Elizabeth Gaskell

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Standard Name: Gaskell, Elizabeth
Birth Name: Elizabeth Cleghorn Stevenson
Nickname: Lily
Married Name: Elizabeth Gaskell
Indexed Name: Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
Pseudonym: Cotton Mather Mills
Pseudonym: The Author of Mary Barton etc.
Self-constructed Name: E. C. Gaskell
Elizabeth Gaskell , one of the foremost fiction-writers of the mid-Victorian period, produced a corpus of seven novels, numerous short stories, and a controversial biography of Charlotte Brontë . She wrote extensively for periodicals, as well as producing novels directly for the book market, often on issues of burning interest: her industrial novels appeared in the midst of fierce debate over class relations, factory conditions and legislation; Ruth took a fallen woman and mother as its protagonist just as middle-class feminist critique of gender roles emerged. Gaskell occupies a bridging position between Harriet Martineau and George Eliot in the development of the domestic novel.

Connections

Connections Sort ascending Author name Excerpt
Travel Mary Howitt
During their first year in Germany, the Howitts went on a tour along the Rhine, on which they were accompanied by Elizabeth Gaskell .
Dunicliff, Joy. Mary Howitt: Another Lost Victorian Writer. Excalibur Press of London.
191
Travel Charlotte Brontë
CB visited her neighbours Sir James and Lady Kay-Shuttleworth in the Lake District, where she met Elizabeth Gaskell .
Barker, Juliet. The Brontës. St Martin’s Press.
631, 651, 653
Gaskell, Elizabeth. The Life of Charlotte Brontë. Editor Shelston, Alan, Penguin.
417
Travel Charlotte Brontë
CB visited Elizabeth Gaskell in Manchester on her way back to Haworth.
Barker, Juliet. The Brontës. St Martin’s Press.
681
Travel Charlotte Brontë
CB returned Gaskell 's visit with a four-day stay in Manchester.
Barker, Juliet. The Brontës. St Martin’s Press.
752
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Michèle Roberts
This volume brings together pieces from various occasions and venues. In them MR discusses many of her favourite topics—the food, sex and god named in her title, the second and third often involving the relation...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Geraldine Jewsbury
GJ was an advocate of realist novels with well drawn characters and a coherent plot. Her review of Charlotte Chanter 's Over the Cliffs compared the plot to a child's attempt at drawing a picture,—the...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Sarah Tytler
Clearly delighted with the opportunity to mix in literary circles, ST recorded her personal observations of these authors in Men and Women Met by the Way, the final 100-page-long section of her family autobiography...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Muriel Jaeger
This book is sometimes called a memoir, but its autobiographical moments are only incidental. MJ 's attention is mostly directed towards books and reading; her own experiences of writing, publishing, and having her works performed...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Margaret Kennedy
Here Kennedy argues that entertainment and enjoyment are valuable aims for the novel. She maintains that the novelist is, in essence, a storyteller, but the storyteller-novelist has been excluded by a literary society that devalues...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Mary Elizabeth Coleridge
While Charlotte Brontë , MEC argues, swept the world away in the storm of her passion and George Eliotconquered it with the power of understanding, [Elizabeth] Gaskell forced it to weep for pity [and]...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text George Eliot
GE discounts the puffery that women authors receive from critics, claiming that praise of women's work is in inverse proportion to their ability: But if they are inclined to resent our plainness of speech, we...
Theme or Topic Treated in Text Anne Thackeray Ritchie
The Blackstick Papers treat a wide range of topics; three of the thirteen concern women writers, and the book's frontispiece is from a miniature of Felicia Hemans . ATR notes the stoicism
Ritchie, Anne Thackeray. Blackstick Papers. Books for Libraries Press.
146
of Mary Berry
Textual Production Elizabeth Robins
ER 's novel White Violets, or, Great Powers, which she wrote in 1909 (just after the first unexpurgated appearance of Elizabeth Gaskell 's life of Charlotte Brontë ), remained unpublished, for reasons that are...
Textual Production Virginia Woolf
Textual Production Angela Thirkell
AT provided an introduction to Elizabeth Gaskell 's Cranford in an edition published by The Novel Library.
British Book News. British Council.
(1951): 691
OCLC WorldCat. http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

Timeline

14 September 1767: Midwife Elizabeth Brownrigg was hanged at...

Building item

14 September 1767

Midwife Elizabeth Brownrigg was hanged at Tyburn (in London near the present Marble Arch) for the murder of Mary Clifford , a workhouse apprentice.

1825: Frances Parkes (Mrs. William Parkes 1786-1842),...

Women writers item

1825

Frances Parkes (Mrs. William Parkes 1786-1842), published a highly successful domesticconduct book whose lengthy title begins Domestic Duties; or, Instructions to Young Married Ladies.

