The Theme of Alienation in Silas Marner
Author(s): Fred C. Thomson
Source: Nineteenth-Century Fiction, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Jun., 1965), pp. 69-84
Published by: University of California Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2932493
Accessed: 19/09/2010 03:03
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp. JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless
you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you
may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use.
Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=ucal.
Each copy of any part of a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the screen or printed
page of such transmission.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
University of California Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
Nineteenth-Century Fiction.
http://www.jstor.org
The Theme of
Alienation in
Si/as Mamrner
FRED
C. THOMSON
S
ILAS MARNER, thoughgraduallybeing rehabilitatedfromits
dreadful fate as a required "classic" for adolescents, is nevertheless still to the rear in due appreciation among the novels of
George Eliot. Middlemarch continues to command the bulk of
critical attention,and no doubt rightly.It is an imaginative achievement of a very high order, but this should not prevent wider recognition of the specific contributions toward its creation by its
slighter predecessor.
The tendency is to regard Silas Marner as something of an exception in George Eliot's fiction. While admiring her customary
merits of stylisticcontrol, deft characterization,and sensitive realistic evocation of provincial England, commentatorshave generally
located the distinctivequality of the book in its formal perfection,
"fairy tale" simplicity,and overt, almost systematicsymbolismqualities theyfindless conspicuous in the bigger novels. They have
looked upon it, in otherwords,as a delightfulbranch or inlet rather
than as part of the mainstream of George Eliot's art. Yet the contention here will be that Silas Marner does in fact belong to that
mainstream,and in particular is important to the development of
the author's vision of tragic life, so impressivelyprojected in Middlemarch.
Not that Silas Marner is a tragedy.Certainly the main contour
of the second half and the ending are of an opposite nature; but
the portions describing Silas' exile, loneliness, and deprivation are
dark-hued indeed. One feelsthatat least in these pages George Eliot
Fred C. Thomson is an assistant professor of English, University of North
Carolina.
[69]
70
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
witha tragicmode. In a letterto JohnBlackwas experimenting
wood she said, "I have feltall throughas if the storywould have
lent itselfbest to metricalratherthan prose fiction,especiallyin
of Silas; except that,under that
all thatrelatesto the psychology
treatment,
therecould not be an equal playofhumour."1 Though
in some of her shorterpoems George Eliot did essayhumor,the
implicationin thiscontextis thatpoetrymighthave heightened
thetragicaspectof Silas' plight.As it is, thefirsttwochaptershave
fromalmostanything
a sustainedsombertonalityoddly different
in her previous novels.2
Take, forexample,The Mill on theFloss,publisheda yearbetragedy,has
foreSilas Marner. It too, if hardlya thorough-going
definitetragiccolorations.On the whole,however,it conformsto
the traditional"comic" or optimisticorientationof the English
novel,withthe underlyingpredicationof a stable world,wherein
the individual is placed in coherentrelationshipto his society.
Whatevertheflawsin thatsociety,thefundamental
valuesbywhich
it existsare neverseriouslyquestioned.Maggieinhabitsa relatively
integrated
worldin whichshemaybe an insurgentbut notan alien.
At times confusedand rebellious in her hazy aspirationsfor a
betterlife,she is always presentedas a memberof her society,
whetherin itsfavoror disfavor.She acknowledgesitsauthorityand
does not disputeitsrightto punishher.3
Nor does one feel,as withHardy,any deep senseof disharmony
betweenthe laws governingsocietyand thosegoverningthe universebeyondit. The agnostic,humanisticbasis of George Eliot's
outlookencouragedthe assumptionthatobstaclesto the ultimate
improvement
of civilizedlifemustcome fromno sourcebut man
himself.Altogether
thenovellackstheelementofuniversalmystery
1 Gordon S. Haight, ed., The George Eliot Letters (7 vols., New Haven, 19541955),III, 382. Hereafterreferredto as GE Letters.
2 The language foreshadowsthe "poetic prose" of Felix Holt. Frederic Harrison
remarkedabout that novel. "Can it be right to put the subtle finishof a poem into
the language of a prose narrative?It is not a waste of toil? And yet whilst so many
readers must miss all that, most of them even not consciously observing the fact,
that theyhave a really new species of literaturebefore them (a romance constructed
in the artisticspirit and aim of a poem) yet it is not all lost. I know whole families
where the three volumes have been read chapter by chapter and line by line aild
reread and recited as are the stanzas of In Memoriam" (GE Letters, IV, 284-285).
3See, for example, the gipsy episode, where Maggie is disenchanted from her
romantic notions about a free nomadic life. The chapter is significantlytitled,
"Maggie Tries to Run Away from Her Shadow." Also notice her closeness, evell
bondage, to her family; her unhappiness whenever separated from them, and her
reluctancein disgrace to leave town.
