Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 The “Evangelical”: starting out in a Christian culture
- 2 The Apostate: moving beyond the Christian mythos
- 3 The Journalist: editing, reviewing, shaping a worldview
- 4 The Germanist: balancing the counterweight of German thinkers
- 5 The Novelist: mixing realism, naturalism and mythmaking
- 6 The Historian: tracking ideals – utopian and national – in Romola and The Spanish Gypsy
- 7 The “Radical”: taking an anti-political stance in Felix Holt
- 8 The Encyclopedist: transcending the past in Middlemarch
- 9 The Visionary: transmitting ideals in Daniel Deronda
- 10 The Intellectual: cultural critique in Impressions of Theophrastus Such
- Notes
- Works cited
- Name index
Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 April 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Preface
- Introduction
- 1 The “Evangelical”: starting out in a Christian culture
- 2 The Apostate: moving beyond the Christian mythos
- 3 The Journalist: editing, reviewing, shaping a worldview
- 4 The Germanist: balancing the counterweight of German thinkers
- 5 The Novelist: mixing realism, naturalism and mythmaking
- 6 The Historian: tracking ideals – utopian and national – in Romola and The Spanish Gypsy
- 7 The “Radical”: taking an anti-political stance in Felix Holt
- 8 The Encyclopedist: transcending the past in Middlemarch
- 9 The Visionary: transmitting ideals in Daniel Deronda
- 10 The Intellectual: cultural critique in Impressions of Theophrastus Such
- Notes
- Works cited
- Name index
Summary
… though I have studied [Mill's] books, especially his Logic and Political Economy, with much benefit, I have no consciousness of their having made any marked epoch in my life. Of Mr. Herbert Spencer's friendship I have had the honour and advantage for twenty years, but I believe that every main bias of my mind had been taken before I knew him. Like the rest of his readers, I am of course indebted to him for much enlargement and clarifying of thought.
(letter of August 13, 1875)If you referred to something in Mr. Lewes's letter, let me say once for all that you must not impute my opinions to him, nor vice versa. The intense happiness of our union is derived in a high degree from the perfect freedom with which we each follow and declare our own impressions.
(letter of November 13, 1860)There is as yet no high moral purpose in the impression she makes, and it is that alone which commands love. I think she will alter. Large angels take a long time unfolding their wings; but when they do, soar out of sight.
Bessie R. Parkes (letter of March 6, 1852)What is an intellectual biography? It would be the story of a life largely devoted to and directed by ideas – i.e., the biography of an intellectual.
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- Information
- George Eliot's Intellectual Life , pp. 1 - 11Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010