This dissertation examines the theme of irredeemable egoism in all seven of George Eliot's novels. Irredeemable egoists are those characters who do not complete the process of shedding what Eliot identifies in Middlemarch as the "moral stupidity" into which all people are born, and they contrast with those major characters in her novels that achieve a moral victory over egoism.The characters share in common a predilection for self over others. They are self-deluded, have a narrow imagination, and lack compassion for others. Depicted as pitiful and miserable, these characters are doomed by their natures to imprisonment within themselves. They are also incapable of redeeming themselves for actions that harm others, actions they all commit, for all of them break, betray, or deny the bonds a commitment entails. Their blocked or distorted vision of the world prevents a clear understanding of their duty to their fellow men, a duty which Eliot sees at the heart of the fulfillment of mankind's quest for not only improvement and enrichment but finally salvation.Chapter two looks at Hetty Sorrel and Arthur Donnithorne in Adam Bede. Hetty is a creature whose primitive egoistic cravings lead to a cold alienation from all human contact, while Arthur's morally irresponsible behavior is inexcusable despite his efforts to seek redemption.In chapter three, Torn Tulliver and Stephen Guest are scrutinized. Tom's rigidity and narrowness make him unresponsive to Maggie's natural warmth and affection. This unresponsiveness results in anguish and emotional turmoil for Maggie. Stephen produces the same results with opposite motives, seeking self-gratification despite Maggie’s explicit belief in self-denial.Silas Marner is examined in the next chapter, with Godfrey Cass at the center of the study. While the nemesis is mild, as Eliot herself says, the basic theme remains the same; Godfrey crows to regret his abandonment of Eppie, but his misgivings come too late to change the effects of his actions. Rompla, the subject of chapter five, contains Eliot's archetypal villain, Tito Nelema, who represents the extreme of moral degeneration. Tito's wanton disregard of other people's good will and well being is evident from the beginning, as Eliot carefully depicts his complete deterioration while he betrays family, friends, and country for personal gain.In chapter six, three characters in Felix Holt the Radical are discussed. Mss. Transome is perhaps the most sympathetic portrayal of despair and bitterness in all of Eliot's fiction. Her sin years earlier has produced only emotional deprivation, disillusionment, and tortured regret as she finds her son to be no source of joy and her former lover a grim reminder of her post transgression. Harold Transome is oblivious to the needs of his mothers and Jermyn is self-seeking and untouched by the needs of others. Middlemarch contains three major characters that clearly do not shed moral stupidity. Bulstrode, the religious hypocrite, Casaubon, the desiccated pedant, and Rosamond Vincy Lydgate, the self-centered beauty, are closely analyzed in chapter seven.Chapter eight focuses on Eliot's final novel, Daniel Deronda, which contains a character as evil as Tito Melema, Henleigh Mallinger Grandcourt. His psychological cruelty to his mistress, his wife, and everyone else he cares to trifle with marks him a sinister, repugnant example of unregenerate egoism. On the other hand Gwendolen Harleth, though clearly as potentially destructive as Grandcourt, is rescued from moral impoverishment by Deronda. Eliot uses all these characters, shown at various stages of moral dissolution, to illustrate her belief that egoism is harmful, often deadly, and produces consequences that are extensive and unalterable. The characters are punished by remorse, degradation, humiliation, defeat, or even death for their inability or refusal to emerge from moral stupidity.

