GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, St. Mary's, 16 April [1857]
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, St. Mary's, 16 April [1857]
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, St. Mary's, 16 April [1857]
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Sara Sophia Hennell
Date(s)
- 1857-04-16
Place
St. Mary's
Letter Content
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, St. Mary's, 16 April [1857]
MS: Yale. Endorsed: 1857. Extracts published: Cross, I, 441-442.
St. Mary's, Scilly | April 16.
Dear Sara
I was particularly pleased with that notice in the Athenaeum. 837 It is quite a white crow for their short reviews rarely give any idea of the character of a book, and moreover I feared, from their usual avoidance of theology, that they might not mention yours at all. But it was really a just and sensible account of the matter in hand, which is precisely the rarest thing to be met with in newspaper reviews. Better than all newspaper notice is what Harriet Martineau tells you about her nephew. Let that impression be made on four or five readers who live in the world, and the edition will soon be sold; which is a shorthand way of saying that you will have influenced many minds and achieved your greatest object in writing.
Looking back on your unanswered letter about "Design," I do not feel impelled to write anything on the subject. My remark on the paragraph in your book had a purely practical object -- that of calling attention to an obscurity arising, if not from the stupidity of the reasons, probably from an excessive curtness of exposition which you might remedy. I shudder at entering on such great subjects in letters; -- my idle brain wants lashing to work, like a negro, and will do nothing under a slighter stimulus.
You were quite right in your divination. Mr. Lewes does nothing for the Leader now he is away, and it is not a little relief to see no quarterlies and heaps of magazines insisting on being read in a hurry. Mr. Chapman has sent us the Westminster, but we have lent it to a rubicund surgeon 838 here, who has not yet returned it, and so are still in the dark on the "Law of Progress." 839 The number looks rather heavy, but there are at least two articles which can hardly fail to be valuable -- the German Theology, by Wilson, 840 and the "Law of Progress."
We are enjoying a retrogression to old-fashioned reading: -- George buries himself in big physiological books, German French and English, with broad pages spreading like a prairie, unbroken by paragraph or quotation; I rush on the slightest pretext to Sophocles and am as excited about blind old '8cdipus as any young lady can be about the latest hero with magnificent eyes. 841
But there is one new book we have been enjoying -- and so, I hope, have you. The "Life of Charlotte Bronte"! Deeply affecting throughout: -- in the early part romantic, poetic as one of her own novels; in the later years tragic, especially to those who know what sickness is. Mrs. Gaskell has done her work admirably, both in the industry and care with which she has gathered and selected her material, and in the feeling with which she has presented it. There is one exception, however, which I regret very much. She sets down Branwell's conduct entirely to remorse, and the falseness of that position weakens the effect of her philippics against the woman who hurried on his utter fall. 842 Remorse may make sad work with a man, but it would not make such a life as
Branwell's was in the last three or four years unless the the germs of vice had sprouted and shot up long before, as it seems clear they had in him. What a tragedy -- that picture of the old father and the three sisters, trembling day and night in terror at the possible deeds of this drunken brutal son and brother! That is the part of the life which affects me most. 843
I have looked with anxiety for a letter from my brother, on each of the two post days since he wrote last, but nothing has come. I try to think that Chrissey must be going on well, but I am very uneasy.
I can't imagine how you have room for all the family including a servant, in the cottage -- still less visitors, who it seems are a necessary appendage, wherever you may be. Surely there must be some additional bedrooms built, since I saw the place! It is difficult to believe that "Memento Mori" is really dead. But perhaps superfluous people do die, sometimes.
We have wonderful descriptions from Barbara Smith of the glorious scenery and strange picturesque life she finds in Algiers. 844 It really seems an easy way of bringing the tropics near to one's imagination, to take that short journey. In less than a week's easy travelling you are among palms and Arabs and wild horses and lions and panthers, and I don't know what beside. She dashes down sketches with her pen and ink, making arrow-heads to indicate the bark of Jackals!
Tell me any news you hear about your book, and about other things too when you are inclined. You know you live in the thick of the world and [Society] compared with us. Best love to Cara and to the gas-lighted-content-radiating-nap-after-dinner-taking-leg-rest-enjoying- and ever-by-Pollian-remembered-affectionately-presiding genius of Ivy Cottage. And love, also best, to you, dear successful author, from your old friend
Marian.