Alienation in Silas Marner
71
The implacand ineluctablepowerso pervasivein classictragedy.4
able generallaws withwhichindividualwills therefatallycollide
are not,in The Mill on the Floss, givenadequate presenceor dimension.The embodimentof "law" in the narrowmoralityof
people like theDodsons,or in theconscienceof Maggie,inevitably
reducesits tragicpotentialbecause thesesocial and ethical forces
are too clearlylocated and defined.Maggie's struggleswith instinctiveideas of rectitudeand her heart'sdesires,her longingto
be loved and at peace with the world,are not related to larger
universal,or even social,conditions,until the flood;and thatrepowersscarcely
to introduceextra-human
mainsan awkwardeffort
evidentbeforeit strikes.Many sincere,plausible, and ingenious
forthe floodhave been advanced; but despitea symjustifications
bolic aptness,theimpactupon mostreadersis moreofcontrivance
withMaggie'shistory.RobertSpeaightwell sums
thanofsynthesis
up its tragicinvalidity:"It is an unhappyaccident,but it is not a
necessarydoom." 5
To conveya more genuinelytragicvision of life,George Eliot
had to suggestvaster,less easilydiscernibleor accessiblesanctions
and powersthan Maggie's conscienceor the pettytyrannyof St.
Ogg's society.She had to finda way of portrayingcharactersillattunedto the ruling conditionsof the world,a way of putting
into the operationof human destinies.This
more inscrutability
need not be entirelycosmic; it could also suffuse
mysteriousness
intricatesocial relationships.It must,however,be handled otherwisethanin The Mill on theFloss.
4 As W. J. Harvey says, "The novels lack any supernatural or metaphysical
framework;George Eliot is concerned solely with man's moral struggle in this
world.... In other words,although we may be ultimatelygoverned by a non-human
necessity,by the movement of atoms or by genetic patterns, human beings are
rarely concerned with such ultimates. There is plenty of room for manoeuvre in
the foreground.Much more obviously, we are directed and conditioned by social
pressuresof various kinds, yet this denies neither us nor George Eliot's characters
the opportunityof making moral choices, of taking decisions.... So we are limited
by our social canvases, yet within these limits we are free" (The Art of George
Eliot [London, 1961],pp. 47, 50).
6 George Eliot, The English Novelists series (London, [1954]), p. 57. Barbara
Hardy puts it differently.
"But the theme is the theme of tragic personal division,
and the final resolutionin the death which brings them togetheras life could never
do, merelyemphasizes their relation as brother and sister.It is this relation, rather
than the formalopposition of two ways of life, which is prominent throughout the
book partly because of a relative absence of structuralrelations to point the moral
in the other characters,partly because it is the most personal of George Eliot's
novels.. ." (The Novels of George Eliot [London, 1959],p. 84).
72
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
The openingparagraphof Silas Marnerindicatesone possible,
ifseverelylimited,directionin itsneatbalanceofrealismand quasisupernaturalism:
hummedbusilyin the farmhouses
In thedayswhen thespinning-wheels
-and even great ladies, clothed in silk and threadlace,had their toy
of polished oak theremightbe seen, in districtsfar
spinning-wheels
away among the lanes, or deep in the bosom of the hills, certainpallid
looked like
undersizedmen,who,by theside of thebrawnycountry-folk,
theremnantsof a disinheritedrace. The shepherd'sdog barked fiercely
when one of these alien-lookingmen appeared on the upland, dark
against the earlywintersunset; forwhat dog likes a figurebent under
a heavy bag? and these pale men rarelystirredabroad withoutthat
mysterious
burden.The shepherdhimself,thoughhe had good reasonto
believe thatthebag held nothingbut flaxenthread,or else thelong rolls
of stronglinen spun fromthatthread,was not quite sure thatthistrade
of weaving,indispensablethoughit was, could be carriedon entirely
withoutthehelp oftheEvil One.6
GeorgeEliot commencesby settingthe storyin a vaguelydistant
by assopast,but simultaneously
qualifiesany aura of strangeness
ciating the age with a practical domesticactivity.Within this
temporalframe,she moves fromthe shelteredfarmhousesand
upper-classestatesto the exposed outskirtsof civilization,where
the occasionalwanderersof as yetunspecifiedoccupationare seen
in sharpcontrastto the natives.Their comparisonwiththe "remallusiveconnotations,
nantsofa disinherited
race" bearsmysterious
but the structureof the simile suggeststhat theyare really not
such Ahasuerianexiles. Moreover,in the contextof the sentence,
theywould seem to have some connectionwithspinning.Intimationsof the occult aroused by the dog's barkingat the silhouette
againsta wintrysunsetare dispelledby the prosaicinterpretation.
