Part 1 of Essay
e: women in the novels Middlemarch clearly defines the expectations and functions of middle and upper class women in nineteenth century England. It becomes immediately obvious that the woman is inferior in every way to the man and that the function of the wife is that described in the words of the marriage ceremony; "to lo ....

Part 2 of Essay
.... wife as a nurse". Mr Causabon married so as to secure "the solace of female tendance for his declining years". As with his work, causabon is disillusioned about his marriage. He had married Dorothea hoping for a quiet docile companion who could also function as his secretary. Instead, he finds a person who makes intellectual demands on him that he is unable to fulfil. His marriage can be added to his long list of failures of which he is aware but which he is unable to acknowledge fully. Similarly, in Pride and Pre ....