A study of characterisation in the novels of George Eliot

;ylaints which'ange many clitics on the side of I,~rs ? ,:=;'c"allader as upholders
of the proprieties .. What interests r::e in so af a of
his career is a passage of authorial comment which ():;:urs at the time when
','!ill is rejecting his life of unf'::tterecl ana. ~s choosing a
life of commit+,ed service. It is made quite clear to
influence his love for Dorothea exerts over his enoi.
this provides a parallel to the influence Mary
how stron€; an
of activity
has over her wayward
and undisciplined lover, Fred Vincy¥ We learn t::.at "it is under...iable
that but for the desire to where Dorothea was, an~~. perhaps the 'h'1:lnt
v.cknowing wLrj:; else to do, Will would not at this Lr"6 have been meditating
on the needs of the English people or critic~;
Jing J;.lLJ'E) ......... "'·u statesmanship:
he vlould probably have been
for several dramas, trying prose and
in
sketching
, tX"Ji-inC verse
and finding it too artificial, beginnine: to copy
leaving off because they were 'no good t, and observ~L
from
pictures,
all,
self-culture VlSS the principal point;
in poUL
he would have
been sympathising vrarmly with liberty ar"i progress :.1.:
Eliot's iram disrrissal of this as a p;:ogramme for -, ~.fe
II 33 George
is obviOUS, even
if she left:·,· at that. But she paints oontrast b: .. Cl leen what 'I'(ould
have been 8.IHi ViM t he now , rather t c hi~, S l..xrpr ..'lG!I finds hi;
doing and ever enjoying, and tells us t:1at l'Ot:!!'
for some >,vorL which shall take the plaCe of dilett..:u: and us
:1'eel that of CO'lI' action is matter indifference. 34
II
It would appear that HLadislaw had now ,-,-ccepted his l::5..'; of
'~hough
it was not that indeterminate loftiest thing Vlhich
bad once dreamed of
as alone worthy of cantintwus effort."
In terms of this examinatl.otl of George Eliot t s
ncept of II duty ," it
is the opposition of dilettante~sm and