1837: Fredrika Bremer published her domestic novel...

Writing climate item

1837

Fredrika Bremer published her domestic novelGrannarne, translated into English in 1842 as Neighbours.

December 1839: Thomas Carlyle published his essay Chartism,...

Writing climate item

December 1839

Thomas Carlyle published his essayChartism, bearing the date of 1840.

Late Summer 1842: The Plug Riots, with significant participation...

National or international item

Late Summer 1842

The Plug Riots, with significant participation by women, occurred in the northern industrial region of England when workers rebelled against inadequate wages.

March 1848: Chartist uprisings took place in London,...

National or international item

March 1848

Chartist uprisings took place in London, Glasgow, and Manchester.

14 March 1856: A petition for Reform of the Married Women's...

National or international item

14 March 1856

A petitionfor Reform of the Married Women's Property Law, organized by the Married Women's Property Committee and signed by many prominent women, was presented to both Houses of Parliament.

By 20 June 1857: W. W. Carus Wilson published A Refutation...

Writing climate item

By 20 June 1857

W. W. Carus Wilson published A Refutation of the Statements in The Life of Charlotte Brontë, Regarding the Caterton Clergy Daughters' School when at Cowan Bridge.

10 April 1858: An advertisement for Mudie's Circulating...

Writing climate item

10 April 1858

An advertisement for Mudie's Circulating Library boasted of its vast holdings of popular titles.

January 1859: W. R. Greg's essay "False Morality of Lady...

Writing climate item

January 1859

W. R. Greg 's essay"False Morality of Lady Novelists" was published in the National Review in London.

March-June 1864: William Makepeace Thackeray's final, unfinished...

Writing climate item

March-June 1864

William Makepeace Thackeray 's final, unfinished novel, Denis Duval, appeared in Cornhill Magazine.

May 1992: The Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century British...

Women writers item

May 1992

The Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century British Women Writers Association held its first annual conference. Thereafter the conference was held at a different American location each year.
Parker, Pamela Corpron. “A Conference of Our Own: on the 20th Anniversary of the BWWA”. The Female Spectator, Vol.
16
, No. 1, p. 6.
6

Texts

Gaskell, Elizabeth. A Dark Night’s Work. Smith, Elder, 1863.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Cousin Phillis and Other Tales. Smith, Elder, 1865.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Cranford. Chapman and Hall, 1853.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Cranford; Cousin Phillis. Editor Keating, Peter John, Penguin, 1986.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. “Editorial Materials”. Mary Barton, edited by Jennifer Foster, Broadview, 2000, p. Various pages.
Gaskell, Elizabeth, and Anna Walters. Elizabeth Gaskell - Four Short Stories. Pandora Press, 1983.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Further Letters of Mrs. Gaskell. Editors Chapple, John and Alan Shelston, Manchester University Press, 2000.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Gothic Tales. Editor Kranzler, Laura, Penguin, 2000.
Shelston, Alan, and Elizabeth Gaskell. “Introduction”. The Life of Charlotte Brontë, Penguin, 1975, pp. 9-37.
Walters, Anna, and Elizabeth Gaskell. “Introduction”. Elizabeth Gaskell - Four Short Stories, Pandora Press, 1983, pp. 1-22.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. “Introduction”. Cranford; Cousin Phillis, edited by Peter John Keating, Penguin, 1986, pp. 7-30.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. “Libbie Marsh’s Three Eras”. Howitt’s Journal of Literature and Popular Progress, Vol.
1
, pp. 310 - 13, 334.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Lizzie Leigh and Other Tales. Chapman and Hall, 1855.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Mary Barton. Chapman and Hall, 1848.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Mary Barton. Editor Foster, Jennifer, Broadview, 2000.
Gaskell, Elizabeth, and Anita Miller. My Lady Ludlow. Academy Chicago, 1995.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. My Lady Ludlow and Other Tales. Sampson and Low, 1861.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. North and South. Chapman and Hall, 1855.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. North and South. Editor Easson, Angus, Oxford University Press, 1973.
Miller, Anita, and Elizabeth Gaskell. “Preface and Chronology”. My Lady Ludlow, Academy Chicago, 1995, pp. 7-10.
Gaskell, Elizabeth, and Sophia Isaac Holland. Private Voices. Editors Chapple, J. A. V. and Anita Wilson, Keele University Press, 1996.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Ruth. Chapman and Hall, 1853.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Ruth. Editor Shelston, Alan, Oxford University Press, 1985.
Gaskell, Elizabeth. Sylvia’s Lovers. Smith, Elder, 1863.
Gaskell, Elizabeth, and Arthur Pollard. Sylvia’s Lovers. Dent, 1964.