A Peculiar link Between
Don Juan and Middlemarch
Was George Eliot’s character Dorothea directly inspired by Lord Byron’s portrayal of Donna Julia in Don Juan? A lot of good authors borrow concepts and ideas from the literature they read and incorporate such ideas into their own works. George Eliot was an avid reader of her contemporary authors, and there are many instances of which she draws such outside inspiration into Middlemarch. Throughout Middlemarch it is easy to find several references to the works of authors and poets such as the works of Adam Smith, Robert Southey, Wordsworth, and several others. As I was alternately browsing through George Eliot’s Middlemarch and Lord Byron’s Don Juan in search of inspiring quotes, I came across some conspicuously similar themes that suggested these two literary works shared more in common than possible by pure coincidence. George Eliot seemed to be making deliberately subtle resemblances and allusions to Byron’s Don Juan. Upon reviewing all of the evidence related to the two literary works, I quickly arrived to the thesis that Eliot deliberately borrowed the character of Donna Julia from Lord Byron’s Don Juan, changed the character’s name, and thrust this character into the world of Middlemarch as Dorothea.
My attention to the possibility of borrowed concepts began with George Eliot’s discussion of writers and poets on pages sixteen and seventeen of Middlemarch; most particularly Robert Southey and William Wordsworth. Throughout Don Juan, Lord Byron establishes a theme of constantly bashing these poet laureates. The two passages in which George Eliot first introduces Wordsworth and Southey are written much in the same manner through her use of the word “know” as a subtle grammatical mechanic to link the two poets together. Does this word link bear any real meaning?
“– the poet Wordsworth, you KNOW. Now there was something singular (pg. 16 Middlemarch).”
“But talking about books, there is Southey’s Peninsular War. I am reading that of a morning. You KNOW Southey (pg. 17 Middlemarch).”
George Eliot’s introduction of Southey and Wordsworth at this specific point in the plot is strikingly bizarre because it directly coincides with the first time Dorothea meets Mr. Casaubon – her future husband. The meeting between Dorothea and Mr. Casaubon signifies the beginning of their mutual romantic interest towards each other. Don Juan is a poem of love, but Lord Byron places his criticisms of Southey and Wordsworth before the romance commences. George Eliot’s timely exposition of Wordsworth and Southey at the same time Dorothea meets her future husband for the first time mirrors Lord Byron’s exposition of Wordsworth and Southey in the introduction – dedication, to his epic poem. There has to be a tenacious literary connection between Middlemarch and Don Juan. The next question begs to wonder if Lord Byron or Don Juan is referenced in Eliot’s Middlemarch.
To answer this, I had to delve right into the passages of Middlemarch to search for any mentioning of Lord Byron; and if so, study the significance of those specific allusions. Previously when I read Middlemarch, I do not remember any reference to Lord Byron; but at the same time, Lord Byron’s name wouldn’t have stood out in my mind and I would have simply overlooked such details. Bingo! I found two passages of which George Eliot mentions Lord Byron’s name and, fortunately for my thesis, they actually bear the significance I was looking for. For your convenience, I will quote and share those passages then discuss them to prove my point.
The first passage I found containing reference to Byron is on page 82 at the end of the chapter. My chosen passage takes place when Mr. Casaubon is taking Dorothea on a tour of his estate for the first time, and they happen to stumble upon the “young” Will Ladislaw.
“Celia laughed. She was surprised to find that Mr. Casaubon could say something quite amusing. ‘Well, you know, he may turn out a Byron, a Chatterton, a Churchill – that sort of thing – there’s no telling,’ said Mr. Brooke. ‘Shall you let him go to Italy, or wherever else he wants to go (pg. 82 Middlemarch)?’”
The second passage I found mentioning Lord Byron is on page 380 at the beginning of chapter 38, when Sir. James is discussing, with the Cadwalladers, Mr. Brooke and Will Ladislaw’s business partnership at The Pioneer newspaper.
“’Oh, he’s a dangerous young sprig, that Mr. Ladislaw,’ said Mrs. Cadwallader, ‘with his opera songs and his ready tongue. A sort of Byronic hero – an amorous conspirator, it strikes me. And Thomas Aquintas is not fond of him. I could see that, the day the picture was brought (pg. 380 Middlemarch).’”
In order to establish a foundation on supporting my claims on Dorothea as Lord Byron’s Donna Julia, I must briefly digress into the significance of Will Ladislaw and explain how he is Dorothea’s Don Juan. Will Ladislaw is much younger than Dorothea as he was just a young teenager when he first stumbled upon Dorothea during Mr. Casaubon’s estate tour. This bit of information is a copy of the romantic encounters found in Lord Byron’s Don Juan in that Don Juan was always younger than his women lovers by several years. Much like Byron, Ladislaw takes a trip around Europe and settles in Rome, Italy for some time. Lord Byron spent six years in Italy, and while there he wrote a large portion of Don Juan and notably engaged in an elicit love affair with a woman named Teresa Guiccioli (BBC History). It is compelling to note that George Eliot mentions Dorothea to be like Saint Theresa (or humorously Teresa in this instance). Also, Will Ladislaw doesn’t follow the same social rules and practices as everyone else in Middlemarch, similarly to the way Lord Byron doesn’t follow the social norms and expectations in his writing of Don Juan.
