LIST OF CHARACTERS

Major Characters

Dorothea Brooke

A young, lovely and willful girl who, at the start, is desperate to break out of her humdrum cozy life and acquire some lofty knowledge as also to do something socially useful. The novel traces her struggle for fulfillment.

Edward Casaubon

An elderly, rich clergyman of around fifty years. He is interested more in research than in preaching and is involved in a voluminous research work. Surprised at her interest in him, Casaubon marries Dorothea, believing she will be a docile helpmate in his old age. His frustration and insecurity create much of the tension in the early pass of the novel.

Tertius Lydgate

A young dedicated doctor keen to improve methods of treatment for the public, and to do pioneering research in biology. Himself an orphan with no financial support, he is still welt connected and has expensive tastes, a dangerous contradiction in his nature.

Rosamond Vincy

The young beautiful and superficial daughter of a Middlemarch manufacturer. She has been educated at an establishment for "ladies" and means to marry a member of the gentry who will carry her into a higher class. Identifying Lydgate as a rich person, she marries him, leading to the distraction of his goals, and their mutual unhappiness.

A plain, lively and outspoken girl, Mary is the young daughter of Caleb and Susan Garth, a couple noted for their hard work, intelligence, and honesty. They are poor, and Mary has to work for her living as housekeeper in the house of Peter Featherstone, an old rich misses.

Fred Vincy

RosamondÂ’s elder brother, he is an attractive easy-going, pampered young man. He too has been educated as a "gentleman" and intended to join the clergy. He looks forward to an easy life, hoping to inherit the bulk of his uncle FeatherstoneÂ’s property. FredÂ’s saving grace is his faithful love for Mary, his childhood sweetheart and his respect and affection for her father.

Nicholas Bulstrode

An elderly banker, a pillar of Middlemarch society. Having been a deeply religious Dissenter in his youth, he still has claims to piety and believes that his prosperity is based on GodÂ’s favor. Both because of his pious ways and his constant attempts to control business in the town he is very unpopular. But he has a genuine desire to set up a modern medical facility in the town, with Lydgate as its head.

Will Ladislaw

The attractive artistic young cousin of Casaubon, he has been supported by the latter in his education. But the two dislike each other. He becomes friendly with Dorothea, arousing CasaubonÂ’s jealousy. In spite of CasaubonÂ’s desperate efforts to keep them apart, they finally marry after his death. Will becomes a journalist and activist for social reform. He turns out to have a connection with BalustradeÂ’s murky past.

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