@spb969 3 жыл бұрын
I'm glad that Elizabeth Gaskell is getting more attention! I became first aware of her books back in Uni when I had Cranford on my required reading list for English Lit. Having finished it, I read every one of her books from the library. North and South is by far my favorite.
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
Yes, she needs far more attention!!!
@mayloo2137 2 жыл бұрын
Did you ever get to watch the Cranford series? It was wonderful
@LK-se2ju 3 жыл бұрын
Thank you for introducing me to Elizabeth Gaskell. I love North and South. Margaret is the perfect heroine.
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
I’m so glad you like it!!! Gaskell is amazing.
@LK-se2ju 3 жыл бұрын
@@EllieDashwood She really is! I already recommended her to Austen lovers.
@0halibut0 3 жыл бұрын
NICE! I branched out to Elizabeth Gaskell after I went through all the Jane Austen novels. Now to find another person to read now that I've read all of Gaskell.
@janetmaxwell222 4 жыл бұрын
Cranford is actually Knutsford in Cheshire where I kept my pony as a kid. Knutsford is well worth a trip if you are a Gaskell fan. She is buried in Knutsford. She very much captured the north of England.
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
That is so cool!
@annamattos8627 3 жыл бұрын
I have read North and South, Cranford and My Lady Ludlow. Mary Barton is waiting on my shelf, then I have Wives and Daughters and Ruth to tackle. I am in love with Elizabeth Gaskell, I wish people would talk more about her work. To me, she is almost at the same level as Jane Austen (my favorite author of all time) and definitely at the same level as Dickens.
@monicacall7532 3 жыл бұрын
“Ruth” and “Sylvia’s Lovers” require the reader to invest in several boxes of Kleenex before beginning the books. One thing that all of Gaskell’s books and short stories do is that they show life and people as complicated, messy, maddening, inspiring and wonderful as they are in real life. For a Victorian woman to write about abject poverty, the double standard whereby men could be sexually promiscuous and get away with it while any woman who was sexually assaulted/harassed or found in a “compromising situation” was ruined for good, a society where intelligent women were considered to be “unnatural” and where women were legally their father’s and then their husband’s property, where the poor had few advocates and so on was truly gutsy. And yet she succeeded and gave a voice to the voiceless. If she lived now I think that she would be speaking all over the world about the plight of the poor, women and other marginalized groups. EG is one author I wish that I’d had the opportunity to know. From what Charlotte Bronte and other well-known people of that time who knew her said of her, Gaskell was very intelligent, had a wonderful sense of humor, was a lovely human being-including being a mother who gave her girls the freedom to be themselves in an age of strict conformity, showed herself to be an excellent author and was a true and loving friend who really put herself out to help her friends when they needed help. (Again Charlotte Bronte comes to mind.) What’s not to love and admire about a person like this?
@mrs.feliceinfirst5508 2 жыл бұрын
I would love a video on how engagements worked and the consequences of broken engagements. I'm relistening to Wives and Daughters and having a hard time wrapping my mind around Cynthia's predicament.
@melenatorr 3 жыл бұрын
I love Mrs. Gaskell - she has a way of pulling you into whatever she wants to relate, and you stay there until she's done. And you're so happy you stayed. Dickens did say that he wished her characters were "steadier on their feet", but bear in mind the environment she was living and writing in. Bear in mind that she started writing because her husband was concerned about the depression she had fallen into after the death of her baby son. She spent her life caregiving, and this is where she came from in her work. "Cranford" is based on the town where her aunts, who helped to raise her lived, and there is, in fact, a very loose couple of threads connecting the chapters of the "novel" (which was my introduction to Mrs. Gaskell). I would submit that you can get fairly close to Austen in the two novels by Anne Bronte, youngest of the Bronte siblings, the least "romantic" and the most realistic as far as their novels go. For a very long time, public and critical opinion was dismissive of her, but she's been gaining attention, slowly and surely over the last couple of decades, and she is definitely worth reading.
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
That’s so interesting about Gaskell’s depression! Thanks so much for your comment!
@dorothywillis1 3 жыл бұрын
I had not heard that Dickens said that. Can you tell me where to find the source? My first reaction is "Look who's talking!" and I'd like to know more.