With Mrs. Cadwallader’s opinions of Will Ladislaw, as I quoted above, George Eliot bridges a deliberate literary connection to Lord Byron. The question arises, could Will Ladislaw’s “opera songs and ready tongue” be referring to the lyrical verse of poetry as found in Don Juan? If so, the next line furthers Ladislaw’s “a sort of Byronic hero” envelopment of Don Juan’s character. We know, from several passages in Middlemarch, that Ladislaw loves to draw and is an avid writer who eventually helps Mr. Brooke by writing articles for The Pioneer newspaper. Throughout the text of Middlemarch, however, I have found no other reference to Ladislaw producing or having anything to do with the opera, which causes this purposeful inclusion of information to vividly stand out. In contemplating the significance of why Eliot put “opera songs” and “Byronic hero” so close together concerning the characteristics of Ladislaw, I came to the conclusion that Eliot wanted her readers to view Ladislaw and Don Juan as mirrors of each other.
Little is known about Ladislaw’s family except for his grandmother Julia – a woman who sacrificed everything to marry the man of her dreams. See the allusion here? Donna Julia sacrificed everything in pursuing her love for Don Juan. This allusion can be tied directly to Dorothea, because every time Ladislaw’s grandmother – Mr. Casaubon’s Aunt – is mentioned, it is through Ladislaw’s conversation with Dorothea. It is important for Eliot to maintain the literary link between Dorothea and Donna Julia by using Ladislaw’s grandmother only through Dorothea’s conversations with Ladislaw (Don Juan) and not with her husband Mr. Casaubon. Ladislaw really loves his grandmother Julia and he really loves Dorothea which makes the two characters into one focal point. George Eliot is able to brilliantly convey the literary link through only Ladislaw by stating, “Especially the mysterious ‘Aunt Julia’ about whom Dorothea had never found it easy to question her husband (pg. 371 Middlemarch).” Why would Dorothea find the task of asking her husband about his family so difficult, and yet find it so easy to ask Ladislaw? This is a device that Eliot uses to create tension and distance between Dorothea and Mr. Casaubon; and, at the same time, create closeness between Dorothea and Ladislaw. Also, it is as if Eliot is using this device to remove the solid family connection between Ladislaw and Casaubon. Note that their last names are different. The separation between Ladislaw and Casaubon is further perpetuated by their contempt for each other over Ladislaw’s romantic interest in Dorothea. Perhaps George Eliot received the inspiration for the distant family relation between Ladislaw and Casaubon directly from Lord Byron’s Don Juan. Don Alfonso had a long term love affair with Don Juan’s mother, Donna Inez, which started after the death of her husband. Such a long term love affair could be interpreted as creating a loose family tie between Don Alfonso and Don Juan. Though it is a far stretch, the Donna Inez could be considered Don Alfonso’s unofficial second wife, in much the same way as Gulbeyaz was the fourth wife of the Sultan in canto V of Don Juan.
After some brief digression into how the characteristics of Will Ladislaw and Mr. Casaubon contribute to support my theory of George Eliot’s allusion to Don Juan through her portrayal of Dorothea, it is time for me to focus primarily on Dorothea herself and examine how she is a direct link to Donna Julia in Lord Byron’s Don Juan. In shifting my focus, I find Dorothea’s peculiar interactions with the miniature figurines to be a good starting point. For your convenience, I will again share the passages I have found then provide an explication de texte analysis of the passages to bring about my point.
“’This is your mother,’ said Dorothea, who had turned to examine the group of miniatures. ‘It is like the tiny one you brought me; only, I should think it a better portrait. And this one opposite, who is this?’ ‘Her elder sister. They were, like you and your sister, the only two children of their parents, who hang above them, you see...’ ‘The sister is pretty,’ said Celia, implying that she thought less favourable of Mr. Casaubon’s mother… ‘It is a peculiar face,’ said Dorothea, looking closely…. ‘And all the powdered curls hanging backward. Altogether it seems to me peculiar rather than pretty. There is not even a family likeness between her and your mother (pgs. 75-76 Middlemarch).’”
We find in this passage of text that George Eliot brings a particular focus to the details of the miniature figurine of Mr. Casaubon’s mother – Ladislaw’s grandmother – which seems to exhibit the characteristics of Dorothea. Mr. Casaubon furthers the connection between his aunt Julia and Dorothea by stating that the two figurines were just like Celia and Dorothea. The passage goes further to say that the figurines were two young women who wore necklaces. In an earlier chapter, Eliot goes into a lengthy description of a necklace the sisters inherited from their deceased mother. Celia makes an interesting statement by saying that the sister looks pretty which makes a reference to Dorothea being the prettier of the two sisters. Mr. Casaubon’s mother is not important in this scene because the passage shows the readers that “there is not even a family likeness between her and your mother,” and “said Celia, implying that she thought less favorable of Casaubon’s mother.
