Books with author Elizabeth C. Gaskell

*This Book is annotated (it contains a detailed biography of the author). *An active Table of Contents has been added by the publisher for a better customer experience. *This book has been checked and corrected for spelling errors.Ruth is a novel by Elizabeth Gaskell, first published in three volumes in 1853.Ruth is a young orphan girl working in a respectable sweatshop for the overworked Mrs Mason. She is selected to go to a ball to repair torn dresses. At the ball she meets the aristocratic Henry Bellingham, a rake figure who is instantly attracted to her. They meet again by chance and form a secret friendship; on an outing together they are spotted by Mrs Mason who, fearing for her shop's reputation, dismisses Ruth.Alone in the world, Ruth is whisked away by Bellingham to London where it is implied she becomes a fallen woman. They go on holiday to Wales together and there on a country walk Ruth meets the disabled and kind Mr Benson. Bellingham falls sick with fever and the hotel calls for his mother who arrives and is disgusted by her son's having lived in sin with Ruth. Bellingham is persuaded by his mother to abandon Ruth in Wales, leaving her some money.A distraught Ruth attempts suicide but is spotted by Mr Benson who helps comfort her. When he learns of her past and that she is alone he brings her back to his home town, where he is a Dissenting minister, to stay with him and his formidable but kind sister Faith. When they learn that Ruth is pregnant they decide to lie to the town and claim that she is a widow called Mrs Denbigh, to protect her from a society which would otherwise shun her.

Having grown up in London and rural southern England, Margaret Hale moves with her father to the northern industrial city of Milton. She is shocked by the poverty she encounters and dismayed by the unsympathetic attitude of the textile-mill owner John Thornton, whose factory workers are engaged in an acrimonious strike. Against this backdrop of social unrest, the relationship between the two is tumultuous, and it takes further upheaval and tragedy for them to see each other in a different light.First serialized in Dickens's magazine Household Words in the same period as Hard Times, North and South shares its famous counterpart's concern with the inequality and hardship generated by the Industrial Revolution in northern England, while at the same time creating one of the nineteenth century's most memorable and engaging female protagonists in Margaret Hale.

Elizabeth Gaskell's wonderfully atmospheric tale depicts life in the fictional town of Cranford where Mary Smith and her friends the spinster sisters Miss Matty and Miss Deborah live. Their experiences of the innumerable events that unfold are narrated with Gaskell's brilliantly fluid prose that draws the reader deep into this absorbing novel. Just as accessible and enjoyable for today's modern readers as it would have been when first published well over 150 years ago, the novel is one of the great works of English literature and continues to be widely read throughout the world.This meticulous digital edition from Heritage Illustrated Publishing is a faithful reproduction of the original text and is beautifully illustrated with a number of delightful sketches that accompanied early editions of the novel.

How is this book unique?Font adjustments & biography includedUnabridged (100% Original content)Formatted for e-readerIllustratedAbout North and South by Elizabeth GaskellNorth and South is a social novel by English writer Elizabeth Gaskell. Along with Wives and Daughters (1865) and Cranford (1853), it is one of her best known novels and has been adapted for television twice, in 1975 and 2004. The latter version renewed interest in the novel and gained it a wider audience. Whereas Gaskell's first novel Mary Barton (1848) views relations between employers and workers from the perspective of the working poor, North and South is more balanced, focusing as well on the thinking of the employers. North and South is set in the fictional industrial town of Milton in the North of England. Forced to leave her home in the tranquil rural south, Margaret Hale settles with her parents in Milton where she witnesses the brutal world wrought by the industrial revolution and employers and workers clashing in the first organised strikes. Sympathetic to the poor whose courage and tenacity she admires and among whom she makes friends, she clashes with John Thornton, a cotton mill manufacturer who belongs to the nouveaux riches and whose contemptuous attitude to workers Margaret despises. Gaskell based Milton on Manchester, where she lived as the wife of a Unitarian minister.

"North and South" is Elizabeth Gaskell's 1854 novel that contrasts the different ways of life in the two respective regions of England. In the North the emerging industrialized society is sharply contrasted with the aging gentry of the agrarian based South. The plot of "North and South" centers around the main character Margaret Hale, the daughter of a non-conformist minister who moves his family to an industrial town in the North after a split from the Church of England. With important underlying social themes, North and South stands out as one of the greatest novels in the history of English literature.

A sensitive and moving portrait of a Victorian town, captured at a transitional period in English society, Cranford first appeared serially in Charles Dickens's magazine Household Words from 1851 to 1853, and in book form in 1853. Author Elizabeth Gaskell situated her stories in a hamlet very like the one in which she grew up, and her affectionate but unsentimental portraits of the residents of Cranford offer a realistic view of life and manners in an English country village during the 1830s.Cranford recounts the events and activities in the loves of a group of spinsters and widows who struggle in genteel poverty to maintain their standards of propriety, decency, and kindness. Tales of the heroism and self-sacrifice of Captain Brown, the surprisingly betrothal of Lady Glenmire, and the future for pretty but poor Miss Jessie support a web of subtle but serious themes that include the movement from aristocratic to middle-class values, the separate spheres and diverse experiences of men and women, and the curious coexistence of customs old and new in a changing society.Often referred to as Mrs. Gaskell, the author preferred Cranford to all her other works, which include a popular biography of her friend Charlotte Brontë. Praised by Charles Dickens as "delightful, and touched with the most tender and delicate manner," the novel remains a favorite with students and aficionados of nineteenth-century literature.

With an Introduction and Notes by Dr Patsy Stoneman, University of Hull Set in the mid-19th century, and written from the author's first-hand experience, North and South follows the story of the heroine's movement from the tranquil but moribund ways of southern England to the vital but turbulent north. Elizabeth Gaskell's skilful narrative uses an unusual love story to show how personal and public lives were woven together in a newly industrial society. This is a tale of hard-won triumphs - of rational thought over prejudice and of humane care over blind deference to the market. Readers in the twenty-first century will find themselves absorbed as this Victorian novel traces the origins of problems and possibilities which are still challenging a hundred and fifty years later: the complex relationships, public and private, between men and women of different classes.

A tragic affair blooms between a working-class orphan and a wealthy rake in this classic novel of Victorian England. Although Ruth Hilton is kind, life does not treat her kindly in return. An orphaned young seamstress, she works long hours at a sweatshop in a small English town. When she is sent to a fancy ball to repair the ladies’ dresses, she catches the eye of a gentleman, Henry Bellingham. Falling for Henry leads to the loss of her job and her home, and Ruth quickly finds herself raising a child alone. Overcome with grief and shame, she must now make her way in a world where society has turned its back on her and all she can rely on is hope. A moving novel from the author of North and South and Mary Barton, Ruth offers a unique look at British life during the mid-nineteenth century.

Use Amazon's Lookinside feature to compare this edition with others. Compelled to leave her home in rural southern England, Margaret Hale moves with her parents to the industrial town of Milton in the north. Here she is exposed to the brutality wrought by the Industrial Revolution, where the clash of striking workers and their employers begins to result in violence. Margaret sympathizes with the workers and makes it her mission to improve their lives. But she soon finds herself in conflict with the man she is falling in love with - the headstrong and handsome industrialist John Thornton.