MS: Yale. Endorsed: 1857. Extracts published: Cross, I, 441-442.
St. Mary's, Scilly | April 16.
Dear Sara
I was particularly pleased with that notice in the Athenaeum. 837 It is quite a white crow for their short reviews rarely give any idea of the character of a book, and moreover I feared, from their usual avoidance of theology, that they might not mention yours at all. But it was really a just and sensible account of the matter in hand, which is precisely the rarest thing to be met with in newspaper reviews. Better than all newspaper notice is what Harriet Martineau tells you about her nephew. Let that impression be made on four or five readers who live in the world, and the edition will soon be sold; which is a shorthand way of saying that you will have influenced many minds and achieved your greatest object in writing.
Looking back on your unanswered letter about "Design," I do not feel impelled to write anything on the subject. My remark on the paragraph in your book had a purely practical object -- that of calling attention to an obscurity arising, if not from the stupidity of the reasons, probably from an excessive curtness of exposition which you might remedy. I shudder at entering on such great subjects in letters; -- my idle brain wants lashing to work, like a negro, and will do nothing under a slighter stimulus.
You were quite right in your divination. Mr. Lewes does nothing for the Leader now he is away, and it is not a little relief to see no quarterlies and heaps of magazines insisting on being read in a hurry. Mr. Chapman has sent us the Westminster, but we have lent it to a rubicund surgeon 838 here, who has not yet returned it, and so are still in the dark on the "Law of Progress." 839 The number looks rather heavy, but there are at least two articles which can hardly fail to be valuable -- the German Theology, by Wilson, 840 and the "Law of Progress."
We are enjoying a retrogression to old-fashioned reading: -- George buries himself in big physiological books, German French and English, with broad pages spreading like a prairie, unbroken by paragraph or quotation; I rush on the slightest pretext to Sophocles and am as excited about blind old '8cdipus as any young lady can be about the latest hero with magnificent eyes. 841
But there is one new book we have been enjoying -- and so, I hope, have you. The "Life of Charlotte Bronte"! Deeply affecting throughout: -- in the early part romantic, poetic as one of her own novels; in the later years tragic, especially to those who know what sickness is. Mrs. Gaskell has done her work admirably, both in the industry and care with which she has gathered and selected her material, and in the feeling with which she has presented it. There is one exception, however, which I regret very much. She sets down Branwell's conduct entirely to remorse, and the falseness of that position weakens the effect of her philippics against the woman who hurried on his utter fall. 842 Remorse may make sad work with a man, but it would not make such a life as
Branwell's was in the last three or four years unless the the germs of vice had sprouted and shot up long before, as it seems clear they had in him. What a tragedy -- that picture of the old father and the three sisters, trembling day and night in terror at the possible deeds of this drunken brutal son and brother! That is the part of the life which affects me most. 843
I have looked with anxiety for a letter from my brother, on each of the two post days since he wrote last, but nothing has come. I try to think that Chrissey must be going on well, but I am very uneasy.
I can't imagine how you have room for all the family including a servant, in the cottage -- still less visitors, who it seems are a necessary appendage, wherever you may be. Surely there must be some additional bedrooms built, since I saw the place! It is difficult to believe that "Memento Mori" is really dead. But perhaps superfluous people do die, sometimes.
We have wonderful descriptions from Barbara Smith of the glorious scenery and strange picturesque life she finds in Algiers. 844 It really seems an easy way of bringing the tropics near to one's imagination, to take that short journey. In less than a week's easy travelling you are among palms and Arabs and wild horses and lions and panthers, and I don't know what beside. She dashes down sketches with her pen and ink, making arrow-heads to indicate the bark of Jackals!
Tell me any news you hear about your book, and about other things too when you are inclined. You know you live in the thick of the world and [Society] compared with us. Best love to Cara and to the gas-lighted-content-radiating-nap-after-dinner-taking-leg-rest-enjoying- and ever-by-Pollian-remembered-affectionately-presiding genius of Ivy Cottage. And love, also best, to you, dear successful author, from your old friend
Marian.
Signature
Marian.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, St. Mary's, 16 April [1857], Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/94114