The Aging Experience of Silas Marner PDF

THE AGING EXPERIENCE OF SILAS MARNER: "SILAS MARNER" AS
"VOLLENDUNGSROMAN"
Author(s): CHAO-FANG CHEN
Source: George Eliot - George Henry Lewes Studies, No. 46/47 (September 2004), pp. 36-52
Published by: Penn State University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/42827775
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THE AGING EXPERIENCE OF SILAS MARNER:
SILAS MARNER AS VOLLENDUNGSROMAN
by
CHAOFANG CHEN
National Cheng Kung University
Beginning with William Wordsworth's insistence in choosin

"incidents and situations from common life" for his poems, ordin
people emerge, gradually, to the foreground in literature of the t
(241). Poems and prose narratives begin to see the appearance
what Wordsworth calls "low and rustic life": we find in these works
the insane, the half-wit, the orphan child, the abandoned woman, the
old beggar, and so on (241). George Eliot's full-hearted espousal of
such literary practice is explicit in her well-known discussion in
chapter seventeen of Adam Bede, in which she pleads for the beauty
of the commonplace found in many Dutch paintings. As a response
to Wordsworth, Eliot presents, especially in her earlier works, nu-
merous characters from the lower classes or with some disadvan-
tages.1 So we find the idiot in "Brother Jacob," the orphan girl and
fallen woman Hetty Sorrel in Adam Bede, the opium-addict Molly
Cass in Silas Marner. Silas Marner, in fact, does not simply focus on
the "low life" of a working-class man in a rural community; it is, in
fact, one of the first English novels that feature an older person as its
protagonist. This is hardly surprising considering Eliot's special af-
filiation with the Romantic poet laureate from whose poem she takes
her epigraph for the novel. Eliot's portrayal of the titular character
and his experience, however, proves not only her fascination with
the "low and rustic life"; more significantly, it pictures a mode of
aging much admired by the novelist herself. Interestingly, it also an-
ticipates her own experience of aging. Centering on Eliot's treatment
of the aging experience of her titular character in Silas Marner, this
paper examines the novel in terms of its connection to the tradition
of an emergent type of writing one critic calls a " Vollendungsroman ."
Sila s Marner is not yet forty in the first part of the novel and
fifty-five when the story ends. By no means is he to be considered an
old man even at fifty-five, whether by the nineteenth-century's stan-
dard or by today's. This paper, however, treats him as an older man
for there are clear indications in the novel of Silas's physiological as
36
well as psychological aging. In addition, the narrative voice which
describes Silas and his social relations, especially that in the first part
of the novel, also points to his accumulated years.
In terms of his physiological aging, at forty, the pale-faced Silas
is "so withered and yellow" that children always call him "Old Mas-
ter Marner" and the villagers in Raveloe treat him as a crazy old mi-
ser (69) .2 Later in the novel, he is described as having "a frame much
enfeebled by . . . years." His "bent shoulders and white hair give him
almost the look of advanced age, though he is not more than five-
and-fifty" (196). When Godfrey Cass, the natural father of Silas's
adopted daughter, comes to ask him to rescind his claim on her,
Godfrey notices Silas's physical decline: "You look a great deal
pulled down, though you're not an old man, are you?" Apparently,
Godfrey regards Silas as an aged man. He believes it's time Silas
"laid by and had some rest" (228).
But Silas's age is perhaps more clearly revealed through his men-
tal state and social relations. Since his flight to Raveloe from the pain-
ful experience in Lantern Yard, Silas has lived "a myopic solitary life
of soul-destroying mechanical activity" (Pinion 133). He cares for no
one and nobody cares for him; loveless years hence age him consid-
erably. As the narrative description shows, Silas's life is reduced to
mere weaving and hoarding, disconnected with the outside world.
Children fear him, partially on account of his eccentricity, and the
villagers in Raveloe distrust him because he comes from nowhere.
He is one of "the remnants of a disinherited race" (52). Being a
"stranger," "alien," "outsider" and "the other" in the community, he
is suspected, despised and shunned by his neighbors, to whom he is
a mysterious figure. As such, Silas's status is not much different from
that which many societies grant to the stigmatized elderly, whose
marginal social position can be represented by the rural village of
Raveloe, Silas's self-willed exile home, which is "quite an hour's
journey on horseback from any turnpike" and is never reached by
the vibrations of modern civilization (53). Silas and the elderly alike
are untouched by the outside world and are invisible to many peo-
ple. Finally, in the novel, decline/aging is perceived as universal,
both in the man and in his profession. Eliot's narrative voice ob-
serves, "when the weaving was going down . . . Master Marner was
none so young" (200). The obsolescence of Silas's handloom industry
37
in the course of the novel is also symptomatic of his own aging. To
sum up, Silas's pre-mature aging, children's fear of him as well as
the fellow villagers' misunderstanding and rejection of him link the
weaver to an aged person commonly viewed as a crazy old man.
