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Silas Marner (Bantam Classics)
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Manufacturer: Bantam Classics
Author: George Eliot
Publisher: Bantam Classics
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Our Price: $3.95
You Save: $ ( % )
Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Bantam Classics
Author: George Eliot
Publisher: Bantam Classics
Average Customer Rating:
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Silas Marner (Bantam Classics) Description
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.8
EAN: 9780553212297
ISBN: 055321229X
Label: Bantam Classics
Manufacturer: Bantam Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 208
Publication Date: 1981-10-01
Publisher: Bantam Classics
Product Release Date: 1981-09-01
Studio: Bantam Classics
Dewey Decimal Number: 823.8
EAN: 9780553212297
ISBN: 055321229X
Label: Bantam Classics
Manufacturer: Bantam Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Book Pages: 208
Publication Date: 1981-10-01
Publisher: Bantam Classics
Product Release Date: 1981-09-01
Studio: Bantam Classics
Editorial Review of Silas Marner (Bantam Classics)
Embittered by a false accusation, disappointed in friendship and love, the weaver Silas Marner retreats into a long twilight life alone with his loom. . . and his gold. Silas hoards a treasure that kills his spirit until fate steals it from him and replaces it with a golden-haired founding child. Where she came from, who her parents were, and who really stole the gold are the secrets that permeate this moving tale of guilt and innocence. A moral allegory of the redemptive power of love, it is also a finely drawn picture of early nineteenth-century England in the days when spinning wheels hummed busily in the farmhouses, and of a simple way of life that was soon to disappear.
Customer Reviews of Silas Marner (Bantam Classics)
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A female writer who stands on her own two feet...
Review: George Eliot is the best woman author I've ever read. She had God-given talent that you or I, no matter how much we read, no matter how much we write, could not consciously replicate. She had something which can't be taught, a kernel of genius hidden somewhere in the brain, which was allowed to express itself...to our collective benefit.
Silas Marner, while not perfect, is something recognizably special--a book with lingering phrases, a book with extraordinary insight, a book that instates the reader with the feeling that the author knows what the hell she is doing. It's a book that matters.
I know what you are afraid of: you are afraid this book will be a bloated succession of tea parties and persiflage with mutton-chopped vicars. No fear: the plot is credibly organic, and moves along briskly, wrapping itself up in just over two-hundred pages. It should hold your interest so that you can discover the ten or so gem-sentences dispersed throughout. Sentences that are not just airtight, but that meld with your mind, and cause an "Aha!" reaction. You know what I'm talking about.
Perhaps the most convincing signal I can offer of my sincere regard for her abilities is the fact that I'll now seek out her other works...something I can't say about Virginia Woolf, for instance, whose literary inferiority to Eliot I would take as axiomatic. (Ironic, isn't it--or maybe not--that feminists seem to esteem Woolf more highly than Eliot?)
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: I was bored to tears
Review: I am one of the former students who long ago was forced to read this rot for a HS english class. I can not think of a book that would be of less interest to a teen age american boy than this one. All the reviewers who praise this book make me wonder about what else they read. It was beyond boring and had no possible points of reference to me. There are literally thousands of British novels that would be better choices. If you are going to assign students a British Novel pick one that at least they would enjoy reading. Thank god I liked to read or after this experience I would probably not read anything for years. I hope to god that this is no longer assigned or rather forced reading for HS. When there are books like 1984 or Brave New World available why use one that has so little possible interest to students.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A perfect story of redemptive love
Review: George Eliot's SILAS MARNER is a literary classic. What does that mean? A classic is a book that has passed the test of time. A book taken out of its historical milieu and placed in a contemporary one, e.g. our 2008 society, and still reads fresh is a classic.
SILAS MARNER still reads fresh, if you are a sophisticated reader or have a teacher to guide you through the ground mines of vocabulary and complex writing. However, wrapped inside those is a great story, even a soap opera that students recognize as soon as the Cass brothers are introduced.
Two story lines run parallel until they intersect with the theft of Silas's gold. Silas Marner has been in this village for seventeen years, living a life of isolation, while he makes a living as a weaver. Even if he had chosen to live amongst people, he possesses two things that would always hinder acceptance: he is a herbalist and a victim of catatonic seizures. He discontinues his use of herbs early on, but he cannot stop catatonia, which of course becomes a metaphor for his life with others before Eppy appears.
It is these quiet seizures that result in blackouts that--bottom line--cause his banishment from a religious community where he was highly respected. In the seventeen years near Raveloe, nothing has happened to change his life with a dead heart. His great love in this time is his growing stacks of gold. He loves it! He idolizes it!
Enter Godfrey and Dunstan Cass, two landed gentry, both dissolute in differing ways, both catalysts in the change in Silas Marner's dull life. The younger brother, Dunstan, is a n'er-do-well, a gambler in debt and subject to embarrassment by a man to whom Dunstan owes a great deal of money. He finds gold in Silas's house. On the other hand, Godfrey leads a superficial respectable life, because he too has indulged himself and has a child born out of wedlock.