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D.Litt. et Phil. (English) / This study investigates George Eliot's approach to the existential dilemma of her times, the collision of the individual with the general. It takes into account the historical context in which political radicalism and religious controversy threatened the stability and continuity of the individual and of society. The novels fictionalize the philosophical ideas expressed in earlier writings in terms of the individual experience of the characters. Each of the eight chapters is devoted to one ofthe novels and is discussed in chronological order of publication. Reference is made to George Eliot's letters and essays where relevant. The affinities of George Eliot with Auguste Comte and with Wordsworth are also considered. The nature and extent of a protagonist's rebellion is defined as it appears in each specific novel. The forms of active and passive rebellion are diverse. An utterance, usually an extended speech act made in complete sincerity, is a visible sign of the shift of consciousness which occurs when the individual moves from a state of rebellion to one of continuity of being. The two main categories of utterance are those of confession and those of commitment. The continuity of being towards which the individual strives consists of a belief in the innate goodness of the individual and trust in another sympathetic human being to release the good. Chapter One, Scenes of Clerical Life and Chapter Two, Adam Bede, emphasize the ceI,ltral role of a confessional utterance in the attainment of coherence of self. Chapters Three to Six focus on the novels published between 1860 and 1866 that are marked by key utterances of commitment and belief, arising from a sympathetic feeling towards another person. In The Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner and Romola, the pervasive Antigone theme is evaluated in which there is an opposition of two equally valid claims proposed by characters uttering contrary points of view in their expression of a rebellion against accepted norms. With the novel Felix Holt in Chapter Six, a political dimension appears and is further emphasized in the criticism of contemporary mores of the last two...

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Although rejecting Christian dogma, George Eliot retained, throughout her life, a strong sympathy for the humanitarian aspects of Christianity, which finds expression in her humane and moral philosophy, and especially in the value she attaches to right conduct. The treatment of death in her novels is governed both by this humanitarian emphasis and by her conviction of unalterable cause and effect in the universe. Given the interrelationship between individuals in society, the awesome reality of this law of consequences, demonstrating the ramifications of human error, makes it incumbent on man to avoid selfish choices. A study of the death episodes in Eliot's novels provides a comprehensive way of understanding and appreciating the operation of these concepts, in their moral and artistic aspects.

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George Eliot's fiction is filled with mentoring relationships which generally consist of a wise male mentor and a foolish, egotistic female mentee. The mentoring narratives relate the conversion of the mentee from narcissism to selfless devotion to the community. By retaining the Christian value of self-abnegation and the Christian tendency to devalue nature, Eliot, nominally a secular humanist who abandoned Christianity, reveals herself still to be a covert Christian. In Chapter 1 I introduce the moral mentoring theme and provide background material. Chapter 2 consists of an examination of Felix Holt, which clearly displays Eliot's crucial dichotomy: the moral is superior to the natural. In Chapter 3 I present a Freudian analysis of Gwendolen Harleth, the mentee most fully developed. In Chapter 4 I examine two early mentees, who differ from later mentees primarily in that they are not egotists and can be treated with sympathy. Chapter 5 covers three gender-modified relationships. These relationships show contrasting views of nature: in the Dinah Morris-Hetty Sorrel narrative, like most of the others, Eliot privileges the transcendence of nature. The other two, Mary Garth-Fred Vincy and Dolly Winthrop-Silas Marner, are exceptions as Eliot portrays in them a Wordsworthian reconciliation with nature. In Chapter 6 I focus on Maggie Tulliver, a mentee with three failed mentors and two antimentors. Maggie chooses regression over growth as symbolized by her drowning death in her brother's arms. In Chapter 7 I examine Middlemarch, whose lack of a successful standard mentoring relationship contributes to its dark vision. Chapter 8 contains a reading of Romola which interprets Romola, the only mentee whose story takes place outside nineteenth-century England, as a feminist fantasy for Eliot. Chapter 9 concludes the discussion, focusing primarily on the question why the mentoring theme was so compelling for George Eliot. In the Appendix I examine the relationships in Eliot's life in which she herself was a mentee or a mentor.

So many critics have pointed to George Eliot as a symbol of the nineteenth century's religious flux that the idea is becoming a commonplace one. House, for example, in "Qualities of George Eliot's Unbelief", concedes that Eliot is not a typical Victorian, "Yet her history her intellectual and spiritual and moral history -- exemplifies so many trends and qualities of Victorian thought that she deserves to be considered alone." [...]

The discussion in this thesis is designed to show reflections of George Eliot's life and philosophy in her four early novels: Adam Bede, The Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner, and Romola.