'But it's bad - it's bad,' Mr Tulliver added - 'a woman's no business wi' being so clever; it'll turn to trouble, I doubt.' Rebellious and affectionate, Maggie Tulliver is always in trouble. Recalling her own experiences as a girl, George Eliot describes Maggie's turbulent childhood with a sympathet[...]
'To be taught to write or to speak - but what is the use of speaking, if you have nothing to say? To be taught to think - nay, what is the use of being able to think, if you have nothing to think of? But to be taught to see is to gain word and thought at once, and both true.' Ruskin was the most p[...]
'She loved him much, and admired him even more than she loved him...Would that he had some faults!' Alice Vavasor is torn between a risky marriage with her ambitious cousin George and the safer prospect of a union with the formidably correct John Grey. Her indecision is reflected in the dilemmas of[...]
'She had resolved to trust in everything, and, having so trusted, she would not provide for herself any possibility of retreat.' Lively and attractive, Lily Dale lives with her mother and sister at the Small House at Allington. She falls passionately in love with the urbane Adolphus Crosbie, and is[...]