Mary Anne Evans, known more commonly by her pen name of George Eliot, was a Victorian novelist. Her novels are known for their accurate portrayal of real life and psychological awareness. She wrote possibly her most famous work, “Silas Marner”, in 1861. In it she explores the notions of reconciliation, religion and the position of the gentry. Superficially it appears to have a simple moral message; the sinful characters, Dunstan and Molly, receive their punishment and Silas, who is reconciled from sin, is richly rewarded. Underneath, through its rich symbolisms, it includes criticisms of religion, the Industrial Revolution and the gentry.

In the first paragraphs of the book Eliot attempts to set up a feel for the reader of the historical context of the novel’s setting. Set “In the days when spinning-wheels hummed busily in farm houses”, the very beginning of the industrial revolution, it would have been an unfamiliar time for the Victorian readers of the novel. Eliot chooses this period in time because the plot relies heavily on poor transport, difficulty in communication and little education.

Eliot also establishes a feel for the social context of the time. It was a time of prejudice, suspicion of the unknown and blind faith in God “superstition clung easily round every person or thing that was at all unwonted”. Eliot also begins to create a sense of distrust of skilled workers, especially weavers, “The shepherd himself…was not quite sure that this trade of weaving…could be carried on entirely without the help of the evil one”. “How was a man to be explained unless you at least knew someone who knew his father and mother?” Here Eliot slips into the narrative the voice of the common people, allowing more of a rapport between the text and the reader, giving the narration less of a clinical and more of a human feel.

After establishing these general ideas the focus shifts to the protagonist Silas. Introduced as “such a linen weaver”, Eliot ties all the ideas of prejudice she expressed in the first paragraph to him, giving the audience an idea of the challenges Silas will face. We find Silas living in a “stone cottage” “not far from the edge of a deserted stone pit” in the village of Raveloe. He is portrayed as out of place, as if his very existence there is against the natural order of things “the questionable loom, so unlike the natural cheerful trottering of the winnowing-machine” this is Eliot’s way of showing the views of the people around him and the contrast between rural and urban life. Silas is an object of teasing by the Raveloe boys who “peep in at the window of the stone cottage…by a pleasant sense of scornful superiority”. Silas rarely ventures from his loom except occasionally to shoo away the peeping boys, or to sell his wares. Silas’ catatonic fits are a device used by Eliot for several reasons. In The opening parts of the book they also serve to distance Silas from the Villagers, Silas is attributed all sorts of demonic powers by the villagers “Silas Marner could cure folks’ rheumatism if he had a mind. Eliot continues to describe Silas’ 15 years of hermit like existence in some detail making the reader feel sorry for him and invoking a sense of intrigue; how did he end up like this?

After raising all these questions and intrigue, Eliot sets about answering them. She uses a flashback to tell the reader about his life before Raveloe. We learn that as a young man he was part of a community and well respected “a young man of exemplary life and ardent faith”. “There was one young man…with whom he had long lived with such close friendship” we learn that Silas was capable of loyalty and friendship “to his friend’s mind he was faultless”, he is even engaged. Eliot does this to raise even more of a sense of mystery surround Silas, the reader wants to know what sort of an event could have robbed Silas of his faith in Man. Silas is wrongly accused of robbing money from the church, his naive and unfaltering belief in God leads him to believe “God will clear me”. They draw lots and he is found guilty, it is here Eliot introduces the idea of fate into the novel. “Poor Marner went out with that despair in his soul” Silas loses everything his friends, his fiancé and even his faith in God. “There is no God that governs the earth righteously” Eliot uses this as an extremely dramatic contrast to Silas’ views before, when he was sure God would clear him. Through her quick narrative of previous history Eliot has answered the questions she has raised and explained how Silas came to be bitter, angry and full of contempt for Man and God.

