Finishing this felt like an achievement, mainly as I rarely, if ever, read a long classic having not watched the adaptation first. I'm so glad I spread it out over a few weeks rather with some short books in between or I think I would have been either overwhelmed or not able to fully appreciate it's ambition.

Middlemarch is a novel set in the reform period from around 1829-1832 and follows a wide set of characters from a small provincial town whose lives and mistakes interweave beautifully. Middlemarch's full title includes "A Study of Provincial Life" and it is exactly that. Middlemarch is a microcosm for 1830s England, as Eliot looks at the looming Reform Act, Catholic Emancipation, Education, Religion, status of women in society, marriage and the looming threat of the railway.

Ironically I wanted to read this with the assumption that I wouldn't like it, like to accept that George Eliot wasn't for me and then I could move on! Except I loved it... though I can see how Eliot's style or her emphasis on the less favourable characters could be unpopular.

Middlemarch is dry and dense - not lighthearted with social commentary like Dickens or dramatic and dark like the Brontes - Eliot has her own style, which is a deep commitment to realism and the humanity of flaws. Eliot gets into their heads in a real sympathetic way - she wants you to understand why they act as they do - even Mr Casaubon. There is an empathy to her writing that I just love.

I really liked the self aware narration style, that sometimes slipped into first person as the narrator addressed the reader - it was unique and brought an intimacy to the narration.
Dorothea and Mary are now some of my favourite literary characters 😊.