7 Middlemarch - Read By Stephanie Poppins

Middlemarch by George Eliot explores the lives of its inhabitants as they navigate societal expectations, personal aspirations, and the changing world around them. The story centres on Dorothea Brooke, a young, idealistic woman who marries an older scholar.

In this episode, Dorothea is approached, but chooses to remain oblivious.

Transcript

Welcome to Sleep Stories with Steph,

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Happy listening.

Chapter 4 Sir James seems determined to do everything you wish,

Said Celia as they were driving home from an inspection of the new building site.

He is a good creature and more sensible than anyone would imagine,

Said Dorothea inconsiderately.

You mean he appears silly?

No.

Dorothea recollected herself and laid her hand on her sister's a moment.

But he does not talk equally well on all subjects.

I should think none but disagreeable do,

Said Celia in her usual purring way.

They must be very dreadful to live with.

Only think at breakfast and always.

Dorothea laughed.

Oh Kitty,

You are a wonderful creature.

She pinched Celia's chin,

Being in the mood now to think her very winning and lovely.

Fit hereafter to be an eternal cherub,

And if it were not doctrinally wrong to say so,

Hardly more in need of salvation than a squirrel.

Of course people need not be always talking well.

Only one tells the quality of their minds when they try to talk well.

You mean Sir James tries and fails?

I was speaking generally.

Why do you catechise me about Sir James?

It is not the object of his life to please me.

Now Dodo,

Can you really believe that?

Certainly.

He thinks of me as a future sister,

That's all.

Dorothea had never hinted this before,

Waiting from a certain shyness on such subjects,

Which was mutual between the sisters,

Until it should be introduced by some decisive event.

Celia blushed,

But said at once,

Pray do not make that mistake any longer,

Dodo.

When Tantrip was brushing my hair the other day,

She said that Sir James' man knew from Miss Cadwallader's maid that Sir James was to marry the eldest Miss Brooke.

How can you let Tantrip talk such gossip to you,

Celia?

Said Dorothea indignantly.

Not the less angry,

Because details asleep in her memory were now awakened to confirm the unwelcome revelation.

He must have asked her questions.

It's degrading.

I see no harm at all in Tantrip's talking to me.

It's better to hear what people say.

You'll see what mistakes you make by taking up notions.

I'm quite sure Sir James means to make you an offer,

And he believes that you will accept him,

Especially since you've been so pleased with him about the plans.

And Uncle too.

I know he expects it.

Everyone can see that Sir James is very much in love with you.

The revulsion was so strong and painful in Dorothea's mind that the tears welled up and flowed abundantly.

All her dear plans were embittered,

And she thought with disgust of Sir James' conceiving she recognised him as her lover.

There was vexation too on account of Celia.

How could he expect it?

She burst forth in her most impetuous manner.

I'd never agreed with him about anything but the cottages.

I was barely polite to him before.

But you've been so pleased with him since then,

He's begun to feel quite sure you're fond of him.

Fond of him,

Celia?

How can you choose such odious expressions?

Said Dorothea passionately.

Dear me,

Dorothea,

I suppose it would be right for you to be fond of a man whom you've accepted for a husband?

It is offensive to me to say that Sir James could think I was fond of him.

Besides,

It's not the right word for the feeling I must have towards the man I would accept as a husband.

Well,

I am sorry for Sir James.

I thought it right to tell you because you went on as you always do,

Never looking just where you are and treading in the wrong place.

You always see what nobody else sees.

It is impossible to satisfy you,

Yet you never see what's quite plain.

That's your way,

Dodo.

Something certainly gave Celia unusual courage,

And she was not sparing the sister of whom she was occasionally in awe.

Who can tell what just criticisms mirror the cat may be passing on us beings of wider speculation?

It is very painful,

Said Dorothea,

Feeling scourged.

I can have no more to do with the cottages.

I must be uncivil to him.

I must tell him I will have nothing to do with them.

It is very painful.

Her eyes again filled with tears.

Wait a little.

Think about it.

You know he's going away for a day or two to see his sister.

There'll be nobody besides Lovegood.

Poor Dodo.

Celia could not help relenting.

It's very hard.

It is your favourite fad to draw plans.

Fad to draw plans?

Do you think I only care about my fellow creatures' houses in that childish way?

I may well make mistakes.

How can one ever do anything nobly Christian living among people with such petty thoughts?

No more was said.

Dorothea was too much jarred to recover her temper and behave so as to show she admitted any error in herself.

She was disposed rather to accuse the intolerable narrowness and the purblind conscience of the society around her.

Celia was no longer the eternal cherub but a thorn in her spirit,

A pink and white nullifidian worse than any discouraging presence in the pilgrim's progress.

The fad of drawing plans?

What was life worth?