The Raveloe community's misconception of Silas is clearly seen
through the foolish old miser epithet given to him by Dunstan Cass.
Silas is thought to be a miser because he is frugal, and in fact, he has,
indeed, a hoard of guineas. Even though hoarding is common prac-
tice in country districts in those days, Silas's extreme frugality
arouses suspicion simply because the weaver has already been stig-
matized by fellow villagers. But Silas's relation to the guineas is
rather different from that of a true miser frequently depicted in lit-
erature. Deprived of both faith and love due to the devastating ex-
perience in the old country, Silas in the new environment feels a
desperate need to cling. Trusting and loving no one in Raveloe, he
clings "with all the force of his nature to his work and his money"
(92). So similar to the loom that he works at every day, the hoard of
gold lends to him a sense of fellowship with its nightly presence. In
other words, Silas relies on his gold for support for his spiritually
impoverished soul.
Although money is essential to Silas, its significance does not lie
in its economic value. Silas has no intention of making profit through
his knowledge in herbal remedies. Moreover, his sympathy with and
munificence towards the suffering people prompt him to provide for
the foundling. Were Silas a miser in its traditional sense, his concern
for material wealth would surpass all private feelings; his insatiable
greed for gold would cause him to deceive or mistreat others for fi-
nancial gain; his fear of being intruded upon by a thief would be in-
tense. But Silas distinguishes himself from well-known miser figures
such as those in Shakespeare and in Moliere because tender feelings
still reside in him; he desires no material acquisition through falsity;
and, finally, the idea of being robbed does not "present itself often or
strongly on his mind," which is why he leaves the cottage door
unlocked when he runs errands outside the night his gold is stolen
(68) .3
. George Eliot's genuine miser is Peter Featherstone, an obnox-
ious, manipulative old man in Middlemarch. Though a dying old in-
valid, Featherstone uses his material wealth to exercise his power
over his relatives, most of whom expect to become his beneficiaries.
38
Silas, on the other hand, does not resort to such means for control.
Doubtlessly, Silas also gains from his gold a sense of security and
certitude that Featherstone obtains from his wealth. But for the aging
weaver, it is the companionship embodied by the guineas that makes
the gold valuable to him. Unlike Featherstone, whose obsession with
money is connected with his anxiety over decrepitude and impend-
ing death, Silas's hoarding has little to do with self-preservation in
the face of old age. His hoarding habit is cured as soon as he gains a
new purpose in his life. Eppie comes to replace the hoard, and Silas
never regrets the loss of his money. Moreover, with the adoption of
Eppie, Silas also wins the true friendship of his neighbors, particu-
larly Mrs. Winthrop.
Parenting, like weaving, involves a creative process that brings
something new into being. As a parent, Silas helps to shape the life of
an orphan girl. Although the task seems to him difficult at the start,
Silas proves rather competent thanks to his willingness to learn and
seek assistance from neighbors. Thus he is enabled to master his
sense of discontent through creativity. As William Kerrigan says,
creative achievement late in life is "often the result of felt depriva-
tion, an attunement to the lost chances of an imperfect and frustrated
youth" (186). Eliot depicts Silas's ability to cultivate his potentials
and broaden his sensibilities through his capacity as Eppie's surro-
gate mother and the subsequent social integration. This "creative"
achievement in later life shows how the elderly demonstrate their
"protean capability to remake the self" (Wyatt-Brown 264). Thus, for
them, old age is a stage of continuous unfolding and self-discovery.
It is a period of renewal of hope and an affirmation of life's possibili-
ties. Silas's aging experience is an unremitting process of self-
fashioning and meaning-making. It is my contention that Silas
Marner can be treated as an example of what literary critic Constance
Rooke terms "the Vollendungsroman."
