exact page reference (and novel) where author George Eliot said, "In
the staring gas light, the women...had a similarity of expression
common, typical of all the married women around and about...Marriage
scored on their faces a kind of preoccupied, faded, lack-lustre air as
though they were constantly being plagued by some problem.  As they
were.

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Clarification of Question by sylk-ga on 04 Jun 2003 19:31 PDT

Hi!
Thank you for your prompt response.  I,too, saw a reference from The
Mill on the Floss--I read the entire book and could not find the
quote.  I am still assuming it is from Eliot.  Does anyone know
Eliot's writing well enough to know where it could be from?
Are you giving up?
Thank you,
Sylvia

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Request for Question Clarification by leli-ga on 05 Jun 2003 06:07 PDT

Sylvia

I don't want to raise your hopes unrealistically - this isn't easy -
but there's just a chance one of us might see a clue if you could post
more of the passage.
Is Mill on the Floss the only work Heyn is discussing in that part of
her book?

Leli

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Request for Question Clarification by angy-ga on 06 Jun 2003 22:38 PDT

Have you tried her letters?

Sylk and fellow Researchers~

Hmmm. This is interesting. I did find two articles that claim that the
quote in question is from George Eliot's novel "Mill On The Floss."
However, I have gone to several searchable online versions of this
novel, and have been unable to find the quote. I've also downloaded
several versions of the novel, and using the usual "find" feature,
have been unable to find this quote within that book.

Therefore, I'm thinking this quote has been attributed to the wrong
book, and perhaps the wrong writer. Unfortunately, doing searches for
bits of the quote yielded nothing.
	
Good luck!
kriswrite

I posted this once, but it didn't show up (!)  I did an online search
of all of Eliot's major works(Scenes of Clerical Life, Adam Bede, The
Lifted Veil, The Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner, Romola, Brother
Jacob, Felix Holt, Spanish Gypsy, Middlemarch, Daniel Deronda, Agatha,
Brother and Sister, How Lisa Loved the King, The Legend of Jubal,
Armgart, Arion, A Minor Prophet, Stradivarius, A College Breakfast
Party, The Death of Moses, Impressions of Theophrastus Such, and Early
Essays) at this site:
http://aolsvc.aol.com/computercenter/internet/index.adp

There were no matches. Perhaps this can help a fellow Researcher
narrow down the possibilites.

kriswrite

Kriswrite,  were the two sites you found
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=11137
and
http://www.metroactive.com/papers/cruz/06.27.01/wives-0126.html?

These are the same story, "My so-called marriage" by Tai Moses - and
she clearly attributes the quote to Eliot, "Mill on the floss".  As
Moses was reading a lot of 19th century novels at the time of which
she was writing, it could be she mis-remembered which one this quote
came from.

Dear researchers,
   Thank you so much for all your efforts.  The original reference to
The Mill on the Floss was from a book by Dalma Heyn, called Marriage
Shock, which I read.  She does make reference to the characters and
story of The Mill, but she then quotes this long quote about marriage
(which is the one I am looking for) and credits that to The Mill also.
 Perhaps she had used the same wrongly quoted reference before.  So it
seems it is not in any of Eliot's writing? Any other help would be
most appreciated.
Thanks,
Sylvia

Yep, read, those were the articles. I agree that it is surely from
another 19th (perhaps early 20th) century novel...and perhaps not by
Eliot.

kriswrite

Dear Leli,
   I had given you almost the entire quote--maybe one sentence was
missing, and no names or clues in it.  Heyn does discuss Drabble's The
Waterfall in the same chapter.  I have ordered that book from Barnes
and Noble (has not yet arrived). That is a good thought that maybe she
meant it from Drabble, but quote doesn't sound like Drabble.
Thanks so much,
Sylvia