Silas Marner

In Silas Marner, Silas flees his strict religious community after being framed for a crime he

didn't commit. He settles on the outskirts of a small town, where he becomes a wealthy but

unfeeling weaver. His faith is restored when he adopts a young orphan girl.

●At the beginning of the novel, Silas loses everything when a man he thought to be a

good friend frames him for a crime that the friend himself committed. He believes his

faith will protect him, but when God doesn't defend his innocence, he abandons his

religion.

●After fleeing his home, Silas settles in a small town, where he devotes himself to

weaving linen and amassing a small fortune. His world is turned upside down,

however, when he's robbed around Christmas.

●A young golden-haired girl arrives on his doorstep. He takes her in, and this allows

him to join the community and the church that he has been avoiding for fifteen years.

In the end, Silas recovers his faith and believes that God sent him the child as a

reward.

In Silas Marner, George Eliot achieved some of her most successful symbolic narrative, a

method that has been compared to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s definition of “romance” with

reference to this story. In this novel, Eliot’s pervasive theme of spiritual renewal through the

influence of human love and communal fellowship is embodied, as elsewhere, in realistic

events, drama, and dialogue, with currents of symbolic meanings that suggest a mythic

structure of concrete universals. Eliot called the story a “legendary tale” with a “realistic

treatment.”

The theme of spiritual rebirth is announced in chapter 1 by reference to Marner as “a dead

man come to life again” and to his “inward life” as a “metamorphosis.” The resolution is

foreshadowed in the description of his catalepsy as “a mysterious rigidity and suspension of

consciousness” that his former religious community has “mistaken for death.”

The rigidity of despair has driven him from his former home in a northern industrial city, the

dimly lit Lantern Yard, where members of his “narrow religious sect” have believed him

guilty of stealing church funds in the keeping of a dying man. Marner has been so stunned at

being framed by the man he thought was his best friend, at being renounced by his fiancé,

who soon married the guilty man, and at being believed guilty by his community, that he

could only flee. Because he had believed that God would defend his innocence, he has felt

utterly abandoned in his faith and has declared “there is no just God.”

He chances among strangers in the isolated village of Raveloe and for fifteen years remains

an alien at its fringes, immersed in his work as a linen weaver like “a spinning insect,” loving

only the gold he earns and hoards, with ties to neither past nor present. When his gold is

stolen as the Christmas season begins, Marner announces his loss at the Rainbow (promise of

hope) Tavern and, like Job, begins to receive “comforters,” an interaction that slowly renews

human feeling and consciousness of dependency. On New Year’s Eve, as Marner longs for

the return of his gold, he finds on his hearth instead a sleeping, golden-haired toddler, a baby

girl who has wandered in while Marner held his door open during one of his cataleptic

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Silas Marner In Silas Marner , Silas flees his strict religious community after being framed for a crime he didn't commit. He settles on the outskirts of a small town, where he becomes a wealthy but unfeeling weaver. His faith is restored when he adopts a young orphan girl. ● At the beginning of the novel, Silas loses everything when a man he thought to be a good friend frames him for a crime that the friend himself committed. He believes his faith will protect him, but when God doesn't defend his innocence, he abandons his religion. ● After fleeing his home, Silas settles in a small town, where he devotes himself to weaving linen and amassing a small fortune. His world is turned upside down, however, when he's robbed around Christmas. ● A young golden-haired girl arrives on his doorstep. He takes her in, and this allows him to join the community and the church that he has been avoiding for fifteen years. In the end, Silas recovers his faith and believes that God sent him the child as a reward. In Silas Marner , George Eliot achieved some of her most successful symbolic narrative, a method that has been compared to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s definition of “romance” with reference to this story. In this novel, Eliot’s pervasive theme of spiritual renewal through the influence of human love and communal fellowship is embodied, as elsewhere, in realistic events, drama, and dialogue, with currents of symbolic meanings that suggest a mythic structure of concrete universals. Eliot called the story a “legendary tale” with a “realistic treatment.” The theme of spiritual rebirth is announced in chapter 1 by reference to Marner as “a dead man come to life again” and to his “inward life” as a “metamorphosis.” The resolution is foreshadowed in the description of his catalepsy as “a mysterious rigidity and suspension of consciousness” that his former religious community has “mistaken for death.” The rigidity of despair has driven him from his former home in a northern industrial city, the dimly lit Lantern Yard, where members of his “narrow religious sect” have believed him guilty of stealing church funds in the keeping of a dying man. Marner has been so stunned at being framed by the man he thought was his best friend, at being renounced by his fiancé, who soon married the guilty man, and at being believed guilty by his community, that he could only flee. Because he had believed that God would defend his innocence, he has felt utterly abandoned in his faith and has declared “there is no just God.” He chances among strangers in the isolated village of Raveloe and for fifteen years remains an alien at its fringes, immersed in his work as a linen weaver like “a spinning insect,” loving only the gold he earns and hoards, with ties to neither past nor present. When his gold is stolen as the Christmas season begins, Marner announces his loss at the Rainbow (promise of hope) Tavern and, like Job, begins to receive “comforters,” an interaction that slowly renews human feeling and consciousness of dependency. On New Year’s Eve, as Marner longs for the return of his gold, he finds on his hearth instead a sleeping, golden-haired toddler, a baby girl who has wandered in while Marner held his door open during one of his cataleptic

