Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 166, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 July 1918 — George Eliot Seldom Read. [ARTICLE]

George Eliot Seldom Read.

George. Eliot was a writer almost omnipotent in her power to charm at once the great multitude and the austere critic of her time. She was taken more seriously than any writer of today ever Jjas been or ever will be taken. Yet to the great bulk of educated criticism of today George Ello£ has become a writer unreadable in herself and negligible as a critical illustration. Her character drawing appears to be singularly wooden, her books without any form, her style entirely pedestrian and her solemnity intolerable. And it is probable that It was this very solemnity that gave to her works all the qualities that make them to men in touch with the life of today so entirely unreadable, so exactly like so many heavy cakes. 7 George Eliot was, In fact, a great figure. She was great enough to impose herself upon her day; she probably never sought, though she certainly found, the popularity of sensationalism.