Wives and Daughters

by Elizabeth Gaskell, Angus Easson

Overview

According to many critics, Wives and Daughters is Elizabeth Gaskell's masterpiece. Set in a provincial English town, the novel is a subtle representation of historical change explored in human terms.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780191605987
Publisher:	OUP Oxford
Publication date:	12/14/2000
Series:	Oxford World's Classics Series
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Elizabeth Gaskell was born in London in 1810 but spent most of her life in Cheshire, Stratford-upon-Avon. She married the Reverend William Gaskell and had four daughters by him. She worked among the poor, travelled frequently and wrote for Dickens'smagazine, Household Words. Elizabeth Gaskell was friends with Charlotte Brontë and consequently went on to write her biography.

Pam Norris is Reader in Literature at Liverpool John Mooores University

Table of Contents

I. THE DAWN OF A GALA DAY
II. A NOVICE AMONGST THE GREAT FOLK
III. MOLLY GIBSON'S CHILDHOOD
IV. MR. GIBSON'S NEIGHBOURS
V. CALF-LOVE
VI. A VISIT TO THE HAMLEYS
VII. FORESHADOWS OF LOVE PERILS
VIII. DRIFTING INTO DANGER
IX. THE WIDOWER AND THE WIDOW
X. A CRISIS
XI. MAKING FRIENDSHIP
XII. PREPARING FOR THE WEDDING
XIII. MOLLY GIBSON'S NEW FRIENDS
XIV. MOLLY FINDS HERSELF PATRONISED
XV. THE NEW MAMMA
XVI. THE BRIDE AT HOME
XVII. TROUBLE AT HAMLEY HALL
XVIII. MR. OSBORNE'S SECRET
XIX. CYNTHIA'S ARRIVAL
XX. MRS. GIBSON'S VISITORS
XXI. THE HALF-SISTERS
XXII. THE OLD SQUIRE'S TROUBLES
XXIII. OSBORNE HAMLEY REVIEWS HIS POSITION
XXIV. MRS. GIBSON'S LITTLE DINNER
XXV. HOLLINGFORD IN A BUSTLE
XXVI. A CHARITY BALL
XXVII. FATHER AND SONS
XXVIII. RIVALRY
XXIX. BUSH-FIGHTING
XXX. OLD WAYS AND NEW WAYS
XXXI. A PASSIVE COQUETTE
XXXII. COMING EVENTS
XXXIII. BRIGHTENING PROSPECTS
XXXIV. A LOVER'S MISTAKE
XXXV. THE MOTHER'S MANŒUVRE
XXXVI. DOMESTIC DIPLOMACY
XXXVII. A FLUKE, AND WHAT CAME OF IT
XXXVIII. MR. KIRKPATRICK, Q.C.
XXXIX. SECRET THOUGHTS OOZE OUT
XL. MOLLY GIBSON BREATHES FREELY
XLI. GATHERING CLOUDS
XLII. THE STORM BURSTS
XLIII. CYNTHIA'S CONFESSION
XLIV. MOLLY GIBSON TO THE RESCUE
XLV. CONFIDENCES
XLVI. HOLLINGFORD GOSSIPS
XLVII. SCANDAL AND ITS VICTIMS
XLVIII. AN INNOCENT CULPRIT
XLIX. MOLLY GIBSON FINDS A CHAMPION
L. CYNTHIA AT BAY
LI. "TROUBLES NEVER COME ALONE"
LII. SQUIRE HAMLEY'S SORROW
LIII. UNLOOKED-FOR ARRIVALS
LIV. MOLLY GIBSON'S WORTH IS DISCOVERED
LV. AN ABSENT LOVER RETURNS
LVI. "OFF WITH THE OLD LOVE, AND ON WITH THE NEW"
LVII. BRIDAL VISITS AND ADIEUX
LVIII. REVIVING HOPES AND BRIGHTENING PROSPECTS
LIX. MOLLY GIBSON AT HAMLEY HALL
LX. ROGER HAMLEY'S CONFESSION
CONCLUDING REMARKS [By the Editor of the "Cornhill Magazine."]

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"No nineteenth-century novel contains a more devastating rejection than this of the Victorian male assumption of moral authority."
—Pam Morris

Editorial Reviews

"My dear Scheherazade . . . I am sure your powers of narrative can never be exhausted in a single night, but must be good for at least a thousand nights and one."  —Charles Dickens



"Her stories are wonderfully funny, but the ridiculous is bathed in a poignant, dreamlike mood found nowhere else in fiction, and profound ideas and strong values sleep beneath everyday details of bonnets and cakes."  —Jenny Uglow, author, The Lunar Men

From the Publisher