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Average Course Rating

This FYS will be devoted to reading a single work, often called the greatest English novel: George Eliot’s Middlemarch. It's a love story, and story about loving one's work; one of its protagonists is a scientist, the other an idealistic and passionate young woman. It's a novel that readers remember through their lives, and return to reread as their life changes. It's beautiful and the questions it raises continue to matter: What happens when love and your career conflict? How much are you willing to compromise your committments? How can you maintain your ideals when you also need to have an income? And how can stories help us understand, and perhaps change, a disappointing world? Our conversations will address these questions, try to understand why the novel is considered so highly, and reflect on how it speaks to our contemporary concerns. Students will be asked to read the novel with patience and energy and to write informal response papers.