Another Eliot novel I enjoyed just fine, but which didn't come anywhere near the excellence of Middlemarch. Very good, though, in its depiction of rural life, and with some quite funny moments too. ( )

I'm not a George Elliot fan, I read Middlemarch with my book club and hated it. I had no interest in any of the characters nor where or how they lived. But Adam Bede is different. The characters are engaging and where they live is unpretentious. Most of all there is a strong plot with some real twists. I'm glad my book club choose this book. After Middlemarch I would never have picked this up on my own.

While the title character is Adam Bede and he appears throughout almost all of book the genesis of the story is another character, Hetti or Hester Sorel and her interaction with a young woman preacher, Dinah, who is also her cousin. Adam is The Good Guy, Hetti is the Bad Girl, Dinah is the Good Girl and a fourth major character, Arthur, who seems to be a Good Guy but we eventually learned he's really a Bad Guy. Adam is the strong stoic type who concentrates on working hard and is above it all but has one slight distraction. He eventually decides to take a wife and chooses the young, pretty, self-centered Hetti who is more interested in the coming of age, soon to be lord of the manor, Arthur. Arthur is so much better than the existing landlord, his grandfather, that all, including Adam, can't wait for the young gentleman to replace his aging grandfather. At this point the unusually pretty Dinah appears to comfort any and all who will listen to her. Then the plot thickens.

A brief encounter in the woods between Arthur and Hetti, leads to what appears to be a dalliance on his part but a mind turning event for the seventeen year old Hetti. She convinces herself Arthur will marry her in spite of her being a lowly barely educated commoner and his being an educated aristocrat soon to become lord of the manor. By chance Adam, walking through the woods, sees them kissing. He confronts Arthur, they come to blows. Arthur reluctantly agrees to Adam's demands to write a letter to Hetti saying he's sorry, they can never marry and decides to go off and join his regiment where he's already an officer. Hetti is devastated but decides to hide this from all. Unable to convince her Aunt and Uncle to let her move on she eventually decides her only way out is to agree to marry Adam who has faithfully waited for her to come around. In a misguided attempt to find Arthur she sets off on what she leads all to believe is a trip to assemble things for her wedding. In reality she's running away to find Arthur who she thinks is in Windsor only to find he and his regiment are in Ireland. Yes it's a harrowing trip but that's the least of it. Out of the blue we learn she's was pregnant has had the child and has killed it. Yikes. She's quickly apprehended, tried, convicted and sentenced to be hung. Double yikes. Adam can't believe any of this. She's too pure in his eyes. He quickly realizes Arthur has deceived him and there was more to the dalliance than Arthur had let on. Adam and all the town's people realize the real villain is Arthur. Hetti remains mum throughout her trial and only after Dinah intervenes and stays with her does she confess and repent. Miracle of miracles, at the very last moment, just as Hetti is about to be hung, Arthur appears with a pardon he has somehow obtained for Hetti.

The story goes silent at that point. We never hear anything more about Hetti. Arthur decides to abandon his plans to run the estate his has just become the lord of. Instead he decides to spend his life with his regiment. After a couple of years Adam convinces the marriage averse Dinah to be his wife and they have two happy kids. Unfortunately this is the point where this story becomes less believable. It was Adam's younger brother Seth who had wanted to marry Dinah. She had told him she would never marry anyone as it would interfere with her calling to be preacher. On top of that Adam and Dinah were the only two people who really believed in Hetti. Now Dinah marries the person Hetti was supposed to marry. That seems a stretch. Yes it ties up the loose end, the good guy gets the good girl but what happened to Hetti. We'll never know.

The novel is actually a retelling of a real event. But like Law & Order you can see the underlying story but a lot has been changed to make if a more engaging read. The child killer was not a pretty young thing, she was hung, the guy was never a good guy to begin with and her name was not Hester but Mary. The subplot involving Hetti was actually the story of the author's aunt had told the author she was the young preacher who comforted Hetti and got her to confess. In George Elliot's own words, this was her aunt's story. One point that I wonder about is whether the author had been aware of Nathaniel Hawthorn's The Scarlet Letter published about the same time as Adam Bede. Hester Sorel seems too close, at least in name, to Hester Prynne. ( )

“Our deeds determine us, as much as we determine our deeds, and until we know what has been or will be the peculiar combination of outward with inward facts, which constitutes a man's critical actions, it will be better not to think ourselves wise about his character."

Published in 1859 and set in the fictional rural English village of Hayslope in 1799, this is the story of a town, focusing on two women and two men of different temperaments. Adam Bede is smitten by pretty Hetty Sorrel, a farmgirl, who dreams of becoming a lady of wealth and leisure. She is attracted to the squire’s son, Captain Arthur Donnithorne. Arthur does not mind a dalliance but is not about to marry a woman of lower social standing. Dinah Morris is a Methodist minister – a woman in this role would have been quite rare for the time. Dinah’s kind compassionate nature is contrasted with Hetty’s flightiness and frivolity. Adam’s serious principled disposition is contrasted with Arthur’s reckless selfishness.

To say this is a love triangle is to sell it short. It is a novel of many dimensions, including changing times on the cusp of a new century, restrictions due to social class, the role of women, religion, education, infatuation, shame, and manslaughter. Strengths of this book include the depth of the psychological development of the characters the depiction of their gradual transformations. It conveys an emotional depth that echoes through time. The story touched me deeply, especially in the climactic scenes. If I have one criticism, it is the denouement, which seems long and dragged out. Though definitely Victorian in its tone and style, it has the trappings of a timeless story of human nature. I enjoyed it very much.
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Unfortunately, trying to interpret the dialect gets in the way of enjoying the story. ( )

Just reading the first chapter I didn't know what to make of this novel. The dialogue was difficult to read, but the narration was a little simple. By the second chapter the book was easier and I realize Eliot was just writing how some of the working class characters would have talked back then. Overall I enjoyed this novel. I like how it started out as a simple plot between characters, but then towards the end turned into a tragic romance.

When I say tragic, do I mean tragic. I can see some "sensitive" people probably reading this book and not liking it at all. I woun't say what happens because it's a spoiler, but for a book written in the 1800s I felt it was a little ballsy. If you know who George Eliot was and her writing style the ballsy part I don't think comes to a surprise. Her stories are character driven, not really plot driven, so she writes more realistic people rather than sugarcoating things.

I'm really becoming a huge fan of George Eliot though. I've only read this book and Middlemarch, but I love her writing style. I honestly think she is the greatest writer from the Victorian era. They way sh writes is modern compared to the writers at her time, like Dickens for example. I have a feeling she usually is ignored because her books are long, and she was a woman who chose to write what she wanted under a male name because she wanted to be taken seriously. By the time she was writing women could use there on names, but it was mostly silly romances.

I still liked Middlemarch more, but I liked this one a lot too. ( )