Parallel Lives: George Eliot's Daniel Deronda

Daniel Deronda was the last novel that George Eliot completed before her death in 1780, a work which most nearly approaches the level of her masterpiece, Middlemarch. Daniel Deronda is a young man of uncertain parentage, who grows up in an aristocratic milieu. Just as he has decided on one life course, he discovers his Jewish identity and becomes captivated by the implications that this suggests. Daniel’s story is paralleled by that of Gwendolen Harleth, who makes a disastrous marriage with a sadistic older man and has to deal with its consequences. In these two contrasting stories of young people searching for meaning, love, and purpose, we see a great novelist at the peak of her powers

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