Elizabeth Gaskell never completed her final novel, Wives and Daughters, due to her early death in 1865. It appeared serially in The Cornhill Magazine between August 1864 and January 1866. Her last work is considered her best, representing the pinnacle of her achievements and the evidence of a style much improved since her early thesis novels Mary Barton (1848) and Ruth (1853).

However, she continues to pursue a favorite theme: the restrictions individuals suffer within a culture intent on categorizing humans according to the social strata they occupy. The novel’s protagonist, Molly Gibson, matures from a young girl, her life touched by many additional characters.

The daughter of a Hollinford doctor, Molly enjoys her existence in the small town until her father marries the odious widow Clare Kirkpatrick. Clare had served Lord and Lady Cumnor as governess and schoolmistress and adopted some of their Whig attitudes. This causes conflict for Molly, whose second home is Hamley Hall with Tory landowner Squire Hamley and his sons, Roger and Osborne.

Clare’s lovely daughter Cynthia moves into the community, and Molly develops a fondness for her intelligence despite her flirtatious nature. The two become foils, allowing bright contrast in characterization. Cynthia had committed to marry a Mr. Preston, a crass employee of the Cumnors, but she enters an engagement with Roger Hamley. While Roger finds Cynthia amusing, he does not love her. After a time, he moves on to study science, while Cynthia weds Henderson, a London barrister.

Molly tries to assist the various characters in their pursuits, even helping Cynthia shed Preston. Gaskell skillfully introduces irony in her handling of the everyday activity that represents the characters’ existence. Unlike the strident narrative of her early social-problem novels, Wives and Daughters displays a quiet, indulgent, and nonjudgmental attitude toward its characters, which has been compared to those of Anthony Trollope.

Molly will eventually wed Roger and learn to deal with the annoying Clare. One sad note occurs when Roger’s brother Osborne secretly marries a French girl who does not match the social status of his own family and dies apart from those he loves. The difference in their social standing—in that of Molly and Roger, of Cynthia and the land agent Preston, and of Clare and the doctor—offers an opportunity for Gaskell to reflect on the foolish divisions such observances of class create.

In a clever and crafty manner, she lightens the sometimes-serious tone with the introduction of comic minor characters, including Lady Harriet and Mr. Coxe. While her character study lacks the uncontrolled passion in the characters of her friend, Charlotte Brontë, Gaskell produces a masterpiece in Wives and Daughters. She writes of matters to which her personal experience adds weight and realism.

Bibliography
Duthie, Enid Lowry. The Themes of Elizabeth Gaskell. London: Macmillan, 1980.

Categories: British Literature, Literature, Novel Analysis

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