Other editions of book North and South: Penguin Classics

To celebrate the 200th anniversary of Elizabeth Gaskells birth we embark on a series of unabridged and abridged recordings of her major novels. North and South follows our widely-praised recording of Cranford (2008), transporting the listener to the heart of Victorian England by vividly delineating the social landscape and an unlikely romance which flourishes within it. Saddened to be leaving behind the sophistication of the South, Margaret Hale approaches her new life in the unrefined, industrialised North with dread. Appalled at the poverty, struggle, and mean conditions that surround her, her revulsion particularly centers on the factory owner John Thornton. Yet, when circumstances conspire to bring them together, Margaret begins to see past crude stereotypes. Conjuring up a fantastic sense of time and place, Gaskells novel of romantic suspense and changing perceptions, is a sheer delight in the hands of Manchester-born reader, Clare Wille.

North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell How is this book unique?Tablet and e-reader formattedOriginal & Unabridged EditionAuthor Biography includedIllustrated versionNorth 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.

When her father leaves the Church in a crisis of conscience, Margaret Hale is uprooted from her comfortable home in Hampshire to move with her family to the north of England. Initially repulsed by the ugliness of her new surroundings in the industrial town of Milton, Margaret becomes aware of the poverty and suffering of the local mill workers and develops a passionate sense of social justice. This is intensified by her tempestuous relationship with the mill-owner and self-made man, John Thornton, as their fierce opposition over his treatment of his employees masks a deeper attraction. In North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell skillfully fuses individual feeling with social concern, and in Margaret Hale creates one of the most original heroines of Victorian literature.

North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell How is this book unique?Tablet and e-reader formattedOriginal & Unabridged EditionAuthor Biography includedIllustrated versionNorth 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.

How is this book unique? Illustrations includedUnabridgedNorth 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.

First published in serial form in Household Words in 1854-1855 and in volume form in 1855. On its appearance in 'Household Words,' this tale was obliged to conform to the conditions imposed by the requirements of a weekly publication, and likewise to confine itself within certain advertised limits, in order that faith might be kept with the public. Although these conditions were made as light as they well could be, the author found it impossible to develope the story in the manner originally intended, and, more especially, was compelled to hurry on events with an improbable rapidity towards the close. In some degree to remedy this obvious defect, various short passages have been inserted, and several new chapters added. With this brief explanation, the tale is commended to the kindness of the reader;'Beseking hym lowly, of mercy and pite,Of its rude makyng to have compassion.'

About North and South by Elizabeth GaskellHow is this book unique?E-reader & tablet formatted, Font Adjustments100% Original contentUnabridged EditionAuthor Biography InsideIllustrations includedNorth 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 by Elizabeth Gaskell How is this book unique?Tablet and e-reader formattedOriginal & Unabridged EditionAuthor Biography includedIllustrated versionNorth 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.

It was curious how the presence of Mr. Thornton had power over Mr. Hale to make him unlock the secret thoughts which he kept shut up even from Margaret. Whether it was that her sympathy would be so keen, and show itself in so lively a manner, that he was afraid of the reaction upon himself, or whether it was that to his speculative mind all kinds of doubts presented themselves at such a time, pleading and crying aloud to be resolved into certainties, and that he knew she would have shrunk from the expression of any such doubts-nay, from him himself as capable of conceiving them-whatever was the reason, he could unburden himself better to Mr. Thornton than to her of all the thoughts and fancies and fears that had been frost-bound in his brain till now. -from Chapter XXXV: "Expiation" As interest in 19th-century English literature by women has been reinvigorated by a resurgence in popularity of the works of Jane Austen, readers are rediscovering a writer whose fiction, once widely beloved, fell by the wayside. British novelist ELIZABETH CLEGHORN GASKELL (1810-1865)-whose books were sometimes initially credited to, simply, "Mrs. Gaskell"-is now recognized as having created some of the most complex and broadminded depictions of women in the literature of the age, and is today justly celebrated for her precocious use of the regional dialect and slang of England's industrial North. North and South-Gaskell's fourth novel, which was originally serialized in 1854 and 1855 in the periodical Household Words, edited by Gaskell's friend Charles Dickens-draws on Gaskell's own life as the wife of a progressive preacher in Manchester for its tale of the tumultuous romance between a minister's daughter and a wealthy mill owner. The plight of the poor as well as the class divisions of the era come to the fore here, and helped establish the author's reputation as a champion of the working class. Adapted as an acclaimed 2004 BBC miniseries, this is perhaps Gaskell's most beloved work. Friend and literary companion to such figures as Charlotte Brontë-of whom Gaskell wrote an applauded 1857 biography-Gaskell is today being restored to her rightful place alongside her. This delightful new edition is an excellent opportunity for 21st-century fans of British literature to embrace one of its most unjustly forgotten authors.

To celebrate the 200th anniversary of Elizabeth Gaskells birth we embark on a series of unabridged and abridged recordings of her major novels. North and South follows our widely-praised recording of Cranford (2008), transporting the listener to the heart of Victorian England by vividly delineating the social landscape and an unlikely romance which flourishes within it. Saddened to be leaving behind the sophistication of the South, Margaret Hale approaches her new life in the unrefined, industrialised North with dread. Appalled at the poverty, struggle, and mean conditions that surround her, her revulsion particularly centers on the factory owner John Thornton. Yet, when circumstances conspire to bring them together, Margaret begins to see past crude stereotypes. Conjuring up a fantastic sense of time and place, Gaskells novel of romantic suspense and changing perceptions, is a sheer delight in the hands of Manchester-born reader, Clare Wille.