In her discussion of Margaret Laurence's The Stone Angel, Con-
stance Rooke outlines the general characteristics of an emergent
genre for which she coins the word, "the Vollendungsroman ," mean-
ing the "novel of 'completion' or 'winding up'" (31). Rooke's term
originates from the well-known " Bildungsroman " a literary term of-
ten used by German critics to signify "the novel of formation" or
"novel of education," a type of fiction that deals with the growth of
39
the protagonist "from childhood through varied experiences - and
usually through a spiritual crisis - into maturity and the recognition
of his [or her] identity and role in the world" (Abrams 121). Notwith-
standing, Rooke's employment of the term "Vollendungsroman" car-
ries a certain ironic connotation. As Rooke observes, the elderly pro-
tagonist in this type of novel is often "tormented by the memory of
characters who have died before some vital message could be deliv-
ered or received" (33). So the intrinsic irony with this kind of novel is
the feeling that something is left undone. Nevertheless, the protago-
nist's reminiscence or life review4 is potentially therapeutic and al-
lows character development. Finally, there is also an intense relation-
ship between art and life, between the elderly character and the nov-
elist.
Silas Marner exhibits these characteristics with only minor varia-
tions. To start with, Silas is troubled by the traumatic experience in
Lantern Yard. Unable to clear himself of the false accusation, the
weaver exiles himself to a place where he hopes to eschew the pain-
ful memory of betrayal and humiliation. Nevertheless, Silas contin-
ues to be haunted by the memory. His confusion about such reli-
gious practice as the drawing of the lots in Lantern Yard and the
sense that he has yet to prove his innocence call attention to the idea
of the incomplete human character prevalent in the Vollendungsro-
man. Later, when Silas is gradually integrated into the Raveloe com-
munity, he is able to appreciate Dolly Winthrop's friendship and
trust himself to her. Step by step he discloses to her the secret of his
past life; thus the aging weaver inaugurates his journey of the life
review, which, according to Constance Rooke, is the most common
form of the Vollendungsroman (37).
Robert N. Butler, the famous neuropsychiatrist and pioneer
American gerontologist,5 argues for the positive value and signifi-
cance of reminiscence in old age. In his ground-breaking work, "The
Life Review: An Interpretation of Reminiscence in the Aged," Butler
maintains that an elderly person can work through such unresolved
conflicts as regret, grief, guilt and unfulfilled dreams by retrieving
memories of the past. Echoing Erik Erikson's developmental psycho-
logical theories, which emphasize that "man develops through con-
flict," Butler asserts that reminiscence and life review can result in
adaptation or maladjustment (4). It all depends on the individual's
ability to resolve, reorganize, and reintegrate what is troubling or
40
preoccupying them (Butler, "Unrecognized Bonanza" 37). Central to
Erikson's theory is the idea that developmental change occurs
throughout a human life span. Butler also recognizes the elderly
people's potential to develop and he speaks highly of the importance
of an evaluative reminiscence6 that enables one to expiate guilt, exor-
cize problematic childhood identifications, resolve intra-psychic con-
flicts, reconcile family relationships, etc ("Successful Aging" 534). To
achieve these goals, Butler recommends the assistance of what he
calls the "participant-observer" to help prevent the older person in
the review from "becoming stuck at some painful point in the past"
(Lo Gerfo 43). With the presence of a willing listener, the elderly can
reflect upon their lives with the intent to search for purpose, recon-
cile relationships, and resolve conflicts and regrets (Butler, "Success-
ful Aging" 533).
Silas's review of his past life does not just commence after he be-
friends Mrs. Winthrop, as a matter of fact. Earlier, when he is urged
by compassion to help relieve his neighbor's pain from a heart dis-
ease, he recalls his mother and her legacy to him, the knowledge
about herbal medicine. Again, when he finds the foundling in his
cottage, he is reminded of the little sister he carried about in his arms
before she died. These journeys back to his younger days, however,
are unpurposeful and essentially painful and non-therapeutic. More-
over, the reminiscence occurs in Silas's private world. It is the disclo-
sure to Mrs. Winthrop regarding the secret of his past life that initi-
ates a life review shared in the public world with a caring and sup-
portive "participant-observer." For the aging weaver, this is a turn-
ing point from which Silas eventually emerges from the solipsistic
world of his wounded self. That Silas later also shares on various
occasions his earlier life with his adopted daughter, most notably in
the form of the search for the old home in Lantern Yard, exemplifies
more directly Harry R. Moody's concern with the redeeming of the
public world and the establishment of generational links through life
review.