The focusnext shiftsto the shepherd'sapprehensionsabout the
figureand his mysterious
bag, and again the rationalexplanation
is offered,the groundsfor any supernaturalrealitybeing transferredto rusticsuperstition.
Such devicesare not particularlyoriginaland contributeonly
to the story'stragicsubstance.They help generatea
superficially
providetheconditions
preparatory
mood,but do not in theniselves
fora tragicworld.The local peasantrymayfeel awe and mystery,
but George Eliot as narratorplainlyrepudiatesany sharein their
6
Quotations are from the Limited Editions Club edition (London, 1953).
Alienation in Silas Marner
73
From sentencefour to the end of the paracrude superstitions.
graph,she deliversa littletreatiseon vulgar errorsthat lays the
blame squarelyon ignoranceand insularity.
timesuperstitionclungeasilyround everypersonor thing
In thatfar-off
and occasional merely,
that was at all unwonted,or even intermittent
No one knew where
like the visitsof the pedlar or the knife-grinder.
wanderingmen had theirhomesor theirorigin;and how was a man to
be explained unless you at least knew somebodywho knew his father
and mother?To the peasants of old times,the world outside their
own directexperiencewas a regionof vaguenessand mystery:to their
untravelledthoughta stateofwanderingwas a conceptionas dim as the
winterlife of the swallowsthat came back with the spring;and even a
settler,if he came fromdistantparts,hardlyever ceased to be viewed
witha remnantof distrust,whichwould have preventedany surpriseif
a long courseof inoffensive
conducton his part had ended in the commissionofa crime;especiallyifhe had anyreputationforknowledge,or
showedany skill in handicraft.All cleverness,whetherin the rapid use
instrumentthe tongue,or in some otherart unfamiliar
of thatdifficult
to villagers,was in itselfsuspicious: honest folks,born and bred in a
visiblemanner,weremostlynot overwiseor clever at least,not beyond
such a matteras knowingthe signsof the weather;and the processby
which rapidityand dexterityof any kind were acquired was so wholly
hidden,thattheypartookof thenatureof conjuring.In thiswayit came
to pass that those scatteredlinen-weavers-emigrantsfromthe town
into the country-were to the last regarded as aliens by their rustic
neighbours,and usually contractedthe eccentrichabits which belong
to a stateof loneliness.
But if George Eliot discreditssupernaturalmystery,
she at the
same timerecognizesmystery
of an intellectuallymore acceptable
sort.In thesenseof discontinuity
or of disconnectionshe perceives
a commonexperiencewithtragicpossibilitieson a level of actuality surpassingthe comprehensionof the unenlightenedcountryfolk.If the rusticmind was inclinedto detectin discontinuity
the
externalagencyof the Evil One, she sees it ratheras an illusion
wroughtby the circumstantiallimits of knowledgeand by the
submergedinternalprocessesof society.Beneath the slightlycondescendingironyof her rationalismin analysingpeasantsuperstition, she insinuatesa furtherirony,that in truththe world is
mysterious.In more sophisticatedsocieties,the boundaries of
knowledgeare extendedand may be translatedinto termsother
thangeographical,but therepersiststhesame wonder,so to speak,
about "thewinterlifeoftheswallows,"thesamehelplessnessbefore
74
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
the hidden yet humanly determinable origins of thingsand events.
We seldom know enough thatcould be known at the moment when
it would do most good. As George Eliot writeselsewhere, "there is
no private life which has not been determined by a wider public
life, from the time when the primeval milkmaid had to wander
with the wanderings of her clan because the cow she milked was
one of a herd which had made the pastures bare." 7
Tragic force in Felix Holt and Middlemarch seems to derive
froma peculiar combination of spiritual and social alienation and
the often obscure social interactions that nourish or intensifyit.
I have suggested that in The Mill on the Floss this combination
was lacking. For all the range and depth of social observation, one
misses the sense of process, the proliferous entanglement of circumstance that with the uncritical passes for Destiny, and that can
wear down or destroythe individual who challenges its power. In
Silas Marner, George Eliot succeeded in selecting and organizing
precisely the ingredients required for her special concept of tragedy. Even though she developed her materials inversely toward a
happy conclusion for Silas, the weaver is her firstfull study of
alienation, anticipating the subtler, more complex treatmentsof
the theme in such characters as Harold Transome and Dorothea
Brooke.
