The topic of my thesis is《 George Eliot “Middleton ma qi” of the female and female problems》.Here's the paper selected topic background.

　　George Eliot (1819-~1880) was bom as Mary Anne Evans, an English novelist,journalist, translator and one of the leading writers of the Victorimi era who developed themethod of psychological analysis. George Eliot is her pseudonym in the literary circle.

　　In January 1855 after eight-month-stay with George Henry Lewes from Germany back toEngland, her first article Evangelical Teaching in Westminster Review was well received, butconsidering the discriminative views on women critics in the mid-Victorian era,she used “theauthor of article No. 4as a code name to conceal her gender so that she could gaina fair treatment from critics. With the encouragement of Lewes and her distinct views onwriting, she turned to fiction in 1856, among which Scenes of Clerical Life is her first novel.

　　As a leading woman novelist in the late Victorian era, Eliot is a prolific writer in noveland poetry. Her works include seven novels including Adam Bede (1859)， The Mill on theFloss (1860)，Silas Marner (1861)，^omo/a(1863)， Felix Holt, the Radical (1866)，Middlemarch (1871-72)，Daniel Deronda (1876)，poetry with The Spanish Gypsy (1868) asthe representative, translation of David Strauss' The Life of Jesus (1846) and of LudwigFeuerbach's The Essence of Christianity (1854) and other articles like Silly Novels by LadyNovelists (1856)，Scenes of Clerical Life(l857)，etc. when she worked as editor ofWestminster Review (1851-1854)。

　　As far as Eliot's writing style is concerned, she creates her fictional world out of herpersonal experience~a middle-and-lower-class rural England of the nineteenth-centuryMidlands. All her rich experience gives rise to her distinct writing features, which is highlypraised by Leavis in The Great Tradition:

　　Of the earlier novelists it was George Eliot alone (if we except the minor relevance of JaneAusten) whose work had a direct and significant bearing on her own problem. It had this bearingbecause she was a great novelist, and because in her mature work she handled withunprecedented subtlety and refinement the personal relations of sophisticated charactersexhibiting the 'civilization,of the 'best society,' and used, in so doing, an original psychologicalnotation corresponding to the fineness of her psychological and moral insight .

　　Leavis summarizes the writing features of George Eliot from two aspects. Firstly, Eliot's lifeexperience and her research into the Victorian society are well reflected in her works,whichjustifies for our study on the inter-relationship among her life, her feminine outlook and herfeminine characters in her works. Secondly, she specializes in ”sophisticated characters“ withthe touch upon the Victorian society and a daring trial on the psychological development ofcharacters.

　　Young called Eliot as ”moralist of the Victorian revolution . Undoubtedly Eliot'sdeep insight into human psychological and moral aspects symbolizes her mature techniques inhandling with characters, which,to a great extent, also greatly influences her successorsincluding Henry James, Joseph Conrad, and D.H. Lawrence,etc.

　　When it comes to her position in English literature,Leavis places Eliot “mnong threeother great novelists including Jane Austen, Henry James and Joseph Conrad.” He regardsEliot as “a great artist~a great novelist, with a great novelist's psychological insight andfineness of human valuation .” Lord David Cecil compares George Eliot with Jane Austenand says by way of explaining the phrase, it is this: that “George Eliot, being concerned, notto offer 'primarily an entertainment,' but to explore a significant theme-a theme significantin its bearing on the 'serious problems and preoccupations of mature life'-breaks with 'thoseftmdamental conventions both of form and matter within which the English novel up till thenhad been constructed?‘” In this way, Eliot's contribution to English literature and herphilosophy beyond the traditional realm for women cannot be neglected.

　　Middlemarch is a milestone of Eliot's mature works,which depicts a provincial life of avirtual town named Middlemarch in1830s with more than 70 characters in it Leavis callsMiddlemarch as “the only one book to represent her mature genius.” Virginia Woolfmakes- the following comments on Middlemarch:

　　It is not that her power diminishes, for, to our thinking, it is at its highest in the matureMiddlemarch, the magnificent book which,with all its imperfections, is one of the few Englishnovels written for grown-up people.

　　The political background of Middlemarch is concerned about the first Reform Bill in1832 of English history. This novel has won critical triumph as well as commercial success,which embodies Eliot's philosophy on life, women, reform and morality,etc. Besides,characters reflect the writer's thinking and passion. As Longinus points out,“The genius ofgreat poets and prose writers, as their passion declines, finds its final expression in thedelineation of character !叫。” So it is with George Eliot in her Middlemarch, Therefore, thefeminine characters in Middlemarch have something to do with George Eliot's outlook onVictorian women. What's more, her personal experience also contributes to the formation ofher distinct feminine views.