'The important work of moving the world forward'

 “It’s never too late to be who you might have been.” – George Eliot

 

 Born in England on this date in 1819, Mary Ann Evans realized early in her career that if she was going to be taken seriously as a novelist she needed to change her identity.   While women did write under their own names during her lifetime, she said she used a male pen name to escape the stereotype of women only writing lighthearted romances. She also wished to have her fiction judged separately from her already extensive and widely known work as an editor and critic. 

 

 So, she became George Eliot, regarded as one of the best novelists of the 19^th Century, authoring such classics as Mill on the Floss and Silas Marner – known for their realism and psychological insights.   Self-taught, she was the first female writer for The Westminster Review, starting in 1850 and becoming assistant editor in 1851.   By the time she started writing novels she was pretty much running the magazine, contributing many essays and reviews, something she continued even after her success with creative fiction.

 

“The important work of moving the world forward," she said, "does not have to wait to be done by perfect men.”