@melenatorr 3 жыл бұрын
@@dorothywillis1 Wow: I found it (for a bit I thought I had dreamed it!): " Dickens wished that happily restored homes could be more frequently featured in Gaskell’s work. He writes to Wills of her later contribution, ‘The Heart of John Middleton’ which appeared on 28 December 1850: ‘I think [it] the best thing of hers I have seen, not excepting Mary Barton - and if it had ended happily [. . .] would have been a great success [. . .] [It] will link itself painfully, with the girl who fell down at the well, and the child who tumbled down stairs. I wish to Heaven, her people would keep a little firmer on their legs!" page 45-46 of this site: watermark.silverchair.com/efs040.pdf?token=AQECAHi208BE49Ooan9kkhW_Ercy7Dm3ZL_9Cf3qfKAc485ysgAAAqYwggKiBgkqhkiG9w0BBwagggKTMIICjwIBADCCAogGCSqGSIb3DQEHATAeBglghkgBZQMEAS4wEQQMEnzDlblG3fxRv9fVAgEQgIICWbDKHy_xJPas3VE1agr5zhfTMCUIAHWSmwAKiscTI4SoV91EvdZsYkuNCEkYOYhcsUT3iME46_h7KqS5MJ-jjewnSirarY1DTYppe8sufcAXmw07FjHSDiBOZgkBvJ_bSfPjbaJosuYpMG-FwJ7Cf-esYA7Z1r5yMoFhaL4fHQuDOpB4OUHCgz5-xjLPtYyTw9y5z5RikZ8PrG3Bp_pLqI3KNLJu80_sIpmdkGOho1t-w_mpmkChnmgn_HDjG_3ZzjpwJzgxhR2TVgQ9NtTiKw5aO6HdaiOHT3cNQBNHfEYyGeLtfykNDBDGSZpqje7hRPkKtpQ1qzxVoQOFR4WbJdm7y_6ZgwYQ4ZJZN9BUwi4fA-H0_odjD1OjjtcJF1Swx6T-5xa-1WiaMeDRJkV0oypLczdEn7WE8t2zmR77sCOzPsH3QaPkC_YxxitOiCi34lD37ultZitoKPQLz4Nw1eUX4M1Eu0vkq9BanI1F0kl2cEDBANach3tQBAgnA2A9r4g4p3AgB2oVEWg5QF6YjsOwyOTT6KgiGuWogTnrqIZIwsQDx_-nWw85_X-wQZObPJXrrAKmYTx4VQTkUYMfFQTa90PkLGCOeezwF3J9eK5rfqtqvgfiC2302GxbCh9tPgKIoGpRuoNmtGpEt2psQBUzNFLsyyXDTmF0an93A7RtEOPT979X3tOkYsdzo1mbzhMmreARzuvSC2gpu5_yapp-QzOuJ00R9OX1KW4G9YP2weuvnzYKKb5m9Uiw6CNgRJvfQvBCAtrtqZD1nm3k85Vfy6r2enQStws
@dorothywillis1 3 жыл бұрын
@@melenatorr Thank you so much for going to all that trouble! I now understand the "steadier on their feet" remark and it's actually funny! Having said that, if I had been Mrs. G. Dickens would have been short an author very quickly. That he got away with it so much shows what a tremendous reputation he had.
@kania1072 7 жыл бұрын
I read North and South last year and I loved it :) and I've just finished Wives and Daughters and it was great too, I was like 'oh, poor Molly" most of the time. I was very sorry it wasn't finished, I would love to read the ending scene, but I quite liked the ending in the adaptation.
@williamisley1880 2 ай бұрын
Thank you for these introductions to Elizabeth Gaskell novels. I just completed North and South and enjoyed it very much. In spite of her obvious critique of the industrialists, she also can see something to admire in their dynamism, etc. Also, your presentation style is just so much fun.
@aishatbay6013 7 жыл бұрын
I've heard about Elizabeth Gaskell, but I've never read her novels/watched movies. Thank you for your recommendation!❤ Now I should definitely learn more about her works.
@EllieDashwood 7 жыл бұрын
Her books are amazing! You should definitely check them out!
@leahn9876 3 жыл бұрын
Thank you for the recommendations! I still have my copy of Mary Barton from my university Victorian Lit course (almost a decade ago), because I loved it so much. I'm excited to check out North and South and Wives and Daughters next.
