Silas Marner: the Jacqui's Room Notes

Silas Marner, in ten words:

Betrayed weaver counts gold.
Treasure stolen.
Child appears.
Love wins.


Two thoughts on Silas Marner:

1. Strong story, deep emotion, complex characters and relationships, and tons of tension. I actually very much enjoyed it. So much so that I pulled Middlemarch off the shelf and read the introduction. Phrases included: "completely different from Silas Marner," "difficult in many ways," and "despite the monotony of the beginning." I put it back.

2. Eliot was writing Romola, a sweeping history of the Italian Renaissance, when the story of Silas Marner, "thrust itself between me and the other book I was meditating." She stopped writing to whip off Silas Marner. I often say my best writing comes when I take a break to write a story that's "not the book I'm writing." I think a sense of freedom and relaxation of pressure come when we tell ourselves, "Oh, this is nothing." And that freedom can spark our best work. I wrote The New Girl...And Me (back then in was called Shakeeta's Iguana) on the train in Chicago, on my way downtown. I started my first chapter book on a whim waiting for my brake pads to be replaced. If you really want to have fun with your writing, tell yourself, "Nobody is ever going to read this," and see where your imagination brings you.