The Key To All Mythologies
Book Choice for March 2020: Middlemarch by George Eliot
In the middle of March, I was about a third of the way through Middlemarch, by George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans) and I was simultaneously floored by its incredible width and DEPTH. There cannot be SO many books that plumb the psychological depths of nearly all of their characters, while containing a literal WORLD within them (I know there are fantasy books which contain literal alternate “worlds,” but…) this big fat book is basically a reconstruction of English village life from around, I believe, the time that Queen Victoria took the throne (although it was published in 1872). Everything is present, preserved in its pages, down to the hand-sewn stitches in the hems of the women’s layered skirts and the grimace which turns down the corners of a farm-labourer’s mouth…
And yet. It’s lovely to read, or hear, I should say. I very much wanted to “read Middlemarch in March” as I have mentioned before (what can I say, cannot pass up a cool trend) and I just find myself too swamped mentally to read such a long book right now. It was however, HEARTILY recommended to me, I was told by a dear friend it is something really unique, which caused it to lodge in my brain because in general, I do not think I am meant to read these Victorian Who Will She Marry stories. (I have become okay with the fact that I am never going to read, or even listen to Anthony Trollope books again, life is too short. And besides, after Middlemarch, his characters appear, comparison being a brutal thing, quite thin by contrast).
Middlemarch’s propensity for psychoanalysis might actually go TOO far—now that I have seen every character in every mood, and in many situations both normal and trying, now that I know their private dreams, confessions and impressions, I can only conclude that there are no villains; people are basically good.
To which I can only say: Damn it. It really IS that simple, because we are all so complex. Everyone, even despicable people have always done something in the right direction in their lives, they have loved SOMEONE, they have had a charming doubt about themselves, they have confronted the certainty of their own death, which cases, naturally, unwillingly, an empathetic sensation in your own stomach.
Our cruelty to each other is usually born from tiny unconsciousnesses.
ANYWAY—that is not what I wanted to talk about in this blog. I want to talk about a dried old prune. Specifically Mr. Casaubon the scholar, and the decrepit figure he makes, shuffling around, pale and crusty, selfishly ruining everyone’s life while he writes…nothing.
Well, that about sums it up. My descriptions are becoming a bit too efficient. It’s just funny, because had I read this in high school I’m sure I wouldn’t have seen myself in Mr. Casaubon, but I cannot now help making comparisons. His polite, stiff, coldfishness is a feature of so many scenes. Most surrounding characters believe him to be simply the worst. And yet. He can garner the sympathy of the reader. I just cannot help talking about Casaubon here, its so relevant. He’s a major force in the book –with all the force of a dusty treatise falling off a shelf onto the floor– and his scholarship is dwelt on in such poignant detail…although many suspect…and his wife begins to suspect…
This endeavor might be pointless.
Mr. Casaubon has been engaged all his adult life on taking notes for, but not necessarily writing, or drafting in any way, (uhhm…why is the bile rising in my throat?) a huge work which is to be entitled: “The Key to All Mythologies.” This has allowed him to dabble in every type of mythology from around the world, snooping into hundreds of books. (And his great wealth has allowed him to be a permanently independent scholar, an aspect of his life I don’t sympathize with, obviously). Somewhere around Chapter 40 he has just begun to contemplate that life is not infinite, and that he may never finish his life’s work….in fact, he may never begin it. He has been playing at scholarship his whole life.
It’s harrowing.
(Also, currently, it strikes way too close to the bone. Are you really anything before you have made something? Personally, I am feeling a bit like a fetus).
In physical appearance, Mr. Casaubon and I are nothing alike. I’m not fifty, and rarely brood (I haven’t got time). He’s constantly described as thin as a rail, with a face you somehow imagine as, well, Thomas Aquinus living on a cloud forever (you’ll see) whereas I’m decently plump and cheerful. He spends his days answering letters, composing beautiful dedicatory paragraphs that are never read, reading, ruminating, wondering how he will be remembered by posterity, and staring out the window. I spend my days—-I’d rather not say. I’m not in the place of being able to analyse what I am doing…I’m just doing and hoping the clouds will part and it will become more clear; something which happens about every four months or so.
I must interject with positivity: it doesn’t actually matter how we spend our lives, if we like them.
It doesn’t matter what we do daily, if we put happiness first, that is to say, it will matter that we tried to live our minutes. There may not actually be any way of “balancing” scholarship and relationships, friendships, fun etc. perfectly. But you can’t go too far, you want to avoid a completely dried-prune situation. It takes a lot to do great work, my boyfriend and I talk about this ALL the time, not because we are doing great work, but we rather fantasize about those who have; we have to remind ourselves to be realistic. Great work takes a toll. It has even turned geniuses mad.
(We are not geniuses, but it doesn’t really matter. The trying is the thing)
When I was younger, for example going to Uni for the first time 2003-2007, I perhaps could have guessed, if I had been capable of reflection at the time, that I was not meant for the crabbed, cramped, indoor world of scholarship. But instead of taking that onboard, I decided to apply to one of the most prestigious Uni’s in the world (but that truly is a story for another day). Even there, I was an erratic student, but since then…since I was pulled back in…I remember a friend saying when I started my PhD “Oh, you won’t do anything else now” (she meant come back to the real world and real jobs), “they have got you good.”
Although it still seems unlikely, because I have been anything but a success, this is what I have chosen. In the time since c. 2016 (and under conditions of the pervasive Druck of the German work ethic) and I have learned how to sit down, concentrate, optimize myself, crank out work, even manage my time (this phrase pretty much means working all the time, or in the words of another friend “working every day you are well enough to work,” prove me wrong)…Anyway, being a student was something I had to learn how to do, it didn’t come naturally. I wonder if it came naturally to Mr. Casaubon, if that’s really what he was born for, or could it be that he had a wild-youth sunlit backstory of yearning…The book is silent on this point. It allows you to share the surmises of the other characters, that Mr. Casaubon’s life was ever the same shade of bleakness, that he came out a fully formed dried husk and has never lived. It’s a bit strange to me how he is universally pitied or resented and described as basically a ghost in his own life…
(For his own sake thank goodness that he is a rich man, that counted for much in 1840)
I must admit, I have never identified so much with a male character in my life, nor had so many unresolved questions and feelings about him. And this book is full of lovely, intricate females with whom I certainly could sympathise, but here we are: I see this man in the mirror.
