A month ago it suddenly seemed like ton of people on Substack seemed to be reading Middlemarch, and since I’d bought a copy last year at The Portobello Bookshop, I gave in and jumped on the bandwagon though bandwagons are typically not my kind of thing.
My (certainly incomplete) theory about why Middlemarch suddenly became popular is that the plot has a little of everything— political drama, romantic drama, work drama, family drama, backstabbing, humiliation, unrequited love, loads of gossiping locals, a romantic but demented scene taking place during a sudden thunderstorm, and at least two rich men finding ways to fuck things up even from beyond the grave. This is one of the reasons so many people re-read Middlemarch, which, in turn, could be why so many are Middlemarching right now. It’s also full of absolute zingers (I was laughing and gasping at lot more than expected) and the language is a big ice cream sundae at all times, and since it’s over 800 pages you can just get in and fo…