trances, leaving her laudanum-stupefied mother unconscious in the snow-filled lane. Marner can only think that “the gold had turned into the child,” but then seeks the mother, goes for the authorities, and learns that the woman is dead. Marner clings urgently to the child as his own and names her Eppie for his mother and sister, renewing his ties to his past. His conscientious fatherhood, under the good Dolly Winthrop’s tutelage, brings him firmly into the community, including its church, making the ways of Raveloe no longer alien to him. As in Adam Bede , Eliot contrasts the Church of England as a vehicle of tradition with evangelicalism as awakening more fervent, personal religious feelings for some. She is not an advocate of either set of beliefs, however, but approves a religious sense that cultivates “a loving nature” with a Wordsworthian piety expressed in charitable acts and fortified by a non-doctrinal awareness of “Unseen Love.” As Dinah the Methodist awakened this sense in Hetty, Dolly the Anglican awakens it in Marner, enabling him to ravel (weave or involve) himself into the “O”—to join the circle of fellowship. He is rewarded by Eppie’s filial loyalty when her blood father offers to adopt her into his home of luxury and rank. SUMMARY In the village of Raveloe lives a weaver named Silas Marner. He is viewed with distrust by the local people because he comes from a distant part of the country. In addition, he lives completely alone, and he has been known to have strange fits. For fifteen years he has lived like this. Fifteen years earlier, Silas was a respected member of a church at Lantern Yard in a city to the north. His fits were regarded there as a mark of special closeness to the Holy Spirit. He had a close friend named William Dane, and he was engaged to marry a serving girl named Sarah. But one day the elder deacon fell ill and had to be tended day and night by members of the congregation, as he was a childless widower. During Silas' watch, a bag of money disappears from a drawer by the deacon's bed. Silas' knife is found in the drawer, but Silas swears he is innocent and asks that his room be searched. The empty bag is found there by William Dane. Then Silas remembers that he last used the knife to cut a strap for William, but he says nothing to the others. In order to find out the truth, the church members resort to prayer and drawing of lots, and the lots declare Silas guilty. Silas, betrayed by his friend and now by his God, declares that there is no just God. He is sure that Sarah will desert him too, and he takes refuge in his work. He soon receives word from Sarah that their engagement is ended, and a month later she marries William Dane. Soon afterward Silas leaves Lantern Yard. He settles in Raveloe, where he feels hidden even from God. His work is at first his only solace, but soon he begins to receive gold for his cloth; the gold gives him a kind of companionship. He works harder and harder to earn more of it and stores it in a bag beneath his floor. His contacts with humanity wither. Once he gives help to a woman who is ill by treating her with herbs as his mother taught him, but this action gives him a reputation as a maker of charms. People come for miles to ask his help, and he cannot give any. As a result, he is believed to cause other misfortunes and be in league with the devil. After that, Silas is more alone than ever.

