A study of characterisation in the novels of George Eliot

acceptance of the
'al determini -;m, anci of t:r:c\iI:JY
in which she shoVls a chars-Gter's estab'
set p';tterns of rc}ponse
to the situations which c)yli'ront him.:"s she says i.1 Romola., "Ou::" lives
make a mora]. tradition :£'0:" our individual selves, as the life of man­
'-1
kind at large makes a moral tradition for the race. H:>
The laws furnished
by the learning theories of the ,~ighteenth .. an::i early nineteenthcentury
philosophers, taken over and incorporated into neurophysiological
and biological researches, all reinforced her belief in the strictness
of ca.usa.l sequences. Habit formation becomes almost irreversible and it
therefore becomes supremely important ~;o
ensure that the habits
ore acquired are those that increase a sense'of fellowship, ofs)npathy
towards others, those, in short, that, in George Eliot's terms, promote
moral grovrch.· And the acquisition of right habits is especially importunt
in that our supposedly impulsive actions are decisively determined by the
sorts of moral choices, the sorts of habitual responses we have r:lade in
the past. When Tito disovil1s his father on the steps of the Duomo, and
is himself bewildered at hOVl spontaneously the denunciation has risen
to his lips, recognising that he would have saved hj.mself a great deal
of trouble if he had lovingly acknowled.ged the old
the authorial
comment reminds u::;that
o was experiencing that inexorable law of
human souls, that we prepare ourselves for sudden dz,,;eds by the reiter­
I;?
ated choice of good or evil vlhieh gradually determines character ~ 1/ ./~
These early novels, then, highlight exactly this
the character
with his inner battles, is foregrourded
to e. degree, isolated
from his surroundings. The pastoral com.'1lunity of Ac;.,,:::~
;?ede, and the
less well-real:1.sed Renaissance Florence of :.:::.::~;;;:::.::::.
a:ce backgrounds
against whieh the characters live out their livos;~h.ere
is none of
that uIlcertainty between figure and ground which Martin Price describes
as a feature of a realistic novel like li!;i.ddle.r~~:'9h,
where we cannot