George Eliot: 19th Century Novelist
She led an unconventional life and wrote powerful novels
George Eliot was one of the foremost novelists of the 19th century, ranking alongside the Brontës and Dickens in her skill at characterization and plot-making, but bringing to the novel something new, namely a moral purpose that went beyond the prime motive of most of her predecessors, which was to entertain.
She is almost universally referred to by her pen name, adopted more as a device to achieve anonymity than a pretense of masculinity. She was born Mary Anne Evans, although she used several variants of her given name (such as Marian) and took the surnames of her two husbands.
Her Early Life
She was born on 22nd November 1819 near Nuneaton in Warwickshire, the third child of an estate manager. Her mother was the daughter of a local farmer. She grew up in a semi-rural environment, aware both of the life of the agricultural community and the developing industry of nearby cities such as Coventry, as well as the busyness of the local coalmines and the canals and railways that crisscrossed this area in the heart of England.
She was educated locally, and soon developed a strong sense of religion, with a definite evangelical bias.
