Silas Marner Lantern Yard-Community
SILAS MARNER
LANTERN YARD—COMMUNITY
1. p14, “His life, before he came to Raveloe, had been filled with the movement, the mental activity, and the close fellowship, which in that day as in this, marked the life of an artisan early incorporated in a narrow religious sect” ( Setting: Lantern Yard is imbued with a sense of idleness, faith, morality and kindness. It sounds like the paragon of a small, rustic British village.
2. p15, “Among the members of his church there was one young man, a little older than himself, with whom he had long lived in such close friendship that it was the custom of their Lantern Yard brethren to call them David and Jonathan.” ( Relationships- wise: “Silas was highly thought of in that little hidden community” (p14). The community seems very close
3. p14, “that little hidden community” ( Diction: “little”, “hidden”; George Eliot also refers to it as “obscure religious life” (p19) ( It shows how physically isolated Lantern Yard is ( Shows rigidness of mentality, and might imply that the physical isolation caused Lantern Yard to be still using such obscure, ridiculous methods instead of more astute ones—their way of finding out the “truth” is by “praying and drawing lots” (p19)
4. p19, “the lots declared that Silas Marner was guilty” ( the community is so religious—herd mentality (perhaps??) ( Religion is so revered and upheld that there is no room for contradiction—to contradict it or to declare it wrong would be considered “blasphemy” (refer to p20, “there was a general shudder at this blasphemy”. ) ( Can Lantern Yard still be considered a community? Physically, yes—but emotionally wise? Cross reference to point 2. (A community which at first regarded Silas as a “young man of exemplary life and ardent faith”(p14), and “Marner was highly thought of in that little hidden world” (p14), and yet later turn their backs on him just as easily; that “community” seems to be rather
LANTERN YARD—COMMUNITY
1. p14, “His life, before he came to Raveloe, had been filled with the movement, the mental activity, and the close fellowship, which in that day as in this, marked the life of an artisan early incorporated in a narrow religious sect” ( Setting: Lantern Yard is imbued with a sense of idleness, faith, morality and kindness. It sounds like the paragon of a small, rustic British village.
2. p15, “Among the members of his church there was one young man, a little older than himself, with whom he had long lived in such close friendship that it was the custom of their Lantern Yard brethren to call them David and Jonathan.” ( Relationships- wise: “Silas was highly thought of in that little hidden community” (p14). The community seems very close
3. p14, “that little hidden community” ( Diction: “little”, “hidden”; George Eliot also refers to it as “obscure religious life” (p19) ( It shows how physically isolated Lantern Yard is ( Shows rigidness of mentality, and might imply that the physical isolation caused Lantern Yard to be still using such obscure, ridiculous methods instead of more astute ones—their way of finding out the “truth” is by “praying and drawing lots” (p19)
4. p19, “the lots declared that Silas Marner was guilty” ( the community is so religious—herd mentality (perhaps??) ( Religion is so revered and upheld that there is no room for contradiction—to contradict it or to declare it wrong would be considered “blasphemy” (refer to p20, “there was a general shudder at this blasphemy”. ) ( Can Lantern Yard still be considered a community? Physically, yes—but emotionally wise? Cross reference to point 2. (A community which at first regarded Silas as a “young man of exemplary life and ardent faith”(p14), and “Marner was highly thought of in that little hidden world” (p14), and yet later turn their backs on him just as easily; that “community” seems to be rather