A few days ago, I came across an opportunity to right an introduction for Silas Marner. I wasn't sure what to write. I mean, what can I write that's not already written? I found my answer, when I was in my English Class today, where our teach(er) was talking about words often confused. When she came to greed/ avarice, she specfically mentioned that Silas Marner was 'Avaricious' for hoarding his gold. That actually hurt me. I wasn't expecting my English teach to be so ignorant.. but I maybe prejudiced.
Y'see, Silas Marner by George Eliot is my favourite novel. So, when the teach said that Silas was avaracious, I was appalled, not to say, and sad too. It was like she'd completely forgone the jist of the entire novella. Silas Marner is NOT avaracious. Neither is he a miser for that matter.
Silas is simply a man who was conned by his best friend and his fiancee, taking advantage of his Catalepsy and implicating him in murder and stealing, forcing him to leave his home and go away. Even when he came to Raveloe, he wasn't really welcomed with open arms. When he got his first pay, the coins, with their silent existence, actually reminded him of the things he'd lost. They were the only familiar thing in that new place. So like all of us, he too started clinging to the only thing that he really knew. The more coins he got, the closer he felt to his home... until the home became a mere idea, while the coins became a reality. Anyone who has lived in a foreign place for a long time can vouch that. We hoard the things that remind us of home, until that home itself becomes a distant dream.
When his coins were stolen, he went into same kind of shock that anyone who has suddenly lost all the things that he really cared about has lost. Quite like a person, who went out of town for a day returns to find his home destroyed in a flood or an earthquake. That feeling of loss is greater than all, because you just weren't expecting it.
And when Eppie was "brought to him", his greed to hoard the gold was replaced by his greed to hoard her.
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Silas Marner by George Eliot |
Y'see, Silas Marner by George Eliot is my favourite novel. So, when the teach said that Silas was avaracious, I was appalled, not to say, and sad too. It was like she'd completely forgone the jist of the entire novella. Silas Marner is NOT avaracious. Neither is he a miser for that matter.
Silas is simply a man who was conned by his best friend and his fiancee, taking advantage of his Catalepsy and implicating him in murder and stealing, forcing him to leave his home and go away. Even when he came to Raveloe, he wasn't really welcomed with open arms. When he got his first pay, the coins, with their silent existence, actually reminded him of the things he'd lost. They were the only familiar thing in that new place. So like all of us, he too started clinging to the only thing that he really knew. The more coins he got, the closer he felt to his home... until the home became a mere idea, while the coins became a reality. Anyone who has lived in a foreign place for a long time can vouch that. We hoard the things that remind us of home, until that home itself becomes a distant dream.
When his coins were stolen, he went into same kind of shock that anyone who has suddenly lost all the things that he really cared about has lost. Quite like a person, who went out of town for a day returns to find his home destroyed in a flood or an earthquake. That feeling of loss is greater than all, because you just weren't expecting it.
And when Eppie was "brought to him", his greed to hoard the gold was replaced by his greed to hoard her.
love .. love ..love this ..it captured me from the first moment I saw the film.. just memorizing
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