The Road to Middlemarch - My Life with George Eliot

Author(s): Rebecca Mead

Biography and Memoir

What would happen if I stopped to consider how Middlemarch has shaped my understanding of my own life? Why did the novel still feel so urgent, after all these years? And what could it give me now, as I paused here in the middle of things, and surveyed where I had come from, and thought about where I was, and wondered where I might go next? At the age of 17, Rebecca Mead read Middlemarch for the first time, and has read it again every five years since, interpreting and discovering it anew each time. In The Road to Middlemarch she writes passionately about her relationship with this remarkable Victorian novel-loved by so many-and explores how its characters and their stories, along with George Eliot's own life experiences, can answer some of our fundamental questions about life and love. Written when Eliot was 51, Middlemarch has at its centre one of literature's most compelling and ill-fated marriages, and some of the most tenderly drawn characters-their most intimate struggles, their ambitions, dreams, and attachments. Mead interweaves her own reflections on adolescence, relationships and marriage to explore how Middlemarch teaches us to be grown-ups, and to value the limitations of our ordinary lives. The Road to Middlemarch is not only a sensitive work of deep reading and biography, but a guide to living well today.


Product Information

* Interviews in broadsheet newspapers such as Sydney Morning Herald, Age, Canberra Times, Courier Mail and New Zealand Herald * Interviews on national radio programs such as Radio National's Life Matters and Radio NZ's Mornings with Kim Hill * Extract to be placed in women's glossy magazine such as North & South, Metro or Vogue * Review coverage across national newspapers such as Sunday Star Times, Weekend Australian and Herald Sun * Review coverage in a variety of magazines such as The Monthly, Listener, Australian Book Review, The Big Issue and Australian Women's Weekly * Review coverage on radio programs such as Radio National's Books & Arts Daily * Widespread online review coverage * Advertisements in literary and current affairs publications such as ABR, Griffith Review and The Monthly, and on their associated websites * Online promotions and giveaways with targeted subscriber groups, including book lovers such as CAE, Good Reading and Good Reads * Budget for bookseller catalogues * Banner advertising on bookseller websites * Feature title in Text newsletters and website * Author video to be available on Text's website, YouTube and on bookseller sites

'A perfectly composed offering of literary love and self-observation. I adored it.' Elizabeth Gilbert 'A wise, humane and delightful study of what some regard as the best novel in English.' Harold Bloom 'In this deeply satisfying hybrid work of literary criticism, biography, and memoir, New Yorker staff writer Mead brings to vivid life the profound engagement that she and all devoted readers experience with a favorite novel over a lifetime...Passionate readers, even those new to Middlemarch, will relish this book.' Publishers Weekly

Rebecca Mead is a staff writer for The New Yorker. Born and educated in England, she left for the States in her twenties. She has written for many newspapers and magazines and is the author of One Perfect Day: The Selling of the American Wedding. She lives in Brooklyn.

General Fields

  • : 9781922079329
  • : Text Publishing Co
  • : The Text Publishing Company
  • : September 2013
  • : 234mm X 153mm
  • : Australia
  • : books

Special Fields

  • : Rebecca Mead
  • : Paperback
  • : 823.8
  • : very good
  • : 320