One cold, dark, stormy night two stories intersect: Dunstan steals Silas's gold, then disappears forever, and Silas is devastated by the loss of his gold. However, this loss brings Silas into community. The night the golden-haired child appears magically on Silas's hearth clinches Silas's total acceptance into village life. Silas adopts this child and Dolly Winthrop becomes his guiding angel in helping to raise the child.
When the two secrets are revealed concerning Dunstan and Godfrey, the reader cheers Silas on, directs hisses at Godfrey, and stands amazed at Dunstan's revelation.
Inside this "soap opera" is a fabulous story of love and redemption. Without love one man lives a life of solace in gold with a heart dried and shriveled. With love his heart beats passionately and lovingly and makes him live fully with family and friends. No greater lesson can come from a story as one of redemption. From the still-point of one golden-haired girl radiates a life that redeems a man.
George Eliot, or Mary Ann Evans, is a genius in depicting the lives of men and women and their influence on others for good or evil. Eppy is the source of good out of sinful circumstances and selfishness on Godfrey's part. Godfrey continues his static life force by not claiming his child at one point and trying to claim her when it is too late. The contrast between one man who has little and the other who has everything is instructive in explaining the ways of the heart.
If I were marooned on a deserted island and could take ten books with me, SILAS MARNER would definitely be on the list. It is a great book to teach and listen to students respond to it (and NO, I won't be stranded with students). Watching their faces in class discussion concerning Dunstan's re-appearance in Raveloe is absolutely priceless. Even though the foreshadowing is huge, students never figure out what happens.
Just think of all the choices we make in our lives, some irrevocable as to cause and effect. SILAS MARNER is a caution and a beacon to making the right choices. Making wrong choices to hide one's actions, more often than not, results in dire consequences. Silas shows us that right actions produce right results. I love this book!
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Classical Gas
Review: About halfway through when the little bundle of joy shows up in Silas's house I couldn't help thinking Dickens would have done a much better job with this story. As it is, the second part (which is actually the last third of this slim novel) is awkward and sloppy and doesn't make a lot of logical sense. Why does the father confess after he finds out he's going to get away with it scot-free? In "The Telltale Heart" Poe established the kind of guilt that made the eventual confession make sense, but there's nothing like that here to prod the father into doing anything--especially when he's waited so long as it is. By the time he does come forward and want to take responsibility there's really no point in doing so anymore as Silas has done the work for him.
Anyway, I could see why kids would hate reading this. I'd recommend they watch the old "Wishbone" episode from PBS instead. That got to the point and trimmed out a lot of the useless fat and would be far more entertaining for your kids--who doesn't like to see a dog wearing clothes?
That is all.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Cuts to the Heart of Things
Review: Like some of the other reviewers, I found this a heartwarming story about Silas Marner, a solitary hermit who discovers things about himself he has forgotten, or may never have known. When his solitary existence is turned upside down by the departure of his treasure and the arrival of an unexpected guest, Silas takes the opportunity to examine his life and make the best of what life has given him. I felt this was an uplifting story telling how much the choices we make define who we are, and that it's never too late to decide to be something more.
Review Summary: A female writer who stands on her own two feet...
Review: George Eliot is the best woman author I've ever read. She had God-given talent that you or I, no matter how much we read, no matter how much we write, could not consciously replicate. She had something which can't be taught, a kernel of genius hidden somewhere in the brain, which was allowed to express itself...to our collective benefit.
Silas Marner, while not perfect, is something recognizably special--a book with lingering phrases, a book with extraordinary insight, a book that instates the reader with the feeling that the author knows what the hell she is doing. It's a book that matters.
I know what you are afraid of: you are afraid this book will be a bloated succession of tea parties and persiflage with mutton-chopped vicars. No fear: the plot is credibly organic, and moves along briskly, wrapping itself up in just over two-hundred pages. It should hold your interest so that you can discover the ten or so gem-sentences dispersed throughout. Sentences that are not just airtight, but that meld with your mind, and cause an "Aha!" reaction. You know what I'm talking about.
Perhaps the most convincing signal I can offer of my sincere regard for her abilities is the fact that I'll now seek out her other works...something I can't say about Virginia Woolf, for instance, whose literary inferiority to Eliot I would take as axiomatic. (Ironic, isn't it--or maybe not--that feminists seem to esteem Woolf more highly than Eliot?)
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: I was bored to tears
Review: I am one of the former students who long ago was forced to read this rot for a HS english class. I can not think of a book that would be of less interest to a teen age american boy than this one. All the reviewers who praise this book make me wonder about what else they read. It was beyond boring and had no possible points of reference to me. There are literally thousands of British novels that would be better choices. If you are going to assign students a British Novel pick one that at least they would enjoy reading. Thank god I liked to read or after this experience I would probably not read anything for years. I hope to god that this is no longer assigned or rather forced reading for HS. When there are books like 1984 or Brave New World available why use one that has so little possible interest to students.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: A perfect story of redemptive love
Review: George Eliot's SILAS MARNER is a literary classic. What does that mean? A classic is a book that has passed the test of time. A book taken out of its historical milieu and placed in a contemporary one, e.g. our 2008 society, and still reads fresh is a classic.
