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New Year, New Fallen Woman: Elizabeth Gaskell's Ruth Readalong

586 replies

BishyBarnyBee · 28/12/2023 07:42

Following the very successful Madame Bovary readalong, we have decided to explore another woman who refused to be bound by contemporary mores.
So shocking at the time, two of Gaskell's friends burnt their copies.

"Elizabeth Gaskell's Ruth (1853) was the first mainstream novel to make a fallen woman its eponymous heroine. It is a remarkable story of love, of the sanctuary and tyranny of the family, and of the consequences of lies and deception, one that lays bare Victorian hypocrisy and sexual double-standards. Shocking to contemporary readers, its radical utopian vision of a pure woman faithfully presented predates Hardy's Tess by nearly forty years."

We will aim for two chapters a week - a weekend chapter and a mid week chapter. If I have time, I'll try and do a ChatGPT chapter summary, but anyone else is welcome to jump in if I haven't got there first.

We start 1st Jan, so if you are up for a bit of Victorian passion, guilt, regret and redemption, sign up here!

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onegreyhair · 30/12/2023 21:32

I would like to lurk please. I go to an English Lit class every week which I joined in September and am loving. They have previously read some Elizabeth Gaskell and it comes into our discussions, but I haven't read any. However I also battle an addiction to psychological and murder thrillers, so its a struggle to keep up with my reading homework for that class and I don't think I would be able to manage all the reading.

cariadlet · 30/12/2023 19:14

Thanks for the updates @FFuzzyCaoraDhubh and @BiBishyBarnyBee

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BishyBarnyBee · 30/12/2023 18:59

So - we'll start with Chapter 1 on New Year's Day, then Chapter 2 on Thursday 4th. Sundays and Thursdays from then on. I'll aim to post first thing in the morning, but if I haven't managed to do that, anyone else is welcome to chip in and start off the next chapter. If you've read it before, try not to get ahead of the current chapter, but you won't be chucked off the thread if you accidentally drop a massive spoiler.

Drop, drop, slow tears,
And bathe those beauteous feet
Which brought from Heaven
The news and Prince of Peace.

Cease not, wet eyes,
His mercy to entreat;
To cry for vengeance
Sin doth never cease.

In your deep floods
Drown all my faults and fears;
Nor let His eye
See sin, but through my tears.

Phineas Fletcher

New Year, New Fallen Woman: Elizabeth Gaskell's Ruth Readalong
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AthenaWhite · 30/12/2023 18:03

Ordered mine 😊

LiesDoNotBecomeUs · 30/12/2023 16:40

Ordering a copy of Ruth now.

LiesDoNotBecomeUs · 30/12/2023 16:39

I would love to join you!
Mrs Gaskell's wives and Daughters is a favourite of mine.

FuzzyCaoraDhubh · 30/12/2023 16:33

I think the bi-weekly chapter summaries will keep us on track, cariadlet. We usually do one chapter per day starting on January 1st. This will be similar but slower. Chapters 1-8 for the month of January.

cariadlet · 30/12/2023 15:53

Thursday and Sunday sound great.

I haven't done a MN readalong before. Is there a reminder of which chapters are being discussed?

FuzzyCaoraDhubh · 30/12/2023 15:37

That sounds perfect.

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BishyBarnyBee · 30/12/2023 15:30

Thursday and Sunday works for me, and yes, expect spoilers for that chapter from that day.

So I agree it's probably best to avoid the thread if you want to preserve the full reading experience.

But equally, if we do manage quick chapter summaries, should be possible to catch up and get the gist so you can keep going if you get a bit behind.

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Sadik · 30/12/2023 15:24

Maybe Thursday for the midweek chapter & Sunday for the weekend one? Or earlier?
I've always just avoided the readalong threads if behind.

StColumbofNavron · 30/12/2023 15:20

I think winging it and people popping in with comments will be fine. If there is time for more there is time, if not then it will be fine.

Is thE general consensus that once we get midweek or the weekend that people can post and we should expect spoilers etc? I’m very happy to just not look until I’ve read the chapters.

Original poster
BishyBarnyBee · 30/12/2023 15:18

FuzzyCaoraDhubh · 30/12/2023 15:09

No @BishyBarnyBee I was just thinking of winging it improvising. Something short and simple to keep us on track.

We'll wing it together!

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FuzzyCaoraDhubh · 30/12/2023 15:09

No @BishyBarnyBee I was just thinking of winging it improvising. Something short and simple to keep us on track.

