1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910821041503321

Autore

Paris Bernard J

Titolo

Rereading George Eliot : changing responses to her experiments in life / / Bernard J. Paris

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Albany, : State University of New York Press, c2003

ISBN

0-7914-8636-2

1-4175-3141-X

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (235 p.)

Collana

SUNY series in psychoanalysis and culture

Disciplina

823/.8

Soggetti

Psychoanalysis and literature - England - History - 19th century

Psychological fiction, English - History and criticism

Psychology in literature

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 213-215) and index.

Nota di contenuto

Front Matter -- Contents -- Preface -- No Longer the Same Interpreter -- “An Angel Beguiled”: Dorothea Brooke -- The Two Selves of Tertius Lydgate -- “A Dreadful Plain Girl”: Mary Garth -- “This Problematic Sylph”: Gwendolen Harleth -- “The Crushed Penitent”: Gwendolen’s Transformation -- Gwendolen and Daniel: A Therapeutic Relationship? -- Deronda the Deliverer -- Conclusion -- References -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

In a probing analysis that has broad implications for theories of reading, Bernard J. Paris explores how personal needs and changes in his own psychology have affected his responses to George Eliot over the years. Having lost his earlier enthusiasm for her "Religion of Humanity," he now appreciates the psychological intuitions that are embodied in her brilliant portraits of characters and relationships. Concentrating on Eliot's most impressive psychological novels, Middlemarch and Daniel Deronda, Paris focuses on her detailed portrayals of major characters in an effort to recover her intuitions and appreciate her mimetic achievement. He argues that although she intended for her characters to provide confirmation of her views, she was instead led to deeper, more enduring truths, although she did not consciously comprehend the discoveries she had made. Like her characters, Paris argues, these truths must be disengaged from her



rhetoric in order to be perceived.