Scenes of Clerical Life (Oxford World's Classics)

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We are poor plants buoyed up by the air-vessels of our own conceit: alas for us, if we get a few pinches that empty us of that windy self-subsistence.”

But it is with men as with trees: if you lop off their finest branches, into which they were pouring their young life-juice, the wounds will be healed over with some rough boss, some odd excrescence; and what might have been a grand tree expanding into liberal shade, is but a whimsical misshapen trunk. Many an irritating fault, many an unlovely oddity, has come of a hard sorrow, which has crushed and maimed the nature just when it was expanding into plenteous beauty…The Sad Fortunes of the Rev. Amos Barton’ is the sketch of a commonplace clergyman, the curate of Shepperton, unpopular with his parishioners, who earns their affection by his misfortune—the death from overwork, childbearing, and general wretchedness of his beautiful gentle wife, Milly. Dolin, Tim (2005). George Eliot: Authors in Context. Oxford: Oxford University Press. p.67. ISBN 9780192840479. If that is not convincing, consider what a man - any man anywhere in the world - would say offered the same alternative, of repeated usage and death in youth with a handsome mausoleum as a memento to the "love". It is a no brainer - men would club anyone suggesting this to death, with no memorial. orphan whom they were raising as their own daughter. The Cheverels’ nephew, Captain Anthony Wybrow, and Gilfil grew up like brothers with Caterina. As Caterina blossoms into a young woman, Gilfil falls in love with her, and she falls in love with Anthony.

Scenes of Clerical Life has been reprinted in book form several times since 1858, including five editions within Eliot's lifetime. [2] The three stories were released separately by Hesperus Press over the years 2003 to 2007. A silent film based on " Mr. Gilfil's Love Story" was released in 1920, starring R. Henderson Bland as Maynard Gilfil and Mary Odette as Caterina. [40] Frome, Susan (1 July 2006). "The Sage of Unbelief: George Eliot and Unorthodox Choices". The Humanist . Retrieved 11 November 2008. I, at least, hardly ever look at a bent old man, or a wizened old woman, but I see also, with my mind’s eye, that Past of which they are the shrunken remnant, and the unfinished romance of rosy cheeks and bright eyes seems sometimes of feeble interest and significance, compared with that drama of hope and love which has long ago reached its catastrophe, and left the poor soul, like a dim and dusty stage, with all its sweet garden-scenes and fair perspectives overturned and thrust out of sight.” During the period that George Eliot depicts in Scenes of Clerical Life, religion in England was undergoing significant changes. While Dissenting (Nonconformist) Churches had been established as early as the Church of England itself, the emergence of Methodism in 1739 presented particular challenges to the Established Church. Evangelicalism, at first confined to the Dissenting Churches, soon found adherents within the Church of England itself. Meanwhile, at the other end of the religious spectrum, the Oxford Movement was seeking to emphasise the Church of England's identity as a catholic and apostolic Church, reassessing its relationship to Roman Catholicism. Thus in the early 19th century Midlands that George Eliot would later depict, various religious ideas can be identified: the tension between the Established and the Dissenting Churches, and the differing strands within Anglicanism itself, between the Low church, the High church and the Broad church. [19] Plot summary [ edit ] "The Sad Fortunes of the Reverend Amos Barton" [ edit ] a b Landow, George P. (14 October 2002). "Typology in Victorian Fiction". Victorian Web . Retrieved 11 November 2008.In 1893, Tchaikovsky considered writing operas based on two of the stories from the collection Scenes of Clerical Life (1857) by the English writer Mary Ann Evans (1819-1880), published under her literary pseudonym of " George Eliot". The second of these subjects was Mr Gilfil's Love Story (Любовь Мистера Гильфиля) ( TH 245; ČW 464) [1]. Barton and Milly become acquainted with Countess Caroline Czerlaski. When the Countess' brother, with whom she lives, gets engaged to be married to her maid, she leaves home in protest. Barton and his wife accept the Countess into their home, much to the disapproval of the congregation, who assume her to be his mistress. The Countess becomes a burden on the already stretched family, accepting their hospitality and contributing little herself. With Milly pregnant and ill, the children's nurse convinces the Countess to leave. The religious themes of the stories may not be of any great interest to the modern reader although I understand they were 'hot topics' in their day but the stories are mainly well-written. Already Eliot is showing an ability to create and describe life in a small industrial town and people it with an array of believable characters from the pauper in the workhouse to the country knight in the manor house. Simply beautiful stories in a prose style that is both dense and poetic but also extremely readable.

The culmination is reached in “Janet’s Repentance.” By this time your heart has been pummeled by the first two “scenes,” and you are ready for a happy ending. But Eliot, true to form, has created a real life heroine and hero. They struggle with their own “sins” and their purgatory is harrowing, but this final installment ends with a beautiful triumph of the soul. Mr Gilfil’s Love-Story” is also sad, but is more high romance than tragedy, full of chivalry and unselfish passion. The information that we collect and store relating to you is primarily used to enable us to provide our services to you. In addition, we may use the information for the following purposes: Silly Novels by Lady Novelists': essay by George Eliot". The British Library . Retrieved 17 June 2023. The final story of Janet is probably the most complicated and dense. It's first part is basically long, confusing, religious discussions which slowly lead in to the plot of competing religious doctrines forcing the town in to two camps, and then the stage is set. It's pretty difficult to follow unless you have a strong grasp of the religious landscape of country towns in England from 1790 to 1830 (read: very few people), but once that's out of the way it's pretty smooth sailing.Milly Barton was poor, overworked, starving, worrying about her children being fed and clothed, and paying the bills in all honour. One cannot but help compare here, since it is very pertinent and relevant - Barton in all his poverty and ordinary Englishman's life and persona of someone who has been to university and is involved day to day in matters intellectual and religious (for Barton approaches religion and sermons within strictly the intellectual realm and bores his parish stiff, enabling them to distance themselves until they sympathise with his loss of his wife) and little or none of the luxuries or power in his life or riches for that matter, is nonetheless no different from the Mongol (Mughal is Persian for Mongol, and the close relatives of Kublai Khan that settled in India routed via Persia bringing that nomenclature) emperor Shah Jahan who built that extravagant mausoleum for his wife on top of the revered temple of the majority religion of the country, achieving two shots in one; both the women were worn out by extensive childbearing beyond their health capability and died due to this "excessive love from the husband", a husband who was incapable of forbearing his sexual appetite even when the consequences endangered the wife's health to the point of death. The thing we look forward to often comes to pass, but never precisely in the way imagined to ourselves. The second story of Mr Gilfil is even better, though the ending plot twist is a bit "ehhh". The story's setup and structure is just flawless though, it's extremely easy to be pictured in your mind as a TV series.