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WonderLiterary fact

George Eliot, author of Middlemarch, was really Mary Ann Evans. From 1857 she wrote under a man's name so that her novels would be taken seriously rather than dismissed as light 'lady novels', and to keep her private life out of the reviews.

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Evans (1819–1880) grew up in Warwickshire, where her father managed a country estate. Before writing fiction she was a respected translator and an editor of the Westminster Review, a leading London journal. In an 1856 essay, 'Silly Novels by Lady Novelists', she mocked the far-fetched plots of much fiction by women, and she wanted her own work judged on its merits. There was also her private life: she lived openly with the writer George Henry Lewes, who was still married to someone else. She later explained that George was Lewes's first name and that Eliot was 'a good mouth-filling, easily pronounced word'. Her first stories, Scenes of Clerical Life, appeared in Blackwood's Magazine in 1857, and many readers assumed a country parson had written them. After Adam Bede (1859) became a hit and a man named Joseph Liggins claimed to be its author, she let her identity be known.

Türkçe oku
Middlemarch'ın yazarı George Eliot aslında Mary Ann Evans'tı. Romanları hafif “hanım romanları” diye küçümsenmesin, ciddiye alınsın ve özel hayatı eleştirmenlerin diline düşmesin diye 1857'den itibaren bir erkek adı kullandı.

Evans (1819–1880) Warwickshire'da büyüdü; babası orada bir malikânenin yöneticisiydi. Roman yazmaya başlamadan önce saygın bir çevirmendi ve Londra'nın önde gelen dergilerinden Westminster Review'un editörlerindendi. 1856'da yazdığı “Silly Novels by Lady Novelists” (Hanım Yazarların Saçma Romanları) adlı denemesinde, kadınların yazdığı pek çok romanın akla sığmaz olay örgülerini alaya aldı; kendi eserlerinin ise kendi değeriyle okunmasını istiyordu. Bir de özel hayatı vardı: Başka biriyle hâlâ evli olan yazar George Henry Lewes ile açıkça birlikte yaşıyordu. Sonradan anlattığına göre George, Lewes'in ilk adıydı; Eliot'u ise “ağız dolduran, kolay söylenen bir sözcük” olduğu için seçmişti. İlk öyküleri, Scenes of Clerical Life (Papaz Hayatından Sahneler), 1857'de Blackwood's Magazine'de yayımlandı ve birçok okur onları bir taşra papazının yazdığını sandı. 1859'da Adam Bede büyük ilgi görünce Joseph Liggins adlı bir adam kitabın yazarı olduğunu ileri sürdü; bunun üzerine Evans kim olduğunu açıkladı.

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