&&LDIV&&R&&LDIV&&R&&LP style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 22.5pt"&&R&&LI&&RMiddlemarch&&L/I&&R, by &&LB&&RGeorge Eliot&&L/B&&R, is part of the &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics&&L/I&&R series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics&&L/I&&R: &&L/P&&RNew introductions commissioned from today's top writers and scholars Biographies of the authors Chronologies of contemporary historical, biographical, and cultural events Footnotes and endnotes Selective discussions of imitations, parodies, poems, books, plays, paintings, operas, statuary, and films inspired by the work Comments by other famous authors Study questions to challenge the reader's viewpoints and expectations Bibliographies for further reading Indices & Glossaries, when appropriateAll editions are beautifully designed and are printed to superior specifications; some include illustrations of historical interest. &&LI&&RBarnes & Noble Classics &&L/I&&Rpulls together a constellation of influences—biographical, historical, and literary—to enrich each reader's understanding of these enduring works.&&L/DIV&&R&&L/DIV&&R&&LDIV&&R &&L/DIV&&R&&LDIV&&ROften called the greatest nineteenth-century British novelist, &&LB&&RGeorge Eliot&&L/B&&R (the pen name of Mary Ann Evans) created in &&LI&&RMiddlemarch&&L/I&&R a vast panorama of life in a provincial Midlands town. At the story’s center stands the intellectual and idealistic Dorothea Brooke—a character who in many ways resembles Eliot herself. But the very qualities that set Dorothea apart from the materialistic, mean-spirited society around her also lead her into a disastrous marriage with a man she mistakes for her soul mate. In a parallel story, young doctor Tertius Lydgate, who is equally idealistic, falls in love with the pretty but vain and superficial Rosamund Vincy, whom he marries to his ruin. &&LP&&REliot surrounds her main figures with a gallery of characters drawn from every social class, from laborers and shopkeepers to the rising middle class to members of the wealthy, landed gentry. Together they form an extraordinarily rich and precisely detailed portrait of English provincial life in the 1830s. But Dorothea’s and Lydgate’s struggles to retain their moral integrity in the midst of temptation and tragedy remind us that their world is very much like our own. Strikingly modern in its painful ironies and psychological insight, &&LI&&RMiddlemarch&&L/I&&R was pivotal in the shaping of twentieth-century literary realism. &&L/P&&R&&LP&&R&&LB&&RLynne Sharon Schwartz&&L/B&&R is the author of fourteen books of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry, including the novels &&LI&&RDisturbances in the Field, Leaving Brooklyn&&L/I&&R, and &&LI&&RIn the Family Way&&L/I&&R, and the memoir &&LI&&RRuined by Reading&&L/I&&R. Her poetry collection &&LI&&RIn Solitary&&L/I&&R and her translation of &&LI&&RA Place to Live: Selected Essays of Natalia Ginzburg&&L/I&&R appeared in 2002.&&L/P&&R&&L/DIV&&R Read Less