Book Review – Adam Bede by George Eliot
An Overview of Eliot’s Celebrated First Novel
May 19, 2009 Michelle Bailat-Jones
George Eliot (the pen name of Mary Ann Evans) published Adam Bede, her first novel, in 1859 to great acclaim. This rich, detailed novel tells the story of Adam, a simple and honest carpenter and his love for Hetty Sorrel, a vain young woman who falls in love with the local gentleman Captain Arthur Donnithorne. Using this love triangle as her foundation, Eliot painstakingly illustrates the intricacies of rural life at the turn of the eighteenth century.
Adam Bede – George Eliot’s Flawed Hero
The characters in George Eliot’s Adam Bede exist along a continuum of human weakness. From Hetty and Arthur, who give in too easily to their illicit passion, to Adam’s mother Lisbeth, whose temperament warps an otherwise honest character, all the way to Dinah, a pinnacle of correct behavior and Christian compassion.
Adam is situated toward the upper end of that continuum. He is a stoic and honest man, with good intentions and sincere passions. He is a hard worker and trustworthy, respected among his peers and even admired by the small town’s gentry. But Eliot does not give her reader an unflawed hero. Adam is proud and severe in his judgment of others. He is also blind to the failings of the woman he loves.
This ultimate but innocent fault will nearly cost him his happiness when the truth of all that has occurred between Hetty and Arthur finally comes to light.
Scandal and Rural Life in Adam Bede
Despite its pastoral setting and overall bucolic tone, there is a shocking scandal at the heart of the novel. Eliot’s frank, forthright treatment of Arthur and Hetty’s love affair and its ensuing complications turn this seemingly quiet novel into a careful investigation of morality and human limitations.
Eliot’s real skill lies in portraying the rural setting as well as each of her characters with as much detail as possible. This makes for a rich novel, filled with a number of multifaceted moral dilemmas: Will Dinah consent to marry Adam’s brother Seth, even though she feels called to continue her ministry? Will Adam eventually understand Hetty’s true character? How will Adam negotiate his long-standing friendship with Arthur after the scandal is revealed?
George Eliot’s Powerful but Imperfect First Novel
Adam Bede is read less often than Eliot’s purported masterpiece Middlemarch and for good reason. Although a highly accomplished first novel and a rewarding and entertaining read, Adam Bede does contain a certain number of conspicuous flaws. The structure for instance, lacks a certain shape and economy. Eliot takes some time to get her plot moving and there are even a few chapters which appear to be superfluous.
These small failings, however, only indicate how accomplished Eliot already was at the time she published Adam Bede and provide a wonderful discussion base for her later novels.
George Eliot’s Adam Bede is a deeply psychological work which delves into the darker corners of human weakness using the complex realities of love, friendship, sorrow and forgiveness to paint its splendid portrait.
Adam Bede, Penguin Classics, 2008 (originally published 1859), 608 pp.
ISBN: 978-0140436648
George Eliot
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