#epic lives

[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 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]

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.