Some Questions for Middlemarch, Books V and VI
- Describe Dorothea's visit to Lydgate. What do we learn that might surprise us? How does Dorothea respond to Ladislaw's presence? What does her response suggest about her attitudes? about Ladislaw's?
- How do Tertius and Rosamond discuss Ladislaw? What do we learn about Rosamond in this chapter (chapter 43)?
- What do Casaubon's thoughts at the end of chapter 44 tell us about the Casaubons' marriage?
- What is the purpose of the reported conversations of chapter 45?
- What advice does Farebrother give Lydgate? Are we to see this exchange as ironic?
- What does Rosamond mean when she tells Lydate that his profession is not "a nice profession"?
- What do we learn about Dorothea's influence on Ladislaw in chapter 46? What do we learn about Ladislaw's past?
- Lydgate tells Ladislaw that a person can be independent of others. The narrator doesn't comment on this statement (at the end of chapter 46), but if she did what would she say?
- Describe Ladislaw's feelings for Dorothea. Are we supposed to see his feelings as comic or ironic?
- Look carefully at the beginning of chapter 48. What words and images are used? Why?
- What words and images are used to describe Casaubon's attempt to extract from Dorothea a promise? What promise does she believe he will ask? Why is she uncertain about agreeing to it? How does she persuade herself to accept it? What is Tantripp's role in this scene?
- How do Sir James and Mr. Brooke respond to Casaubon's will? By the end of the chapter (chapter 49), what are your opinions of Sir James and Mr. Brooke?
- Describe Dorothea's response to the news of Casaubon's codicil. What does she realize about Casaubon or everyone for that matter?
- How does Lydgate respond to Dorothea's questions about Mr. Tyke? When asked about Rev. Farebrother, what does Lydgate admit about himself?
- Why does Mary reject Farebrother?
- How does Raffles find Bulstrode? What are the implications of Raffles' calling his discovery of Bulstrode "providential"?
- What does the "dead hand" of the book's title refer to?
- Why does Dorothea write a letter to her late husband? What other letters have figured in the book? What purposes have letters served?
- Describe the meeting between Ladislaw and Dorothea (in chapter 54). How would you describe Dorothea's present attitude? Ladislaw's? What themes are played out in their meeting? What is the distinction between doing what we like and doing what we are bound to?
- What happens when Celia lets Dorothea's hair out of the widow's cap? What is signified by this scene? What aspect of Dorothea is highlighted by this scene?
- Why are the railway surveyors attacked? What do they represent to the provincial town of Middlemarch?
- What does Fred discover about himself? What advice does Caleb give him about work?
- Caleb says to Fred, "The young ones have always a claim on the old." How does this statement fit with other plot lines and characters in the novel? (or how does it not fit?)
- Contrast the responses of Caleb Garth and Walter Vincy to Fred's discovery of his vocation. What do these parallel scenes tell us about the two men?
- How does Rosamond lose her baby? What does this episode reveal about her? What does Lydgate begin to realize about her? What effect does this realization have on him?
- Why does he recall Dorothea's appeal to him about Casaubon? When he thinks of Dorothea as the "voice of deep-souled womanhood" is this ironic?
- When Lydgate tells Rosamond of their debts, she responds "What can I do?" Explain the importance of the emphasis. What other scenes in the book does this scene mirror? How is this scene different and what is the importance of those differences?
- What does Rosamond's further response to their situation tell us about her? How does it contrast with the actual or imagined response of other characters?
- How does Ladislaw find out about Casaubon's will? How does he respond? How does Rosamond respond to her role?
- What is Bulstrode's story? What is he afraid of? When the narrator says that Bulstrode's actions had been "sanctioned by remarkable providences," whose attitude is she revealing? What claim about the role of providence or the providential might be made?
- According to the narrator, what is the source of Bulstrode's hypocrisy? Why might his hypocrisy be the most dangerous kind? To what other characters might Bulstrode be compared? How does Ladislaw respond to Bulstrode's offer?
- When Dorothea and Ladislaw meet in chapter 62, what has changed? What miscommunications take place in this scene?