Annotated Table of Contebts: Novels 03

Silas Marner. George Eliot. Novel. Bitter, miserly weaver who has no friends in the village, has come there after having been accused of a crime committed by a friend, has his hoard of gold stolen, but takes in a little yellow-haired baby girl, Eppie. Gradually, as she grows older, she brings him back to a more normal view of life.

Middlemarch. George Eliot. Novel. The theme of this novel is the loss of idealism, first by Dorothea, who is disillusioned to find that her husband is a desiccated scholar, a scholar whose work is a waste of time. The second loss of idealism occurs with Dr. Lydgate, a physician. The lost idealism of Dr. Lydgate is probably true of many physicians today.

The Mayor of Casterbridge. Thomas Hardy. Novel. A man gets drunk at a fair and sells his wife and daughter to another man. He repents. Bt he cannot overcome the consequences of his evil act.

 Tess of the D'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman. Thomas Hardy. Novel. Part of the charm of this novel, in spite of its tragic story of a good girl ruined, is Hardy’s description of the local villages, farms, and nature in the changing seasons and the customs of the rural people.