Being shunned by her brother was the tragedy that motivated so much of The Mill on the Floss and its focus on the fractured relationship between Tom and Maggie Tulliver - one of English fictions most powerful female protagonists. He was unwilling to accept her unconventional relationship with the critic and philosopher George Henry Lewes. Her best friend growing up was her brother Isaac, yet as adults they became estranged. It was near here that Mary Ann Evans (Eliot’s real name) was born and developed her literary appetite. Much of the plot had parallels to the author’s own life.Įliot’s journey began at Arbury Hall in Warwickshire. Its focus was a young woman’s struggle for intellectual fulfilment, her forbidden love and the ruptured relationship between a sister and brother. Published in 1860, The Mill on the Floss was George Eliot’s third novel and also her most autobiographical. If you enjoyed The Mill on the Floss, you might like Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure, also available in Penguin Classics.Explore The Mill on the Floss with exclusive videos and activities

In 1857, she published Scenes of Clerical Life, the first of eight novels she would publish under the name of 'George Eliot', including The Mill on the Floss, Middlemarch, and Daniel Deronda. Mary Ann Evans (1819-80) began her literary career as a translator, and later editor, of the Westminster Review. Byatt, author of Possession, provides full explanatory notes and an introduction relating The Mill on the Floss to George Eliot's own life and times. With its poignant portrayal of sibling relationships, The Mill on the Floss is considered George Eliot's most autobiographical novel it is also one of her most powerful and moving. As she reaches adulthood, the clash between their expectations and her desires is painfully played out as she finds herself torn between her relationships with three very different men: her proud and stubborn brother hunchbacked Tom Wakem, the son of her family's worst enemy and the charismatic but dangerous Stephen Guest. Byatt, author of Possession, in Penguin Classics.īrought up at Dorlcote Mill, Maggie Tulliver worships her brother Tom and is desperate to win the approval of her parents, but her passionate, wayward nature and her fierce intelligence bring her into constant conflict with her family.

Drawing on George Eliot's own childhood experiences to craft an unforgettable story of first love, sibling rivalry and regret, The Mill on the Floss is edited with an introduction and notes by A.S.

The mill of the floss