What great faith was possible where the whole effect of one's actions could be withered up into such parched rubbish as that?

When she got out of the carriage her cheeks were pale and her eyelids red.

She was an image of sorrow and her uncle,

Who met her in the hall,

Would have been alarmed if Celia had not been close to her looking so pretty and composed that he once concluded Dorothea's tears to have their origin in her excessive religiousness.

He had returned during their absence from a journey to the country town about a petition for the pardon of some criminal.

"'Well,

My dears,

' he said kindly as they went up to kiss him,

"'I hope nothing disagreeable has happened while I've been away.

' "'No,

Uncle,

' said Celia,

"'we've been to Frechet to look at the cottages.

"'We thought you would have been at home to lunch.

' "'I came by Loick to lunch,

And you didn't know I came by Loick,

"'and I bought a couple of pamphlets for you Dorothea.

"'In the library,

You know.

They lie on the table in the library.

'" It seemed as if an electric stream went through Dorothea,

Thrilling her from despair into expectation.

They were pamphlets about the early church.

The oppression of Celia,

Tantrip and St James was shaken off and she walked straight to the library.

Celia went upstairs.

Mr Brooke was detained by a message,

But when he re-entered the library,

He found Dorothea seated and already deep in one of the pamphlets,

Which had some marginal manuscript of Mr Cassabon's,

Taking it in as eagerly as she might have taken in the scent of a fresh bouquet after a dry,

Hot,

Dreary walk.

Dorothea was getting away from Tipton and Freshet and her own sad liability to tread in the wrong places on her way to the New Jerusalem.

Mr Brooke sat down in his armchair,

Stretched his legs towards the wood fire,

Which had fallen into a wondrous mass of glowing dice between the dogs,

And rubbed his hands gently,

Looking very mildly towards Dorothea,

But with a neutral,

Leisurely air,

As if he'd nothing particular to say.

Dorothea closed her pamphlet as soon as she was aware of her uncle's presence and rose as if to go.

Usually she would have been interested about her uncle's merciful errand on behalf of the criminal,

But her late agitation had made her absent-minded.

I came back by Loic,

You know,

Said Mr Brooke,

Not as if with any intention to arrest her departure,

But apparently from his usual tendency to say what he'd said before.

This fundamental principle of human speech was markedly exhibited in Mr Brooke.

I lunched there and saw Cassabon's library and that kind of thing.

There's a sharp air driving.

Won't you sit down,

My dear?

You look cold.

Dorothea felt quite inclined to accept the invitation.

Sometimes when her uncle's easy way of taking things did not happen to be exasperating,

It was rather soothing.

She threw off her mantle and bonnet and sat down opposite to him,

Enjoying the glow,

But lifting up her beautiful hands for a screen.

They were not thin hands or small hands,

But powerful feminine maternal hands.

She seemed to be holding them in propitiation for her passionate desire to know and to think,

Which in the unfriendly mediums of Tipton and Freshet had issued in crying and red eyelids.

She bethought herself now of the condemned criminal.

What news have you brought about the sheepstealer uncle?

What,

Poor Bunch?

Well,

It seems we can't get him off.

He's to be hanged.

Dorothea's brow took an expression of reprobation and pity.

Hanged,

You know,

Said Mr Brooke with a quiet nod.

Poor Romilly.

He would have helped us.

I knew Romilly.

Cassabon didn't know Romilly.

He's a little buried in books,

You know Cassabon is.

When a man has great studies and is writing a great work,

He must of course give up seeing much of the world.

How can he go about making acquaintances?

That's true.

But a man mopes,

You know.

I've always been a bachelor too,

But I have that sort of disposition.

I never moped.

It was my way to go about everywhere and take in everything.

I never moped.

I can see that Cassabon does,

You know.

He wants a companion.

A companion,

You know.

It would be a great honour to anyone to be his companion,

Said Dorothea energetically.

You like him,

Eh?

Said Mr Brooke,

Without showing any surprise.

Well now,

I've known Cassabon ten years,

Ever since he came to Lewick.

But I never got anything of him,

You know,

Any ideas.

However,

He's a tip-top man and he may be a bishop,

That kind of thing,

You know.

If Peel stays in,

He has a very high opinion of you,

My dear.

Dorothea could not speak.

The fact is he has a very high opinion indeed of you and he speaks uncommonly well,

Does Cassabon.

He's deferred to me,

You not being of age.

In short,

I promised to speak to you,

Though I told him I thought there was not much chance.

I was bound to tell him that.

I said,

My niece is very young,

You know,

And that kind of thing.

But I didn't think it necessary to go into everything.

However,

The long and the short of it is,

He's asked my permission to make you an offer of marriage.

Of marriage,

You know,

Said Mr Brooke with his explanatory nod.

I thought it better to tell you,

My dear.