Epilogue:

Abstract

While the prominence of drinking and drugs in George Eliot’s fiction reflects their importance in nineteenth-century culture, it also proves a personal expertise on these topics about which I and other scholars have speculated. In support of his point that ‘George Eliot would make a damn good doctor’ (64), J. W. Bennett cites the detailed accuracy of her portrayals of alcoholics in ‘Janet’s Repentance’: ‘We learn more about delirium tremens from George Eliot than from DMSdII-R /Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (61). In ‘Pink Toads in Lord Jim,’ Christopher Ricks also notes the accuracy of George Eliot’s knowledge of delirium tremens (143).