She claimed that the genesis of the book was inspirational: "It
came to me firstof all, quite suddenly, as a sort of legendary tale,
suggestedby myrecollection of having once, in early childhood seen
a linen-weaverwith a bag on his back. . ." (GE Letters,III, 382). Not
the least importantfeatureof the germinal image is the factthat the
solitaryfigureis a weaver. As such he plies a staple trade, one that
the opening sentence stressesis identifiedwith a closely ordered society. But the sentence also juxtaposes to the picture of a busy domestic and communal life a fragmentaryglimpse of an unhoused,
rootless, stunted, lonely breed of men, who are nevertheless connected with the same occupation as the feminine spinners. Society
cannot get along without the weavers, nor could the weavers survive without a society to buy their products. Yet in rural areas the
position of theseweavers is anomalous. They are both indispensable
and distrusted,the verybag containing the stufffor their looms increasing their suspiciousness in local eyes. Business is transacted
Felix Holt, chap. iii.
Alienation in Silas Marner
75
with them almost as if in furtivepact with the Evil One. George
Eliot has thus chosen a protagonist whose trade combines the familiar and the strange,whose way of life is both continuous and discontinuous with established society.The whole storyis based upon
a pattern of these dichotomies.
Silas is equipped with a historyof alienation that reaches much
furtherback than his arrival in Raveloe. His whole life has been a
series of disconnections. An orphaned impoverished artisan pent
in a squalid alley in the heart of a Northern industrial town, his
opportunities forsocial participation have been restrictedto a Dissenting sect splintered offby its narrow principles from both the
religious Establishment and the surrounding secular world. Evlen
within this tight brotherhood, Silas becomes separated from his
fellows by the unaccountable fits,which he refusesto exploit to his
advantage. His cramped beliefs, poor education, and ignorance
of human nature, togetherwith his natural capacities for affection
and faith, conspire to make him preeminently vulnerable to the
misfortunesthat suddenly befall him. In devastatingsuccession, he
is bereft of friendship, fellowship, love, faith in divine justice,
home, native town-everything, in fact,that had meaning forhim.
The disasteris especially radical because his loss is not so much material as spiritual. Silas must learn to live not only in an entirely
differentregion but with an entirely new set of values, or rather
with the shards of his old ones.8
In the earlyages of theworld,we know,it was believed thateach territorywas inhabitedand ruled by its own divinities,so thata man could
crossthe borderingheightsand be out of the reach of his native gods,
whosepresencewas confinedto the streamsand the grovesand the hills
among whichhe had lived fromhis birth.And poor Silas was vaguely
consciousof somethingnot unlike the feelingof primitivemen, when
theyfledthus,in fearor in sullenness,fromthe face of an unpropitious
deity.It seemed to him that the Power in which he had vainly trusted
among the streetsand in the prayer-meetings,
was veryfar away from
this land in which he had taken refuge,where men lived in careless
abundance,knowingand needingnothingof thattrust,which,forhim,
had been turnedto bitterness.The little light he possessedspread its
beams so narrowly,that frustratedbelief was a curtain broad enough
to createforhim the blacknessof night(pp. 19-20).
Notice that George Eliot nowhere commits herselfto belief in the
8
The incidentof the brokenpot is symbolicof this.
76
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
objectiverealityof any such superhumanPower (malign,benign,
or neutral)as Silas feelshas strickenhim. The causes of his ruin,
she is carefulto show,are all naturallyexplicable,and the source
of mysteryis his contractedunderstanding.As Jerome Thale
acutelyputsit, "What he has lost is not a creedbut a senseof the
world." 9
The contrasts between the religiously and secularly oriented
societies of Lantern Yard and Raveloe are explicitly drawn near the
start of chapter ii. Lantern Yard, "within sight of the widespread
hill-sides," is an interior, upward-yearning world, physically enclosed by the white walls of the chapel, yet boundless for spiritual
aspiration. To Silas the immediate palpable environment matters
less than the sounds and rhythms,the hymnsand scripture,which
by their familiarityhave become the surrogates or guarantees of
exalted unseen but devoutly trustedrealities.
The white-washedwalls; the little pews where well-knownfiguresentered with a subdued rustling,and where firstone well-knownvoice
and thenanother,pitchedin a peculiar keyof petition,utteredphrases
at once occult and familiar,like the amuletwornon the heart; the pul'pit wherethe ministerdeliveredunquestioneddoctrine,and swayedto
and fro,and handled the book in a long accustomedmanner; the very
pauses betweenthe coupletsof the hymn,as it was given out, and the
recurrentswell of voices in song: thesethingshad been the channel of
divine influencesto Marner-they were the fosteringhome of his religious emotions-theywere Christianityand God's kingdomupon earth
(p. 19).