Harry R. Moody, another prominent gerontologist who, enlight-

ened by Butler's faith in the therapeutic benefits of reminiscence and
life review, underscores the importance of public disclosure. In
"Reminiscence and the Recovery of the Public World," Moody high-
41
lights the advantages to both the elderly and their listeners when
reminiscence or life review is shared:
If the act of reminiscence fails to recover the public
world - fails, that is, to participate in something larger than
a single life story - then reminiscence fails of its larger pur-
pose. In that case, reminiscence becomes merely a "senti-
mental journey": an evocation of nostalgia or a flight from
the present. By contrast, the old person who helps the pre-
sent generation to remember the public world also redeems
it from the natural ruin of time, and for future generations,
bestows guidance on the life journey. (161-62)
Inspired by Christopher Lasch's The Culture of Narcissism, Moody
says that "hope in the future is linked to the task of old age as the
guardian of the remembered past," and that reminiscence "makes
sense only if 'we believe that our memories form a continuous chain
from the past into the future, from one generation to the next'" (160).
In other words, Moody underlines not only the therapeutic value of
life review but also the significance of generational links established
when private stories are told out loud.
In view of Butler's and Moody's ideas, Silas's revelation of his
early life to Mrs. Winthrop and Eppie becomes significant in several
ways. First of all, it allows the weaver to work through fragments of
past experience, especially those unresolved conflicts, in the presence
of supportive others who enact the role and function of a participant-
observer. Raising Eppie has enabled Silas to recover "a consciousness
of unity between past and present" (202). As Silas confides to Mrs.
Winthrop earlier in the novel, Eppie is the name of his little sister
who was named after their own mother, Hephzibah. The adoption of
Eppie therefore helps Silas to reestablish the sense of continuity with
his beloved dead mother and sister. But the disclosure to Mrs. Win-
throp of the dark secret related to the theft in Lantern Yard initiates
Silas's return to an unpleasant past significantly different from that
shared with his beloved family members. This open confrontation
with the dark side of one's past life can be crucial in an elderly per-
son's ego integration. With the assistance of the sympathetic secret-
sharer, Silas is able to understand old events from new perspectives.
In addition, the life review with Mrs. Winthrop and his adopted
daughter is essential because, apart from bringing forth relief for Si-
las's "confession" and providing him with sympathy from another
42
person, it also offers the aging Silas an opportunity for psychic
growth. Sharing with Mrs. Winthrop his traumatic experience in
Lantern Yard, Silas learns, although slowly, to be positive, thankful
and trusting in spite of the mystery surrounding the drawing of the
lots. Silas has come to believe, as he tells Mrs. Winthrop himself,
"There's good i' this world" and "it makes a man feel as there's a
good more nor he can see, i' spite o' the trouble and the wickedness"
(205). Silas at this stage of his life has come a long way from his much
younger self who asserts that "there is no just God that governs the
earth righteously, but a God of lies, that bears witness against the
innocent" (61). That after sixteen years' interval Silas's eyes "have a
less vague, [and] a more answering gaze" also suggests that Silas has
become a lot more assertive (196).
Finally and most importantly, as a result of the life review shared
with a supportive company, Silas discovers hope, although para-
doxically it is achieved "through the recognition of [life's] failure"
(Rooke 40). Venturing with Eppie back to the old streets in his native
place, Silas discovers that a big factory has replaced the old commu-
nity in Lantern Yard. "I've no home but this now," Silas admits to
Mrs. Winthrop after he returns to Raveloe again from this revisit to
Lantern Yard (240). He understands as well that the secret of the
drawing of the lots will be dark to him till the end, "but that doesn't
hinder" his trust in the goodness of the world (241). This implies that
Silas's outlook on life is much more optimistic now though at the
same time he has learned that life may not be all that he wants it to
be. Silas says to Eppie earlier, "things will change, whether we like it
or not" (210). As U. C. Knoepflmacher observes, Silas realizes and
accepts life's changes in the end (235). He is now prepared for all that
made up life, both its fulfillment and its discontent. In short, Silas's
willingness to let go of the irreconcilable signifies an important stage
in his aging experience. He has come to a full acceptance of the good
and bad of his life.
In Erik Erikson's theory of eight psychological stages of human
development, the final stage occurs in late adulthood when an indi-
vidual looks back and evaluates his or her life. Erikson is convinced
that an elderly person feels a sense of integrity, rather than despair, if
he or she can accept "one's one and only life cycle as something that
had to be and that by necessity permitted of no substitution" (qtd. in
43
Merriam 606). That is to say, integrity in late adulthood demands
"the acceptance of one's life history as right and inevitable" (Lo
Gerfo 42). Such is the case with Silas. So Silas reaches ego integrity in
the end. According to Constance Rooke, only rarely does a work un-
der the category of the Vollendungsroman endorse Erikson's idea in
this regard (34). Silas Marner , however, represents a rare example.
