George Eliot
Public lies and secret truths
Smith’s sweeping historical novel spans slavery in Jamaica in the 1770s and the marathon trials of the Tichborne Claimant in London a century later
The case for travelling abroad
I’m off. In the week when you may read this, my partner and I will be winging our way to…
The Literary Disco podcast made me want to throw my laptop at the wall
One of the stranger things that happened in the period just before lockdown was the sudden disappearance of audiences from…
From Middlemarch to Mickey Mouse: a short history of The Spectator’s books and arts pages
The Spectator arts and books pages have spent 10,000 issues identifying the dominant cultural phenomena of the day and being difficult about them, says Richard Bratby
George Eliot was much more radical than we give her credit for
It’s easy to forget, as we celebrate the 200th anniversary of her birth, how radical George Eliot actually was. The…
Oddballs of English philosophy
Charles Kay Ogden once proposed that conversations would be conducted more efficiently if participants wore masks. Apart from confirming the…
Romance and rejection
‘Outsider’ ought to be an important word. To attach it to someone, particularly a writer, is to suggest that their…
The question Christianity fails to answer: ‘Who is my neighbour?’
‘Fine old Christmas,’ wrote George Eliot, ‘with the snowy hair and ruddy face, had done his duty that year in…
Horse racing, Sancerre and escaped lobsters
A stint in dry dock — the ‘dry’ literally — has one advantage. There is time for lots of long…
Middlemarch: the novel that reads you
The genesis of The Road to Middlemarch was a fine article in the New Yorker about Rebecca Mead’s unsuccessful search…
The greatest novel in English – and how to drink it
Which is the greatest novel in the English language? Let us review the candidates: Clarissa, Pride and Prejudice, Middlemarch, The…