Conversely, in low-lying,wood-screened Raveloe, the church is an
exterior to the lounging men, the tempo of life relaxed and meandering, the satisfactionsand realities decidedly earthbound.
And what could be more unlike that Lantern Yard world than the
world in Raveloe?-orchards looking lazy with neglectedplenty; the
large churchin the wide churchyard,which men gazed at lounging at
9 The Novels of George Eliot (New York, 1959), p. 61. Thale underscores the
relationship of Silas to George Eliot's later, more sophisticated aliens. "Silas's route
is like that of the Victorian intellectual-from earnest belief through disbelief to a
new, oftensecular, faith.As psychologistand as student of the new theology,George
Eliot saw religion as valid subjectivelyrather than objectively. For her, our creeds,
our notions of God, are true not as facts but as symbols,as expressionsof states of
mind." Thus, Silas' "new religion is really an acceptance of the prevailing local
account of the world. It is a symbol of his sense of integration,of his oneness with
himself,with nature, and with his fellow men..." (pp. 61-62).
Alienation in Silas Marner
77
the purple-facedfarmersjogging along
theirown doors in service-time;
thelanes or turningin at theRainbow; homesteads,wheremen supped
heavilyand slept in the lightof the eveninghearth,and wherewomen
seemedto be layingup a stockof linen forthe life to come (p. 19).
These details are shrewdlycalculated to penetrate the merelyvisual
differentiaof the two places and to reveal their intrinsic spiritual
opposition.
With the advent of Silas in Raveloe, George Eliot has a thematic
precursor of a central situation in Middlemarch-a person living
with the wreckage or confusion of ardent spiritual ideals in a mediocre, spirituallyatrophied society.The differencesare, of course,
many. Dorothea and Lydgate are in a manner trapped by their society,whereas Silas is virtually independent of Raveloe, living on
its fringesand for years hardly affectingits consciousness. When
he is finallyreached by the community, it acts wholesomely upon
him instead of oppressively.But these and other distinctionsaside,
the important thing is that George Eliot was here studying in
simplified and diagrammatic form the mutual relationship of an
indigenous society and an outsider. Middlemarchis a massive,
highly complex variation on the theme of its pilot model. Of considerable interest,therefore,are the methods by which a sense of
disjunction is communicated in Silas Marner.
The village itselfis appropriately situated for its function. Nestled in the fertile Midlands and comfortablyprosperous, it is still
out of touch with the broader life of England and has long been
sinking into torpid obsolescence. The simple, self-containedstructure of this tinysociety enables George Eliot to sketch its principal
stratificationsand interrelationships with spare economy and to
polarize two units of roughlycomparable narrativeweight-a compact social organization and an alienated individual. At the outset,
as I have indicated, George Eliot superimposes upon a background
of ancient inert social stability an antithetical motif of transient
deracination. She then descends from generalities to particulars,
describing the superstitious speculations in Raveloe about the
strange appearance and habits of Silas.
Noteworthy is the absence of the dialogue that fills the Cass
episodes and the period of Silas' reclamation. During the firstfifteen years of his stay in Raveloe, he is talked about rather than to;
and the narratoreffectively
preservesthis breach of communication
78
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
by neverlettingthe mindsof Silas and the villagersjoin. To the
latter,he remainsa vaguely sinisterenigma whose presence is
taken for grantedbut whose inner characteris opaque. For instance,the curingof Sally Oates is firstalluded to as a matterfor
dark conjecture.Later we get Silas' point of view and learn that
The aborhis powersand motiveshave been sadly misconstrued.
tiveresultofhisbenevolentimpulseis to deepentheisolationfrom
whichhe could thenhave been rescued.Likewise,hishistorymight
have broughthim sympathyif told to a villager; but it is interof the reader,and sealed offfromthe
polated forthe information
knowledgeof the community.Silas' eventualrecitalof it to Dolly
Winthropis an importantmilestonein his restorationto a unified
existence.
