Gorgeous gift hardback edition with an introduction from Zadie Smith. Discover one of the most admired, best loved and influential novels in the history of English literature. The perfect long read to lose yourself in. "If we had a keen vision and feeling of all ordinary human life... " Dorothea is bright, beautiful and rebellious. Lydgate is the ambitious new doctor in town. Both of them long to make a positive difference in the world. But their stories do not proceed as expected and both they, and the other inhabitants of Middlemarch, must struggle to reconcile themselves to their fates and find their places in the world. Middlemarch contains all of life: the rich and the poor, the conventional and the radical, literature and science, politics and romance, but above all it gives us a vision of what lies within the human heart. VINTAGE CLASSICS 150th ANNIVERSARY EDITION George Eliot''s novel was first published in 8 installments, in an innovative new style of serialization. The earliest part, entitled Middlemarch, Book 1 - Miss Brooke, was published on December 1st 1871. It was an instant commercial and critical success, and continues to captivate readers 150 years later. **One of the BBC''s 100 Novels That Shaped Our World**