Later in Middlemarch I came across another interesting passage concerning Dorothea and the miniature figurines.
“Each remembered thing in the room was disenchanted, was deadened as an unlit transparency, till her wandering gaze came to the group of miniatures, and there at least she saw something which had gathered new breath and meaning: it was the miniature of Mr. Casaubon’s aunt Julia, who had made the unfortunate marriage – of Will Ladislaw’s grandmother. Dorothea could fancy that it was alive now – the delicate woman’s face which yet had a head-strong look, a peculiarity difficult to interpret…. What breadths of experience Dorothea seemed to have passed over since she first looked at this miniature! She felt a new companionship with it, as if it had an ear for her and could see how she was looking at it… the face was masculine and beamed on her with that full gaze (pg. 275 Middlemarch)…”
Here, the room and her environment completely fade away only leaving the focus on Dorothea and the miniature figurine of Julia. “Transparency,” could Eliot mean that to be a looking glass into the works of Lord Byron and the mirror to who Dorothea actually is? The significance of miniature figurines is they are graven images of actual people, much like that of a portrait or sculpture. At the moment of sole focus upon the miniature figurine of Julia in the scene, Dorothea finds a new breath and meaning in the figurine to the point she “could fancy that it was alive now.” Now it is important to pay attention to the description that is given of the miniature. Julia’s figurine has “the delicate woman’s face which yet had a head-strong look, a peculiarity difficult to interpret.” This description is a direct mirror of Dorothea’s characteristics! In this light, Julia is Dorothea and Dorothea is the Donna Julia found in Don Juan. The next line is followed by an exclamation point which suggests that the reader pay close attention to what Eliot is trying to point out. Perhaps the “breadths of experience” Dorothea went through here refers to more than her focusing on her marriage. With the inclusion of the exclamation point, we have permission to take the line to represent the larger picture; that Dorothea was experiencing (or reminiscing upon) the unfortunate life of Donna Julia and her marriage to Don Alfonso. “She felt a new companionship with it, as if it had an ear for her and could see how she was looking at it,” demonstrates how Dorothea has become one with the miniature figurine, the direct link to herself. A curiosity arises in my mind regarding George Eliot’s additional description of the face as being masculine. Is she referring to the comical pantomime Byron employed in Don Juan with his constant gender confusion?
Further along in the journey through the passages of Middlemarch, I found yet another important excerpt that directly ties Dorothea to Julia; “fresh images had gathered around that Aunt Julia who was Will’s grandmother: the presence of that delicate miniature, so like a living face that she [Dorothea] knew, helping her to concentrate her feelings (pg. 371 Middlemarch).” Dorothea recognized the “living face” of the miniature of Julia as being her own face. In looking into herself through introspection, Dorothea found the strength to control her feelings. The figurine has a presence, it has a recognizable face, it is alive; the figurine of Julia is Dorothea.
Now I must move on to discuss the significance of George Eliot’s portrayal of Dorothea as Saint Theresa of Avila and how it relates to the strong link between Dorothea and Donna Julia. With a little background research, I found it interesting to read that Saint Theresa was born near a Spanish riverside town called Avila and was primarily raised by her father Don Alonso Sanchez. At five years old, Theresa convinced her brother to join her in a quest for Martyrdom against the Moors (Middlemarch Prelude). When she was old enough, Theresa ran away from home and joined a convent to serve as a nun (newadvent.org). After enduring many shortfalls and failures, Theresa ended up becoming a powerful spiritual leader in the Catholic Church. Theresa looked to the Virgin Mary to help her endure the many adversities she faced. These few details are important in establishing the link between Dorothea and Donna Julia.
In Don Juan, Byron wrote that Donna Julia grew up in Seville, a nice riverside town on the Guadalquivir River (Canto I, stanza 8). She possessed Moorish ancestry and was considered to be rather pious. Much like Theresa, Donna Julia had the royal title of Donna, so she was also born into nobility. Donna Julia fervently prayed to the Virgin Mary for guidance and help in facing her lustful temptations towards Don Juan (Canto I, stanza 75). There are personal memoirs showing that Theresa did not feel as if her prayers were being answered during the early onset of her troubles, though she continued in prayer. On the other hand, Donna Julia did not feel as if her prayers were being answered so she quickly succumbed to her desires for Don Juan. After Don Alfonso caught her in an affair with Don Juan, he sent her off to a nunnery where she spent the rest of her life in prayer and service to the church (Canto I, stanza 191). Outside of geographical background relevance and their service to the church, the connection between Saint Theresa and Donna Julia is rather weak by itself; however, if this device is placed within certain context it can create a very powerful allusion.