@indiraacosta517 2 жыл бұрын
Elizabeth Gaskell was a great writer....I love North and South because it's so intriguing. Wives and Daughters is a book of a common life but a the same time of constancy and truthful, that words describe Molly's personality
@Chia13579 Жыл бұрын
North and South makes me cry it’s so good!!!😭😭😭
@ElizabethJones-pv3sj 3 жыл бұрын
I'd also put in a vote for Ruth, as a story about overcoming mistakes and the way that good friends can improve your situation in a way that ultimately lets you pass that benefit on to others. Of course being a Victorian novel the 'fallen woman' ultimately has to redeem herself in a far more extreme way than we as a modern audience might like and the man gets away with a much lighter punishment, but even with that limitation I still like it.
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
That sounds like such a great book. I heard that it was super sad, and so I have avoided reading it because I can't handle too much sad! 😭 Does it at least have a happy ending?
@ElizabethJones-pv3sj 3 жыл бұрын
@@EllieDashwood i don't want to give spoilers but no the very extreme redemption i hinted at makes a rather sad ending.
@eibhleannmoloney8977 2 жыл бұрын
I was also introduced to Gaskell through the BBC works and I love her books!!!
@6of9js 2 жыл бұрын
I loved Wives and Daughters so much! And Sylvia's Lovers, and Mary Barton. Yes, a lot of people die. (Well, they all do eventually). I love Mrs. Gaskell's deep understanding of human nature and our souls. And marriage and affection and lots of other things.
@i.am.10vely 2 жыл бұрын
Wow I've seen all three of the BBC series you mentioned and loved each of them, I had no idea they were based on books by the same author!!
@Fortheloveofclassics 7 жыл бұрын
I love North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell and I am currently reading Wives and Daughters 👍 Cranford Chronicles and Mary Barton are on my TBR.
@EllieDashwood 6 жыл бұрын
I absolutely love mary Barton! I hope they make an adapation of it soon!
@lifeismeaningful6561 4 жыл бұрын
Hii☺
@Leticia.melo6 3 жыл бұрын
YESSS. So good! Love her novels beyond comprehension! Thank you for this video.
@owl6218 3 жыл бұрын
yes!!! elizabeth gakell is a more serious writer than austen. very serious works. very engaging stories. she had a breadth of themes.
@audrab.589 3 жыл бұрын
Gaskell is amazing. But yeah basically Austen with death (Austen has some death but not to the same extent) and political changes
@teachersilviamontufo 4 жыл бұрын
Thanks for your fantastic video.
@josephmayo3253 10 ай бұрын
I first discovered Elizabeth Gaskell while working in a college library a few years before the W&D miniseries came out. I will say, if Darcy gives women unrealisticly high expectations in a man to love, Molly Gibson did the same for me. She is my biggest literary crush. I know my opinion is contrary to many people, but N&S is my least favorite of her novels. I find the two leads very unappealing. And not in a fun Vanity Fair kind of way, where they are horrible people, but they are fun to watch. I just don't like being in the presence of Thornton and Margaret. Cranford is just pure comfort. Yes, some sad things happen. But what a wonderful community to immerse yourself in for a few hours. Even the less likable people are pleasant company. Excellent video Ellie.
@rdelamadrid 2 жыл бұрын
"Who's gonna die in this chapter? I dunno. Anyone could, really." I laughed out loud, literally.
@julieborzage8471 2 жыл бұрын
SAME
@daveoly6947 3 жыл бұрын
One of her most powerful and heartrending books no movie yet is ruth. If you have not read it, it is a must for elizabeth gaskell fans.
@filhodashalom3223 2 жыл бұрын
Hi! Thanks! I loved hearing you! I still can't understand almost anything you say, but even so I loved you listen Much very thanks! Shalom!
@CottonCandy635 6 жыл бұрын
I want to read more Elizabeth Gaskell now. Mary Barton is my favourite closely followed by North and South. I love all the adaptions of her books as well.
@EllieDashwood 6 жыл бұрын
Mary Barton is my favorite too. I would definitely recommend Wives and Daughters next too!
