability to read facial expression, body language, tone. Therefore they take what someone says quite literally. But on the opposite end, I have met people who only pay attention to body language and tone, and do not listen to what someone is actually saying. Communicating with people who are very deep on that end can be very difficult, partly because body language and tone are very impercise. Though words are not exactly always crystal clear and each word can have a thousand shades of meaning, we at least have a generally agreed upon vocabulary with generally agreed upon meanings. There is a small vocabulary for body language, true--we can all generally agree upon a smile being positive and a frown negative, but while the word "smile" always sounds the same (or close enough), it does not always look the same on different people. IThese "super feelers" I have encountered tend to only trust the vibes they get from you, disregarding everything you say. I thought perhaps Celia might be a "super feeler", partly in contrast to Dorothea, who is so in her own head that she might not notice how other people react to her. Another dichotomy which comes to mind, which often seems to line up with the interprets words/interprets feelings dichotomy, is those who are driven by inward impulses vs those who are driven by outward. I've noticed in characters, but in people also, there are those who have a plan and are driven to execute it, vs those who see what's going on around them and act in the moment. The former type--let us call it "inward-facing"--is less impulsive, but also less informed by other people. The latter, "outward-facing" are more likely to be influenced by thoughts and feelings of others. Dorothea is inward-facing and makes an excellent example since she very much wants to dedicate herself to another person, and works passionately on behalf of improving the cottages. "Inward-facing" may in some respects seem less compassionate, but it really has nothing to do with caring about other people or not. It has to do with what motivates you. (I bring this up because another way to label "inward-facing" might be "selfish", and "outward-facing" selfless, but the connotations of those words are not relavant to the dichotomy I'm trying to dilineate.

[readingmiddlemarch]

I cannot bear notions.

Celia Brooke, I.iii., Middlemarch This is the hilarious end to a larger speech:

Celia was present while the plans were being examined, and observed Sir James's illusion. "He thinks that Dodo cares about him, and she only cares about her plans. Yet I am not certain that she would refuse him if she thought he would let her manage everything and carry out all her notions. And how very uncomfortable Sir James would be! I cannot bear notions."

It's mostly just funny, but it does highlight the difference between Celia and Dorothea. I want to say that Dorothea is an ideas-person, but that isn't quite right--in the quoted section Dorothea is all about action. The "plans" to which Celia refers are plans to improve cottages for the locals. True, Dorothea is excited about these improvements because it fits her ideal and dream of living an "epic" or "grand" life, but the plans are proof her preoccupation is with the concrete and not the abstract. I believe the essential difference is that Dorothea has big ideas behind her actions, and those ideas lead her to do unusual things. Celia, who has no big ideas, is generally happy to follow convention, not having any notions of a world outside of it. (Interestingly, Celia's use of the word "notions" really seems to refer to the action--the plans for action, at least--rather than the ideas behind them. That's partly because the meaning for the word "notion" is I think just sliiiiiiiightly different than it used to be--that is, it seems to be more abstract now than it used to be, but I think the other reason is that Celia would not object to Dorothea's ideas if they did not lead her to act oddly). Sadly, I tend to lack action, so I can't really call myself a Dorothea. However, as I tend to always be full of notions, I do feel I understand her well. (And admire Dorothea for her cottages.)

[readingmiddlemarch]

I believe all the petting that is given them does not make them happy. They are too helpless: their lives are too frail. A weasel or a mouse that gets its own living is more interesting. I like to think that the animals about us have souls something like our own, and either carry on their own little affairs or can be companions to us, like Monk here. Those creatures are parasitic.

Dorothea, I.iii., Middlemarch Dorothea's opinions on lapdogs. I just found it interesting; this issue's been around a long time.

[readingmiddlemarch]

[...]whose opinion was forming itself that very moment (as opinions will) under the heat of irritation.