Since Dorothea is described as the Spanish Saint Theresa, it seems that George Eliot easily laid out the literary bridge to tie Dorothea and Donna Julia together as the same character. Further evidence supporting this link lies within several passages of Middlemarch in which Eliot ties Dorothea to being nun-esque. In the middle of chapter six, during a conversation between Sir James and Mrs. Cadwallader, I found an interesting statement in which Mrs. Cadwallader says, “Celia is worth two of her, and likely after all to be the better match [to Sir James]. For this marriage to Casaubon is as good as going to a nunnery (pg. 59 Middlemarch).” This sample of dialogue is merely a part of the larger conversation of which Sir James and Mrs. Cadwallader discussing how bad of a match Dorothea and Casaubon are for each other. It seems to be a well-known fact that Mr. Casaubon is old and boring compared to the young and lively nature of Dorothea. Is Mrs. Cadwallader making a reference to Don Juan by implying that Dorothea will not find the love she seeks in her marriage and therefore will become so unhappy that she will fall in love with a Byronic hero, have an illicit love affair, and eventually condemn herself to be sent off to a nunnery? It is foreshadowed that Will Ladislaw could easily become the Byronic Hero. A few lines later, the connection between Dorothea and Donna Julia is strengthened by Mrs. Cadwallader’s next statement, “These charitable people never know vinegar from wine till they have swallowed it and got the colic (pg. 59 Middlemarch).” This statement is a clear and direct reference to Don Juan when Lord Byron is discussing the pragmatic nature of marriage at the beginning of canto III, “Tis a melancholy and a fearful sign of human frailty, folly, also crime, that love and marriage rarely can combine, although they both are born in the same clime. Marriage from love, like vinegar from wine – a SAD, SOUR, SOBER beverage – by time is sharpened from its high celestial flavor down to a very homely household savor (Canto III, stanza 5).” Through Mrs. Cadwallader’s dialogue, Eliot is showing that marriage will change Dorothea from being a woman who “sees the stars by daylight (pg. 59 Middlemarch)” to a woman who will grow sick from being unhappy and miserable, hence the bitter taste of vinegar after it’s too late.
During Dorothea’s extended honeymoon in Rome, she decided to occupy herself with having a portrait painted of herself by a German artist. Consequently while she is posing for her painting, the German Artist begs Will Ladislaw to observe the strikingly beautiful woman who is posing painting “else she will have changed her pose (pg. 188 Middlemarch).” Comically, the painter finds that Ladislaw knows the girl in question and she is in fact married to Ladislaw’s older cousin Mr. Casaubon. Before the revelation, the painter goes into noticeable detail of Dorothea’s nun like appearance by saying, “Here stands beauty in its breathing life, with the consciousness of Christian centuries in its bosom. But she should be dressed as a nun; I think she looks almost what you call a Quaker; I would dress her as a nun in my picture. However, she is married (pg. 189 Middlemarch)!” The artists’ odd perception of Dorothea comes at the time Ladislaw is reunited with Dorothea and almost immediately falls deeply in love with her. I take the timing of this description to further enforce the direct envelopment of Ladislaw’s and Dorothea’s characters into the mold of Don Juan and the Donna Julia. There is no evidence that Ladislaw and Dorothea had any sort of “physical” affair, but from this point out it is easy to see the development of their passions for one another. Maybe their love affair is not physical, preferring to manifest itself in the form of a mental love affair that is driven by passion.
Throughout the plots of Middlemarch and Canto I of Don Juan, a lot of similarities arise suggesting that Dorothea and Donna Julia are one in the same. For starters, they are both young women who happened to marry rich men who are in their middle to late fifties. Their marriages went well at first, but they quickly found that they had little in common with their husbands due to the drastic difference in their age. Dorothea’s and Donna Julia’s husbands could not provide the romance and young love that they desired which created a void in their lives. Both women had good intentions to stay true and faithful to their husbands, but the inescapable void caused their natural romantic desires and passions to get the best of them. These driving passions started off as innocent then quickly transitioned into romance. Don Juan, the Byronic hero, provided a great temptation of which Donna Julia’s passions uncontrollably led her to engage in an illicit sexual affair. Julia’s sexual affair with Don Juan carried harsh consequences that eventually led to her forever being separated from her lover. Will Ladislaw as a Byronic hero created romantic tension between him and Dorothea, but they abstain from engaging in an actual physical love affair. In the end, after the death of her husband Mr. Casaubon, Dorothea’s and Ladislaw’s discipline of their passions allows them to eventually marry and live happily together. Such contrary outcomes could be George Eliot’s mockery of Lord Byron’s portrayal of passionate love.
Even though the literary mirror between Dorothea and Donna Julia may seem a little far-fetched to some, there are so many similarities between the two characters that the possibility cannot simply be ignored. Good writers, especially the well-read George Eliot, take ideas from the literary works they read and incorporate those ideas into their own writings. Writing is flavored and perfected through constant reading and absorbing of different ideas. We write well, because we have been exposed to good writing. My thesis merely proposes that George Eliot read and used some of the ideas presented in Don Juan as a template to follow for her characters and writing ideas. I believe that George Eliot actually borrowed ideas from writers such as Lord Byron, and then she brilliantly utilized those ideas to create her own unique masterpiece. Both Eliot’s Middlemarch and Lord Byron’s Don Juan are unique and richly insightful masterworks of literature that have held strong against the test of time making them truly spectacular!
