İngiliz Dili ve Edebiyatı Bölümü Tezleri

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The transformative potential of forgiveness in George Eliot's Scenes of Clerical Lie and Adam Bede
(2009) Coşkun, Behiye
Religion represents a profound influence on George Eliot‟s fiction, and on her life and career as a whole. Her attitude developed from a rigidly evangelical perspective during her youth towards an open-minded liberalism and a gradual embrace of the idea of empathy and care for others without expectation of religious reward. Many critics have explored the implications of George Eliot‟s theory of community. However, this thesis will show how she deploys Christian themes in her earliest work to explore human society. In particular it will focus on the redeeming power of forgiveness in her first two works, Scenes of Clerical Life and Adam Bede. Eliot emphasizes the importance of religion in helping people to forgive themselves or each other. She demonstrates Feuerbach‟s idea that moral development is a transition from a subjective, egoistic view of self and world to an objective, broader view. For Eliot, tragic suffering is necessary for people to move beyond their egoism. Though suffering, the abandonment of pride and a sense of community are all necessary for a person‟s moral redemption, these cannot be achieved without acts of forgiveness.