So, we've been thinking of putting together a television pilot—Law and Order: Hayslope—but how would we stretch an Adam Bede-themed crime drama beyond an episode or two? Only one crime—Hetty's child murder—actually takes place.
Still, Eliot knows how to turn up the tension (and keep you flipping those pages) during Hetty's trial. But Eliot is up to something bigger, too. Hetty isn't absolutely alone in violating civilization's rules. Other characters in the novel—including Arthur and Adam—fight against their worst instincts. No, Adam Bede isn't a criminal dystopia. But it is a novel that examines how even upright, complex people must keep their lawbreaking impulses under control.
Questions About Criminality
- Who is mostly to blame for the fate of Hetty's child? Hetty? Arthur? Society? Or is this a situation with a terrible crime and no real criminals?
- At different times, Hetty, Adam, and Arthur all act outside the norms of English society. Is Eliot trying to tell us that all people are potential criminals? Or simply that tense situations bring out the worst in human nature?
- How did you feel about Hetty's exile and death? Was this a just fate, or simply a source of additional and unnecessary suffering?
Chew on This
The criminal acts in Adam Bede are never elaborately planned. By depicting criminality as something brutal and spontaneous, Eliot shows just how far her "realist" characters are from the sensationally cunning villains of earlier literature.
Hetty is consistently depicted in a manner meant to arouse compassion. She is the most extreme and daring expression of the principles of sympathy and understanding that Eliot endorses throughout Adam Bede.