Ms. George Eliot

I have fallen in love with and adopted as my own the quote: "It is never too late to be what you might have been."

That is because I have too much "too late" and not enough "to be" in my life.

But I ain't done yet, Bubba.

I had to check out the originator of this comment and found it to be George Eliot. I figured George Eliot had to be a pretty cool guy.

Until I found out that George Eliot was the pen name of Mary Ann Evans. Then I became even more impressed.

Mary Ann Evans was one of the leading English novelists of the 19th century. "Her novels, most famously "Middlemarch", are celebrated for their realism and psychological insights."

I did not know this. I got the info from a BBC history page, hence the quotes.

She also wrote Silas Marner, a novel I am aware of but have never read.

How could I not know this? I can't know everything but when it comes to literature I expect to know everything.

How silly of me.

Maybe you are laughing at me saying "For Christ sake, Joe, everybody knows that." Like those Geico ads, of which the only good one is the Old Macdonald one. The way that dude adds EIEIO to the end of cow and the way he says dagnabit when he is disqualified..................makes me smile every time.

Evans took the George Eliot pen name because female writers in the 19th century were associated with romantic novels and apparently her novels had more meat to them. She wanted to be taken seriously.

Pretty ballsy.

She began her career submitting pieces to the 'Westminster Review', a leading journal for philosophical radicals. She eventually wrote six novels.

As a successful writer, her and her husband's home became a meeting place for writers and intellectuals.

This concept has always fascinated me. The idea of creative and intelligent people meeting to exchange ideas, to inspire and critique each other, seems so cool. There were the ex-pats in Paris, of which Gary Handley was not one but could have easily fit in with his intellect and furious wit. There was The Algonquin Round Table. Etc.

When Mary Ann Evans husband died, she married a friend twenty years her junior.

This woman was a rebel, she was a free thinker, and she was talented.

She lived from 1819 to 1880.

I am going to try to summon her spirit tonight over the pinecone and lime scented Yankee Candle that I bought yesterday.

And in a related incident, here are some great quotes from members of The Algonquin Round Table:

Robert Sherwood, reviewing cowboy hero Tom Mix: "They say he rides as if he were part of the horse, but they don't say which part."

Dorothy Parker: "That woman speaks eighteen languages and can't say "no" in any of them."

George S. Kaufman: Once when asked by a press agent, "How do I get my leading lady's name into your newspaper?" Kaufman replied: "Shoot her."