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Summary
Summary
Mary Barton is the story of a working-class family in which the father, John Barton, lapses into bitter class hatred during a cyclic depression and carries out a retaliatory murder at the behest of his trade union.
Author Notes
Elizabeth Gaskell was born on September 29, 1810 to a Unitarian clergyman, who was also a civil servant and journalist. Her mother died when she was young, and she was brought up by her aunt in Knutsford, a small village that was the prototype for Cranford, Hollingford and the setting for numerous other short stories. In 1832, she married William Gaskell, a Unitarian clergyman in Manchester. She participated in his ministry and collaborated with him to write the poem Sketches among the Poor in 1837.
Our Society at Cranford was the first two chapters of Cranford and it appeared in Dickens' Household Words in 1851. Dickens liked it so much that he pressed Gaskell for more episodes, and she produced eight more of them between 1852 and 1853. She also wrote My Lady Ludlow and Lois the Witch, a novella that concerns the Salem witch trials. Wives and Daughters ran in Cornhill from August 1864 to January 1866. The final installment was never written but the ending was known and the novel exists now virtually complete. The story centers on a series of relationships between family groups in Hollingford. Most critics agree that her greatest achievement is the short novel Cousin Phillis.
Gaskell was also followed by controversy. In 1853, she offended many readers with Ruth, which explored seduction and illegitimacy that led the "fallen woman" into ostracism and inevitable prostitution. The novel presents the social conduct in a small community when tolerance and morality clash. Critics praised the novel's moral lessons but Gaskell's own congregation burned the book and it was banned in many libraries. In 1857, The Life of Charlotte Brontë was published. The biography was initially praised but angry protests came from some of the people it dealt with.
Gaskell was against any biographical notice of her being written during her lifetime. After her death on November 12, 1865, her family refused to make family letters or biographical data available.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (1)
Guardian Review
If the work had met with the fate of 19 out of 20 of the novels published now-a-days, I might have been well content to let it sink into oblivion, with its false statements unchallenged, and its doubtful logic unquestioned; but, possessing an internal force and vitality far above mediocrity, it has reached that height of a novel writer's ambition, a third edition, thus showing that it is being well read, and, consequently, that its errors have become dangerous. The authoress of this truthful tale of Manchester life acknowledges that the interests of both masters and men are really the same; and if her intention were to get both parties to act together for their mutual benefit it would have been well to have considered whether her book would have that tendency or not. As a whole the tale is beautifully written; the characters are graphically delineated; the events are so interestingly interwoven, and the groundwork is so artistically constructed, that whoever reads the two first chapters is sure to read the whole. The only fault of the book is that the authoress has sinned gravely against truth, in matters of fact either above her comprehension, or beyond her sphere of knowledge. But to return to the story. At the meeting, a shilling a week more was offered (by the way, power-loom weavers were never paid by the week, but by the piece), which the men refused and the meeting broke up. Before however, the deputation left the room, Harry Carson found time to draw a caricature of the five miserable workmen who composed it, which he handed round to the other mill-owners who chuckled over it and were highly amused. One of the men got hold of it and it caused such exasperation among the workmen that they resolved to murder young Carson, and he was murdered. Every feeling of grief and tenderness in the heart of old Carson was totally absorbed by the thirst for revenge, to be gratified by the immediate punishment of Jem Wilson, the supposed murderer, whom he wished to see executed before his son was consigned to his grave. Can the authoress believe this to convey a truthful impression of Manchester life? It is a libel on the workmen of Manchester; they never committed a murder under any such circumstances. It is a libel on the masters, merchants and gentlemen of this city, who have never been exceeded by those of any other part of the kingdom in acts of benevolence and charity, both public and private. In a truthful "tale of Manchester, or factory life," it appears very strange that no notice whatever is taken of what has been done by the masters for improving the condition of the workmen - for instance, of the day and Sunday schools attached to many mills, and where this is not the case, of the inducements held out for their becoming subscribers to extensive libraries founded expressly for their benefit, or to mechan ics' institutions. Nothing is said of the parks which have been purchased, and laid out exclusively for their recreation and enjoyment, where thousands of happy and intelligent faces may be seen on Saturday afternoons and on holidays, delighting themselves in innocent games or athletic exercises, nor (when the mills are stopped for the want of a market) of the many instances in which the masters advance their workpeople a weekly sum for their subsistence. Not one word of all these is there in this "true tale of Manchester life." Mrs Gaskell . . . 'sinned gravely against truth' If you are interested in the history of the Guardian or the Observer, please refer to www.guardian.co.uk/newsroom for more information on the Newsroom, a purpose- built archive and visitor centre for the Guardian, the Observer and Guardian Unlimited at 60 Farringdon Road, London EC1R 3GA. Caption: article-Archive.1 In a truthful "tale of Manchester, or factory life," it appears very strange that no notice whatever is taken of what has been done by the masters for improving the condition of the workmen - for instance, of the day and Sunday schools attached to many mills, and where this is not the case, of the inducements held out for their becoming subscribers to extensive libraries founded expressly for their benefit, or to mechan ics' institutions. Nothing is said of the parks which have been purchased, and laid out exclusively for their recreation and enjoyment, where thousands of happy and intelligent faces may be seen on Saturday afternoons and on holidays, delighting themselves in innocent games or athletic exercises, nor (when the mills are stopped for the want of a market) of the many instances in which the masters advance their workpeople a weekly sum for their subsistence. Not one word of all these is there in this "true tale of Manchester life."