Like many of Eliot's older characters, Silas exhibits a great
amount of energy. This energy on several occasions expresses itself
through rage as the weaver confronts injustice and mistreatment. But
Silas does not display his rage openly all the time, especially when
he is younger. Reacting to the false accusation of his stealing, for in-
stance, young Silas flees his homeland. He is indeed infuriated by the
result of the drawing of the lots, which erroneously declares him
guilty, yet he responds to the injury with "flight" rather than "fight."
Writing about The Mill on the Floss , Peggy Fitzhugh Johnstone em-
ploys Heinz Kohuťs psychoanalytical theory and discusses Maggie
Tuilier 's narcissistic rage: It is "a chronic and disproportionate anger
in response to any incident perceived as a narcissistic injury - any
incident that attacks her already weak sense of self, or that repeats
the pattern of rejection by her parents and society" (45). Silas also
experiences a similar narcissistic injury when he is mistakenly
judged to be a felon. Silas has an "impressible self-doubting" nature,
as opposed to the "self-complacent suppression of inward triumph"
of his church friend, William Dane, who "hold[s] himself wiser than
his teachers" (57). Not surprisingly, Silas's reaction to such an injury
is to depart from the community that misjudged him. His with-
drawal from the community resembles Maggie Tulliver's "flight" (to
the attic, the gypsies, etc), as opposed to "fight," an honest expres-
sion of one's narcissistic rage (Johnstone 45).
Silas expresses a similar type of rage when Godfrey comes to
claim Eppie. However, Silas's self-doubting nature resurfaces mo-
mentarily duetto Godfrey's allusion to the weaver's low (social)
status. From the start, Godfrey's reference to the weaver's aging and
physical decline undercuts Silas's competence as Eppie's father. The
mention that Eppie "doesn't look like a strapping girl come of work-
ing parents" and is not fit for "a rough life" contributes further to
Silas's narcissistic injury (228-29). Hurt and uneasy, Silas, however,
does not give in easily. With "an accent of bitterness " that has been
silent in him since his past traumatic experience, Silas challenges
44
Godfrey's belief that, as Eppie's biological father, he has a natural
claim on her (231 emphasis added). Never before has Silas been so
certain about himself, nor has he been so outspoken about his own
feelings. The result of the struggle between Silas and Godfrey over-
turns the initial assumption about the older man's gradual loss of
competence as a father. It implies the possibility of victory of age
over youth when the elderly is positive and assertive. Finally, it
shows the vitality an elderly person may have which can be shown
through his or her rage when triggered. Silas's open expression of his
rage, then, demonstrates the tremendous amount of energy in him.
The relationship between fury and age is obvious in Silas's ex-
ample. I propose to read such resurgence of mental acuteness as a
self-sustaining gesture. This gesture is a common quality among sev-
eral of Eliot's older characters, although in some of them their energy
may be misdirected. Take Peter Featherstone again, for instance. The
old man easily goes into fits of fury with his relatives. His anger
mostly results from a keenly felt sense of frustration of his desires,
one of which is to make sure of his dominance. That's why he be-
comes furious when the well-principled Mary Garth refuses to ex-
change his wills for him when no other relative is present hence
thwarting his wish to maintain control. He dies the same night with-
out achieving what he desires. This suggests that he has misspent his
energy mainly to bully his relatives. On the contrary, Silas's energy is
more adequately channeled. Enraged and frustrated first by the false
accusation and then by the loss of his gold, Silas channels his emo-
tions through weaving initially and parenting eventually. Silas's en-
ergy hence is constructive and productive because he successfully
transforms negative emotions into positive expressions. The resur-
gence of his energy also suggests the elderly man's "proud refusal to
rest" (Kerrigan 182). When he deals with an egotistically benevolent
man like Godfrey Cass, Silas's vitality of real fury is revived. His
rage is attributed to the wounded self's awakening and an increased
sensibility to its call to defend itself against injustice or mistreatment.
Thus compared to Peter Featherstone, or even to the younger God-
frey Cass, Silas's aging experience has strengthened rather than de-
bilitated him.
Finally, typical also in the Vollendungsroman is the peculiar alli-
ance between the elderly character and the author (Rooke 31). Again
45
Silas Marner provides a good example. According to F. B. Pinion,
personal reasons "may be suspected for the overriding appeal of the
theme" in Silas Marner (132). Factors such as the author's own age
when she wrote the novel, her personal relation with George Henry
Lewes, her common-law husband, her community's treatment of her,
her role as a (surrogate) mother, and so forth, remarkably link
George Eliot to the aging Silas Marner.
