When I finished reading this story, I thought that Maggie spent tragic time. At first I thought that this story is Tom's tragic story. Actually Tom had tragedy. But Maggie had caught tragedy of love. This may be bigger problem than Tom. And the ending was... I was really surprised. ( )

Maggie's story is tragic, and the ending left me in tears. She was a character that acted impulsively, and drew my sympathies. Her brother Tom may have been annoying and sometimes cruel, but he was her connection to her past ... who she was, and with her in the end. The end...no longer divided, Maggie and Tom will be forever immortalized by unconditional love, despite their dysfunction. ( )

Ooh, what an abrupt ending! I hadn't read any George Eliot, to my shame, and found this on my bookshelf. I'm so glad I picked it up, I thoroughly enjoyed all her observations and explanations of character and actions - a really mature, inspiring piece of writing. And I laughed so often. I think my favourite passage is her take on destiny:

"'Character' - says Novalis, in on eof his questionable aphorisms - 'character is destiny.' But not the whole of our destiny. Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, was speculative and irresolute, and we have a great tragedy in consequence. But if his father had lived to good old age, and his uncle had died an early death, we can conceive Hamlet's having married Ophelia and got through life with a reputation of sanity notwithstanding many soliloquies, and some moody sarcasms towards the fair dughter of Polonius, to say nothing of the frankest incivility to his father-in law."

Eliot is a really generous writer. Tom is pretty reviled by some of the readers who have written reviews here, but I think that's unfair. Maggie's love can be pretty incomprehensible, towards Tom and more so towards Stephen Guest, who isn't drawn particularly clearly but doesn't seem to merit the devotion of either Maggie or Lucy. But Tom is drawn in great detail, and Bob's affection for him, Uncle Deane's respect for him and the aunts' frustration with hm together with his own pride and moodiness all make sense. How delightful that awful Aunt Glegg comes good at the end as well with regards to Maggie. And Philip's last letter to Maggie is a beautiful piece of sincerety, deep love and a tremendously powerful understanding of a strength of reasoning, introspection and thoughfulness that saves him (and everyone else) from his suicide. ( )

The Mill on the Floss details the isolation and evntaul death of Maggie Tulliver - a courageous, intelligent and likeable heroine too good for the narrow society she's condemned by, and certainly too good for her censorious, half-witted brother. ( )

Mind-numbingly dull. Someone had compared Eliot's style of writing to Dickens... I can only laugh at the very thought of this. The only reason I finished this book is because I wanted to know what happened to Maggie.I'll be donating this one to the local library. ( )