GE to John Blackwood, London, 5 November 1873
Title
GE to John Blackwood, London, 5 November 1873
Title
GE to John Blackwood, London, 5 November 1873
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
John Blackwood
Date(s)
- 1873-11-05
Place
London
Letter Content
GE to John Blackwood, London, 5 November 1873
MS: National Library of Scotland. Extracts published: Cross, III, 217-219.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
November 5. 73.
My dear Mr. Blackwood
It was a cheerful accompaniment to breakfast this morning to have a letter from you, with the pretty picture you suggested of Miss Blackwood's first ball. I am glad that I have seen the "little fairy," so as to be able to imagine her.
We are both the better for the delicious air and quiet of the country, though just now Mr. Lewes is going through his usual introductory town headache. We too, like you, were sorry to quit the woods and fields for the comparatively disturbed life which even we are obliged to lead in town. Letters requesting interviews can no longer be made void by one's absence, and I am much afflicted by these interruptions which break up the day without any adequate result of good to any mortal. 869 In the country, the days have broad spaces and the very stillness seems to give a delightful roominess to the hours.
I think I have known something like the sensations in the stomach which have been tormenting you. I suppose they come from disordered conditions of that delicate mucous membrane which has so much to do with our happiness or misery. Golfing is one good medicine for you.
Is it not wonderful that the world can absorb so much [Middlemarch] at a guinea the copy? I shall be glad to hear particulars, which I imagine will lead to the conclusion that the time is coming for the preparation of a 7/6 edition. I am not fond of reading proofs, but I am anxious to correct the sheets of this edition, both in relation to mistakes already standing, and to prevent the accumulation of others in the reprinting.
I am slowly simmering towards another big book, but people seem so bent on giving supremacy to M[iddlemarc]h that they are sure not to like any future book so well. I had a letter from Mr. Bancroft 870 (the Amer[ica]n ambassador at Berlin) the other day -- asking me to let him quote something with a slight change from the Sp. Gypsy -- in which he says that everybody in Berlin reads Middlemarch; he had to buy 2 copies for his house, and he found the Rector of the University, a stupendous mathematician, occupied with it in the solid part of the day. I am entertaining you in this graceful way about myself, because you will be interested to know what are the chances for our literature abroad.
That Ashantee business seems to me hideous. What is more murderous than stupidity? To have a husband gone on such an expedition is a trial that passes my imagination of what it is possible to endure in the way of anxiety.
I agreed very warmly with the remarks made by your contributor this month on Mr. Pater's book, which seems to me quite poisonous in its false principles of criticism and false conceptions of life. 871
We are looking forward to the [Inkerman] volume 872 as something for me to read aloud. Mr. Lewes sends his kind regards and I am always
Yours most truly
M. E. Lewes.
MS: National Library of Scotland. Extracts published: Cross, III, 217-219.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
November 5. 73.
My dear Mr. Blackwood
It was a cheerful accompaniment to breakfast this morning to have a letter from you, with the pretty picture you suggested of Miss Blackwood's first ball. I am glad that I have seen the "little fairy," so as to be able to imagine her.
We are both the better for the delicious air and quiet of the country, though just now Mr. Lewes is going through his usual introductory town headache. We too, like you, were sorry to quit the woods and fields for the comparatively disturbed life which even we are obliged to lead in town. Letters requesting interviews can no longer be made void by one's absence, and I am much afflicted by these interruptions which break up the day without any adequate result of good to any mortal. 869 In the country, the days have broad spaces and the very stillness seems to give a delightful roominess to the hours.
I think I have known something like the sensations in the stomach which have been tormenting you. I suppose they come from disordered conditions of that delicate mucous membrane which has so much to do with our happiness or misery. Golfing is one good medicine for you.
Is it not wonderful that the world can absorb so much [Middlemarch] at a guinea the copy? I shall be glad to hear particulars, which I imagine will lead to the conclusion that the time is coming for the preparation of a 7/6 edition. I am not fond of reading proofs, but I am anxious to correct the sheets of this edition, both in relation to mistakes already standing, and to prevent the accumulation of others in the reprinting.
I am slowly simmering towards another big book, but people seem so bent on giving supremacy to M[iddlemarc]h that they are sure not to like any future book so well. I had a letter from Mr. Bancroft 870 (the Amer[ica]n ambassador at Berlin) the other day -- asking me to let him quote something with a slight change from the Sp. Gypsy -- in which he says that everybody in Berlin reads Middlemarch; he had to buy 2 copies for his house, and he found the Rector of the University, a stupendous mathematician, occupied with it in the solid part of the day. I am entertaining you in this graceful way about myself, because you will be interested to know what are the chances for our literature abroad.
That Ashantee business seems to me hideous. What is more murderous than stupidity? To have a husband gone on such an expedition is a trial that passes my imagination of what it is possible to endure in the way of anxiety.
I agreed very warmly with the remarks made by your contributor this month on Mr. Pater's book, which seems to me quite poisonous in its false principles of criticism and false conceptions of life. 871
We are looking forward to the [Inkerman] volume 872 as something for me to read aloud. Mr. Lewes sends his kind regards and I am always
Yours most truly
M. E. Lewes.
Signature
M. E. Lewes.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to John Blackwood, London, 5 November 1873, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/92688