The Oxford Handbook of George Eliot
Published on 19. March 2025
Book
Hardback
880 pages
978-0-19-285659-3 (ISBN)
Description
George Eliot repeatedly stressed the aesthetic and ethical importance of viewing subjects from different perspectives: The Oxford Handbook of George Eliot presents fifty-two perspectives on this major nineteenth-century writer. Together, the chapters provide the most wide-ranging collection of essays on Eliot's life and works published to date. While providing fresh perspectives on the important themes running through Eliot's works, the volume is distinctive in placing a concern with literary form at its heart. Part I questions longstanding conceptions of Eliot as a figure isolated by scandal by exploring her personal and intellectual relationships with her contemporaries. Part II focuses on Eliot's close engagement with earlier poets, dramatists, and novelists, as well as with painting, sculpture, and music, and in so doing probes Eliot's interest in the nature of influence itself. Part III explores the full range of Eliot's unpublished and published works: chapters on each of the novels make a renewed case for the centrality of Eliot's works to current scholarly debates about nineteenth-century literature; other chapters offer ways into texts that have either been neglected (such as the novellas and poetry) or more often mined for biographical and historical contexts than given a close reading (such as the notebooks, manuscripts, letters, and journals). Part IV gives close scrutiny to those aspects of literary form which characterise Eliot's writing, particularly her preoccupation with genre and her handling of voice, both that of her narrators and her characters. Part V assesses the complexity of Eliot's legacy for later writers, concluding with five shorter essays which tackle the nature and impact of the enduring cultural status of Middlemarch as a (often declared the) 'great English novel'.
Reviews / Votes
This is a monumental achievement and an exceptional addition to George Eliot studies The calibre of the contributions as of the whole conception and execution guarantee its durability, just as the volume itself is evidence of George Eliot's durability, and of her capacity to excite. * Margaret Harris, The George Eliot Review *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
sewn/stitched
Cloth over boards
Illustrations
14 figures
Dimensions
Height: 150 mm
Width: 183 mm
Thickness: 51 mm
Weight
1814 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-19-285659-3 (9780192856593)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Juliette Atkinson studied at UCL and the University of Oxford. Since 2009 she has worked at UCL, where she is now Professor of English. Her research focuses on three main areas: nineteenth-century fiction (especially the work of George Eliot, two of whose novels she has edited for the Oxford World's Classics series), life-writing (she has published on the Victorian preoccupation with 'obscure' lives) and transnational literary works, and Anglo-French exchanges in particular. She is also an editor (Victorian-present) for The Review of English Studies.
Elisha Cohn received her PhD from the Johns Hopkins University. Since 2011, she has worked in the Department of Literatures in English at Cornell University, where she is currently Associate Professor. Her research and teaching focuses on theory of the novel from the nineteenth century to present; literature and science; and affect theory. She is the author of Still Life: Suspended Development in the Victorian Novel (OUP, 2016) and essays in Victorian Studies, Victorian Literature and Culture, Contemporary Literature, and elsewhere.
Elisha Cohn received her PhD from the Johns Hopkins University. Since 2011, she has worked in the Department of Literatures in English at Cornell University, where she is currently Associate Professor. Her research and teaching focuses on theory of the novel from the nineteenth century to present; literature and science; and affect theory. She is the author of Still Life: Suspended Development in the Victorian Novel (OUP, 2016) and essays in Victorian Studies, Victorian Literature and Culture, Contemporary Literature, and elsewhere.
Content
Juliette Atkinson and Elisha Cohn: Introduction
Part I: Life and Networks
1: Philip Davis: George Eliot's Life-Writing
2: Sebastian Lecourt: George Eliot among Evangelicals, Dissenters, and Freethinkers
3: Fionnuala Dillane: Marian Evans, 'George Eliot' and Nineteenth-Century Media Communities
4: Supritha Rajan: George Eliot among Philosophers and Scientists
5: Elsie Michie: George Eliot and Contemporary Writers
6: Nancy Henry: George Eliot Abroad
Part II: Influences
7: Isobel Hurst: George Eliot and the Classics
8: Anthony Ossa-Richardson: George Eliot and Early Modern Practical Divinity
9: Alison Milbank: George Eliot, Dante, and Milton
10: Gail Marshall: George Eliot and Shakespeare
11: Charlotte Roberts: George Eliot and Eighteenth-Century and Romantic fiction
12: Thomas Owens: George Eliot and Wordsworth
13: Linda K. Hughes: George Eliot and Goethe
14: John Rignall: George Eliot and French Literature
15: Deborah Epstein Nord: George Eliot and the Visual Arts
16: Shannon Draucker: George Eliot and Music
Part III: Works
17: Ruth Abbott: George Eliot's Notebooks
18: Kathryn Sutherland: George Eliot's Manuscripts
