Daniel Deronda (Oxford World's Classics) [Paperback]

Within reading the first few chapters, Daniel Deronda became my most beloved and favourite of books. I was reading my first Eliot novel, Middlemarch when I saw the advertisements on BBC one for their serial of Daniel Deronda, and knowing little of Eliots other work I watched it with little knowledge of this story. But I was enchanted by the characters and their lives and couldn't wait to read the book. As soon as I had started I wished I hadn't seen the programme first and knew how the story ended, however there was so much more to learn about the characters whilst reading the book that I was consoled. Eliot is a master storyteller and is capable of completely emmersing her readers into her world. I have read of adults finding Eliot difficult to take in, but I was fifteeen when I first read Daniel Deronda and Middlemarch and once I got used to her complex language and analogies I couldn't put it down. I found myself waking up early in the morning just to read and rushing home from school to pick up from that morning. I would recommend Daniel Deronda to anybody that loves romance and drama - Daniel Deronda is packed full of both. Gwendolen is such a tragic heroine, Daniel and Mirah are so impossible not to fall in love with and Grandcourt such a wonderful character to completely detest that I'm sure many other readers will agree that Daniel Deronda is a classic work of genius.

"Daniel Deronda" was the last novel George Eliot wrote, and it's an appropriate finale to her career -- a lushly-written, heartfelt story about a young man searching for his past (and clues to his future), as well as a vibrant strong-willed young lady who discovers that life doesn't always go your way. Even better, Eliot deftly avoided the cliches and caricatures of the Jewish people, portraying them with love and respect.

Daniel Deronda is the ward (and rumored illegitimate son) of a nobleman, who is unsure of his past (particularly of his mother) catching a glimpse of pretty, reckless, arrogant Gwendolyn Harleth at a casino. Gwendolyn (who boasts that she gets everything she wants) is interested in Daniel, but when her family loses all their money, she marries a rich suitor, a relative of Daniel's -- knowing that his mistress and illegitimate children will be disinherited. But she soon finds that her new husband is a sadistic brute, and sees Daniel as her only help.

Meanwhile, Daniel rescues the despairing Mirah Lapidoth from a suicide attempt in the river, and he helps the young Jewish singer find a home and friends to care for her. As he helps her find her family, he becomes passionately attached to the Jewish population and their plight, embodied by a dying young visionary and a kindly shopkeeping family. Then he receives an important message -- one that will illuminate his roots, and give him a course for the future.

When Eliot published her final novel, it caused a massive stir -- not many novelists tackled the plight of the Jewish population, or how it compared to the gilded upper classes. In a way, "Daniel Deronda" is both a love triangle and an allegory -- Daniel must choose between the pretty, shallow English life (Gwendolyn) or a rich Jewish heritage (Mirah) with a background of tragedy.

The biggest problem with Eliot's writing is that it becomes a little too lush and dense at times, and the narrative moves a bit slowly (in the Victorian manner). But that flaw doesn't rob her writing of its power or beauty -- she describes every feeling, gesture and emotion in detail, as well as the sumptuous balls, exquisitely gilded mansions, and every shadowy tree or rich expanse of land ("a grassy court enclosed on three sides by a gothic cloister").

Yet the greatest power is in the stories that twine like ivy over the main plot -- a young Jewish girl's search for her family, a sadistic man's search for a wild lovely girl he can break, and especially of the composer Herr Klesmer and his sweet, atypical love story with Miss Arrowpoint. And the last quarter of the book is wrapped in Daniel's search for his own family, culminating in a quietly tense encounter with someone from his long-ago past.

Daniel almost seems like a character too good to be true -- unselfish, kind, universally kindly and very intelligent, though possessed of a vaguely searching quality. Gwendolyn is his complete opposite: she has been raised to be selfish, disdainful and immature, but as the book goes on she learns that selfishness doesn't pay -- marriage to the despicable Grandcourt changes her from a selfish little girl into a scarred but stronger woman.

The third leg of the triangle is Mirah, who is not given the loving attention that Gwendolyn is, but who is still a compelling figure -- her father tried to sell her, and now she wanders through England searching for her family. And the book is littered with many other striking characters: the sadistic Grandcourt and his creepy servant Lush, the crotchety but kindly Klesmer, the spirited artist Hans, the kindly Sir Hugo and the doomed, strong-willed Mordecai.

"Daniel Deronda" is a beautiful portrait of a young man's search for his past, and a young woman's struggle with the fruits of her own selfishness. What's more, George Eliot's last novel is a loving, powerful portrait of the Jewish people, in a time when they were caricatured at best.

'Daniel Deronda' is a very satisfying novel - at over 800 pages, it is verging on epic proportions, and its meandering style is at times at odds with a page turning cranking up of the plot - but nevertheless, I seem to have gotten through it surprisingly quickly! Having literally caught a glimpse of the recent TV version, I was intrigued by one line: 'it shall be better with me for knowing you' - and such simple but profound reflections characterise Eliot's style. It is an intensely psychological novel, and Eliot's study of her emotionally self centered heroine, Gwendolen Harleth, as she evolves, through experience, into an admirable woman is really remarkable. It is the kind of novel where the insight shown in portraying the characters makes you feel like you are truly learning something about yourself and others, and to me that is what makes a novel great. Eliot is also concerned with questions of religious and national identity, and the tension between separateness and togetherness is still resonant today. 'Daniel Deronda' is probably less famous than Eliot's other novels 'The Mill on the Floss' and 'Middlemarch', and possibly less finished, but nevertheless highly successful on its own terms. Full of insight - give it a try!