Godfrey Flashcards
Family life, character, bg, etc
As the eldest son of Squire Cass, Raveloe’s largest land owner, he wants t do the right thing but due to his father’s neglect and the absence of a mother figure, discipline, and familial warmth, he is indecisive and demonstrated idle moral cowardice when faced with difficult decisions.
- “fountain of wholesome love and fear” - metaphor - woman’s love is like free flowing water, but he didn’t have this
- “in the dark wainscoted parlour” - dark imagery - lack of good in house
- “the hearth had no smiles” - symbolic - no family warmth, contrast to Lammeters
- “the need of some tender, permanent affection” - complimentary adjectives implying the love he craves
- “natural irresolution” “moral corwardice” - indecisive
- “a vague longing for some discipline which would have checked his own errant weakness” - sympathy - lazy careless father
Squire Cass
- “knit brow and rather hard glance” “slack and feeble mouth” - common of Eliot to portray personalities through facial features - lazy, cold
- “ate his meat hastily” - adverb - rash and uncaring
- “allowed his tenants to “get into arrears, neglect their fences, reduce their stock, sell their straw” - list - feudal aristocracy criticism
- “made resolutions in violent anger”
- “as fiery volcanic matter cools and hardens into rock” - simile - he’s a hazard to his surroundings
Godfrey’s love for Nancy
G idolises N, the perfect Victorian woman, as she is the womanly figure he lacked growing up and believes he is her source of redemption, however, she’s unreachable as he’s married to Molly and divorce was frowned upon.
- “would make home lovely to him” “made him think of the future with joy” - domestic admiration
- “bright-winged prize” - angel imagery - impulses towards what is holy, pure and right
- “instead of keeping hold of the strong silken rope by which Nancy would have drawn him safe to the green banks, where it was easy to step firmly, he had let himself be pulled back into the mud and slime” - metaphor - her grace, purity, and moral strength could redeem him
- “neatness, purity, liberal orderliness” - list of Victoria virtues
- “wooed her with tacit patent worship” - divine domestic Goddess
- “the Lammeter household, sunned by the smile of Nancy” - light imagery
Godfrey towards Molly
He is cruel to his wife, and whilst Eliot tries to create antipathy towards Molly for her opium addiction, a modern 21st century reader feels more antipathy towards G for the heartless way he treats her and hides their marriage so his father doesn’t disinherit him. Further antipathy in ch13 when G is pleased to hear of her death.
- “the demon opium to whom she was enslaved” - addiction presented in the language of Christian sin
- “the familiar demon in her bosom” - metaphor for opium - vilified as sinful Christian woman
- “a blight on his life”- a curse
- “an ugly story of low passion” “unhappy hated wife” - the pejorative language - cruel - hateful
- “his own vicious folly” - possessive - also contrasts views on N
- “hiding her in the darkest corner of his heart” - dark imagery - sympathy for Molly
- “one evil terror in his mind […] that the woman might not be dead” - sadistic, cruel
“how should those white-winged delicate messengers make their way to Molly’s poisoned chamber?” - juxtaposition - metaphors - highlighting difference between N and M
Godfrey’s dilemma
Relied too heavily on chance when he struggles to choose between doing the right thing and revealing the truth to his father with the huge risk of losing Nancy, or continue his deceit,
- “the sword hanging over him” - metaphor for truth
- “the iron bit that destiny put in his mouth” - metaphor - his dilemma
- speaks “evasively” - adverb - making matters worse for himself
- “Chance is the “mighty creator of success” and the “God of all men” - authorial intrusion - criticising G’s moral weakness
- “hoping for some unforeseen turn of fortune” - helpless
G and N childlessness
He is married to Nancy, and he escaped fatherhood when he wanted it least, but his marriage is blighted with sadness due to this childlessness. The chance he so strongly relied on bit back - karma.
- “he would do everything but own it” - ch13
- “and the child - shall be taken care of somehow” - pause - lack of care
- “would be much happier without owning the child” - selfish
- “take it to the parish” - pronoun - dehumanises her
- “watched with hidden interest the prosperous growth of Eppie” - adjective - not confronting the problem - authorial comment - Eppie rich in love, nt money
- “he told himself that the time would come where he might do something towards furthering the welfare of Eppie” - procrastination - previously seen in not telling Squire
- “he felt a reformed man” - verb of appearance
- “delivered from temptation” “his future seemed a promise land” - biblical language - lying to himself
- “He would see that the child was well provided for. That was a father’s duty” - indirect free speech - irony - his duty was to care for her
- “why did his mind fly so easily to that void” - metaphor - childlessness - he brought it upon himself and now “life is not thoroughly joyous to him”
- “everything seems so blank to him” - divine justice
Godfrey - end of novel
Admits his wrongdoings after Eppie declines living with him and sees her dislike towards him as something he has deserved. He gains decisiveness and takes responsibility for his actions.
- “everything comes to light, sooner or later” - understands
- “It’s been ‘I will’ and ‘I won’t’ all my life. I want to make sure of myself now”
- “It’s too late to mend some things”
- “I want to do my duty” - irony - not the same duty as before
- “felt an irritation familiar to almost all of us when we encounter an unexpected obstacle” - irony - the obstacle was his daughter’s happiness
- “with a keen decisiveness of tone” - contrasts natural irresolution
Godfrey SHC
- lack of protection of children in Victorian era - G was the problem ,wanting Eppie to go to the workhouse
- Before 1857, divorce was managed by CofE which made it difficult
- marriage was unjust for women as the men could take all earnings and inheritance
- Class divides were strong during Napoleonic wars - MF
- Victorian writer Ruskin said men should have “gentleness and sympathy” towards women, which G didn’t to Molly
- Eliot married her husband Lewes in 1851, despite him trying to disentangle himself from previous relationship