SILAS MARNER still reads fresh, if you are a sophisticated reader or have a teacher to guide you through the ground mines of vocabulary and complex writing. However, wrapped inside those is a great story, even a soap opera that students recognize as soon as the Cass brothers are introduced.
Two story lines run parallel until they intersect with the theft of Silas's gold. Silas Marner has been in this village for seventeen years, living a life of isolation, while he makes a living as a weaver. Even if he had chosen to live amongst people, he possesses two things that would always hinder acceptance: he is a herbalist and a victim of catatonic seizures. He discontinues his use of herbs early on, but he cannot stop catatonia, which of course becomes a metaphor for his life with others before Eppy appears.
It is these quiet seizures that result in blackouts that--bottom line--cause his banishment from a religious community where he was highly respected. In the seventeen years near Raveloe, nothing has happened to change his life with a dead heart. His great love in this time is his growing stacks of gold. He loves it! He idolizes it!
Enter Godfrey and Dunstan Cass, two landed gentry, both dissolute in differing ways, both catalysts in the change in Silas Marner's dull life. The younger brother, Dunstan, is a n'er-do-well, a gambler in debt and subject to embarrassment by a man to whom Dunstan owes a great deal of money. He finds gold in Silas's house. On the other hand, Godfrey leads a superficial respectable life, because he too has indulged himself and has a child born out of wedlock.
One cold, dark, stormy night two stories intersect: Dunstan steals Silas's gold, then disappears forever, and Silas is devastated by the loss of his gold. However, this loss brings Silas into community. The night the golden-haired child appears magically on Silas's hearth clinches Silas's total acceptance into village life. Silas adopts this child and Dolly Winthrop becomes his guiding angel in helping to raise the child.
When the two secrets are revealed concerning Dunstan and Godfrey, the reader cheers Silas on, directs hisses at Godfrey, and stands amazed at Dunstan's revelation.
Inside this "soap opera" is a fabulous story of love and redemption. Without love one man lives a life of solace in gold with a heart dried and shriveled. With love his heart beats passionately and lovingly and makes him live fully with family and friends. No greater lesson can come from a story as one of redemption. From the still-point of one golden-haired girl radiates a life that redeems a man.
George Eliot, or Mary Ann Evans, is a genius in depicting the lives of men and women and their influence on others for good or evil. Eppy is the source of good out of sinful circumstances and selfishness on Godfrey's part. Godfrey continues his static life force by not claiming his child at one point and trying to claim her when it is too late. The contrast between one man who has little and the other who has everything is instructive in explaining the ways of the heart.
If I were marooned on a deserted island and could take ten books with me, SILAS MARNER would definitely be on the list. It is a great book to teach and listen to students respond to it (and NO, I won't be stranded with students). Watching their faces in class discussion concerning Dunstan's re-appearance in Raveloe is absolutely priceless. Even though the foreshadowing is huge, students never figure out what happens.
Just think of all the choices we make in our lives, some irrevocable as to cause and effect. SILAS MARNER is a caution and a beacon to making the right choices. Making wrong choices to hide one's actions, more often than not, results in dire consequences. Silas shows us that right actions produce right results. I love this book!
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Classical Gas
Review: About halfway through when the little bundle of joy shows up in Silas's house I couldn't help thinking Dickens would have done a much better job with this story. As it is, the second part (which is actually the last third of this slim novel) is awkward and sloppy and doesn't make a lot of logical sense. Why does the father confess after he finds out he's going to get away with it scot-free? In "The Telltale Heart" Poe established the kind of guilt that made the eventual confession make sense, but there's nothing like that here to prod the father into doing anything--especially when he's waited so long as it is. By the time he does come forward and want to take responsibility there's really no point in doing so anymore as Silas has done the work for him.
Anyway, I could see why kids would hate reading this. I'd recommend they watch the old "Wishbone" episode from PBS instead. That got to the point and trimmed out a lot of the useless fat and would be far more entertaining for your kids--who doesn't like to see a dog wearing clothes?
That is all.
Customer Rating:
Review Summary: Cuts to the Heart of Things
Review: Like some of the other reviewers, I found this a heartwarming story about Silas Marner, a solitary hermit who discovers things about himself he has forgotten, or may never have known. When his solitary existence is turned upside down by the departure of his treasure and the arrival of an unexpected guest, Silas takes the opportunity to examine his life and make the best of what life has given him. I felt this was an uplifting story telling how much the choices we make define who we are, and that it's never too late to decide to be something more.