Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon to GE, Algiers, 26 April [1859]
Title
Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon to GE, Algiers, 26 April [1859]
Title
Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon to GE, Algiers, 26 April [1859]
Sender
Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon
Recipient
George Eliot
Date(s)
- 1859-04-26
Place
Algiers
Letter Content
Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon to GE, Algiers, 26 April [1859]
MS: Tinker Collection, Yale. Address: Mrs. George Lewes | Holly Lodge | Wimbledon Park | Wandsworth | London. Hitherto unpublished.
My darling Marian!
Forgive me for being so very affectionate but I am so intensely delighted at your success. I have just got the "Times" of April 12th with the glorious review of "Adam Bede" and a few days ago I read the "Westminster Review" article. 113 I can't tell you how I triumphed in the triumph you have made. It is so great a one. Now you see I have not yet got the book but I know that it is you. There are some weeks passed since in an obscure paper I saw the 1st review and read one long extract which 'absettled my'bb instantly made me internally exclaim that is written by Marian Evans, there is her great big head and heart and her wise wide views.
Now the more I get of the book the more certain I am, not because it is like what you have written before but because it is like what I see in you. "It is an opinion which fire cannot melt out of me. I would die in it at the stake." I have not breathed a word to a soul except to the Doctor who is like the tomb for a secret.
Here an Archdeacon of the Church of England, one of our friends, is eloquent in praise of the Scenes of Clerical Life and sent me all the "Times" notice of "A.B." I can't tell you, my dear George Eliot how enchanted I am. Very few things could have given me so much pleasure.
That a woman should write a wise and humourous book which should take a place by Thackeray.
That YOU that you whom they spit at should do it!
I am so enchanted so glad with the good and bad of me! both glad -- angel and devil both triumph!
Everybody (but Bessie and my Doctor) have bullied me for saying "My friend Marian" so you see I may take a little pet bit of delight to myself that you will be what all will wish to claim as "my friend Marian"!
My dear friend I am a very sympathetic sort of fool and sometimes read things [in] the newspapers which make me cry my eyes out. As did the story of a certain girl 114 undefended, alone, condemned. -- Cool now, I don't think anyone can help her, and so say I am fool and don't remember I wrote to you. 'abWhen I was'bb
I have so much to say to you about the Journal. Bessie writes in such a wild way of its success that I hardly know what to make of her. She has not a big enough head to see the small size of her work! I wish she could. I am sometimes so disgusted with her exaggeration -- (the letter I sent you a specimen) that I think she will waste all her pure enthusiasm and do no good in the end. But we will talk of this when we meet. This is only to tell you how I rejoice with you.
B. L. S. B. of April.
MS: Tinker Collection, Yale. Address: Mrs. George Lewes | Holly Lodge | Wimbledon Park | Wandsworth | London. Hitherto unpublished.
My darling Marian!
Forgive me for being so very affectionate but I am so intensely delighted at your success. I have just got the "Times" of April 12th with the glorious review of "Adam Bede" and a few days ago I read the "Westminster Review" article. 113 I can't tell you how I triumphed in the triumph you have made. It is so great a one. Now you see I have not yet got the book but I know that it is you. There are some weeks passed since in an obscure paper I saw the 1st review and read one long extract which 'absettled my'bb instantly made me internally exclaim that is written by Marian Evans, there is her great big head and heart and her wise wide views.
Now the more I get of the book the more certain I am, not because it is like what you have written before but because it is like what I see in you. "It is an opinion which fire cannot melt out of me. I would die in it at the stake." I have not breathed a word to a soul except to the Doctor who is like the tomb for a secret.
Here an Archdeacon of the Church of England, one of our friends, is eloquent in praise of the Scenes of Clerical Life and sent me all the "Times" notice of "A.B." I can't tell you, my dear George Eliot how enchanted I am. Very few things could have given me so much pleasure.
That a woman should write a wise and humourous book which should take a place by Thackeray.
That YOU that you whom they spit at should do it!
I am so enchanted so glad with the good and bad of me! both glad -- angel and devil both triumph!
Everybody (but Bessie and my Doctor) have bullied me for saying "My friend Marian" so you see I may take a little pet bit of delight to myself that you will be what all will wish to claim as "my friend Marian"!
My dear friend I am a very sympathetic sort of fool and sometimes read things [in] the newspapers which make me cry my eyes out. As did the story of a certain girl 114 undefended, alone, condemned. -- Cool now, I don't think anyone can help her, and so say I am fool and don't remember I wrote to you. 'abWhen I was'bb
I have so much to say to you about the Journal. Bessie writes in such a wild way of its success that I hardly know what to make of her. She has not a big enough head to see the small size of her work! I wish she could. I am sometimes so disgusted with her exaggeration -- (the letter I sent you a specimen) that I think she will waste all her pure enthusiasm and do no good in the end. But we will talk of this when we meet. This is only to tell you how I rejoice with you.
B. L. S. B. of April.
Signature
B. L. S. B.
Citation
Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon, Barbara [Mme Eugene] Bodichon to GE, Algiers, 26 April [1859], 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/95538