The disconnectionof Silas fromsocietyis systematically
expressed by contrastinggroups of image and metaphor.Despite
the bad farming,intellectualsomnolence,coarse hedonism,and
tackygentryof Raveloe, the place does have a kind of weedyor
overripevitality,observablein the drowsyimpressionsof laden
orchards,nuttyhedgerows,and thickwoods. There is a human
heavyconparallel in the clusteredhomesteads,cosydomesticity,
viviality,and indolentpace of thenatives.Silas,on theotherhand,
afterthe austereyetwarmcommunallifein LanternYard, where
the brethrenenjoyedan emotionalsolidaritythroughsong,worship,and doctrine,is associatedwithimagesof deathand inorganic
nature-witheringvegetation,dryingsap, the shrunkenrivulet
in barrensand, stone,iron,and of course the gold. His veryappearance mirrorshis abstractionfromordinarylife: "Strangely
Marner'sface and figureshrankand bent themselvesinto a constantmechanicalrelationto the objectsof his life,so thathe produced the same sortof impressionas a handle or a crookedtube,
whichhas no meaningstandingapart" (p. 25).1o Even the sound
of his loom, "so unlike the naturalcheerfultrottingof the winnowingmachine,or the simple rhythmof the flail,"is a jarring
10
Cf. the vital tableau in chapter xvi. "Eppie, with the rippling radiance of her
hair and the whiteness of her rounded chin and throat set off by the dark-blue
cotton gown, laughing merrilyas the kitten held on with her four claws to one
shoulder, like a design for a jug-handle, while Snap on the right hand and puss
on the other put up their paws towardsa morsel which she held out of the reach of
both. .." (p. 190). Silas' fitsare obviously emblematic of death in life, which is the
effectof his abstraction.Even when fully conscious,he resembles"a dead man come
to life again" (p. 7).
Alienation in Silas Marner
79
note in the Raveloe world.Afterthe fiascowith Sally Oates, he
renounceshis once-belovedexcursionsforherbsand diminishesto
subhuman existence.
Then therewerethecallsofhunger;and Silas,in his solitude,had to
dinnerand supper,to fetchhis ownwater
providehis ownbreakfast,
fromthewell,and put his ownkettleon thefire;and all theseimmediatepromptings
helped,alongwiththeweaving,to reducehis lifeto
theunquestioning
of a spinninginsect(p. 20).
activity
Besides indicatingthe insectlevel to which Silas has declined,
the simile of the spider has a furthersignificancerelated to the
themeof social discontinuity.Reva Stump has argued that the
pervasiveweb imageryin Middlemarch,when relatedto the charactersof Lydgate,Rosamond,Casaubon, and Bulstrode,is "connected with illusion and egoism rather than with realityand
In a footnote,she adds that in Silas Marner this
fellow-feeling."
imagery"is used to point up the deficiencyin Silas' vision. The
insularworldhe createscan be enteredonlyby the child,and she
can perhaps
alone can lead him out of it." 11This interpretation
be a littleamplified,forthe web image in Silas Marner happens
to be both metaphoricaland objective. Silas is an actual professional weaver,but since his disasterhis workat the loom has become forhim a sterileabstractioninsteadof a usefulsocial function. For him it serves no purpose except to feed his own
unhealthyobsessions.In this respect,he recalls Swift'sspider in
the Apologue, who, alone in his fortress,
spun out of excrement
and venomin poisonous"self-sufficiency."
Preoccupationwiththe
ofthewovenclothleads to theabsurdfascination
abstractgeometry
with the geometryof the multiplyingpiles of gold. Silas is not
evenlinkedeconomicallyto Raveloe by themoneyit payshim,because thevalue ofthecoinsforhim does not lie in theirnegotiability.They are takenout ofcirculation,and thuswitheach gold piece
the weaverrecedesfurtherfromcontactwith human societyand
meaningfulreality.This perversionof values is suggestedby an
ironicmetaphorof organicgrowth:
But now,whenall purposewas gone,thathabit of lookingtowards
themoneyand graspingit witha senseoffulfilled
effort
madea loam
"Movement and Vision in George Eliot's Novels (Seattle, 1959), pp. 149, 225.
80
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
that was deep enough for the seeds of desire; and as Silas walked
homewardacrossthe fieldsin the twilight,he drewout the money,and
thoughtit was brighterin the gatheringgloom (p. 21).
The second half of the book deals with Silas' regeneration,showing
how his life is rewoven with society and how his work once again
acquires a purpose other than as a deadening refuge fromdespair;
and as this occurs, the imagery of sunlight and gardens irradiates
and vitalizes the scenes. The elaborate metaphorical substructures
of the later novels, which so enrich their tragic dimensions, surely
owe something to the experimentation with similar but more exposed techniques in Silas Marner.
The recurrentfits,in addition to making Silas an object of suspicion and aversion, represent chasms of consciousness which permit the seemingly gratuitous intrusion of evil or good. On two
widely separated occasions, they mark an apparent disconnection
fromthe past and a resumed continuity,respectively.Silas feels in
these involuntary suspensions the manifestationsof some controlling Power. Though aware that William Dare has wrongly and
maliciously accused him of theft,he regards himself the victim of
divine as well as human betrayal. That brief lapse of consciousness
breaks for him absolutely the continuity of past and present, and
the shock is worsened by his essentially emotional reaction.