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BishyBarnyBee · 30/12/2023 14:50

FuzzyCaoraDhubh · 30/12/2023 13:11

Thanks so much Bishy!
I'll back you up with a summary, no worries there.

Do you have access to one of the book notes sites? I was wondering about taking a free trial to see how good they are, but I always worry I'll forget to cancel and end up paying for it for evermore.

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BishyBarnyBee · 30/12/2023 13:47

Introduction Part 1: Angus Easson's notes from the Penguin Edition
Gaskell's first novel, Mary Barton, was published in 1848 and was an instant success. Set in Manchester, it explored the impact of the Industrial Revolution through the story of a young woman torn between two suitors: a mill worker and a mill owner. Gaskell's husband, Minister at Manchester's Cross Street Unitarian Chapel, encouraged her to write as a diversion after the death of their infant son. (Incidentally, I checked and the first English translation of Engel's Condition of the Working Class in England, the in-depth study of industrial Manchester that inspired Marxism, was published just a year before, in 1847 - I wonder if Gaskell read it, or if she had enough first hand knowledge of conditions from her own work among the poor?)

Gaskell was aware that her second novel would be widely read, and was conscious of the negative response it might meet. She found it challenging to write. A friend reported in 1852 that she was dissatisfied with the last hundred pages "and we are going over it very carefully to take out superfluous epithets and sentences". Gaskell describes how some friends to whom she had to "talk aesthetically" even while "thinking of pickle for pork", "smashed into Ruth in grand style". Easson suggests the anxiety about structure was actually fear arising from the subject matter, but Gaskell was deeply committed "my heart being so full of it", and Charlotte Bronte viewed the novel as combining nobility, practicality, and a high and just purpose.

The book was published in 1853 and as expected, there was much debate as to whether this was a fit subject for a novel. Gaskell wrote that it had "made them talk and think a little on a subject which is so painful it requires all one's bravery not to hide one's head like an ostrich and try...to forget that the evil exists".

She compared the criticism as being like "St Sebastian stuck full of arrows" and just after publication "had a terrible fit of crying all Saturday night at the unkind things people are saying". But as the reviews began to come in, Easson says she was "cheered by the favourable, thoughtful and often lengthy notices Ruth received".

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StColumbofNavron · 30/12/2023 13:43

Thanks Fuzzy and Bishy. Looking forward.

FuzzyCaoraDhubh · 30/12/2023 13:38

Lovely front covers! I'm reading it on Kindle.

Buttalapasta · 30/12/2023 13:35

My cover is an older version of Cornishlizard's. My library doesn't update its stock very often or indeed at all.

New Year, New Fallen Woman: Elizabeth Gaskell's Ruth Readalong
FuzzyCaoraDhubh · 30/12/2023 13:11

Thanks so much Bishy!
I'll back you up with a summary, no worries there.

Original poster
BishyBarnyBee · 30/12/2023 13:08

Well, hello, lovely fellow readers! It's great to see so many sign ups, and I'm really excited about starting. My experience of mumsnet readalongs has been that it's quite a challenge to show up consistently, but I've loved being pushed to tackle books I might not have thought of or was daunted by.

So no worries if life gets in the way and you have to dip in and out. Just keep up as best you can and it's great to have some company along the way.

I've got the Penguin version on Kindle, with an introduction by Angus Easson, previously Emeritus Professor of English at Salford University. His introduction explores themes and plotlines that are definitely spoilers, so my plan is to summarise the biographical notes today to get us warmed up, but leave the analysis for now.

I don't know how consistent I'll be at posting summaries. There aren't any free chapter guides out there and my cunning plan to get chat GPT to do it doesn't work as it can't seem to give me one chapter at a time. So I'll have a stab, but summaries might be intermittent or non- existent depending on how I get on.

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MrsWinkly · 29/12/2023 19:28

My copy arrived today.
Am really looking forward to this, thanks BishyBarnyBee!

StoorieHoose · 29/12/2023 14:05

I'm In!

Just downloaded it to my kindle

Walkinginthesand · 29/12/2023 13:43

I'm in, glad to have discovered this thread at the right time. I read North and South a lifetime ago and Cranford two lifetimes ago so must be due to read Mrs Gaskell again. Looking forward to it.

keeganface · 29/12/2023 13:18

Thanks for the audible tip. It's handy to have the audio like you say if it's a busy week.