Brother and Sister, a little-known sonnet sequence; and eight Victorian reviews and responses, both published and unpublished, on the novel, including those by Henry James, Algernon Charles Swinburne, and John Ruskin.

The best-known and most autobiographical of George Eliot's novels is now available as a Norton Critical Edition. The text of The Mill ou the Floss is that of the 1862 third edition, the last far which Flinl made revisions. The text has been annotated in order to as sist the reader with obscure references and allusions.

"Backgrounds" includes fifteen letters from the 1859-69 perioc centering on the novel's content and composition; "Brother and Sister" (1869), a little-known sonnet sequence; and eight Victorian reviews and responses, both published and unpublished, on the novel, including those by Henry James, Algernon Charles Swinburne, and John Ruskin.

Judiciously chosen from the wealth of essays on The Mill on the Floss published in the twentieth centuu, "Criticism" includes ten ot the best studies on tile novel, providing the reader with both historical and critical perspective. Contributors include Leslie Stephen,Virginia Woolf, E P,. Leavis, George Levine, Ulrich Knoepflmacher,Philip Fisher, Mary Jacobus, John Kucich, Margaret Homans, and Deirdre David.

A Chronology and Selected Bibliography are also included.

Preface

The Text of The Mill on the Floss

Backgrounds and Contemporary Reactions

 Backgrounds

 Excerpts from Letters

 George Eliot·Brother and Sister

 Contemporary Reactions

 From Spectator, April 7, 1860

 From Saturday Review, April 14, 1860

 Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton to John Blackwood, April 14, 1860

 [E. S. Dallas]·From The Times, May 19, 1860

 [Dinah Mulock]·From Macmillan's Magazine, April 1861

 Henry James·The Novels of George Eliot

 Algernon Charles Swinburne·[The Flaw in The Mill on the Floss]

 John Ruskin·[The Vulgarity of The Mill on the Floss]

Criticism

 Leslie Stephen·[The Heroine of The Mill on the Floss]

 Virginia Woolf·George Eliot

 F. R. Leavis·The Early Phase

 George Levine·Intelligence as Deception: The Mill

 on the Floss

 U. C. Knoepflmacher·Tragedy and the Flux: The

 Mill on the Floss

 Philip Fisher·[Self and Community in The Mill on the Floss]

 Mary Jacobus·The Question of Language:

 Men of Maxims and The Mill on the Floss

 John Kucich·George Eliot and Objects:

 Meaning as Matter in The Mill on the Floss

 Margaret Homans·Eliot, Wordsworth,

 and the Scenes of the Sisters' Instruction

 Deirdre David·Maggie Tulliver's Desire

Chronology

Selected Bibliography