I have read George Eliot’s works, but I did not know much about her life. This biography shows that George Eliot lived a fascinating life. Thus, this was a very comprehensive and balanced biography of an accomplished woman. This biography shows that she was one of the best female writers of her age!

I found this book disappointing as it was less a biography of George Eliot and more of the author's journey and connection to the writer. It was not what I expected and I gave up reading it as I had no interest in following the travels of the author in her car.

Something of a trailblazer in her time, George Eliot was an exceptional author and this book delivers a view of her life which is well researched and very well written. I gained a perspective which I hadn't known before and I would recommend this book to students of literature or anyone interested in the authors of this period. My grateful thanks to Netgalley, the publishers and the author for an ARC of this valuable contribution to literature.

This was an interesting biography of an interesting woman. She was such an anomaly of her time. So ensconced in and yet challenging the mores and expectations of what a woman was during the Victorian period.

The real George Eliot, was of course, Mary Ann Evans. Today, she is acknowledged as one of the greatest novelists who ever lived, but at the time she wrote her novels a male pseudonym was necessary to overcome Victorian prejudice.
Lisa Tippings is passionate about George Eliot's work and writes with integrity, including reviews of the novels, her female protagonists, and even goes in search of the author's home.
Sadly today George Eliot is not as widely read as she should be. Hopefully this superb book and at least one new TV adaptation of Middlemarch coming soon will lead to a revival of interest.

I love George Eliot and enjoyed this book, I felt the author gave a good overview of her life and took a considered approach - the structure was a little confusing in places but nonetheless enjoyable. If you haven't previously read Eliot's work this book is a great motivation to do so!

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the advanced copy

This book is brilliantly written and very well researched. Unfortunately for me I just couldn’t quite engage with the authors style but that is simply personal preference.

Admission: I didn't "get" why Middlemarch was considered such a classic back in 1974 when I read it for a "Women in Literature" seminar in college. I knew one had to read Eliot and I found the little I knew about her interesting. I'm sure I read an article about Eliot to supplement the novel. But I found it hard going. At some point, I read Silas Marner and found that more to my liking, but I would not say I was a fan of Eliot's writing, so much as a fan of Eliot the person. So, I was drawn to this recent biography and was pleased that it was an engaging read, portraying Eliot from many perspectives, including her letters, her journals, the social context of her life as a woman of intellect in the 19th Century, and of course, her body of work. Tippings organized the parts/chapters of the book into subsections, making it an enjoyable, cohesive read. It is particularly interesting to me that Eliot persisted through periods of obvious depression and serious physical debilitation such as migraine, to engage with others in deep friendships, to travel, to earn a living as an editor, translator, and article writer before turning to novels later in life and to live a highly unconventional life with a married man who was unable to procure a divorce. I enjoyed in particular the integration of pieces of her work into the reflections on her life. I also appreciated Tippings' balanced evaluation of Eliot. Yes, she was a nonconformist in her lifestyle, but she was also a woman of her time. Thus, her work and her life reflect many accepted norms of the Victorian era yet makes one think about why people defy those norms. Her novels ask us to reflect more and perhaps to judge less. Somewhere, my copy of Middlemarch sits on a shelf at home. Tippings, and her subject, inspire me to give it another go. Well done. Read this book.

Well researched. Tippings's work is easy to follow, engaging, and surprisingly, packed with information that I did not know.
Far from being dry like some bios can be, I think this work is one that is not just for those interested in the time period, or the author, but anyone interested in interesting females and wanting to gain and expand their general knowledge,

Thank you NetGalley and Publisher for the dARC in exchange for my honest review.

I desperately tried to read this book. However it is such a mix of Eliot biography, Eliot literary analysis, and author’s memoir that I could not focus. Everything mixed too much and it all came out less about Eliot’s life and more about the author’s connection to Eliot.

Lisa Tippings, The Real George Eliot, Pen & Sword History, 2021.
Thank you NetGalley for providing me with The Real George Eliot uncorrected proof in exchange for an honest review.

When I read the introduction to this book, I felt a surge of enthusiasm for Lisa Tippings’ similar enthusiastic embrace of her material, evidenced by her early introduction to George Eliot’s work, her journeys to relevant sites and her commentary on the early stages of her research. She begins with a George Eliot quote from Middlemarch, ‘What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult to each other?’ Following is a warm introduction to Lisa Tippings, her Welsh childhood, including watching BBC costume dramas, and the way in which her imagination was caught by Maggie Tulliver, and remembered discussions unhampered by academic demands. Then, the travelling associated with the work – including Nuneaton, The Red Lion (Bull Inn), The George Eliot Hotel, the George Eliot statue in Newdegate Square, Arbury Hall (closed) and Astley. All these locations are beautifully realised so that the reader joins Tippings’ journey into the life of George Elliot.
Lisa Tipping’s exultation at having no academic instruction in studying George Eliot is justified in that the free discussion of George Eliot with similarly free lovers of the writer and her work shows in the way she engages with the novels. The book resonates with telling quotes, ensuring that the voice of George Eliot is never far from the page.

