What is Meaning?

Meaning is not something you stumble across, like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life – out of your past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something. You are the only one who can put these ingredients together into that unique pattern that will be your life. Let it be one that has dignity and meaning for you. If it does, then the particular balance of success and failure is of less account.
- John W. Gardner


In George Eliot’s novel Silas Marner, the principal character is a lonely and miserly lilen-weaver named Silas Marner. Life has been cruel to Silas, and because of this, Silas is forced to emigrate to Raveloe. Silas, now an eccentric visionary, finds himself a lone alien in his new village. Taking refuge in his work, Silas slowly begins to accumulate gold. Wealth becomes his on...