Product Description

This new revised and expanded edition sets Gaskell's novel in the context of Victorian social and medical debate.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1508 in Books
• Published on: 1994-01-13
• Binding: Paperback
• 528 pages

Synopsis
When her father leaves the Church in a crisis of conscience, Margaret Hale is uprooted from her comfortable home in Hampshire to move with her family to the north of England. Initially repulsed by the ugliness of her new surroundings in the industrial town of Milton, Margaret becomes aware of the poverty and suffering of the local mill workers and develops a passionate sense of social justice. This is intensified by her tempestuous relationship with the mill-owner and self-made man, John Thornton, as their fierce opposition over his treatment of his employees masks a deeper attraction. In "North and South", Elizabeth Gaskell skillfully fused individual feeling with social concern, and in Margaret Hale created one of the most original heroines of Victorian literature.

About the Author
The most comprehensive paperback edition available Includes introduction, notes, selected criticism, further reading, text summary and chronology of Elizabeth Gaskell's life and times Reset with wide B format pages to give generous margins for notes An important addition to, and finally completing the Gaskell series in Everyman

Customer Reviews

Too long, boring
This is the first Elizabeth Gaskell book I've ever read and unfortunately not very impressed. The overall subject seems to be the love story in our heroine's life, however, book tries to give so many other mesages that it is not fun or focused anymore. There are social issues, emerging new worker-master dynamics in the victorian time, continues questioning of death and beyond... Within all this it is impossible to get a true taste of a social, phylosophical or romance novel.
Although I like the period books very much, I could barely finish this one.

The perfect love story
North and South is my favourite book and I think that it's not known enough. Many people had compared Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen with the Gaskell's book, but, in truth, they are very different.
I prefer N&S to P&P because the love between Margaret and Mr Thornton has more passion than the love between Elizabeth and Darcy.
Austen is a genius and I love her novels but she gave us only borders and shadings, Gaskell gave us a picture completed.
I'm very attracted by the idea that a man of power, self-control, strong, firm, could fall so desperately in love with a woman and could become fragile like a child, "she thought she had seen the gleam of unshed tears in his eyes", said Margaret after Mr Thornton's proposal and her vehement refusal.
There are social themes, but I found them interesting too and not boring.
I don't like to call it a social novel, for me it's, first of all, a Romance with a social commentary in the background.
North and South deserves more readers from my point of view and I highly recommended it!

Passion and strife in Victorian times
I loved the BBC adaptation but waited a while before reading the book so it would be fresh. And having just finished this book, what a great story! Political strife, supressed passion, women's rights, class conflict. The fact that Margaret Hale is a strong woman with her own mind (albeit misguided at times) made this story much more believable and enjoyable for me. Despite some bits that might be a little drier to read, I couldn't put it down once I got past the first few chapters. Bear with it! I think it helped having a picture of Richard Armitage in my head as Mr Thornton, as you don't really get an idea of how he looks from the story. However, I'm now watching the BBC adaptation again and have noticed that some really key parts of the story are changed from the book and remove some of the more subtle parts of the story. Plus they seem to make Mr Thornton a much less likeable character than in the book. So I thoroughly recommend this book. A much more exciting and believable story than many of the other Victorian novels I've read - or never managed to finish reading!