To people accustomedto reason about the formsin which their religious feelinghas incorporateditself,it is difficultto enter into that
simple,untaughtstateof mind in which the formand the feelinghave
never been severedby an act of reflection.We are apt to thinkit inevitablethata man in Marner'spositionshould have begun to question
the validityof an appeal to the divine judgmentby drawinglots; but
to him this would have been an effortof independent thoughtsuch
as he had neverknown; and he musthave made the effort
at a moment
when all his energieswere turned into the anguish of disappointed
faith(p. 17).
He is unable to make a rational response to the experience and to
seek out a new basis for coherence in his shattered beliefs. Flight
to Raveloe completesthisvacuum of existence."Minds thathave
been unhinged fromtheir old faith and love, have perhaps sought
this Lethean influence of exile, in which the past becomes dreamy
because its symbolshave all vanished, and the present too is dreamy
because it is linked with no memories" (p. 18).
Alienation in Silas Marner
81
The effecton Silas of his second crucial seizure,duringwhich
but also dependentupon
Eppie crawlsintothecottage,is different
an emotionalresponse.The sightof thechild curiouslyrevivesold
memoriesofa happiertime,castinga fraillifelineof hope back to
thepast.'2Fromthenon, the textureof his lifeis rewoven,and he
comes to recognizethat the great riftbetweenpast and present
had existedmore in his embitteredimaginationthan in reality.
There is much thathe still cannotunderstand,but he can again
have trustin a benevolentunityto the world.AfterDolly Winthrop'seloquentlyinarticulatemusingson Providentialdesign,he
replies,
Nay, nay,... you'rei' the right,Mrs Winthrop-you'rei' the right.
There'sgood i' thisworld-I've a feelingo' thatnow; and it makes
a manfeelas there'sa goodmoreno he can see,i' spiteo' thetrouble
That drawingo' the lots is dark; but the child
and thewickedness.
wassenttome: there'sdealingswithus-there'sdealings(p. 196).
So the two fitsat the beginningand end of Silas' desperateyears
ofexperiencethatmasksa deeper
a superficial
discontinuity
signify
individualand collective.
actual continuity,
Dunstan Cass does not steal the gold while Silas
Interestingly,
is in a trance,as mighteasilyhave been arranged.Instead,George
Eliot devisesa painstakingaccount of whySilas was absent from
home and the door unlocked.It is arguable thatshe was relieving
tale of
the excessof coincidencea little,but in a semi-legendary
A betterexplanation,
thissort,coincidenceis notverybothersome.
I think,is thatat thismomentSilas and thesocietyof Raveloe bethe destiniesof Silas and
gin at last to converge.More specifically,
and
the Cass familyintermesh
subsequentlyoperate upon one
anotherin remarkableways.During the crucial fits,Silas is the
passiverecipientof bad fortuneand good, whereasin this intermediatecrisishe is consciousand active.The episode illustrates
web of social interactionthatoftenproducesbafthe far-reaching
12"The thoughts were strange to him now, like old friendshipsimpossible to
revive; and yet he had a dreamy feelingthat this child was somehow a message come
to him from that far-offlife: it stirred fibres that had never been moved in
Raveloe-old quiverings of tenderness-old impressionsof awe at the presentiment
of some Power presiding over his life; for his imagination had not yet extricated
itselffromthe sense of mysteryin the child's sudden presence, and had formed no
conjecturesof ordinarynatural means by which the event could have been brought
about" (p. 149).
82
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
fling consequences- that mutual influence of dissimilar destinies,"as GeorgeEliot once phrasedit.l3 hile Silas has been in
thevillageat an unwontedhour,Dunstan has been in the cottage
forthe only time in his life and withoutany prior acquaintance
with incalculablereperwiththe weaver.The resultis a mystery
cussions.For Silas, the discoveryof his loss bringsgreaterdesolation and discontinuitythan ever. He does not realize that the
catastropheis reallysalvation.Injuryto him by a Cass is soon followed by a compensatory"gift" froma Cass. George Eliot emphasizes that because of Silas' altered habits since the robbery
Eppie gets into the cottageinsteadof freezingto death outside.
The deadlygold is replacedby the livingchild,thesightof whom
reunitesSilas withthe past. The how and whyof all this,so mysteriousto the weaver,has its rationale in the affairsof certain
people hithertototalstrangersto him.