strangeness has made her cool toward him, and when he asks her forgiveness, she says only that she will be glad to see anyone reform. Meanwhile Godfrey's wife, Molly, has become determined to revenge herself for his treatment of her, and she sets out with their child to confront him at the dance. She loses her way in the snow, and at last she fortifies herself with opium, to which she has become addicted. The opium only makes her more drowsy, and Molly sinks down in the snow. Her child slips from her arms. It is attracted to a light that comes from the open door of Marner's cottage, where the weaver stands, unaware of the child's presence. He has been looking out to see if his money might return and has been stricken by one of his fits. When he awakes, he sees gold by his hearth and thinks his money has come back, then he discovers that the gold is the hair of a child. At last he overcomes his wonder enough to realize that the child has come in out of the snow, and there outside he discovers Molly's body. Silas takes the child and hurries to Squire Cass' house to get the doctor. His entrance causes Godfrey both fear and hope because he recognizes the child as his own, and he hopes that he may be free at last. He goes with Doctor Kimble and finds that the woman Marner found is indeed his wife and that she is dead. The woman is buried that week, a stranger to everyone but Godfrey. Silas feels that the child has been sent to him, and he is determined to keep it. This determination causes even warmer feeling for him in Raveloe, and he is given much well-meant advice. Dolly Winthrop gives him real aid with the child and offers some old clothes that belonged to her son Aaron. Godfrey is glad enough to have the child cared for. He gives money for its support but never claims it as his own. Silas names the child Hepzibah — Eppie for short — after his mother and little sister. He finds that, unlike his gold, Eppie makes him constantly aware of the world and of other men. He gives her his wholehearted love, and everywhere he finds kindness from the other villagers. Sixteen years pass. Nancy and Godfrey are married, and Eppie has grown into a beautiful young woman. Silas is liked and respected in Raveloe. His life with Eppie has been close and happy, and Mr. and Mrs. Cass have done much for them. Dolly Winthrop has become Eppie's godmother, and she is a close friend of Silas. The two of them have discussed his old problem at Lantern Yard and considered the great differences in religion between the two places. Now Dolly's son Aaron wishes to marry Eppie, and Eppie has agreed — if Silas can live with them. She has been told of her mother, but she knows nothing of any other father, and she cannot bear to be parted from Silas. Godfrey and Nancy, however, are childless. Their one child died in infancy. Their childlessness is a great trouble to Godfrey, who has always wanted children. At one time he wished to adopt Eppie, but Nancy refused, feeling that it would be going against Providence to adopt a child when none was given naturally. Nancy has tried to make up to Godrey in other ways, and their marriage has been happy but for this one thing. Godfrey was afraid to tell her that Eppie was his own child.

On this particular Sunday, Nancy is thinking over these old problems when Godfrey becomes very much upset. The Stone Pits near Marner's cottage are being drained, and Dunstan's body has been found there with Silas' gold. Godfrey is forced to tell Nancy that his brother was a thief. At the same time, his newfound honesty convinces him that all truths come out sooner or later, and he admits that Eppie is his own child. Instead of being disgusted with him, Nancy is sorry that she refused to adopt Eppie sooner. The two of them go that night to Marner's cottage to claim Eppie. Eppie, however, does not wish to be claimed. Both she and Silas feel that no claim of blood can outweigh their years of life together. She does not want to leave Silas nor to be rescued from her low station and the prospect of marriage to a workingman. At last Godfrey goes home bitterly disappointed. He feels that he is being punished now for his earlier weakness, but he is determined to try to do his duty at last and to do all he can for Eppie even though she has refused him. Now that he has his gold, Silas feels able to return to Lantern Yard to try to settle the matter of the old theft. He goes there with Eppie, but they find everything changed. The chapel is gone, a factory set in its place. Only the prison is left to remind Silas that this was where he once lived. He returns home no more wise than when he set out; but he agrees with Dolly that there is reason to have faith in spite of the darkness of the past. Eppie and Aaron are married on a fine sunny day, with the wedding at Mr. Cass' expense. The young couple come to live with Silas at his cottage, where the villagers join in agreement that Silas has been blessed through his kindness to an orphaned child.

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