Was George Eliot’s character Dorothea directly inspired by Lord Byron’s portrayal of Donna Julia in Don Juan? A lot of good authors borrow concepts and ideas from the literature they read and incorporate such ideas into their own works. George Eliot was an avid reader of her contemporary authors, and there are many instances of which she draws such outside inspiration into Middlemarch. Throughout Middlemarch it is easy to find several references to the works of authors and poets such as the works of Adam Smith, Robert Southey, Wordsworth, and several others. As I was alternately browsing through George Eliot’s Middlemarch and Lord Byron’s Don Juan in search of inspiring quotes, I came across some conspicuously similar themes that suggested these two literary works shared more in common than possible by pure coincidence. George Eliot seemed to be making deliberately subtle resemblances and allusions to Byron’s Don Juan. Upon reviewing all of the evidence related to the two literary works, I quickly arrived to the thesis that Eliot deliberately borrowed the character of Donna Julia from Lord Byron’s Don Juan, changed the character’s name, and thrust this character into the world of Middlemarch as Dorothea.
My attention to the possibility of borrowed concepts began with George Eliot’s discussion of writers and poets on pages sixteen and seventeen of Middlemarch; most particularly Robert Southey and William Wordsworth. Throughout Don Juan, Lord Byron establishes a theme of constantly bashing these poet laureates. The two passages in which George Eliot first introduces Wordsworth and Southey are written much in the same manner through her use of the word “know” as a subtle grammatical mechanic to link the two poets together. Does this word link bear any real meaning?
“– the poet Wordsworth, you KNOW. Now there was something singular (pg. 16 Middlemarch).”
“But talking about books, there is Southey’s Peninsular War. I am reading that of a morning. You KNOW Southey (pg. 17 Middlemarch).”
George Eliot’s introduction of Southey and Wordsworth at this specific point in the plot is strikingly bizarre because it directly coincides with the first time Dorothea meets Mr. Casaubon – her future husband. The meeting between Dorothea and Mr. Casaubon signifies the beginning of their mutual romantic interest towards each other. Don Juan is a poem of love, but Lord Byron places his criticisms of Southey and Wordsworth before the romance commences. George Eliot’s timely exposition of Wordsworth and Southey at the same time Dorothea meets her future husband for the first time mirrors Lord Byron’s exposition of Wordsworth and Southey in the introduction – dedication, to his epic poem. There has to be a tenacious literary connection between Middlemarch and Don Juan. The next question begs to wonder if Lord Byron or Don Juan is referenced in Eliot’s Middlemarch.
To answer this, I had to delve right into the passages of Middlemarch to search for any mentioning of Lord Byron; and if so, study the significance of those specific allusions. Previously when I read Middlemarch, I do not remember any reference to Lord Byron; but at the same time, Lord Byron’s name wouldn’t have stood out in my mind and I would have simply overlooked such details. Bingo! I found two passages of which George Eliot mentions Lord Byron’s name and, fortunately for my thesis, they actually bear the significance I was looking for. For your convenience, I will quote and share those passages then discuss them to prove my point.
The first passage I found containing reference to Byron is on page 82 at the end of the chapter. My chosen passage takes place when Mr. Casaubon is taking Dorothea on a tour of his estate for the first time, and they happen to stumble upon the “young” Will Ladislaw.
“Celia laughed. She was surprised to find that Mr. Casaubon could say something quite amusing. ‘Well, you know, he may turn out a Byron, a Chatterton, a Churchill – that sort of thing – there’s no telling,’ said Mr. Brooke. ‘Shall you let him go to Italy, or wherever else he wants to go (pg. 82 Middlemarch)?’”
The second passage I found mentioning Lord Byron is on page 380 at the beginning of chapter 38, when Sir. James is discussing, with the Cadwalladers, Mr. Brooke and Will Ladislaw’s business partnership at The Pioneer newspaper.
“’Oh, he’s a dangerous young sprig, that Mr. Ladislaw,’ said Mrs. Cadwallader, ‘with his opera songs and his ready tongue. A sort of Byronic hero – an amorous conspirator, it strikes me. And Thomas Aquintas is not fond of him. I could see that, the day the picture was brought (pg. 380 Middlemarch).’”
In order to establish a foundation on supporting my claims on Dorothea as Lord Byron’s Donna Julia, I must briefly digress into the significance of Will Ladislaw and explain how he is Dorothea’s Don Juan. Will Ladislaw is much younger than Dorothea as he was just a young teenager when he first stumbled upon Dorothea during Mr. Casaubon’s estate tour. This bit of information is a copy of the romantic encounters found in Lord Byron’s Don Juan in that Don Juan was always younger than his women lovers by several years. Much like Byron, Ladislaw takes a trip around Europe and settles in Rome, Italy for some time. Lord Byron spent six years in Italy, and while there he wrote a large portion of Don Juan and notably engaged in an elicit love affair with a woman named Teresa Guiccioli (BBC History). It is compelling to note that George Eliot mentions Dorothea to be like Saint Theresa (or humorously Teresa in this instance). Also, Will Ladislaw doesn’t follow the same social rules and practices as everyone else in Middlemarch, similarly to the way Lord Byron doesn’t follow the social norms and expectations in his writing of Don Juan.