The idea of love and trust destroyed is a prevalent theme in Eliot’s works and Eliot begins to show Marner’s gradual descent into sin, a powerful notion in a Victorian audience, to whom damnation was a very real fear. After settling in Raveloe, to keep a grip on reality and to “bridge over the loveless chasms of his life” Marner begins to do the thing he does best “weave, like the spider”, Eliot uses this metaphor to show how Marner has gradually become a constantly weaving automaton, and like the spider his only form of enjoyment or sustenance is derived from the loom His one chance to form bonds with the local community is quickly dashed. Upon seeing Sally Oates suffering from heart disease he remembers “the relief his mother had found in a simple preparation of foxglove.” The villagers become convinced of his healing abilities, but Silas quickly ruins any chance of forming bonds with the community when he refuses to help anyone else. “he drove one after another away, with increasing annoyance” Eliot uses the event to help reinforce the idea of separation between Silas and the people of Raveloe, and to give the impression that Silas himself is the one responsible for him own loneliness.

As time passes and Silas continues his forsaken existence, inside him begins to grow the “deadly sin” of avarice. The money he hoards from his weaving takes the place of friends, becoming his “familiars”, “he began to think they were conscious of him”. A Victorian audience would have been shocked at Silas’ path to certain damnation. Silas begins to become obsessed with the coins, playing with them. “He loved them all… He spread them out in heaps and bathed his hands in them.” It is as if the void in his life had to be replaced by something, the gold. “How the guineas shone as they came pouring out of the dark leather mouth” Eliot uses this juxtaposition of light and dark to create strong connotations between darkness and evil in the novel, the dark leather mouth is almost a metaphor for hell, a place to which at this point Marner is surely headed. After losing all faith in God, he almost begins to worship the gold – “false idols” – a sacrilegious violation of the second commandment. Marner has become trapped in a web of destruction he himself has woven on his loom.

Another theme of Eliot’s work was the corruption of the upper classes and the honesty of the common people. Further on into the book, we meet Dunstan Cass, the son of the local squire. He is an unpleasant, shifty character. One night, whilst walking home, ‘Duncey’ stumbles across Marner’s Cottage at the precise moment Silas has gone out leaving his cottage door unlocked – an example of fate, or coincidence, a device used by many Victorian novelists. Dunstan stumbles across the gold and steals it, heading out into the “darkness”- symbolic of evil. Eliot goes to painstaking lengths to show Marner’s obsession with his gold, then dramatically uses Dunstan to take it away. In one fell swoop Eliot changes the entire course of the novel, inflicting another bitter blow on Marner.

When Marner returns to find his gold missing, Eliot uses psychological traits to show the profound impact it has had upon Silas “the belief that his Gold was gone could not come at once”. Eliot also uses incredibly detailed physical descriptions to show his sense of complete despair, “he shook so violently he let fall the candle”. Eliot’s usual long rambling sentences are interspersed with “short and snappy” sentences to add emphasis “The table was bare.” Marner is left in such a state of shock he clings to the last facet of reality he knows, “he turned and tottered towards his loom, and got in the seat”. Eliot portrays Marner’s reaction to this upheaval in a very sensitive and human fashion – increasing Marner’s credibility as a character and helping the reader to identify with and sympathise for him.

Instead of driving him to despair, the stealing of his gold acts as a catalyst to Silas’ metamorphosis from darkness to light. In a desperate bid to have his money returned he is forced to ask for the help of the people of Raveloe. He goes to the local pub to ask for the help of those inside, he is forced into the “center of the circle” a rather uncomfortable position for Silas who is not used to it. Eliot uses an extended metaphor to show the uncovering of long unused emotions in Silas “Our consciousness rarely registers the beginning of a growth within us any more than without us: there have been many circulations of the sap before we detect the smallest sign of the bud.” This notion of rebirth is explored in the next stage of the novel.

The greatest change in Silas however comes about with the introduction of Eppie, the illegitimate daughter of Godfrey Cass. Molly – Godfrey’s opium addicted, secret wife – decides on New Year’s Eve she will make the long journey from her town to Raveloe and ruin Godfrey Cass. However as she ventures through the “snow hidden… long lanes” with her child, she is unable to resist the temptations of the small phial of opium she is carrying with her. Soon enough she feels nothing but “the longing to lie down and sleep”. She lies down outside Silas’ cottage in a “complete torpor”. The child cold and alone stumbles into Silas’ cottage to lie down by the fire; at the precise instant Silas is outside his cottage in a catatonic fit – another example of fate being used as a plot device. Silas had opened the door to hear the bells being rung at the New Year’s celebration, which according to the villagers was good luck and could bring back his Gold. When he comes out of his trance Silas turns towards the fire and sees “Gold! – his own gold”, he is still so focused upon the loss of his money instead of seeing a slumbering child he sees his gold returned to him. Eventually Silas realises that the Gold is in fact a child.