@lifeismeaningful6561 4 жыл бұрын
Hı Melanie..I wrote those book☺efeakademi.com/urun/elizabeth-gaskell-and-feminism-the-declining-masculinity-and-docility-of-women-in-elizabeth-gaskells-three-novels-north-and-south-mary-barton-and-wives-and-daughters/
@vineethg6259 3 жыл бұрын
The one Gaskell novel I am yet to read is _Sylvia's lovers._ I wasn't quite tempted when I came to know that Gaskell called it the 'saddest story she ever wrote'. Maybe not my cup of tea.. 😕 The character I loved best in _Wives & Daughters_ was Hyacinth Clare/ex-Mrs. Kirkpatrick/Mrs. Gibson. She reminded me so much of Mrs. Bennet! I also happened to read that the title _'North & South'_ was actually the choice of Charles Dickens. Apparently Gaskell wished to name it _Margaret Hale_ just the way she did with _Mary Barton_ and _Ruth._ Besides _Cranford_ and _My Lady Ludlow,_ I also liked her novella _A dark night's work._ Yet to read her other short stories.
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
That’s so interesting about the title! And yes, I couldn’t read her saddest story either!!! Especially because she kills so many people in her normal stories, it’s like, what is she going to do worse than that? 😳😂
@adabekee4964 3 жыл бұрын
I'm laughing so hard at your dramatisation of Mary Barton's dilemma 😂
@qww760 6 ай бұрын
I read North and South and watched the movie. It’s like an Industrial Revolution version of Pride and Prejudice 😂
@tumpylollen8841 Жыл бұрын
Dear…I just ❤ your vibe 😂
@MeshachMRB 5 жыл бұрын
Thank you for this video. It's helped me understand what to expect from an Elizabeth Gaskell novel. I'm from Manchester, specifically Longsight and interestingly the old Gaskell family home is in the area on Plymouth Grove. I'm interested in reading the 'Mary Barton' book. + don't mind me but you're very cute :)
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
That is so cool about the family home! And thanks!
@rajwantenglishacademy8954 4 жыл бұрын
Thanks u gives useful information about gaskell'work
@lifeismeaningful6561 4 жыл бұрын
efeakademi.com/urun/elizabeth-gaskell-and-feminism-the-declining-masculinity-and-docility-of-women-in-elizabeth-gaskells-three-novels-north-and-south-mary-barton-and-wives-and-daughters/
@marybethdearmonbailey2254 2 жыл бұрын
Fantastic video - I want to read “Wives and Daughters”, but, since Gaskell did not finish the novel due to her death, I feel like I won’t feel satisfied with the ending. Did you feel satisfied at the book’s ending, or did you feel you invested a lot of time and interest in a mammoth book just to reach the end and experience frustration due to lack of completion?
@julieborzage8471 2 жыл бұрын
I just finished Wives & Daughters and loved it! It is a little disappointing not to have the complete ending, but you basically know what's going to happen. It's probably 2-3 chapters away from being finished, I would wager. And in the version I checked out from the library (perhaps this is in all versions?), an editor added an epilogue about what Gaskell intended to have happen. So there aren't really any questions, you just feel a bit of a void at the ending not being told in Gaskell's words
@susannaseay4799 2 жыл бұрын
I couldn't hang with Mary Barton it was just too sad...I loved North and South and Wives and Daughters very much! I also liked Cranford and all the DVDs...
@Seraphina-Rose 3 жыл бұрын
Thanks for the recommendations. I read part of Mary Burton, but I didn't like that the author, through her conservative, religious, middle-class lens, supported the social systems that made life so difficult for the working class characters. Here's a recommendation for you, if you haven't read it yet: Evelina, by Frances Burney. Very Austenian social skewering.
@EllieDashwood 3 жыл бұрын
Thanks for the recommendation!
@podgorskakatarzyna 3 жыл бұрын
Have you read 'Lois the Witch' by Elisabeth Gaskell? So moving.
@tamoramuir2089 2 жыл бұрын
I've heard you mention North and South in other videos, and every time you do it makes me blink. I vaguely remember a Civil War drama by the same name on TV when I was a kid, and being an American, North and South says Civil War to me. My first reaction (and I know this shows my ignorant Americaness) was "Is England even big enough to have a North and a South?" Obviously it is, you can even have a north and south side of a street. It just seems so odd to have regions of a country that are so different, yet are so close geographically. That's even though I know that the British Isles and even what is now England was historically split up into different countries with different languages.
