The isolated, misanthropic, miserly weaver Silas Marner is one of George Eliot's greatest creations, and his presence casts a strange, otherworldly glow over the moral dramas, both large and small, that take place in the pastoral landscape that surrounds him. Part beautifully realized rural portraiture and part fairy tale, the story of Marner's redemption and restoration to humaity has long been George Eliot's most beloved and widely read work.