Painting by Granville White with permission of
the George Eliot Fellowship
Was George Eliot a snob? Did she engage in snobbery? In a word, no. George Eliot was self-educated, and did not attend schools of higher learning. When she had to leave school in her late teens, Mary Ann Evans (young George Eliot) was privately tutored while she served as her father's caretaker and manager of the Griff House.
Some assume that since George Eliot was a brilliant writer, intellectual, and "new thinker" that she was a blue stocking snob. She was not, and in fact she spent her life writing about the common in life and defending common folk through her books.
It is always good to keep things in perspective. Eliot loved learning from others, but it did not limit her social leanings to those of higher education, social status, or grandiose achievements. In fact, she often poked fun at upper crust snobs. One character that immediately comes to mind is the character Edward Casaubon in her most popular novel, Middlemarch, who is presented as a dry intellectual with narrow class views. One almost wants to sock him in the nose for his condescending way with Dorothea!
So when we think about the intellectual accomplishments of George Eliot, we can also breathe a sigh of relief knowing she had a "common" thread running through the tapestry of her life that kept her from becoming a blue stocking snob. I love that about her! And this is a side of her I'm happy to present in my book, Karma Road: Walking through Time with George Eliot. www.karmaroadwalkingthroughtime.com
Some assume that since George Eliot was a brilliant writer, intellectual, and "new thinker" that she was a blue stocking snob. She was not, and in fact she spent her life writing about the common in life and defending common folk through her books.
It is always good to keep things in perspective. Eliot loved learning from others, but it did not limit her social leanings to those of higher education, social status, or grandiose achievements. In fact, she often poked fun at upper crust snobs. One character that immediately comes to mind is the character Edward Casaubon in her most popular novel, Middlemarch, who is presented as a dry intellectual with narrow class views. One almost wants to sock him in the nose for his condescending way with Dorothea!
So when we think about the intellectual accomplishments of George Eliot, we can also breathe a sigh of relief knowing she had a "common" thread running through the tapestry of her life that kept her from becoming a blue stocking snob. I love that about her! And this is a side of her I'm happy to present in my book, Karma Road: Walking through Time with George Eliot. www.karmaroadwalkingthroughtime.com