With Mrs. Cadwallader’s opinions of Will Ladislaw, as I quoted above, George Eliot bridges a deliberate literary connection to Lord Byron. The question arises, could Will Ladislaw’s “opera songs and ready tongue” be referring to the lyrical verse of poetry as found in Don Juan? If so, the next line furthers Ladislaw’s “a sort of Byronic hero” envelopment of Don Juan’s character. We know, from several passages in Middlemarch, that Ladislaw loves to draw and is an avid writer who eventually helps Mr. Brooke by writing articles for The Pioneer newspaper. Throughout the text of Middlemarch, however, I have found no other reference to Ladislaw producing or having anything to do with the opera, which causes this purposeful inclusion of information to vividly stand out. In contemplating the significance of why Eliot put “opera songs” and “Byronic hero” so close together concerning the characteristics of Ladislaw, I came to the conclusion that Eliot wanted her readers to view Ladislaw and Don Juan as mirrors of each other.
Little is known about Ladislaw’s family except for his grandmother Julia – a woman who sacrificed everything to marry the man of her dreams. See the allusion here? Donna Julia sacrificed everything in pursuing her love for Don Juan. This allusion can be tied directly to Dorothea, because every time Ladislaw’s grandmother – Mr. Casaubon’s Aunt – is mentioned, it is through Ladislaw’s conversation with Dorothea. It is important for Eliot to maintain the literary link between Dorothea and Donna Julia by using Ladislaw’s grandmother only through Dorothea’s conversations with Ladislaw (Don Juan) and not with her husband Mr. Casaubon. Ladislaw really loves his grandmother Julia and he really loves Dorothea which makes the two characters into one focal point. George Eliot is able to brilliantly convey the literary link through only Ladislaw by stating, “Especially the mysterious ‘Aunt Julia’ about whom Dorothea had never found it easy to question her husband (pg. 371 Middlemarch).” Why would Dorothea find the task of asking her husband about his family so difficult, and yet find it so easy to ask Ladislaw? This is a device that Eliot uses to create tension and distance between Dorothea and Mr. Casaubon; and, at the same time, create closeness between Dorothea and Ladislaw. Also, it is as if Eliot is using this device to remove the solid family connection between Ladislaw and Casaubon. Note that their last names are different. The separation between Ladislaw and Casaubon is further perpetuated by their contempt for each other over Ladislaw’s romantic interest in Dorothea. Perhaps George Eliot received the inspiration for the distant family relation between Ladislaw and Casaubon directly from Lord Byron’s Don Juan. Don Alfonso had a long term love affair with Don Juan’s mother, Donna Inez, which started after the death of her husband. Such a long term love affair could be interpreted as creating a loose family tie between Don Alfonso and Don Juan. Though it is a far stretch, the Donna Inez could be considered Don Alfonso’s unofficial second wife, in much the same way as Gulbeyaz was the fourth wife of the Sultan in canto V of Don Juan.
After some brief digression into how the characteristics of Will Ladislaw and Mr. Casaubon contribute to support my theory of George Eliot’s allusion to Don Juan through her portrayal of Dorothea, it is time for me to focus primarily on Dorothea herself and examine how she is a direct link to Donna Julia in Lord Byron’s Don Juan. In shifting my focus, I find Dorothea’s peculiar interactions with the miniature figurines to be a good starting point. For your convenience, I will again share the passages I have found then provide an explication de texte analysis of the passages to bring about my point.
“’This is your mother,’ said Dorothea, who had turned to examine the group of miniatures. ‘It is like the tiny one you brought me; only, I should think it a better portrait. And this one opposite, who is this?’ ‘Her elder sister. They were, like you and your sister, the only two children of their parents, who hang above them, you see...’ ‘The sister is pretty,’ said Celia, implying that she thought less favourable of Mr. Casaubon’s mother… ‘It is a peculiar face,’ said Dorothea, looking closely…. ‘And all the powdered curls hanging backward. Altogether it seems to me peculiar rather than pretty. There is not even a family likeness between her and your mother (pgs. 75-76 Middlemarch).’”
We find in this passage of text that George Eliot brings a particular focus to the details of the miniature figurine of Mr. Casaubon’s mother – Ladislaw’s grandmother – which seems to exhibit the characteristics of Dorothea. Mr. Casaubon furthers the connection between his aunt Julia and Dorothea by stating that the two figurines were just like Celia and Dorothea. The passage goes further to say that the figurines were two young women who wore necklaces. In an earlier chapter, Eliot goes into a lengthy description of a necklace the sisters inherited from their deceased mother. Celia makes an interesting statement by saying that the sister looks pretty which makes a reference to Dorothea being the prettier of the two sisters. Mr. Casaubon’s mother is not important in this scene because the passage shows the readers that “there is not even a family likeness between her and your mother,” and “said Celia, implying that she thought less favorable of Casaubon’s mother.
