Silas Marner Research Paper

A person’s life is affected by chance events that are unavoidable. The events that happen to a person are fate and cannot be prevented by their actions. Some men will have unfortunate events in their life, and the incidents will change them into a new person. In Silas Marner by George Eliot, Silas’s life is full of unfortunate occurrences that shape him into the person he is. He thinks he has nothing; although he loses what he once found precious, his lost love is replaced with a new human connection.

Many influential writers have been born in England. George Eliot is no exception; she was born in Nuneaton, England on November 22, 1819 (“Eliot”). Eliot was born into a strict religious family. She was forced to learn and it soon made her reject

Silas Marner has something to replace his love for the gold; he has a child come into his life. The child wanders in unnoticed, “But where was Silas Marner when this stranger entered his home? During the last few weeks since he lost his money, he had contracted the habit of opening the door and looking out time to time to see if the money or clues to his gold’s disappearance will come back to him” (Eliot 111). This child does not know, but she will soon be Silas’s happiness. The child, Eppie, fills his longing for the gold, but it is a very slim chance that he woud find her; it is actually she who found him. When Silas’s life is full of these chance events and this is only one of them; “His money is taken; Eppie arrives, through the operation of forces that he venerates without comprehending” (Holloway). When these different events happen he believes that it is just luck, but it is his fate to lose and then regain his happiness to make him appreciate his human connection with his new daughter. The way that Marner’s life is affected by these chance events is remarkable; he loses something important to him but later regains something better. He is turned into a new man after Eppie arrives, “His pain was turned into happiness by the chance of Eppie arriving” (Hawes 95). Eppie replaces his longing for the gold that is stolen; she soon fills this void and is valued more then the gold originally is to him.

The way he soon is able to love Eppie is remarkable because of how much he longed for the gold, “His love for Eppie eventually negates his bad fortune” (Sonstroem). The chance that Silas will be able to feel so strongly about Eppie is very small considering the longing he had for his lost possession. Silas overlooked that another more important person or item could replace the void he had from the missing gold. When he is grieving from his loss of the gold, he does not think to try and further regain his happiness in another form. Silas is able to replace this loss in another way; “He replaces his love for gold for his love for his daughter” (Hawes 94). The way that Silas changes his grieving to hopefulness with this new excitement and loving relationship he has made. When Eppie arrived, he wanted to make her his daughter so no other person will take care of the girl because Silas is her father in his eyes. He does not want a chance to lose the girl or her companionship so he made her his only, without letting others be there to raise her. He soon will be a happier man because Silas attains redemption for his happiness by adopting Eppie (Hawes 94). By adopting Eppie, Silas recovers his happiness and the love that he lost once the gold is stolen. The chance that Silas will be able to adopt Eppie and regain his happiness is very slim,