I.iii., Middlemarch This seems like such a simple idea, but often it's approached as saying something you don't mean in the heat of the moment. I don't really identify with that; I almost often mean what I say. It's whether I mean it later that's a problem, so I found this quote far more relateable.

[readingmiddlemarch]

I should see how it was possible to lead a grand life here—now—in England. I don't feel sure about doing good in any way now: everything seems like going on a mission to a people whose language I don't know;—unless it were building good cottages—there can be no doubt about that. Oh, I hope I should be able to get the people well housed in Lowick!

I.iii. Middlemarch I identify with this so hard. This is why I once tried to convince my mom to make our house a soup kitchen. It wasn't that I was so compassionate toward my fellow men (not that I was unsympathetic either)--I just couldn't figure out how else to live a "grand life." This is why I identified so strongly with Hamilton's, "I wish there was a war." Also, shades of Jane Eyre: the perception at the time being that a truly "grand life" was to go "on a mission to a people whose language" one didn't know. St. John wanted Jane to do that, and the understanding of most readers would have been that this is certainly the nobler cause, the thing that one "should" do, the way to live a really fulfilling life. But Jane's answer is to balk at the conventional understanding of a "grand life". Her "grand life" was to make herself happy, which is why that story is so goddamn unusual. This bit also relates to the intro about St Theresa, and how circumstances do not often lend themselves to opportunities for women to be great. I do sometimes wonder whether during the times of the lives of the examples of "great" people from history, everyone was actually sitting around saying "I wish there was a war". Like I said before, I do think in large part that we do not do great things because we are lazy, not because the circumstances for greatness are not there for us to exploit if we so chose.

[readingmiddlemarch]

It would be like marrying Pascal.

I.iii. Middlemarch

This relates to another part I have already quoted on a previous post:

The really delightful marriage must be that where your husband was a sort of father, and could teach you even Hebrew, if you wished it.

That is, Dorothea cannot imagine being Pascal, only marrying Pascal. The only rational explanation is because Pascal, like other "Pascals" throughout history, is a man. I found this one sentence even more poignant than the other quote--it is funnier than the bit about Hebrew, and even more profound. Learning Hebrew is unnecessary (in Eliot's, Dorothea's, and my world) and thus rendered a little bit fanciful. Marrying Pascal is certianly fanciful but also life-changing, but all the more ridiculous for being absolutely impossible. The shortness of the sentence renders the sentiment even more ludicrous. And yet I identified with this sentiment too.

[readingmiddlemarch]

Signs are small measurable things, but interpretations are illimitable [...]

I.iii., Middlemarch Mostly speaks for itself (ha ha) but this subject has always fascinated me, thus my interest in Saussure, Wittgenstein, et al.

[readingmiddlemarch]

pilulous pil´u`lous: 1. Like a pill; small; insignificant.

thefreedictionary

[readingmiddlemarch]

[...] life could never have gone on at any period but for this liberal allowance of conclusions, which has facilitated marriage under the difficulties of civilization. Has any one ever pinched into its pilulous smallness the cobweb of pre-matrimonial acquaintanceship?

I.ii, Middlemarch No longer applicable to today's society, I think. I've mostly quoted for this fantastic and ridiculous metaphor.

[readingmiddlemarch]

[...] kind Providence furnishes the limpest personality with a little gum or starch in the form of tradition.

I.ii. Middlemarch Mostly speaks for itself, I think. The "kind" in this phrase seems all snark; she's saying wishy-washy people who don't care about anything will stand their ground on some things just because that's the way they've always done it.

[readingmiddlemarch]

I went into science a great deal myself at one time; but I saw it would not do. It leads to everything; you can let nothing alone.

Mr. Brooke, I.ii., Middlemarch Mr. Brook is ridiculous, but I loved this. For the longest time I didn't like science, and didn't understand why I didn't, because I love nothing more than things that bind everything together (e.g. art, history). I understood that science was everything, and yet it seems so dry. Then I learned that science is an even greater unifier than I had ever imagined; it takes art and history and holds them in its infinitely (wet) embrace.

