Award Date
1-1-1993
Degree Type
Dissertation
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Department
English
First Committee Member
James Hazen
Number of Pages
280
Abstract
The three central conflicts of George Eliot's life--an emotional conflict with male rejection, an intellectual conflict with orthodox Christianity, and a gender conflict with the limitations imposed on women--can be attributed largely to the nineteenth-century feminine ideologies. While Eliot used her nonfiction to criticize the ideas responsible for her conflicts, she used her poetry and fiction to dramatize the conflicts and develop an ideal of humanity. Eliot considered feminism, in Romola, as a resolution to these conflicts, then moved beyond feminism to develop her human ideal. This ideal, which transcends gender ideologies in response to natural and moral law, posits a whole of androgynous female and male, in which each completes and frees the other for development through self-giving love and duty, for a reciprocity of temporal salvation. For Eliot, this whole comprises the human Christ, or divinity, capable of effecting moral and political reform for humanity's greater self-consciousness and unity.
Keywords
Beyond; Eliot; Eliot, George; Eliot, George; Feminism; Gender; Gender Ideology; George; Ideology; Gender Ideology
Controlled Subject
British literature; English literature--Irish authors; Irish literature; Biography
File Format
File Size
7495.68 KB
Degree Grantor
University of Nevada, Las Vegas
Language
English
Permissions
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Repository Citation
Dengler, Mary J, "George Eliot: Beyond feminism" (1993). UNLV Retrospective Theses & Dissertations. 2981.
http://dx.doi.org/10.25669/22mp-d6uv
Rights
IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