Later in Middlemarch I came across another interesting passage concerning Dorothea and the miniature figurines.
“Each remembered thing in the room was disenchanted, was deadened as an unlit transparency, till her wandering gaze came to the group of miniatures, and there at least she saw something which had gathered new breath and meaning: it was the miniature of Mr. Casaubon’s aunt Julia, who had made the unfortunate marriage – of Will Ladislaw’s grandmother. Dorothea could fancy that it was alive now – the delicate woman’s face which yet had a head-strong look, a peculiarity difficult to interpret…. What breadths of experience Dorothea seemed to have passed over since she first looked at this miniature! She felt a new companionship with it, as if it had an ear for her and could see how she was looking at it… the face was masculine and beamed on her with that full gaze (pg. 275 Middlemarch)…”
Here, the room and her environment completely fade away only leaving the focus on Dorothea and the miniature figurine of Julia. “Transparency,” could Eliot mean that to be a looking glass into the works of Lord Byron and the mirror to who Dorothea actually is? The significance of miniature figurines is they are graven images of actual people, much like that of a portrait or sculpture. At the moment of sole focus upon the miniature figurine of Julia in the scene, Dorothea finds a new breath and meaning in the figurine to the point she “could fancy that it was alive now.” Now it is important to pay attention to the description that is given of the miniature. Julia’s figurine has “the delicate woman’s face which yet had a head-strong look, a peculiarity difficult to interpret.” This description is a direct mirror of Dorothea’s characteristics! In this light, Julia is Dorothea and Dorothea is the Donna Julia found in Don Juan. The next line is followed by an exclamation point which suggests that the reader pay close attention to what Eliot is trying to point out. Perhaps the “breadths of experience” Dorothea went through here refers to more than her focusing on her marriage. With the inclusion of the exclamation point, we have permission to take the line to represent the larger picture; that Dorothea was experiencing (or reminiscing upon) the unfortunate life of Donna Julia and her marriage to Don Alfonso. “She felt a new companionship with it, as if it had an ear for her and could see how she was looking at it,” demonstrates how Dorothea has become one with the miniature figurine, the direct link to herself. A curiosity arises in my mind regarding George Eliot’s additional description of the face as being masculine. Is she referring to the comical pantomime Byron employed in Don Juan with his constant gender confusion?
Further along in the journey through the passages of Middlemarch, I found yet another important excerpt that directly ties Dorothea to Julia; “fresh images had gathered around that Aunt Julia who was Will’s grandmother: the presence of that delicate miniature, so like a living face that she [Dorothea] knew, helping her to concentrate her feelings (pg. 371 Middlemarch).” Dorothea recognized the “living face” of the miniature of Julia as being her own face. In looking into herself through introspection, Dorothea found the strength to control her feelings. The figurine has a presence, it has a recognizable face, it is alive; the figurine of Julia is Dorothea.
Now I must move on to discuss the significance of George Eliot’s portrayal of Dorothea as Saint Theresa of Avila and how it relates to the strong link between Dorothea and Donna Julia. With a little background research, I found it interesting to read that Saint Theresa was born near a Spanish riverside town called Avila and was primarily raised by her father Don Alonso Sanchez. At five years old, Theresa convinced her brother to join her in a quest for Martyrdom against the Moors (Middlemarch Prelude). When she was old enough, Theresa ran away from home and joined a convent to serve as a nun (newadvent.org). After enduring many shortfalls and failures, Theresa ended up becoming a powerful spiritual leader in the Catholic Church. Theresa looked to the Virgin Mary to help her endure the many adversities she faced. These few details are important in establishing the link between Dorothea and Donna Julia.
In Don Juan, Byron wrote that Donna Julia grew up in Seville, a nice riverside town on the Guadalquivir River (Canto I, stanza 8). She possessed Moorish ancestry and was considered to be rather pious. Much like Theresa, Donna Julia had the royal title of Donna, so she was also born into nobility. Donna Julia fervently prayed to the Virgin Mary for guidance and help in facing her lustful temptations towards Don Juan (Canto I, stanza 75). There are personal memoirs showing that Theresa did not feel as if her prayers were being answered during the early onset of her troubles, though she continued in prayer. On the other hand, Donna Julia did not feel as if her prayers were being answered so she quickly succumbed to her desires for Don Juan. After Don Alfonso caught her in an affair with Don Juan, he sent her off to a nunnery where she spent the rest of her life in prayer and service to the church (Canto I, stanza 191). Outside of geographical background relevance and their service to the church, the connection between Saint Theresa and Donna Julia is rather weak by itself; however, if this device is placed within certain context it can create a very powerful allusion.
