Novel Approaches13 Heinä 2025

‘The Mill on the Floss’ by George Eliot

The Mill on the Floss is George Eliot’s most autobiographical novel, and the first she published after her identity as a woman was revealed. A ‘dreamscape’ version of her Warwickshire childhood, the book is both a working-through and a reimagining of her life. Ruth Yeazell and Deborah Friedell join Tom to discuss the novel and its protagonist Maggie Tullliver, for whom duty – societal, familial, self-imposed – continually conflicts with her personal desires. They explore the book’s submerged sexuality, its questioning of conventional gender roles, and the way Eliot’s satirical impulse is counterbalanced by the complexity of her characters. Non-subscribers will only hear an extract from this episode. To listen to the full episode, and to all our other Close Readings series, subscribe: Directly in Apple Podcasts: ⁠https://lrb.me/applecrna⁠ In other podcast apps: ⁠https://lrb.me/closereadingsna⁠ Further reading in the LRB: Rachel Bowlby on reading George Eliot: ⁠⁠https://lrb.me/naeliot1⁠⁠ Dinah Birch on Eliot’s journals: ⁠⁠https://lrb.me/naeliot2⁠⁠ Rosemary Ashton on Eliot and sex: ⁠⁠https://lrb.me/naeliot3⁠⁠ Gordon Haight’s speech on Eliot at Westminster Abbey: ⁠⁠https://lrb.me/naeliot4⁠⁠ Audiobooks from the LRB: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://lrb.me/audiobooksna⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

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Jaksot(15)

‘New Grub Street’ by George Gissing

George Gissing’s novels, Orwell once said, could be described in three words: ‘not enough money’. Writing is a matter of survival for the cast of ‘New Grub Street’ (1891), which follows a handful of l...

29 Joulu 202516min

'A Christmas Carol' by Charles Dickens

Did Dickens ruin Christmas? He was certainly a pioneer in exploiting its commercial potential. A Christmas Carol sold 6,000 copies in five days when it was published on 19 December 1843, and Dickens w...

24 Joulu 202533min

‘The Mayor of Casterbridge’ by Thomas Hardy

After drunkenly selling his wife and child at auction, a young Michael Henchard resolves to live differently – and does so, skyrocketing from impoverished haytrusser to mayor of his adoptive town. Eve...

1 Joulu 202512min

‘Kidnapped’ by Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped began life serialised in a children’s magazine, but its sophistication and depth won the lifelong admiration of Henry James. Set in the aftermath of the 1745 Jacobit...

3 Marras 202516min

‘The Portrait of a Lady’ by Henry James

In The Portrait of a Lady, Henry James borrows from Eliot, Austen, folktales and potboilers, but ‘the thing that he took from nowhere was Isabel Archer’. James transformed the 19th-century novel throu...

5 Loka 202513min

‘The Last Chronicle of Barset’ by Anthony Trollope

Trollope enthusiasts Tom Crewe and Dinah Birch say they could have chosen any one of his 47 novels for this episode, so it’s no wonder Elizabeth Bowen called him ‘the most sheerly able of the Victoria...

7 Syys 202516min

'Our Mutual Friend' by Charles Dickens

'Our Mutual Friend' was Dickens’s last completed novel, published in serial form in 1864-65. The story begins with a body being dredged from the ooze and slime of the Thames, then opens out to follow ...

10 Elo 202517min