The Music Utopia In George Eliot’s The Mill On The Floss

Among the great Victorians, George Eliot stands enigmatically as one whose place cannot be defined easily. She has been accredited with many titles, such as historian, psychologist, philosopher, and novelist. With the last one she becomes a household name, whereas her musical talent has often been overlooked by people. Reading her novels, people cannot miss the music in them, which is also an integral component of her creation and has instructive meaning in them. In this thesis, I would like to discuss music in her autobiographical novel The Mill on the Floss in which music plays an indispensible part. Through the utilization of music, Eliot shows her deep sympathy for her protagonist Maggie, who has a susceptible mind to music. With the help of music, Maggie could get detachment from the repressive and suffocating environment, finding a shelter to give her soul a sense of home—her music utopia. Eliot’s music utopia is fully demonstrated from detachment from the surroundings and the social improvement. The thesis explores the illusory status quo and the idealized gender identity through the representation of music in the novel, and thereby argues that the author constitutes a music utopia with her romantic idealism.With the help of music, Eliot depicts vividly the living conditions of women in Victorian society, revealing the necessity of reform for women. She uses art to enlarge people’s sympathy toward ordinary people, and her endeavor to social improvement is obvious. The novel begins with pastoral music, and ends in the great symphony—the resurrection flood, which brings reconciliation between Maggie and her beloved brother, Tom. Eliot’s conceptual space is fulfilled under the influence of music, and her romantic idealism becomes explicit.