A study of characterisation in the novels of George Eliot

181.
are undoubtedly few opportunities. If, as George Eliot insists, "there
is no oreature whose inv~rd being is so strong that it is not greatly
determined by what lies outside it," 45 and if what lies outside it in
46
this oase is "an imperfeot social state," then we can aocept that fla
new Theresa will hardly have the opportunity of reforming a oonventual
life,
any more than a new Antigone will spend her heroio piety in
daring all for the sake of a brother t s burial." 47 But if we are to aocept
this conclusion, we are required also to acoept the first premises:
the interdependenoe of character and environment, and the insuffioiency
of that environment as a medium for heroic deeds. And even if we aocept
these premises, it is still noticeable that the two examples George
Eliot offers:us, St Theresa i and Antigone, are both desoribed in sooial
terms. They are serving what they feel are the needs of their respective
communities, not developing their potential for it.s oVin sake. An ":i:.mperfect
statel! by that token would surely offer ample opportunity for
benefioent aotivity. We have only to think of Florence Nightingale and
other women sooial reformers in George Eliot's time ii to reoognise that
George Eliot has deliberately presented to us a situation where
Dorothea's opportunities are narrowed to two possibilities. She oan either
stay at home at Lowiok and pursue a rather vaouous sooial and oharitable
round or she can marry Will Ladislaw, care ~or
their children, and
support his political objectives. We may well feel that Dorothea is
wasted, that her life presents a II [sad] sacrifice"; 48 but we must not
i
George Eliot leaves out the indisputable faot that her mission
was union with God and that she accepted reluctantly the o