Middlemarch (Wordsworth Classics)

The page quality and font is okayish. I got used to it given the fact that it is a weighty tome.Coming to the book - a vivid portrayal of the rustic, provincial life. There were so many characters I loved. I sympathized with Dorothea. I started admiring her since getting introduced to her character. The level-headedness, the sensibility, the compassion, the love, the grief, the entanglement, the fight within and without, everything was top notch. The characters seem real, driven by motives and intent. The book is not something you buy just to experience the Victorian style of writing, the book is a gem you wish to preserve for the rest of your lives. The book demands your energy which very rarely a book does.The Author - very intelligent writing, out of this world yet distinct, connected and homely.Now I know why it is the Best English Novel ever written. If you wish to know it too buy it and read on.But yes its gonna take you elsewhere for a long long time. So be ready for that !

Good read

A charming glimpse into the lives of some memorable characters in a provincial town of 18th century England. The social and political times of that period is an absolutely fascinating read. The book leaves you wishing that maybe if things would have turned out differently for Lydgate and Dorothea .... perhaps if their lives had intertwined.... it would have been wonderful.But in a novel,it is as the author wishes! Also in today,s world, if a marriage would have been as constraining as Rosamond and Lydgate's, it could have been terminated in the blink of an eye. But those days were different. And a word for the sweetest couple in the book : Fred and Mary....in spite of their trials, their story ends on a happy note. All in all, a fascinating tale. A tad too long... but entirely worth it.

Listen, the cover is NOT the one I had hoped to recieve. It's quite tacky.But the text seems unabridged, complete and genuine.

Overall nice book!

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If you like old classics, this is for you. You'll enjoy reading. It gives soothing feeling.

Damaged book, different cover and no bookmark! Going to return it!

I loved this book. I would never have thought or probably tried to read it, were it not for our book club president. My first moments with the book were a complete ugh. I thought about backing out of my promise to read it. As we find with other classics written in a vastly different era, we must accustom ourselves to the flow of the words. George Eliot wrote in a way that we don't speak in America in 2023. So what happened was, I started to read the Introduction. Let me stop you right there. DON'T do that as the first thing. And also, do note that the Intro contains spoilers. I then tried to read the Prelude. Maybe skip that also, because the heroine of our story is someone it takes a little time to cuddle up with. Next I decided that instead of reading this dusty ole' classic I would listen with an audible book. After listening to the first few chapters read by an excellent narrator, I said you know what(?) I can read this book on my own, so I picked up the paperback version that I had already purchased from Amazon. Read a few chapters, THEN went back to the Introduction and Prelude. My other advice, READ the Introduction!!!! Really read it. When you finish the Finale, go back and read the Prelude. My new opinion of George Eliot (from what little I might have known before) was transformed into now remembering her as a genius among thinkers. While you might find yourself in a whirlpool of words written in the English vernacular of a different era - when you want to scream "just say what you mean!" remember that the message from Eliot is as wonderful and worthwhile as any hour you may spend in contemplating the world around you.

Como sempre, as edições da Wordsworth classics não decepcionam. As letras, para algumas pessoas, podem ser pequenas, mas pra mim ela tem um tamanho muito bom. Veio em perfeito estado tbm

Please read it in your leisure time and enjoy its story.

George Eliot is one of a few women who can write men convincingly. Here we follow the detailed lives of five male characters from different social classes in Middlemarch: the aristocrat, an academic, the businessman/politician, a doctor, artist and farmer ('farmers without landlords, one can’t tell how to class them'). Indeed, the impact of social class is a strong theme – ‘the low people, by whose interference, however little we may like it, the course of the world is very much determined.’Dorothy, the heroine, is a plain woman and no doubt based on George Eliot's own lack of beauty. She moves in circles of pretty women admired by men from the various hierarchy, but her intellect prevails.There is so much wit and wisdom in this novel, I could quote endlessly: ‘Poor Mr. Casaubon had imagined that his long studious bachelorhood had stored up for him a compound interest of enjoyment, and that large drafts on his affections would not fail to be honored;’‘If you are not proud of your cellar, there is no thrill of satisfaction in seeing your guest hold up his wine-glass to the light and look judicial.’‘Oh, blameless people are always the most exasperating.’‘But a prig is a fellow who is always making you a present of his opinions.’‘When a conversation has taken a wrong turn, we only get farther and farther into the swamp of awkwardness.’‘The weavers and tanners of Middlemarch had never thought of Mr. Brooke as a neighbor and were not more attached to him than if he had been sent in a box from London.’‘Mary was fond of her own thoughts, and could amuse herself well sitting in twilight with her hands in her lap; having early had strong reason to believe that things were not likely to be arranged for her peculiar satisfaction, she wasted no time in astonishment and annoyance at that fact.’Last week, I read of research that found sitting for long periods is as bad for you as smoking, yet George Eliot, writing in 1870, and who constantly interjects the novel with her views on the world, tell us that ‘colick, crudities, oppilations, vertigo, winds, consumptions, and all such diseases are caused by over-much sitting.’I enjoyed Dr Lydgate’s journey and the insights it gave me into the medical profession at that time – the political intrigues at the hospital and patients’ fears of Lydgate’s wish to cut up dead bodies for investigation.This story, which gives a brilliant look into English rural town life in the 1830s, needs to be read slowly like sipping a glass of warm sherry. Freak Out! My Life with Frank ZappaFreak Out! My Life with Frank Zappa

The book arrived intact, no concerns about delivery.