It is a commonplacethat the double plot in Silas Marner was
somethingof an innovationforGeorge Eliot, but it has not been
noted that this featureplus the alienated character
sufficiently
comprisethe basic tragicingredientsof her later novels.In Felix
Holt and Middlemarch,she was profoundlyconcernedwith tracL
processesof human soing the hidden ligaturesand labyrinthine
ciety,and withthe tragedythatoftenensuesfromthe "mutual influenceofdissimilardestinies."14 If theoutcomeforSilas is serene,
it could well have been wretched.The
underothercircumstances
point is that the double plot is used less for the sake of variety,
parallelism,or contrastthan to explore the actual workingsof
society,especiallythe minutereticulationof influences.
At the timeof the theft,the qualityand values of Raveloe are
bytheCasses.The Squire is the"greatestman" around
represented
and sets the standardforthe good life with his abundant feasts.
But in his pursuitof pleasurehe neglectshusbandryand the farm
is slipping toward ruin, temporarilyaverted by the precarious
since the deathof his wife
bountyofwartimeprices.Furthermore,
1"Felix Holt, chap. iii.
4 "The double plot of Felix Holt emphasizes the variability of human growth,
and regenerationand failure are put together to make a story with two endings.
In Middlemarch there is again the multiplication of successes and failures,and the
result is a novel with an extraordinarysense of expanding life. The double plots
of Felix Holt or Wuthering Heights or Anna Karenina are highly rigid pieces of
parallelism compared with Middlemarch,where the structurehas its effectof human
generalization and differentiation,but avoids the stiffnessof symmetry"(Barbara
Hardy, The Novels of George Eliot, p. 93).
Alienation in Silas Marner
83
the house has becomerundownand gloomy;his sons are quarreland goingto thebad. The real socialcenter
ingamongstthemselves
of Raveloe is thusnot Red House but the Rainbow,a statusconfirmedby the frequentpatronageof the Squire himself.And it is
to the Rainbow thatSilas runsforhelp afterthe theft.The effect
of thatvisit is to enlistthe sympathyof the villagers,"beeryor
of it may be. At any rate,not
bungling"as theirdemonstrations
only does Silas begin to be drawn into the communitybut his
troubles,like thoseof Wordsworth'sCumberlandBeggar,kindle
some feebleglow in the moulderingbetternaturesof the rustics.
However,the influenceof Silas upon any generalelevationof the
quality of Raveloe life should not be exaggerated.The major
reciprocalinfluencesare betweenSilas and GodfreyCass.
Silas' second errandforaid is on behalfof anotherperson,and
he goesto thedomesticcenterofRaveloe,Red House (itselfa kind
of "rainbow"with its Blue Room and White Parlour). He there
touchesmomentarily
the world of GodfreyCass, whose daughter
becomeshis savior.Godfreyin decidingnot to acknowledgethe
child and to leave her in the keepingof Silas helps the weaverto
renewedlife; but he also changesthe course of his own life. He
reforms,marriesthe efficient
Nancy Lammeter,and restoresthe
farmto stableprosperity.
Red House, and in factthewholevillage,
seemto recovera bloom thathad turnedserein theearlychapters.
Offsettingthese benefits,Godfreyremains childless,unable to
transmithis new affluencethrougha directheir. And as a consequence of his expandingeconomy,the pit is drained,disclosing
Dunstan'sskeletonand thegold. The familyhas long been bound
to Silas bya secretdebt-a debt whichGodfreynow findsmustbe
repaid not merelywiththe gold but withthe loss of his child and
the probable extinctionof his line. Silas has been to him both a
benefactorand an unwittingNemesis.
Thus by combiningthe theme of social and spiritualdiscontinuitywith the double plot, George Eliot approacheda means
ofexpressingherconceptoftragiclife.Insteadofreferring
to some
cosmicor metaphysicalsource forthe sense of mysterious
power,
she implantedit in the organismof societyitself.Tragedy occurs
whenthewell-intentioned
individualactsin ignoranceor defiance
of the intricateweb thatbinds his moral behaviorto thatof the
collectivesociety;and the resultanttragicexperienceconsistsin
the feelingof disconnectionfromthe rootsof one's beliefsand as-
84
Nineteenth-CenturyFiction
a tragic
sumptionsabout what the worldis like. Silas is therefore
figureinsofaras his narrowpietypreventsan adequate response
to the patentinjusticedone him, and insofaras his responseis
a feelingof utteralienation.In Silas Marner,the relationshipof
is examinedin rather
and socialcontinuity
individualdiscontinuity
too schematicor didacticfashion.It all worksa little too slickly
to pass forobjectivereality.But in Felix Holt, stillexperimentally
and with uneven success,and in Middlemarch,triumphantly,
GeorgeEliot masteredthe techniquesand languageintroducedin
her "legendarytale."