Eliot explains in her journal, in "How I Came to Write Fiction," that September of 1856 had marked the beginning of a new era in her life (Letters 2:406). Her sense that the date marked the beginning of a new stage lends support to my view that the timing of her decision to write fiction, which occurred twenty years after her mother’s death in 1836, constituted a positive anniversary reaction that signified the beginning of her release from mourning. I also believe that the publication of her last novel, Daniel Deronda, twenty years later, in 1876, signified a (perhaps partial) resolution of her sense of loss, as well as the fulfillment of her hard-won sense of identity as an artist. I will therefore argue in this book that Eliot’s fiction is an example of Pollock’s idea that an artist’s creative products may represent "aspects of the mourning process itself" (1:127). Eliot’s expressed sense of renewal in the summer of 1856 suggests that she began her fiction writing from a position of strength. Both her rich background of accomplishments and her stable relationship with Lewes had contributed to her readiness for new growth.
Eliot explains in her journal entry that although she had always had a "vague dream" of writing a novel, it was not until after her return from the Continent with Lewes that her "greater [than expected] success . . . in other kinds of writing" convinced them both that it would be worthwhile for her to try fiction. At Tenby, Lewes began to urge her to start immediately, but she deferred because of more pressing projects, until "one morning as I was lying in bed, thinking what should be the subject of my first story, my thoughts merged themselves into a dreamy doze, and I imagined myself writing a story of which the title was 'The Sad Fortunes of the Reverend Amos Barton.'" Deciding to make her dream a reality, she came up with the plan to write "a series of stories containing sketches drawn from my own observations of the Clergy, and calling them 'Scenes of Clerical Life' opening with 'Amos Barton.'" When "Amos Barton" was completed, Lewes helped her by proposing to John Blackwood, the publisher of his series of "Sea-Side Studies," a series of "tales and sketches illustrative of the actual life of our country clergy about a quarter of a century ago; but solely in its human and not at all in its theological aspect; the object being to do what has never yet been done in our Literature, for we have had abundant religious stories polemical and doctrinal, but since the 'Vicar' and Miss Austen, no stories representing the clergy like any other class with the humours, sorrows, and troubles of other men" (2:269). Lewes did not, however, reveal the identity of the author.
Eliot’s first fictional characters were thus based on real-life figures from her childhood. The character Amos Barton was based on the Reverend John Gwyther, the curate who had officiated at Mrs. Evans’s funeral and Chrissey’s wedding (Haight, Biography 211). The title character in the second story, "Mr. Gilfil’s Love Story," was drawn from memories of the Reverend Bernard Gilpin Ebdell, the vicar who had christened Mary Anne; as Haight stresses, however, "the plot is entirely imaginary" (221). In the third and last of the stories, "Janet’s Repentance," Mr. Tryan is an "idealized portrait of Mr. Jones, the Evangelical curate at Nuneaton" during Mary Anne’s schooldays at Mrs. Wallington’s (227). The fact that the characters were drawn from the author’s memories of real-life figures did not go unnoticed. In Warwickshire in particular, much curiosity was aroused as to the identity of the author, who had assumed the pen name of George Eliot. Most people thought the writer must be a clergyman; Charles Dickens was the only person to guess (from the domestic details) that the author was a woman (Laski 55). It was not until she had begun to write Adam Bede that Eliot revealed her identity to her editor, John Blackwood. After the novel’s publication, as Haight records, the truth of its authorship "was spreading generally in literary circles" (Biography 287). The attempts by an imposter, a clergyman named Joseph Liggins, to claim credit for George Eliot’s work contributed to her gradual (although reluctant) willingness to let her identity be known to the public, although more than anything else, it was the "extraordinary success of Adam Bede” that finally "lifted the veil of anonymity" (297).
Throughout the process of publishing Scenes of Clerical Life(1857), Blackwood responded favorably, although with honest criticism, to the manuscripts he received from the unknown author (Eliot, Letters 2:272, 275, 297). Judging from their correspondence, however, neither Eliot nor Lewes could accept the constructive criticism that might have helped the new fiction writer avoid mistakes later in her career (274, 299). Blackwood’s expressed "fear [in regard to "Gilfil"] that [Eliot] huddles up the conclusion of his stories too much" (323) was a criticism that turned out to be prophetic. Although his comment was noted by the author, she seemed not to understand how to work on the problem; she answered that "conclusions are the weak point of most authors, but some of the fault lies in the very nature of a conclusion, which is at best a negation" (324). Blackwood’s response to the first part of "Janet’s Repentance" also anticipates later comments about Eliot’s bleak presentation of provincial life. He wrote, "I should have liked a pleasanter picture. Surely the colors are rather harsh for a sketch of English County Town life only 25 years ago" (344). Arguing that the reality had already been softened enough, Eliot responded, "The real town was more vicious than my Milby; the real Dempster more disgusting than mine; the real Janet alas! had a far sadder end than mine" (347). At this point, Lewes added (in a separate letter) his opinion that "I was in raptures with 'Janet’s Repentance' when Eliot first read it to me and declared it to be the finest thing he had written" (351). Blackwood responded, characteristically, with reassurance (352). Yet when he ventured still another criticism of a scene in "Janet’s Repentance," Lewes, revealing what turned out to be a lifelong tendency to protect Eliot from criticism, finally wrote, "Entre nous let me hint that unless you have any serious objection to make to Eliot’s stories, don't make any. He is so easily discouraged, so diffident of himself, that not being prompted by necessity to write, he will close the series in the belief that his writing is not relished. . . . Don’t allude to this hint of mine. He wouldn’t like my interfering" (363–64). Although the next letter from Blackwood expresses admiration for the ending of "Janet’s Repentance" (371), Eliot apparently still rankled from his earlier criticism. As she recorded in her journal, "I had meant to carry on the series beyond 'Janet’s Repentance,' . . . but my annoyance at Blackwood’s want of sympathy in the first two parts of 'Janet,' . . . determined me to close the series and republish them in two volumes" (410).
Despite their tentative beginnings, Eliot, Blackwood, and Lewes nonetheless developed a good working relationship over the years that followed. Blackwood was still Eliot’s editor, except for a short rift over the publication of Romola, when she wrote her last novel, Daniel Deronda.
George Eliot was paid generously for her fiction. After 1857, she and Lewes, who was also doing well with his publications, no longer had to worry about money, and Eliot was able to give up her article writing. Scenes of Clerical Life was well received in literary circles, and although there were only three reviews, they were encouraging (Laski 55). With the publication of Adam Bede, Eliot’s reputation was established. Her early fiction, which was drawn largely from a combination of various elements of memory and imagination, became less literally based on figures from the past after the Scenes as she began to make rapid progress in her artistic technique. Her early works were also rapidly composed. Scenes of Clerical Life was completed in only a little over a year, as was each of the long novels, Adam Bede and The Mill on the Floss. The short novel, Silas Marner, proved to be a transitional work, written as Eliot was beginning to move toward the writing of her more complex novels, Romola, Felix Holt, Middlemarck, and Daniel Deronda. All of these later novels involved more research and took longer to complete.
In the chapters to come, I have limited myself to a discussion of George Eliot’s seven novels. These are her major works, and as such, the primary focus of her attention during the twenty years of her creative life. Any attempt to include every work of fiction would result in too ponderous a book, and would not add substantially to my argument. Besides the three Scenes and the seven novels, Eliot also published two short stories: "The Lifted Veil," in 1859, between the writing of Adam Bede and The Mill on the Floss, and "Brother Jacob," written in 1860 after the publication of