Gaskell's last novel, widely considered her masterpiece, follows the fortunes of two families in nineteenth century rural England.? At its core are family relationships -- father, daughter and step-mother, father and sons, father and step-daughter -- all tested and strained by the romantic entanglem[...]

Set in the mid-19th century, and written from the author's first-hand experience, North and South follows the story of the heroine's movement from the tranquil but moribund ways of southern England to the vital but turbulent north. Elizabeth Gaskell's skilful narrative uses an unusual love story to [...]

The 'north and south' of the title are the Satanic mills of the industrial north and the leisured life of London society and rural Hampshire. When her father leaves the Church, Margaret Hale is uprooted from her comfortable home in Hampshire to move with her family to the North of England. Initially[...]