19: Rosemarie Bodenheimer: George Eliot's Letters
20: Juliette Atkinson: George Eliot's Journals
21: Matthew Sussman: George Eliot's Essays
22: Clare Carlisle: George Eliot's Translations
23: Stefanie Markovits: George Eliot's Poetry
24: Audrey Jaffe: Scenes of Clerical Life: Genre and the Genealogy of George Eliot s Realism
25: Anna Neill: 'The Lifted Veil', 'Brother Jacob', and Short Form
26: Summer J. Star: Adam Bede and Work
27: Cristina Griffin: The Mill on the Floss and Intimacy
28: Elisha Cohn: Silas Marner and Affect
29: David Sweeney Coombs: Romola and Presentism
30: Ruth Livesey: Felix Holt and the Politics of Middle England
31: Gerard Cohen-Vrignaud: The Intersectional Spanish Gypsy
32: Gage McWeeny: Distantly Reading Middlemarch
33: Jessica R. Valdez: Daniel Deronda and the Forms of Belonging
34: Kent Puckett: George Eliot's Late Style: Impressions of Theophrastus Such
Part IV: Form
35: Ayelet Ben-Yishai: Revisiting George Eliot's Realism
36: Matthew Kaiser: Tragedy, Comedy, and George Eliot
37: Carolyn Williams: George Eliot and Theatricality
38: Jesse Rosenthal: George Eliot's Omniscient Narrator
39: Jonathan Farina: George Eliot's Dialogue
40: Yi-Ping Ong: George Eliot and Character
41: John Plotz: George Eliot's Rhythms
42: Daniel Tyler: George Eliot's Grammar
43: Devin Griffiths: George Eliot and Metaphor
44: Isabella Brooks-Ward: Aphorisms and Maxims in George Eliot
Part V: Afterlives
45: Aaron Rosenberg: George Eliot's Modern Forms
46: Alison Booth: Locating the Gendered Reception of George Eliot, 1880-1930
47: Olivia Moy and Sungmey Lee: George Eliot's East Asian Afterlives
48: Howard Jacobson: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Middlemarch and Contemporary Fiction
49: Dinah Birch: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Middlemarch and the Value of the Humanities
50: Caroline Levine: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Middlemarch as World Literature
51: Nancy Yousef: Perspectives on Middlemarch: The Philosophical Art/Work of Middlemarch
52: Robert Douglas-Fairhurst: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Two Middlemarch Sentences
Part I: Life and Networks
1: Philip Davis: George Eliot's Life-Writing
2: Sebastian Lecourt: George Eliot among Evangelicals, Dissenters, and Freethinkers
3: Fionnuala Dillane: Marian Evans, 'George Eliot' and Nineteenth-Century Media Communities
4: Supritha Rajan: George Eliot among Philosophers and Scientists
5: Elsie Michie: George Eliot and Contemporary Writers
6: Nancy Henry: George Eliot Abroad
Part II: Influences
7: Isobel Hurst: George Eliot and the Classics
8: Anthony Ossa-Richardson: George Eliot and Early Modern Practical Divinity
9: Alison Milbank: George Eliot, Dante, and Milton
10: Gail Marshall: George Eliot and Shakespeare
11: Charlotte Roberts: George Eliot and Eighteenth-Century and Romantic fiction
12: Thomas Owens: George Eliot and Wordsworth
13: Linda K. Hughes: George Eliot and Goethe
14: John Rignall: George Eliot and French Literature
15: Deborah Epstein Nord: George Eliot and the Visual Arts
16: Shannon Draucker: George Eliot and Music
Part III: Works
17: Ruth Abbott: George Eliot's Notebooks
18: Kathryn Sutherland: George Eliot's Manuscripts
19: Rosemarie Bodenheimer: George Eliot's Letters
20: Juliette Atkinson: George Eliot's Journals
21: Matthew Sussman: George Eliot's Essays
22: Clare Carlisle: George Eliot's Translations
23: Stefanie Markovits: George Eliot's Poetry
24: Audrey Jaffe: Scenes of Clerical Life: Genre and the Genealogy of George Eliot s Realism
25: Anna Neill: 'The Lifted Veil', 'Brother Jacob', and Short Form
26: Summer J. Star: Adam Bede and Work
27: Cristina Griffin: The Mill on the Floss and Intimacy
28: Elisha Cohn: Silas Marner and Affect
29: David Sweeney Coombs: Romola and Presentism
30: Ruth Livesey: Felix Holt and the Politics of Middle England
31: Gerard Cohen-Vrignaud: The Intersectional Spanish Gypsy
32: Gage McWeeny: Distantly Reading Middlemarch
33: Jessica R. Valdez: Daniel Deronda and the Forms of Belonging
34: Kent Puckett: George Eliot's Late Style: Impressions of Theophrastus Such
Part IV: Form
35: Ayelet Ben-Yishai: Revisiting George Eliot's Realism
36: Matthew Kaiser: Tragedy, Comedy, and George Eliot
37: Carolyn Williams: George Eliot and Theatricality
38: Jesse Rosenthal: George Eliot's Omniscient Narrator
39: Jonathan Farina: George Eliot's Dialogue
40: Yi-Ping Ong: George Eliot and Character
41: John Plotz: George Eliot's Rhythms
42: Daniel Tyler: George Eliot's Grammar
43: Devin Griffiths: George Eliot and Metaphor
44: Isabella Brooks-Ward: Aphorisms and Maxims in George Eliot
Part V: Afterlives
45: Aaron Rosenberg: George Eliot's Modern Forms
46: Alison Booth: Locating the Gendered Reception of George Eliot, 1880-1930
47: Olivia Moy and Sungmey Lee: George Eliot's East Asian Afterlives
48: Howard Jacobson: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Middlemarch and Contemporary Fiction
49: Dinah Birch: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Middlemarch and the Value of the Humanities
50: Caroline Levine: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Middlemarch as World Literature
51: Nancy Yousef: Perspectives on Middlemarch: The Philosophical Art/Work of Middlemarch
52: Robert Douglas-Fairhurst: Perspectives on Middlemarch: Two Middlemarch Sentences