However, there is a downside, unfortunately. The quotes are cited with only a reference to the title of the work. There are no publication dates, publisher, or page numbers cited. This lack of academic endeavour is also reflected in references to ‘feminists’ who have criticised various of George Eliot’s stances – who were they? When were their criticisms aired? How were their arguments presented? Do the criticisms resonate with literary critics? The women’s movement of the 1970s? Later women’s political stances? To give readers the opportunity to fully engage with the cited works and debates about an important aspect of George Eliot’s biography and its reception such references need to be given.

Various additional writers are quoted. Sometimes they are relevant, at others they seem to be superfluous to the central theme as stated at the beginning of this book: ‘A biography of the writer, a study of the towns and houses in which she lived, and an introduction to the readers she continues to inspire’. At times I found the other writers quite distracting, and this might be why I felt that the material needed better organisation. The chapter descriptions are quite clear, however that clarity is not readily apparent throughout the book. Unlike the way in which Tippings weaves George Eliot’s own writings into the ideas she expresses, the introduction of other writers, and in particular quotes from their books, sometimes seem extraneous.

For example, the reference Charlotte Gilman’s theme in The Yellow Wallpaper, is enough without Charlotte Gilman’s voice joining that of George Eliot and Tipping. As an aside, I would like to point out that Tippings’ understanding of the feminist nature of the work is extremely perceptive, and this perceptiveness is reflected in the way in which she interprets George Eliot’s work and life. The various love affairs, while to the uninformed eye seem quite erratic and difficult to understand, are shown to be an almost logical outcome of George Eliot’s childhood, relationships with her siblings and human desire to have a partner. Through Tippings’ acute observations she appears to be quite without guile, keen to have paid work – and as keen to have a loving partner.

I have mixed feelings about this book. The photographs are enlightening and travelling as did Lisa Tipping could well be a joyful addition to reading this life of George Eliot. There is an index; references, including non-fiction, primary sources, and fiction. However, the lack of citations is a problem. I think that an academic looking for material on George Eliot would want more. That might apply to the non-academic reader also. They could well want to follow up on the quotes provided and there is little help in doing so. On the other hand, do I know more about George Eliot than I did before reading The Real George Eliot? Yes, I do.

I have had to give it only three stars because that is the system. However, I would prefer to record my rating as three and a half stars.

An interesting account of a life which hit the right balance between providing facts and making the book a story. At times I thought the pace could have been picked up a bit and some parts of her life got less attention than others which seemed slightly less relevant to a book trying to bring Eliot “to life” but overall a really great study.

Very disappointing. The interesting bits of biographical Information (that are easily obtained in other publications) are completely overshadowed by a disorganized conglomerate of minimally relevant thoughts, book excerpts, poetry and quotes from George Eliot’s contemporaries, and frustrating miniature essays of analysis that read like freshman Introduction to Literature assignments. The overwriting becomes difficult to endure in places. The best result of my picking up this book is that it has encouraged me to seek out a proper biography that is researched, organized, and documented credibly.

George Eliot is one of my most beloved authors of all time and a person I would dearly love to meet. Like the author of this book, Victorian times enamour me and my thirst for knowledge of this era is vast. Reading this book was such an honour. Tippings goes on a journey of her own to Nuneaton to discover more about Eliot's life. Though I have been to Nuneaton to see Eliot's statue I was unaware of other landmarks. This book is about Eliot's fascinating life from childhood to her death and includes many excerpts from her books to highlight points such as women's roles in society, religion and relationships.

When writing Mary Ann Evans took on the male pseudonym of George Eliot. Very unusual for her time, Eliot describes domestic abuse in her book Janet's Repentance. Not only was such abuse not talked about, it certainly was not written about. But Eliot wrote with realism and did not gloss over difficult topics, nor did she wish for the endings of her books to be unrealistically happy. This is one of the things I appreciate most about her. She was also a thinker and wanted her readers to think and learn. In Silas Marner she writes about religious differences and discord, also seen by some to be controversial. Her descriptions of nature and insight into human nature are incredible. She was known for her cleverness and intelligence which is obvious in her writing. Very interesting especially in times where women were dependent on men for everything, including money and property. After the death of her mother, Eliot nursed her father through his chronic illnesses and after his death she inherited a pittance compared with her brothers which was common then but disappointing.

Eliot's most autobiographical book is The Mill on the Floss. Her life was not easy with tragedy after tragedy. Her governess influenced her early on to become an Evangelical Christian but she later questioned and changed her belief, much to the chagrin of her father. She had bouts of depression and needed to earn her own income which was a worry, though she earned money through writing. In one of my favourite books of hers, Adam Bede, she writes about fallen women, another shunned topic in the Victorian era. In middle age she lived with her soul mate Lewes whom she considered to be married to and later after his death married John Cross. Eliot was also a keen traveler and adventurer, something I can relate to.

This book is breathtaking in its information. The photographs are a lovely addition and allowed me to re-live my travels to the area. Those passionate about George Eliot absolutely must read this book and for those who wish to learn more about her and the era in general definitely ought to as well.

My sincere thank you to Pen & Sword for the privilege of reading the eARC of this stellar book!