As we learn from Gordon Haighťs biography of the novelist,
when the idea of Silas Marner thrust itself upon her and her plans for
Romola, Eliot was around forty (340). That is to say, Eliot was at
about the same age as the weaver in the beginning of the novel. To a
great extent, Silas's more than fifteen years of self-imposed exile mir-
rors that of the novelist, who preferred ostracism from society owing
to her uncommon relationship with Lewes, a family man who was
separated from his wife, but unable to divorce. Silas's betrayal by a
close friend and the false accusation of the theft against him interest-
ingly reflect Eliot's own painful experience: Like Silas, Eliot fell vic-
tim to the accusation of being a thief - in Eliot's case, the theft of an-
other woman's husband.
Prior to the loss of the church money, there had been diverse
opinions regarding Silas's cataleptic fit during the prayer-meeting.
Among them, William Dane alone warns Silas to guard against sin
because to him, Silas's catalepsy looks "more like a visitation of Satan
than a proof of divine favour" (58). The suspicion of a good friend
not only pains the sensitive, self-doubting Süas but also causes him
to lose faith in the church community. Worse still, it shakes the con-
fidence and trust of Sarah, Silas's fiancée, who is reluctant, however,
to dissolve their engagement, not necessarily because she does not
wish to but because their relationship had already been "recognized
in the prayer-meetings" (58). Thus, instead of as an expression of
personal affection and commitment, a marital engagement is reduced
to some kind of "institution" sanctioned and regulated by the feel-
ings of the community. That Eliot was shunned by respectable soci-
ety due to her liaison with Lewes reveals a similar belief regarding
the idea of "stealing." The judgment on Silas is determined by super-
stition (i.e. the drawing of the lots) despite the senselessness of such
a persistent belief in the miraculous. Similarly, Eliot's "transgres-
sion" requires no careful inquires for it is unquestionable to the re-
spectable society that she "stole" another woman's husband even
46
though Agnes, Lewes's legal wife and an exponent of free love, gave
birth to several children fathered by her husband's friend. Under-
standably, Eliot smarted under the injustice of a strictly convention-
coded society that "ostracized her as a violator of the marriage tie
while regarding the impenitent Agnes as a blameless abandoned
wife" (Haight 338). Painfully aware of the complexity of moral is-
sues, Eliot thus cautions against "the dangers of drawing simplistic
moral conclusions" (Spittles 52). It follows then that Eliot's honest
avowal of her union with Lewes was not made purposely "in defi-
ance of the marriage laws, but in obedience to a higher personal mo-
rality" that could brook no deceit (Haight 543).
Eliot's feelings of abandonment or even betrayal by her own
family, especially her brother, Isaac Evans, resonate in Silas's reac-
tion to the treachery by those closest to him. Since their childhood,
Eliot - or more properly, Marian Evans - and her brother had been
very close. But Marian Evans grew to love Isaac with awe, he being a
man of strict moral principle. His approbation would have meant the
whole world to her, but she was never quite able to please him. Her
relationship with Lewes naturally outraged Isaac, who informed her
of his decision not to have any direct contact with her. He also for-
bade any family member to keep in touch with her, including
Chrissy, the sister for whom Marian Evans cared the most. Com-
pletely cut off from family and society, Marian Evans inevitably felt
abandoned or even betrayed. Shy, sensitive and self-doubting since
childhood, Marian Evans therefore experienced a narcissistic injury.
She exhibited her narcissistic rage partly by a declaration to the few
remaining personal friends of her preference to be a social outcast,
and partly through her presentation of Maggie's and Silas's fury.
Marian Evan's rage, like Silas's, is evidence of her tremendous
amount of energy. Similar to Silas, too, Marian Evans also found ap-
propriate outlets for her energy: through writing - the mothering
and weaving of both fictional and non-fictional works - and parent-
hood as "the Mutter" to Lewes's sons, Eliot became more confident
and sure of her own worth, thus paving the way for her successful
transition to maturity and old age. According to one of Eliot's ardent
young admirers, Edith Simcox, Marian Evans at sixty-one years of
age had "a spring of vitality within" (qtd. in Haight 534). In short,
Silas's sense of disappointment towards human relationships echoes
47
the novelist's own. In their shared disappointment, however, both
author and character learn to muster their potential and enhance
their creativity, Marian Evans through writing and mothering and
Silas, weaving and parenting. For both author and character, the rage
resulting from frustrated human relationships was channeled into
productive work.
