North and South North and South is a novel by Elizabeth Gaskell that appeared as a twenty-two-part weekly serial in the magazine Household Words, edited by Charles Dickens (who in those pages had just finished serializing Hard Times), and then with Chapman and Hall as a book, in two volumes, in 1855. Gaskell had originally titled the novel Margaret Hale, but agreed to the publisher's suggestion of the more topically suggestive North and South, alluding to the contrast between the way of life in the industrial north of England and agricultural south.Besides including scenes of industrial strife, North and South is a courtship-and-marriage story with richly complex elements including class conflict, religious doubts, maternal struggles, and naval mutiny. Gaskell's heroine, Margaret Hale, grows up in a country parish town in the south, but when her father renounces the Church, he uproots his family, and Margaret finds herself facing a new life in the fictional industrial town of Milton. Finding it hard to adjust to the strange customs and mannerisms of the north, Margaret befriends a working-class family and gains first hand knowledge of and sympathy for an industrial family's difficulties. Meanwhile, Margaret is thrown into the acquaintance of John Thornton, her father's Classics pupil and the local factory master. Margaret is shocked to learn that Thornton was once a 'shop-boy', and Margaret's southern prejudices struggle to understand Thornton, who, as a mere manufacturer, should not fit her idea of 'gentleman'. Meanwhile, Thornton finds himself falling for the proud, austere Miss Hale, who, though far poorer than he, holds herself like a lady and is like no northern woman. Thornton and Margaret, even while falling for each other, frequently come into conflict over the conditions of the working class in England. As a twist to the plot, Margaret's brother, Frederick, is a fugitive on exile in Spain, unable to return to England because he is wanted for naval mutiny..."North And South" has frequently been favourably compared to the similarly-focused "Shirley" by the better-known novelist and friend of Gaskell, Charlotte Bronte. |
