Daniel Deronda
BBC1, Saturday, November 23, 9-10.30pm
The BBC did Daniel Deronda in the 1970s, but George Eliot’s novel was due for the Andrew Davies treatment - which it will be getting over the next three Saturdays (without the scenes of sex and nudity that Davies usually slips in to remind us that the Victorians were at it, even if they didn’t write about it). The theme of how Daniel, adopted into the English upper class, is torn between two women in his search for his Jewish roots, may have appealed to Eliot as she felt rejected by society. A documentary on Sunday, George Eliot: a scandalous life (BBC1, 5.35-6.35pm) presents her as a determined outsider; yet the moral seriousness of her outlook marks her as a woman of her time. An intriguing Eliot package.