Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell's Half-Brothersfollows two brothers, Gregory, and his younger brother, who is left, unnamed. After the death of her first husband, Helen, Gregory's mother, remarries a man named William Preston. Together, they conceive a child, but Helen tragically dies during childbirth. Mourning the loss of his wife, but happy about the arrival of his son, William is left to raise both children alone. However, since Gregory is quiet, slightly...

There is one characteristic of Robert Griffiths which I have omitted to note, and which was peculiar among his class. He was no hard drinker; whether it was that his head was easily affected, or that his partially-refined taste led him to dislike intoxication and its attendant circumstances, I cannot say; but at five-and-twenty Robert Griffiths was habitually sober-a thing so rare in Llyn, that he was almost shunned as a churlish, unsociable being,...

Die Damen des fiktiven Kleinstädtchens Cranford leben in vornehmer Bescheidenheit und weigern sich entschieden, die Veränderungen des 19. Jahrhunderts anzunehmen. In ihrem Alltag gibt es aber auch genug Klatsch und Tratsch, Verwirrungen, Liebeleien und überraschende Begegnungen, die ihre volle Aufmerksamkeit erfordern. In kleinen liebevollen Episoden erzählt Elizabeth Gaskell, eine enge Freundin von Charlotte Brontë, vom Landleben im viktorianischen...

Mary Barton, daughter of a factory worker, is torn between her love for a poor worker and the life of ease offered to her by the son of a wealthy mill owner. This classic novel of love and redemption, published anonymously in 1848, launched Mrs. Gaskell on her literary career. Also includes four short stories: "My French Master," "The Old Nurse's Story," "Bessy's Troubles at Home," and "Christmas Storms and Sunshine."

First published in 1857, The Life of Charlotte Bronte presents an intimate portrait of the celebrated author through the eyes of Elizabeth Gaskell, a personal friend of Bronte’s and fellow trailblazer of Victorian-era literature. Drawing from hundreds of Bronte’s letters, Gaskell illuminates what she described as a "wild, sad life and the beautiful character that grew out of it." Beginning with Bronte’s lonely childhood as a student at the...

Sylvia Robson lives happily with her parents on a farm, and is passionately loved by her rather dull Quaker cousin Philip. She, however, meets and falls in love with Charlie Kinraid, a dashing sailor on a whaling vessel, and they become secretly engaged. When Kinraid goes back to his ship, he is forcibly enlisted in the Royal Navy by a press gang, a scene witnessed by Philip. Philip does not tell Sylvia of the incident nor relay to her Charlie's parting...