The Mill on the Floss

I 

I started reading this coz it was free on my kindle and then slowly, drip, drip, drip I got totally mesmerised. So much so that I had to buy the book. When a book is amazing I need a proper copy of it in my hand. To be honest I thought this would be really dull and heavy going in places but I would just give it a shot. But for me it was never dull, but sometimes difficult to understand due to the language. It has taken me an age to read because often I read bits twice or three times,because the language was just so beautiful or I didn't quite understand it!  Honestly, I have been totally transported away reading this. 

Elliot has the skill of putting emotions, ideas and pictures into your head in a way that I haven't witnessed, probably since I read the Lacuna by Kingsolver. Her topics are universal and it all seemed so modern. Human nature doesn't change and Elliot had such great insight due to being banished from her own family for being a weird intellectual, who was living openly with a married man.

What can I say, I am actually sad I have finished it.It's not perfect in anyway. the ending is so bad.I'm still in shock by how Geoge Elliot finished it off but the rest of it is great stuff.

The beginning third is based around Maggie and her older brother Tom, growing up in a Mill near the village of St. Ogg's. St.Ogg's is brilliant, a great depiction of small town England. I loved MAggie's Aunties.  Constantly disgraced, gossiping and judging. Maybe I am mad but I saw lots of humour in the way Elliot wrote about these characters. 

Maggie is bright, her brother isn't good at book learning. But Tom has a private education,the type his Dad didn't have. Mr. Tulliver uses His son to show society  that he has ' come up' in the world. Tom hates it all and MAggie's brain is left to stew. She has no formal education and picks up stuff from Tom's discarded books. She gets so frustrated she has a fetish doll she grinds against the beams of her bed.  Bloody hell, when I read this I knew I was in for a good read!!  People don't write like that these days.

Maggie running away to live with the gypsies was another highlight. So funny, yet so sad at the same time. Maggies's Dad is in debt, lives beyond his means and ultimately loses his Mill and his money. The guy who takes the  Mill and wins the law suit becomes Mr. tulliver's arch enemy. Infact Mr. Wakem is hated so much by Mr. Tulliver that the whole family have to witness and sign a curse on his name written by Dad in his shaky hand, in the Bible, the only book which they still possess. Again an image that I have never seen before. Melodrama in the most boring town in England. love it.

The first third is all about MAggie's childhood. it cleverly explains the psychology behind why she behaves like she does when she is older. her fierce loyalty to her family and her older brother outway everything. Maggie grows up in isolation and poverty, totally discarded due to the shame of her Father's bankruptcy but she makes a secret friendship with the hated Mr. Wakem's son. Now he is a thoughtful, artistic hunchback.  Good God...George Elliot sure brings on the afflictions!

He is her intellectual equal,he falls in love with Maggie but of course Maggie only likes him as a friend. Yet more disaster befalls on Maggie. 

Due to Tom's wits and nerve( nothing related to his exclusive education) he manages to claw the family out of poverty and suddenly Maggie is back on the scene and her Aunties on her Mother's side agree to see her.  Suddenly Maggie meets Stephen Guest who is almost engaged to Lucy, Maggie's cousin. Stephen and Maggie fall madly in love with each other and the stolen glances, mad passions and drama of this part of the book were so good. yes, I'm the queen of Victorian literature but to be honest it wasn't melodramatic at all  just beautiful, honest and totally gorgeous to read and imagine. Infact, it all seemed strangely modern. Poor Maggie is totally bowled over by this gorgeous guy and just doesn't know what to do. As you have gussed things don't work out well and poor Maggie's emotions are totally pulled through the wringer. Infact George Elliot must have been emotionally fraught too by the last few pages of this book. She probably had no choice but to end it the way she did.

Another interesting point was how George Elliot writes about small town judgements on Maggie's behaviour. The differences between how men are women are treated is clearly shown but Elliot cleverly shows how everyone is treated so badly and how society loses so much potential from both men and women due to the way the ' World's Wife' judges everything. One other thing,Bob Jakin and his dog mumps. He is the kindest, most intelligent, funniest door to door salesman and entrepreneur in English literature. Why didn't  Maggie fall in love with him?!