“Silas Marner” is almost wonderful. It’s a character study, no less of the title character than of the town where he lives, which is why the subtitle, “The Weaver of Raveloe,” is particularly apropos. Unfortunately, this is also, ultimately, the book’s flaw: as a character study, the depth of the characters involved becomes of crucial importance; and while several are in fact vividly and broadly drawn, one key character is never more than one-dimensional. And since her decision determines the outcome of the story, and we never doubt what decision she’ll make, the book loses much--but not all--of its power in the final pages. It’s an old tenet of dramatic writing: whatever the situation is, make it as bad as possible before its final resolution; in this, Eliot fails. I still enjoyed the ending, it still had emotional impact, but I felt it could have been much stronger if Eliot had written a few extra chapters and not made the resolution so simple. I won’t get into a recapitulation of the setup or the plot, that’s been done by plenty of others. But I do want to take a moment to note that most of the book is delightful, the village really comes to life, and Marner himself is a wonderful character whose emotional journey encompasses some really high highs and one particularly low low. But the young squire, and the townsfolk, are just as vividly drawn--when Eliot seems to go off on a chapter-long digression into talk at the pub before Marner arrives with his complaint, I didn’t mind a bit because it made the town feel so very real, thus giving a particularly compelling context to everything else that was about to happen. So I do recommend the book, albeit with reservations—it’s short, it moves very quickly, and it does have some emotional heft at the end. Could have been more, but that doesn’t undermine the riches that are already present.

The funniest of the Eliot novels I’ve read.

A consideration of fables and myths that reads like one (specifically a religious one) — particularly in the early part when the townsfolk are theorizing about the character of Silas and then the robbery he endures.

Still parsing through thoughts about the comparative religion aspect — between Raveloe and Lantern — but this is also broadly a psychological study of how we try to make sense of the world and try to make it fair and how our lots in life constantly question the sense we make of it.

I hadn't read this in years and really enjoyed going back to it. The dryness of the humour and the gentleness of the story make it one of my favourite comfort reads, I like the friendship between Dolly and Silas as a mutual search for the meaning of his experiences, and the description of recovery from a long period of blank despondency. Also I had forgotten Priscilla who is FANTASTIC, she belongs on anyone's list of C19th protolesbian characters.

A heart-warming story where everyone eventually gets what they deserve. Particularly admirable is Eliot's dialogue, which aptly reflects differences of social class and status underlining her close observance of country folk. Although I found the book difficult when I first read it as a set text at school, re-reading many years later is especially rewarding.

I hadn't expected to be so satisfied by this story. I'm always into stories with men adopting girls but everything was so well set up and Silas's character development is really well done. This would be a great book for a class discussion since all the characters are interesting and have different motivations which intersect in the brief period of time. Time skips are done well here and it was a very nice read.