Mary Ann Evans, better known under her pseudonym ‘George Eliot’, was born 200 years ago in Chilvers Coton, Warwickshire (now part of Nuneaton). She lived in the area until she was 21, when the death of her father set her free to pursue her ambitions. Bicentenary celebrations have been taking place in and around Nuneaton throughout 2019. Funding has been secured for the museum, the library and the Herbert Art Gallery and Museum in nearby Coventry to create new exhibitions and visitor activities relating to Eliot’s life and works. The George Eliot Fellowship is constructing a ‘special trail’ of quotations displayed about the town (including her famous line of advice about reading: ‘Don’t judge a book by its cover.’).
What Evans would have made of all this we can only imagine. She paid her last trip to Warwickshire in 1855 when she was 36. She had just returned from her European ‘elopement’ with the married writer and critic George Henry Lewes. Her decision to live with him and style herself ‘Mrs Lewes’ caused a 25-year break with her brother Isaac and put a strain on old friendships. From that time on, she was in voluntary exile from Warwickshire. She could have gone back but chose not to.
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