Michael Ginsburg, a psychoanalytic critic, comments that
through writing Marian Evans becomes a man. Ginsburg is applying
the Freudian concept that takes writing as "the symbolic way by
which a woman produces herself a phallus'' (qtd. in Spittles 14). This
is intriguing considering that Marian Evans indeed seemed to ex-
plore and exercise more freely her creativity through her male pseu-
donym. Likewise, Silas cultivates his creative potential by way of
weaving and male mothering. As Silas weaves to sustain himself
both financially and emotionally, Marian Evans fabricates stories for
living as well as for personal autonomy. While Silas's parenting
brings forth a more successful mode of aging for him, Marian Evan's
mothering of both her novels and Lewes's sons enables her to appre-
ciate better the different roles she plays and various stages of human
life she experiences, including aging and the acceptance of death. "I
have a deep sense of change within . . . and of a permanently closer
companionship with death," Marian Evans wrote soon after her fifti-
eth birthday (qtd. in Haight 422). While she was working on Middle-
march , she was also nursing the dying Thornie Lewes, son of George
Henry Lewes. Her mind became increasingly occupied with the idea
of a future life and she began her poem, "The Legend of Jubal"
which she did not finish until after Thornie's funeral. Sitting at
Thornie's bedside, Marian Evans realized that though death was in-
evitable, it was not entirely bad, for it brought "new awareness of the
value of life" (Haight 421). Marian Evans wrote in "The Legend of
Jubal" that "No form, no shadow, but new dearness took / From one
thought that life must have an end" (94). Very likely, Marian Evans
was thinking about not only death but also a purpose that made hu-
man existence meaningful. Gordon Haight notes that many of the
novelist's poems dwell on the acceptance of death (517). This also is a
sign of her positive aging, from gerontological point of view.
In a book that specifically examines aging in nineteenth-century
England, the sociologist Jill Quadagno mentions three criteria by
which the social status of the elderly is judged: physical and emo-
48
tional security, respect from others and the assurance of their own
usefulness (205). Based on this standard, Silas's social status appreci-
ates in value as the novel progresses. It was the same with Eliot, who
slowly won back what she had previously lost as the cost for her un-
ion with Lewes, including love, happiness, self-esteem and social
respect. The novelist's increasing confidence and contentment with
her life can be found in the letters she wrote on various New Year's
Eves, in which she looked back and evaluated the past years and felt
reasonably pleased and grateful. So resembling Silas's, her life re-
view in the presence of the supportive listeners - in this case, the ad-
dressees of her correspondence - is adaptive. Likewise, she gradu-
ally regained her social status when respectable society resumed its
visit to her during the first years at the Priory, her home with Lewes
(Haight 406). The prestigious social position granted to her is evi-
dence in that in her final years she presided over a group of admirers
who came ardently every Sunday afternoon to seek guidance and
wisdom from the Victorian sage on the pedestal of the Priory.
Wordsworth's lines from "Michael" is used by Eliot as an epi-
graph for Silas Marner because it points to "the remedial influences of
pure, natural human relations" which Eliot avows is her intended
goal for writing the novel (qtd. in Haight 341). "A child, more than
all other gifts / That earth can offer to declining man, / Brings hope
with it, and forward-looking thoughts." Yet the reference to Michael,
the declining man, in Wordsworth's lines also reveals the fascination
with aging and old age. While Eliot's epigraph stresses the positive
influences children bring to their aging parents, Wordsworth's poem
in fact dwells more on the impact of aging on Michael. So to some
extent, Eliot's allusion to Wordsworth's poem conveys the novelist's
concern with the effects of aging on the creative mind. If Words-
worth portrays the inevitable decline and dissolution in Michael's
old age, Eliot imagines the successful aging of Silas, in whom traces
of her own life are detected and from whom she learns to prepare for
her own aging.
49
Notes
1 An insightful reader recently reminded me that Wordsworth of

course was not the only origin of these ideas. Rousseau, Burns and
Blake, among others, are also relevant. But Eliot's outlook and work
certainly show a very powerful Wordsworthean influence.
This and all following citations are to the Penguin edition of Si-
las Marner, edited by Q. D. Leavis..
3 1 have discussed these features typical of misers and Silas's dif-
ferences from them in another paper, "Healing the Trauma: Lost and
Found in Silas Marner ," to be published in the upcoming issue of Fu
Jen Studies (Taipei: Fu Jen Catholic University).
4 Reminiscence and life review are not synonymous although
they are sometimes used interchangeably. In a life review, both "the
unbidden return of memories" and "the purposive seeking of them"
may occur. Thus life review includes reminiscence, which is com-
monly accepted as occurring inadvertently and tending to be less
orderly (Butler, "An Interpretation" 67).
