Some years ago I read Daniel Deronda on a whim. Two things, or rather two characters, in the novel left a lasting impression: the fervent Zionist Ezra Mordecai Cohen and Daniel Deronda's mother, a Jewish actress who gave her son up, so that she can continue her career on stage. More than anything, it tipped me off to the origin of Israel that predated WWII, even WWI.
I have not even finished reading Middlemarch, but some elements really blew me away with its modern resonance. It was written in 1871 and depicted an earlier period around 1830, so I never dreamed that I would see so many concerns that I had thought belonged strictly in the 20th century, at least.
First, one of the main characters, Dr. Lydgate, was a young physician trying to change the way medicine was practiced in the country. Not content with treating local patients for their common illnesses, his ambition was to do research and unravel the pathology of diseases. He had microscopes and experimental apparatuses at home and kept up with new scientific discoveries in the field from the Continent.
Moreover, he broke from the traditional practice of selling medicinal products (mostly tinctures and potions back then), because he recognized it as a type of conflict of interest. Physicians were incentivized to give patients their own concoctions because they could make more money selling medicines than diagnosing and caring for patients. Who cares if the medicines were effective?
Oh my God this is so modern. Neither concerns have been completely resolved in medicine today. We are still doing research and unraveling pathology of illnesses. We are still struggling with nudging physicians to do the ethical thing in the face of greed. Both remain front and center in medicine.
A second main character, Mr. Will Ladislaw, has an even more contemporary profession: campaign manager! I have never, ever seen this profession mentioned in classic literature, until "All the King's Men", which was published in 1946 in the United States. Ladislaw not only wrote speeches and opinion pieces in the partisan newspaper for his boss, Mr. Brooke, he also devised campaign strategy for him and coached him in his campaign!
Alas, poor Mr. Brooke liked to veer off script and blab to anyone "You have a point there." There is a hilarious campaign rally scene that could happen even today. At one point, Will and the doctor had an argument about whether a politician should be sincere and say what he believes in. The doctor, talking from a scientist's perspective, found Will's cynical approach of saying whatever to keep voters happy appalling. I almost fell out of the chair laughing.
I don't know why George Eliot was so much better at seeing the future than other novelists of the same period, but she seemed to have acute insights into social trends and political sentiment roiling underneath the surface. No, she was not writing about what is often called "universal and timeless human nature," whatever that means, but rather a prediction of the tides to come and wash us away in the new millennia. And she was spot on.
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