@mayloo2137 2 жыл бұрын
I'm in Canada. I've watched both Norths and Souths. In England, the North was historically where there was a lot of manufacturing. The character of John was a mill owner in the North of England, Mary and her family lived in the south of England. That is the North and South of the title. Interestingly, Richard Armitage who played John was born in the north of England, and his parents were named John and Margaret.
@sabrinamitchell1852 7 жыл бұрын
I love the movie of North & South, but I was told if I enjoy the movie to never read the book, and so I haven't. Would you agree? I guess they felt it would ruin the movie for me.
@EllieDashwood 7 жыл бұрын
That's interesting! I watched the movie first, then read the book. I think the movie does a really good job portraying the story. While the book is of course more in depth and contains a lot more reflective moments as any Victorian novel would compared to a modern movie, I think reading the book really enhanced the experience of watching the movie. That's just me though!
@vineethg6259 3 жыл бұрын
@@drpatrickbarry I believe you meant _Wives & Daughters_ as that is the one missing the final chapter, not _North & South._
@shelbylengwenat3774 3 жыл бұрын
I do this... After I've read the book, the screen adaptation will annoy me if the book is better.... But I nitpick things, I.e. x doesn't say that
@owl6218 3 жыл бұрын
margaret oliphount (oliphaunt?)'s ghost stories?
@k.l.8804 3 жыл бұрын
Nobody actually dies in wives and daughters, right? Or well, certain wives and husbands had died previously, before the story starts. That's why they get re married. It's been a while since I saw it and read it, but I can't recall anybody dying in the books present... do they?
@Roseliptillgirl 2 жыл бұрын
There's two deaths I can remember. The squire's wife dies and then Osbourne Hamley dies from an illness about two thirds of the way through.
@owl6218 3 жыл бұрын
can you do george eilliot? silar marner?
@anayelisoria37 3 жыл бұрын
I love you and your videos, but I feel a little baffled that you're saying that Elizabeth Gaskell is *like* Jane Austen. Are you suggesting that Jane Austen is better than Elizabeth Gaskell? I mean, Jane Austen is way more famous, that's for sure, but better? 0_o In my opinion neither the authors or their works should be compared. One of the reasons I love Elizabeth Gaskell is because she was a proactive woman and writer involved on the social changes during her time and her heroines are like that at some extent. Jane Austen never got involved in any relevant social issues and all her observations are on shallow matters like 'how rich guys need wives lol' Austen's books are incredibly entertaining and romantic, she was brilliant I give you that, but I think Gaskell did a better job at talking about the REAL England, the classist, unfair, convulsing England. So, I won't say one is better than the other, they're VERY different, even if they wrote the same genre.
@owl6218 3 жыл бұрын
oh, i remembered mary barton as dolly parton....
@owl6218 3 жыл бұрын
Dolly Parton?
@atalacademia 3 жыл бұрын
love from India
@owl6218 3 жыл бұрын
It shows the harsh lives of the workers very closely
@cindyhammes8680 3 жыл бұрын
The movie of Cranford must be better than the book. I’m finding the book rather dull.
@mayloo2137 2 жыл бұрын
I think it was actually a miniseries. Worth watching, as is the adaptation of Wives and Daughters.
@basura8355 7 жыл бұрын
First ❤️👌😅😂🙌
@tomwilson8607 10 ай бұрын
so living in the epicentre of the industrial revolution is not a nice place to live,, your a snob Ellie,, Gaskell was superior to Austen because she wrote about social degradation and even Dickens asked her to tone it down,, she wouldn't,, her Mary Barton epic is more a social documentary capturing the harrowing conditions of that time. Dickens could only come up with watered down parodies such as Hard Times. Gaskell had courage, she wasn't commercial or trendy and she didn't deal in fantasy or romanticism. Gaskell had more in Common with D. H. Lawrence than Jane Austen. Social realism i think you'll find it's called. Gaskell was pretty much ahead of the game with what would later be deemed 'kitchen sink drama'.
@robertfranklin8704 4 ай бұрын
Personally, I prefer Gaskell and Charlotte Bronte to sexless maiden Austen. J A is a great stylist, but a dreary conservative without a social conscience. And with one-dimensional themes. Adolescent! 😮
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