As the story progresses the child begins to reanimate in Silas long unused emotions, memories and feelings “the child was somehow a message”, “could this be his little sister comes back to him”. Eliot has to explain somehow the psychological changes in Silas and uses the memory of his sister to do so. All of a sudden Silas is forced to care for another, the child requires his care and attention and Silas can no longer be so self absorbed. Dolly Winthrop insists that Silas have the child christened, a practise unfamiliar to him. At the time the local church would have been a major focal point of the village and in not going Silas would have been regarded as a heathen. The child is baptised Hephzibah or Eppie for short – the name of Silas’ sister and mother – and they begin to attend church regularly integrating Silas more and more into the community. “The child created fresh and fresh links between his life and the lives from which he had hitherto shrunk”. Eliot begins to use contrasts to show the changes in Silas, and the changing attitudes people had towards him “unlike the gold… Eppie was a creature of endless claims and ever growing desires”. “Hitherto he had been treated very much as if he had been a useful gnome or brownie… But now Silas met with open smiling faces and cheerful questioning.” Eliot herself sums up very well the effect Eppie has had on Marner “the little child had come to link him once more with the whole world”.

The story abruptly “flashes forward” 16 years, demonstrating Eliot’s control over the narrative, we are presented with a highly descriptive picture of how life has moved on. “The tall blond man of forty is not much changed in feature from the Godfrey Cass of six-and-twenty” “his large brown eyes seem to have gathered a longer vision, as in the way with eyes that have been short sighted in early life”. Eliot intervenes in the narrative occasionally as if pointing out points of interest we might have missed if we were actually looking upon the scene she is describing “See how neatly her prayer book is folded”. Eliot establishes quite firmly that Eppie is entirely happy in her sphere of life “…said Eppie laughing and frisking”. The cottage has changed dramatically; Eppie and Silas live in relative comfort thanks to Godfrey Cass, who almost certainly is so generous to them to salve his conscience. Silas is far more social now “for he was regarded as an exceptional person, whose claims on neighbourly aid were not to be matched in Raveloe.”

In the last part of the book Eliot attempts to show the moral crux of the entire story, and she does this through the confrontation between Godfrey and Silas. Godfrey and his Wife are unable to have children and so they decide they will adopt Eppie. Eliot uses the rediscovery of Silas’ gold to set up some expectation “It takes no hold of me now” “If I lost you Eppie I might come to think I was forsaken again”. Godfrey arrives at Silas’ cottage and attempts to brooch the subject of adopting Eppie carefully. Godfrey uses the guise of Eppie being better off to attempt to blackmail Silas into giving her up. “You’d like to see her taken care of by those who can leave her well of and make a lady of her.” Silas however shows total selflessness, a dramatic contrast to before when he horded his gold, “Eppie my child speak, I won’t stand in your way”. Eppie however is not at all tempted by their offers “but I can’t leave my father”. So Godfrey brings out his darkest tactic “But I have a claim on you, Eppie… she is my own child”. Silas, a working class character who is used to life of subservience, is put under acute pressure and points out the errors in Godfrey’s, his better, ways with vivid directness. “Then sir why didn’t you say so sixteen year ago”. Ultimately the decision is left up to Eppie, “I can’t think o’ no happiness without him… nobody shall ever come between him and me. The confrontation gives added depth, subtlety and a greater insight into Eliot’s exploration of Marner’s psyche.

Eliot draws a strong moral message through her development of Silas. One of the major messages of the book is that the just and the good will be rewarded; Silas, a good man, is rewarded by Eppie’s faithfulness. Many of the sinful characters, such as Molly and Godfrey, are punished for their deceit and betrayal. Another moral message embedded in the novel is that worship of material possessions can only bring misery, as Silas himself learns when he finds out that human love is far more valuable that all the money he could ever possess.