In Middlemarch, in the heart of England, Dorothea wants to change the world and Dr Lydgate hopes to make great scientific discoveries. But after disastrous marriages, they both lose control of their lives.Can they ever achieve their dreams?Middlemarch is generally considered to be one of the greatest novels in the English language.

Silas Marner (1861) is Eliot’s classic tale of an outsider. A weaver who comes to live and work alone in the Midlands village of Raveloe, Silas Marner’s sole pleasure is to count his growing hoard of gold. When it is stolen, his life ceases to have meaning — until Eppie wanders into the weaver’s cottage one snowy New Year’s Eve and falls asleep on his hearth. Eppie is two years old.Silas rears the little girl with friendly help from the villagers and she loves him as a father. Then, after sixteen years of contentment, Eppie’s true background comes to light.

Since its first appearance in 1871-2, Middlemarch has been hailed by successive generations of writers and readers for its authentic view of life in a small English town in the run-up to the Reform Bill of 1832. Addressing such themes as marriage, religion, hypocrisy and political reform, Middlemarch follows the relationships of various couples and their success or failure, placing the position of women in society at the centre of the work. In 2007, an author poll conducted by Time Magazine placed the novel as one of the 10 greatest ever written.