NOVEL

A novel is a long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and
early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late
18th century.
“The THEME of a piece of fiction is its controlling idea or its central insight. It is the unifying
generalization about life stated or implied by the story. To derive the theme of a story, we must ask
what its central purpose is: what view of life it supports or what insight into life it reveals”.

PRIDE AND PREJEDICE

"By limiting her range she secures complete mastery over every inch of ground and achieves
complete unity of effect. Her sphere may be narrow but within it she is perfect. What she loses in
width she gains in depth."
“I read again, and for the third time at least, Miss Austen's very finely written novel of “Pride and
Prejudice” That young lady had a talent for describing the involvement and feelings and characters
of ordinary life which is to me the most wonderful I ever met with. What a pity such a gifted
creature died of so early.”
Trollope remarked about Austen’s works.
“Miss Austen was surely a great novelist. What she did, she did perfectly. Her work, as far as it
goes, is faultless. She wrote of the times in which she lived, of the class of people with which she
associated, and in the language, which was usual to her as an educated lady.
“She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me; and I’m in no humour at present to give
consequence to the young ladies who are slighted by men.”
“The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it”
“You are too good. Your sweetness and disinterestedness is really angelic.”
“I must confess that, I think her as delightful a creation as ever appeared in print”.
“Follies and nonsenses, whims and inconsistencies do divert me, I own, and I laugh at them
whenever I can”.
“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in
want of a wife”.
“A marriage without love is not a worthwhile endeavour”
“In Pride and prejudice, one can’t equate Darcy with Pride, or Elizabeth with Prejudice; Darcy pride
of place is founded on his social prejudice, while Elizabeth’s initial prejudice against him is rooted in
pride of her own quick perceptions.”
“I could easily forgive his pride, if he had not mortified mine."
"The business of her life was to get her daughters married."
"Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance… and it is better to know as little as possible
of the defects of the person with whom you are to pass your life"
"You expect me to account for opinions which you choose to call mine, but which I have never
acknowledged"
"My good opinion once lost, is lost forever."
"I wish you very happy and very rich, and by refusing you hand, do all in my power to prevent your
being otherwise"
"An unhappy alternative is before you, Elizabeth. From this day you must be a stranger to one of
your parents. Your mother will never see you again if you do not marry Mr. Collins, and I will never
see you again if you do"
"Stupid men are the only ones worth knowing after all."
"Neither duty, nor honour, nor gratitude ... have any possible claim on me."
"I certainly have not the talent which some people possess," said Darcy, "of conversing easily with
those I have never seen before."

RETURN OF THE NATIVE

"what the Greek only suspected, we know well; that their Aeschylus imagined, our nursery children
feel"
"say what you will, try as you may, you will love me all your life-long"
“How I have tried and tried to be a splendid woman, and how destiny has been against me... I do
not deserve my lot!”
"Environment of Heath "which would have made a contented woman, a poet, a suffering woman a
devotee, succeeds in making the rebellious Eustacia, saturnine."
“To be loved to madness- such was her great desire.”
“Happiness is an occasional episode in the general drama of pain”. (Hardy)
“Three antagonistic growths had to be kept alive: his mother’s trust in him, his plan for becoming a
teacher, and Eustacia’s happiness”. (Hardy)
“Human will is not free but fettered”. (hardy)
“An impishness of circumstances invades our life and becomes the cause of our undoing”.
“Chance is the incarnation of the blind forces, controlling human destiny”.
“The marriage is not a misfortune in itself. It is simply the accident which has happened since that
has been the cause of my ruin”.
“A place perfectly accordant with man’s nature.”
“The sea changed, the fields changed, the rivers, the villages, and the people changed, yet Egdon
remained."
"She had loved him partly because he was exceptional in this scene, partly because she had
determined to love him, chiefly because she was in desperate need of loving somebody after
wearying of Wildeve."
"If I had known then what I know now, that I should be living in this wild heath a month after my
marriage, I--I should have thought twice before agreeing."
"The day you shut thes door against my mother and killed her."
"... for what I have done no man or law can punish me."

ADAM BEDE
“she is concerned in writing a realistic novel and build up her reputation as a believable
representation of eighteen century country life in England.”
“physical setting of Adam Bede has a symbolic, as well as realistic, aspect.”
“Eliot distinguished her characters according to character with a precision which many writers of
dialogue do not observe”
“he is concerned with serving God in his everyday action..while Seth believe that “take no thought
for the morrow” Adam feels that “God helps them as helps theirsens.”
“his natural urge is to reject the people who don’t act in a way he thinks proper.”…”his pride
sometimes prevents him in reacting sympathetically towards others.” (Adam)
“Arthur’s confidence in his virtue is matched by Adam’s confidence in his ability to solve all
problems and control the course of his own life”
“All that Hetty does reveals her vanity and immaturity; all that Dinah does reveals her serenity and
goodness…Dinnah is as unselfish as Hetty is selfish”
“Insignificant people can also stir up evil tempers.” Eliot
She likes the feeling of keeping Adam at her side but feels no inclination at al to marry him”
“Eliot considers the balance and harmony between the moral and physical realms of paramount
importance in human life, and who projects her enthusiasm in the creation of Dinnah, the woman
with the face of an angel and hands if a working woman.”
“she’s made out of a stuff with a finer grain than most of the women.”… “it was like a dreaming of
the sunshine and awaking in the moonlight” (A abt D) feelings between Adam and Dinnah is natural
and strong.
“Adam Bede is to a great extent a novel about human motivations.”
“we make our decisions freely but we make them in the context if certain circumstances.”
“Men are often deceived by a pretty face into thinking that the owner of it is good. All that glitter is
not gold” (Eliot)
“she created a fictional world in which, as in reality, a significant part of the drama takes place in
the minds of people as they struggle to understand and to deal with a situaltions in which they find
themselves.”
"Which seems made to turn the heads not only of men, but of all intelligent mammals, even of
women." (Hetty)
"It was one of those faces that make one think of white flowers with light touches of colour on their
pure petals" (Dinnah)
“When death, the great reconciler, has come, it is never our tenderness that we repent of but are
severity”.
“Our deeds determine us as much as we determine our deeds”.
“There is no despair as absolute as that which comes with the first moments of our first great
sorrow”.
Arthur makes it possible for Adam and Poysers to remain at Hayslop. Thus, he “Drinks the bitter cup
of repentance to the full”.
“Men’s lives are as thoroughly blended with each other as the air they breathe; evil spreads as
necessarily as disease”
“sorrow was more bearable now hatred was gone”
“He created the mind he believed in out of his own, which was large, unselfish, tender”