[readingmiddlemarch]

The really delightful marriage must be that where your husband was a sort of father, and could teach you even Hebrew, if you wished it.

I.i., Middlemarch Why is Dorothea like this? She's passionate and smart, but channels those qualities into a devotion to good. That devotion could manifest in the form of doing great things herself, and yet she is dedicated to this notion that someone else must do the great thing and she may only help them. This dedication may be the result of modesty, lack of self-confidence, or lack of independence, but I only buy the former two and not the latter. I find her independence quite striking, in fact--her determination to aid in the attainment of this "greatness" flies in the face of convention, while society as Eliot describes it only expects Dorothea to attain a pleasant match that may provide a comfortable situation for her future life. So then conviction that she can only achieve greatness by aiding another is a result of modesty and lack of confidence. These I think can be attributed to the other main cause of her conviction: the fact that women, in history, rarely are great. The intro with St Theresa builds the argument that history does not prove a good source for examples not because women themselves or not great, but because society places women in such a position that they cannot be great. Besides this they are also taught to think that they cannot be great--thus Dorothea's lack of confidence. While society has improved somewhat on the female liberation front I would say that vestiges of this still linger in the way many people think. Case in point: I identify strongly with the quote, especially when I was in my teens I felt that way. The second half of the quote is poking fun, of course, and yet at the time I felt even that specific detail would have matched my ideal.

[readingmiddlemarch]

Sane people did what their neighbors did, so that if any lunatics were at large, one might know and avoid them.

I.i., Middlemarch Here Eliot is being a bit snarky, I think.

[readingmiddlemarch]

Here and there is born a Saint Theresa, foundress of nothing, whose loving heart-beats and sobs after an unattained goodness tremble off and are dispersed among hindrances, instead of centring in some long-recognizable deed.

Prologue "foundress of nothing"

[readingmiddlemarch]

the limits of variation [amongst women] are really much wider than any one would imagine from the sameness of women's coiffure and the favorite love-stories in prose and verse.

Prologue She's referring to the fact that some people believe women incapable of epic lives. Perhaps she is suggesting society is a limiting factor, or perhaps she's pointing out that the aspects of women visible to said people do not reveal the whole truth.

[readingmiddlemarch]

That Spanish woman who lived three hundred years ago, was certainly not the last of her kind. Many Theresas have been born who found for themselves no epic life wherein there was a constant unfolding of far-resonant action; perhaps only a life of mistakes, the offspring of a certain spiritual grandeur ill-matched with the meanness of opportunity; perhaps a tragic failure which found no sacred poet and sank unwept into oblivion. With dim lights and tangled circumstance they tried to shape their thought and deed in noble agreement; but after all, to common eyes their struggles seemed mere inconsistency and formlessness; for these later-born Theresas were helped by no coherent social faith and order which could perform the function of knowledge for the ardently willing soul. Their ardor alternated between a vague ideal and the common yearning of womanhood; so that the one was disapproved as extravagance, and the other condemned as a lapse.

Prelude The passage refers to St Theresa, who was great and managed to live a (presumably) remarkable life, and the idea that many such great people exist and yet do not manage to live such lives. I think of J Alfred Prufrock. I also think of Alexander Hamilton: "I wish there was a war." In particular the phrase "spiritual grandeur ill-matched with the meanness of opportunity" manages to describe exactly a feeling I've had many times. However, I am also hyper-aware of the fact that those who feel such feelings (myself more than anyone) use the "meanness of opportunity" as a crutch to explain why they are not more useful or important, why they never lived an "epic life". After all if one's spirit is sufficiently grand, one could do epic things and live an epic life by sheer force of one's grandeur. Therefore I am also reminded of the immortal Lady Catherine, "and had I ever learned, I should be a true proficient." Eliot seems to be making the particular point that women fail to live epic lives due to "no coherent social faith and order," which is interesting. I like the phrase "far-resonant".