study questions

Some Questions for Middlemarch, Books III and IV

1. How has Fred gotten himself into debt? What is the narrator's attitude towards Fred's debt and/or the idea of debt? (chap. 23)
2. What is the basis for the Vincys' condescension towards the Garths? What is the point of these fine "distinctions"? (chap. 23)
3. How does Mrs. Garth treat her daughter Letty in comparison to her son Ben? What do you conclude from her treatment of her children? (chap. 24)
4. What does Fred feel upon telling the Garths of his default on the loan? What does his response tell us about his character? (chap 24)
5. What are Caleb Garth's views on industry? on labor? How would you characterize these views? How would you characterize the narrator's attitude towards Garth's views? (chap 24)
6. Describe Mary at home? How does she respond to Fred's news? How does Fred respond? Why does she call Fred selfish? Do you agree? What does this scene tell us about the two of them? (chap 25)
7. Chapter 27 begins with a lengthy discussion of the effect of a candle placed upon a surface of polished steel. What is the purpose of this discussion? What is the narrator suggesting about characters in the novel? About the novel itself?
8. How is Rosamond the "perfect" woman? What are her acquirements? The narrator asks us to "think no unfair evil of her." At this point, do you believe this narrative admonition is justified? (chap 27)
9. Look at the description of Dorothea's view of Lowick at the beginning of chapter 28. What is suggested about Lowick? about Dorothea?
10. At the beginning of chapter 29, the narrative shifts. How? What is the purpose of this shift? Is it successful? What is Edward Casaubon afraid of? What is the effect on us of hearing of Casaubon's fears?
11. In chapter 29, what occasions the quarrel between Dorothea and Casaubon? How does Dorothea respond to the quarrel? How does Casaubon?
12. What does Dorothea's plea to Lydgate (in chapter 30) tell us about Dorothea? How does Lydgate respond to it? What is Dorothea afraid of?
13. What do others admire about Rosamond in chapter 31? How does Rosamond portray herself in her relations with other men (such as Ned Plymdale)?
14. Near the end of chapter 31, Lydgate admits his love for Rosamond. How might we characterize his love for her? What exactly does he "love" at that moment? The word "mastered" appears in the second to last paragraph--what does it refer to? and more importantly to whom?
15. At the beginning of chapter 33, we enter into Mary's thoughts. What kind of person is Mary? Does she resemble anyone else in the novel?
16. Why does Mary refuse to follow Featherstone's orders? What do you believe will be the consequences of this choice? Do you agree with her decision?
17. What is meant at the beginning of chapter 34 by Featherstone's "dead hand"? Is Eliot making a larger claim about the relationship between the past and the present? How would you characterize that relationship so far in the book?
18. What are Mrs. Cadwallader, Celia, Sir James and others observing in chapter 34? What sort of comments do they make? What does this scene represent?
19. What are the conditions of Featherstone's will, read in chapter 35? What does the will reveal about Featherstone? What are the responses of Fred and Mary to the will? Do you agree that Mary's decision to not follow Featherstone's orders was made "without will of her own"?
20. What do we learn in chapter 36 about the relationship between Rosamond and her father, Walter Vincy? What does this suggest about Rosamond's future? about Lydgate's?
21. Why does the narrator use the metaphor of romance as a "gossamer web"? What further implications does the language of the "web" have in the novel?
22. How are we to take Mrs. (Harriet) Bulstrode's warning about Rosamond and Lydgate? How does Walter Vincy take it?
23. In Chapter 36, Lydgate thinks that Rosamond is the embodiment of "perfect womanhood." What exactly does perfect womanhood mean to Lydgate? Do you agree with Lydgate's assessment of Rosamond? What do we know about her that he doesn't?
24. How do Lydgate and Rosamond plan for their future? What discussions about money do they have?
25. In chapter 37, the narrator describes the differing responses of Dorothea and Casaubon to Will's return. How would you characterize these responses? When the narrator refers to the effect of Will's occasional visits on Dorothea as like "a lunette opened in the wall of her prison," what are we to infer about Dorothea's life?
26. In their conversation, how does Dorothea describe the life of a woman? What was expected of her?
27. How has Dorothea's opinion of Casaubon changed since the last meeting between Will and Dorothea? What does it mean when the narrator says that for Dorothea "duty became tenderness"? How does that sentiment speak to a changed relationship between Dorothea and Casaubon?
28. What does Dorothea's "blue-green boudoir" represent? Why does she retreat to it in Chapter 37? What exactly is her "blindness" to which the narrator frequently refers?
29. Describe Dorothea's conversation with Casaubon that night. What is the setting? What are the conditions? What kinds of images and metaphors recur in the narrator's description? What is her "dumb inward cry"? Why does she think of her life as a "nightmare"? What does it mean to have "every energy arrested by dread" as she feels?
30. What does it mean that Mrs. Cadwallader refers to Ladislaw as a "sort of Byronic hero"? How does she mean this charge? How do you take it?
31. What is Dorothea's opinion of the pictures in Mr. Brooke's drawing room? What do these pictures represent? How does Dorothea feel after giving her opinion and what do those feelings tell us about her life with Casaubon? What is Will Ladislaw's response to Dorothea's speech?
32. What is Will referring to when he speaks to Dorothea about obligation? What does he compare it to?
33. What does Dorothea mean when she says "I have no longings"? How does she characterize desire? How do we make ourselves part of the "divine power against evil--widening the skirts of light and making the struggle with darkness narrower"? How does Will respond to Dorothea's sentiments? Again, what do these sentiments tell us about Dorothea's life?
34. In chapter 40, how are Mary Garth's prospects described?
35. How does Caleb Garth characterize the work he will do for Mr. Brooke? How is such work "the most honourable work that is"?
36. Why does Raffles pick up the newspaper containing the article on Bulstrode? What are we to make of these "chance" events and their role in the novel's plot? Is is meaningful that Raffles takes the "new-made railway"? (You might go online and search using the terms "William Huskisson" and "railway".)
37. In chapter 42, how does Casaubon persuade himself that he needs to protect Dorothea? How does he interpret Dorothea's silence?
38. What is his health condition and how might we see it as ironic?
39. How does Casaubon respond to Dorothea's compassion? How does she respond to him?
40. Consider carefully the following passage from the book: "it is in these acts called trivialities that the seeds of joy are for ever wasted, until men and women look round with haggard faces at the devastation their own waste has made, and say, the earth bears no harvest of sweetness--calling their denial knowledge" (425). What are the ironies in this passage? How might this passage be considered central to the book?
41. When the narrator reports "Pity was overthrown," what substantial change has just taken place in the novel? When Book 4 ends with the observation that Dorothea "felt something like the thankfulness that might well up in us if we had narrowly escaped hurting a lamed creature," who is the "lamed creature" and who is the one who can harm it? How does this metaphor express an important shift in their relationship?