Deronda is almost too 'good', too virtuous. Among them all, along with other more minor characters, Daniel Deronda lives, with each separate character forming a separate thread in his life, and showing us a different aspect of Deronda himself, and also of the better parts of ourselves. Then there's Mordecai, a Jewish zealot with an almost mystical air of prophecy and destiny. There is Mirah: a beautiful young 'Jewess', innocent, full of naive zeal and Dickensian virtue. So there's Gwendolen: self absorbed, beautiful, accustomed to rule. Underneath the outer things there is a universal something that's in us all, and Eliot shows different aspects of that to us in many of her characters. I am not at all like her in any of the obvious things, yet Eliot still showed me myself in her. Gwendolen, for example, is a beautifully complex character, portrayed with depth, subtlety and sympathy. We see this same genius in Daniel Deronda. Show More perhaps don't want to face, and showing them to us, there on the page.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |