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From: Ross Clark <benlizro@ihug.co.nz>
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: George Eliot born (22/11/1819)
Date: Sat, 23 Nov 2024 22:39:11 +1300
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(or better) Mary Ann Evans born (lived until 1880).
"English novelist, poet, journalist, translator, and one of the leading 
writers of the Victorian era." (Wiki)
She had already published a good deal (translations, reviews, articles 
in magazines on contemporary topics) under her birth name, before her 
first fiction (1857); this was when she assumed her nom de plume. "She 
wanted to escape the stereotype of women's writing being limited to 
lighthearted romances or other lighter fare not to be taken very 
seriously."
But _Adam Bede_ (1859) was so successful that she was outed, and her 
scandalous private life (living successively with two otherwise-married 
men) became known. Still, it did her no long-term harm -- apparently 
Queen Victoria was an avid reader of her novels.
"Due to her denial of the Christian faith and her relationship with 
Lewes,[50][citation needed] Eliot was not buried in Westminster Abbey. 
She was instead interred in Highgate Cemetery (East), Highgate, London, 
in the area reserved for political and religious dissenters and 
agnostics, beside the love of her life, George Henry Lewes. The graves 
of Karl Marx and her friend Herbert Spencer are nearby."

Hm. Quite recently I came across a battered old copy of _Silas Marner_. 
It's on top of my enormous "To Read" pile. Maybe it's time for me to 
read Word One of George Eliot.