5 He has won various awards for his contribution to geriatrics
and gerontology, including the prestigious 1976 Pulitzer Prize for
general nonfiction and the NIHAA 1998 Public Service Award.
6 Literature and practice show that there are at least three types
of reminiscence: informative, evaluative and obsessive. These are
distinct yet overlapping. Informative reminiscence focuses on re-
viewing factual material, mainly to provide pleasure and enhance
self-esteem through retelling past events. Evaluative reminiscence
involves analysis of one's past, attempting to come to terms with old
guilt, conflicts and defeats, and to find meaning in one's achieve-
ments. Both informative and evaluative reminiscence may become
obsessive and dysfunctional when the elderly are unable to accept
their past (Lo Gerfo 40-44).
Works Cited
Abrams, M. H. A Glossary of Literary Terms , 4th ed. New York: Holt,

Rinehart and Winston, 1981.
Butler, Robert N. "The Life Review: An Interpretation of Reminis-
cence in the Aged." Psychiatry 26.1 (1963): 65-76.
50
- . "The Life Review: An Unrecognized Bonanza/' International Jour-
nal of Aging and Human Development 12.1 (1980-81): 35-38.
- . "Successful Aging and the Role of the Life Review." American
Geriatrics Society 22.12 (1974): 529-35.
Eliot, George. Collected Poems. London: Skoob Books Publishing,
1989.
- . Silas Marner . 1861. Ed. and intro. Q. D. Leavis. New York: Pen-
guin, 1967.
Erikson, Erik H. and Joan M. Erikson. "Introduction: Reflections on
Aging." Aging and the Elderly: Humanistic Perspectives in Gerontol-
ogy. Ed Stuart F. Spicker, Kathleen M. Woodward, and David D.
Van Tassel. Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities P, 1978. 1-8.
Haight, Gordon. George Eliot: A Biography. New York: Penguin, 1968.
Johnstone, Peggy Fitzhugh. "Narcissistic Rage in The Mill on the
Floss/' The Transformation of Rage: Mourning and Creativity in
George Elioťs Fiction. New York: New York UP, 1994. 41-67.
Kerrigan, William. "Life's Lamb: The Scansion of Late Creativity in
the Culture of Renaissance." Memory and Desire : Aging - Litera-
ture - Psychoanalysis. Ed. Kathleen Woodward and Murray M.
Schwartz. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1986. 168-91.
Knoepflmacher, U. C. "Reconciliation through Fable: Silas Marner."
GEfs Early Novels : The Limits of Realism. Berkeley: U of California
P, 1968. 221-59.
Lo Gerfo, Marianne. "Three Ways of Reminiscence in Theory and
Practice." International Journal of Aging and Human Development 12
(1980-1): 39-48.
Merriam, Sharan. "The Concept and Function of Reminiscence: A
Review of the Research." The Gerontologist 20.5 (Oct. 1980): 604-8.
Moody, Harry R. "Reminiscence and the Recovery of the Public
World." Journal of Gerontological Social Work 7. 1/2 (1984): 157-66.
Pinion, F. B. A George Eliot Companion : Literary Achievement and Mod-
ern Significance. Totowa, NJ: Barnes & Noble, 1981.
Quadagno, Jill S. Aging in Early Industrial Society: Work, Family , and
Social Policy in Nineteenth-Century England. New York: Academic
P, 1982.
Rooke, Constance. "Hadar's Old Age: The Stone Ange 1 as Vollendungs-
roman ." Crossing the River : Essays in Honor of Margaret Laurence.
51
Ed. Kristjana Gunnars. Winnipeg, Manitoba: Turstone P, 1988.
25-42.
Spittles, Brian. George Eliot: Godless Woman . Hong Kong: MacMillan
P, 1993.
Wordsworth, William. "Preface to Lyrical Ballads (1802)// The Norton
Anthology of English Literature. 7th. Ed. 2 vols. New York: Norton,
2000. 239-51.
Wyatt-Brown, Anne, M. "Creativity in the Face of Death: Claire
Philip's Journal and Poems." Journal of Aging Studies 9.4 (1995):
263-64.
52

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THE AGING EXPERIENCE OF SILAS MARNER: "SILAS MARNER" AS

Beginning with William Wordsworth's insistence in choosin

Harry R. Moody, another prominent gerontologist who, enlight-

1 An insightful reader recently reminded me that Wordsworth of

Abrams, M. H. A Glossary of Literary Terms , 4th ed. New York: Holt,

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