Since Dorothea is described as the Spanish Saint Theresa, it seems that George Eliot easily laid out the literary bridge to tie Dorothea and Donna Julia together as the same character. Further evidence supporting this link lies within several passages of Middlemarch in which Eliot ties Dorothea to being nun-esque. In the middle of chapter six, during a conversation between Sir James and Mrs. Cadwallader, I found an interesting statement in which Mrs. Cadwallader says, “Celia is worth two of her, and likely after all to be the better match [to Sir James]. For this marriage to Casaubon is as good as going to a nunnery (pg. 59 Middlemarch).” This sample of dialogue is merely a part of the larger conversation of which Sir James and Mrs. Cadwallader discussing how bad of a match Dorothea and Casaubon are for each other. It seems to be a well-known fact that Mr. Casaubon is old and boring compared to the young and lively nature of Dorothea. Is Mrs. Cadwallader making a reference to Don Juan by implying that Dorothea will not find the love she seeks in her marriage and therefore will become so unhappy that she will fall in love with a Byronic hero, have an illicit love affair, and eventually condemn herself to be sent off to a nunnery? It is foreshadowed that Will Ladislaw could easily become the Byronic Hero. A few lines later, the connection between Dorothea and Donna Julia is strengthened by Mrs. Cadwallader’s next statement, “These charitable people never know vinegar from wine till they have swallowed it and got the colic (pg. 59 Middlemarch).” This statement is a clear and direct reference to Don Juan when Lord Byron is discussing the pragmatic nature of marriage at the beginning of canto III, “Tis a melancholy and a fearful sign of human frailty, folly, also crime, that love and marriage rarely can combine, although they both are born in the same clime. Marriage from love, like vinegar from wine – a SAD, SOUR, SOBER beverage – by time is sharpened from its high celestial flavor down to a very homely household savor (Canto III, stanza 5).” Through Mrs. Cadwallader’s dialogue, Eliot is showing that marriage will change Dorothea from being a woman who “sees the stars by daylight (pg. 59 Middlemarch)” to a woman who will grow sick from being unhappy and miserable, hence the bitter taste of vinegar after it’s too late.
During Dorothea’s extended honeymoon in Rome, she decided to occupy herself with having a portrait painted of herself by a German artist. Consequently while she is posing for her painting, the German Artist begs Will Ladislaw to observe the strikingly beautiful woman who is posing painting “else she will have changed her pose (pg. 188 Middlemarch).” Comically, the painter finds that Ladislaw knows the girl in question and she is in fact married to Ladislaw’s older cousin Mr. Casaubon. Before the revelation, the painter goes into noticeable detail of Dorothea’s nun like appearance by saying, “Here stands beauty in its breathing life, with the consciousness of Christian centuries in its bosom. But she should be dressed as a nun; I think she looks almost what you call a Quaker; I would dress her as a nun in my picture. However, she is married (pg. 189 Middlemarch)!” The artists’ odd perception of Dorothea comes at the time Ladislaw is reunited with Dorothea and almost immediately falls deeply in love with her. I take the timing of this description to further enforce the direct envelopment of Ladislaw’s and Dorothea’s characters into the mold of Don Juan and the Donna Julia. There is no evidence that Ladislaw and Dorothea had any sort of “physical” affair, but from this point out it is easy to see the development of their passions for one another. Maybe their love affair is not physical, preferring to manifest itself in the form of a mental love affair that is driven by passion.
Throughout the plots of Middlemarch and Canto I of Don Juan, a lot of similarities arise suggesting that Dorothea and Donna Julia are one in the same. For starters, they are both young women who happened to marry rich men who are in their middle to late fifties. Their marriages went well at first, but they quickly found that they had little in common with their husbands due to the drastic difference in their age. Dorothea’s and Donna Julia’s husbands could not provide the romance and young love that they desired which created a void in their lives. Both women had good intentions to stay true and faithful to their husbands, but the inescapable void caused their natural romantic desires and passions to get the best of them. These driving passions started off as innocent then quickly transitioned into romance. Don Juan, the Byronic hero, provided a great temptation of which Donna Julia’s passions uncontrollably led her to engage in an illicit sexual affair. Julia’s sexual affair with Don Juan carried harsh consequences that eventually led to her forever being separated from her lover. Will Ladislaw as a Byronic hero created romantic tension between him and Dorothea, but they abstain from engaging in an actual physical love affair. In the end, after the death of her husband Mr. Casaubon, Dorothea’s and Ladislaw’s discipline of their passions allows them to eventually marry and live happily together. Such contrary outcomes could be George Eliot’s mockery of Lord Byron’s portrayal of passionate love.
Even though the literary mirror between Dorothea and Donna Julia may seem a little far-fetched to some, there are so many similarities between the two characters that the possibility cannot simply be ignored. Good writers, especially the well-read George Eliot, take ideas from the literary works they read and incorporate those ideas into their own writings. Writing is flavored and perfected through constant reading and absorbing of different ideas. We write well, because we have been exposed to good writing. My thesis merely proposes that George Eliot read and used some of the ideas presented in Don Juan as a template to follow for her characters and writing ideas. I believe that George Eliot actually borrowed ideas from writers such as Lord Byron, and then she brilliantly utilized those ideas to create her own unique masterpiece. Both Eliot’s Middlemarch and Lord Byron’s Don Juan are unique and richly insightful masterworks of literature that have held strong against the test of time making them truly spectacular!