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

[BishyBarnyBee]

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!

That description makes her sound like a Sunday school teacher instead of someone whose novels dealt with controversial themes.

Good observation cassandre.
'Dickens was a well-dressed, dapper man, never a hair out of place' would sound ludicrous!

Thanks for the great comments again, you are all really adding to my understanding.

Ruth's struggle to push past the landlord really struck a chord with me - my mum worries terribly about what people will think, and her first reaction in any challenging situation is embarrasment and a desire to hide, never anger or determination. I could see that in Ruth's complete inability to carry out what she knew she needed to do.

It also reminded me of Rees-Mogg's disgraceful comment to an interviewer about Grenfell - that "if either of us were in a fire, whatever the fire brigade said, we would leave the burning building. It just seems the common sense thing to do." It made me furious at the time because he was brought up with an absolute sense of his own rightness and entitlement, whereas the people of Grenfell - and perhaps most of us - are brought up to respect authority and not cause trouble. Poor Ruth doesn't have a chance.

I think Mrs Gaskell has a lot to say about God. I'm not sure Thomas and Ruth are exactly being kept in their place by religion, I think we are being asked to consider what a real and false Christian looks like.

Nearly time to crack on with Chapter 5!

Chapter 5
In which the petulant B shows scant kindness or decency but Ruth is rescued by a true gentleman.

The suffocating boredom of a Welsh hotel on a wet summers day is interrupted by the arrival of Mr B with a well-cloaked Ruth. B bullies the landlady into moving existing guests so that he can have his choice of rooms. She recognises they are unmarried but is happy to take his money. Ruth is content just viewing the mountains through the rain but B takes his boredom out on Ruth. He tells her she is stupid then magnanimously tells her to go for a walk.

Ruth is happy to be in nature and fearless as she traverses the tricky path, but hesitates at a hazardous gap in the stepping stones. She accepts help from a fellow walker, taking in his unusual appearance - an older man, with the stature of a dwarf and visible disabilities, but also a beautiful and sensitive face.

As they walk, she learns he holidays in Wales regularly, and he talks gently of the folk-lore he has learned from a local innkeeper.

B is amused to hear of Ruth's adventure but scoffs at her description of her rescuer as a gentleman. He again shows his contempt for anyone he considers beneath him, comparing the stranger to a fairy tale hunchback and criticising his appearance and lodgings. Ruth softly defends him, but B is not interested so the subject is closed.

I was most struck in chapter 4 with the way B responded when Ruth was re-living her memories at the house. Her emotions were clear on her face- he just admired how she looked while feeling them. He had no empathy or even interest in what she felt.

It seems strange that people looking at this couple are aware of Ruth's young age and comment on her innocent looks but make no effort to help- they just feel that they should disapprove of her (and that their virtue is proved by doing this). To them B is just behaving as young men will.

@BishyBarnyBee great summary again.

Thank you! I am really enjoying doing them and it's making me read the text much more closely than I normally would. They do take some time and focus so I'm not promising they will always be this detailed, but so far I've got a lot of pleasure from writing them.

The double standard at its most stark!

I was taken aback recently by someone in her 40s describing how her young adult son brought home girls and "doesn't even know their names". Her response was "where is their self respect?" - but no criticism of her son whatsoever. So the "boys will be boys" attitude is still alive and kicking.

I really enjoyed the ironic contrasts in this chapter on the theme of outer versus inner beauty, which you find in other 19th novels and plays eg Jane Eyre, where plain Jane is contrasted with the shallower but more beautiful Blanche Ingram, and when Mr Benson is introduced I found myself thinking of the French play Cyrano de Bergerac (1897) and the contrast between the pretty boy lover and the ugly hero with a beautiful soul.

Ruth has already been shown to be entirely without vanity about her physical beauty. However, that’s the only thing Bellingham admires about her, seeing her as a mere trophy or ornament to show off.

The theme is deepened in the contrast between Bellingham and Benson, who may be smaller of stature and not outwardly handsome like him, but is morally the bigger man, and beautiful inside. He also has a profound appreciation of the beauty of nature, which makes him of course a kindred spirit to Ruth, who also finds spiritual solace there. In contrast, the shallow Bellingham only becomes more irritated the more Ruth talks of the beauty of nature, and he really starts to become detestable in this chapter.

Not surprisingly, Benson also loves religious nature poetry, and I like how Gaskell picks up that element by starting the next chapter with a short quotation from George Herbert’s poem ‘Sweet Vertue’. In later chapters, it becomes clear that’s just the kind of Metaphysical poet and poem an intelligent well-read man like him would like. (That’s not remotely a plot spoiler!). Whether intentional or not, I can’t help seeing a moral connection in that poem between him and Ruth, and wondering whether the title perhaps ironically emphasises her innocence - even though she’s technically a fallen woman at this point?

All caught up with chapter 4 and 5. I am wanting to read on to find out what happens next. Mr B is a very unsavoury character and very judgemental ‘’I’ve seen your little hunch back. He looks like Riquet-with-the-Tuft. He is not a gentleman though’’ Well he is more of a gentleman than Mr B could ever be. I am feeling for poor Ruth how on earth is this going to pan out. Hopefully once Mr B has grown tired of his pet Ruth and she is not completely beyond all hope she will go and seek out the kind Thomas and Mary for refuge.

Thank you for pointing out the George Herbert poem @ShabanahFazal .

I'm baffled by the 'I' narrator which turns up again in Chapter five. This 'I' had already seen the room to which Mr B leads Ruth but then tells us that he or she 'shall see no more'.

It's lovely to see how much Ruth enjoys the beauties of nature in Wales, something she'd never have seen under normal circumstances. It's so sad that Bellingham doesn't appreciate her enjoyment, & enjoy them more himself for her sake.

Let's hope Benson shows up again, and is able to help Ruth (maybe? but maybe just a passing tourist)

Another good chapter.

Partly because the 'holiday' in Wales reminds me of many a family holiday in Wales, Scotland and the Lakes - a bit damp but beautiful.

That aside, Mr B having that couple kicked out of the house so he could have a room - hmph. Only bothered about himself, as usual. Plus, I wonder if it mirrors how Ruth may be set aside later, for his comfort or convenience?

What an unpleasant man he is. And how lovely was Mr Benson?

That’s a good idea, which seems obvious now you mention it - that Bellingham’s entitled removal of the other guests is a warning of what he’ll do to Ruth.

Me too! I’m also trying to work out exactly what the function is of this unusual use of the first person in an otherwise classic third person narrative. I’ve read much further on because it’s such a page turner and she uses this voice on a number of isolated occasions. I wondered at first if it would turn out to be a character who’s involved in the story, but it hasn’t.

Mostly the perspective is the usual Victorian omniscient one, where the author has a god-like view of everything and what’s inside all the characters’ minds, and the I voice that pops up every now and again still seems to be that of Gaskell the author. So I think she’s probably doing it at times to speak to the (most likely female) readers, and establish a closer bond with them because she knows she’s telling a controversial story. I think she wants them to trust her enough to be drawn into greater sympathy with Ruth than they would otherwise, and sometimes does directly comment in compassionate tone.

However, it could also be a way of checking herself in case she comes across as too sympathetic to Ruth. I have a feeling it might be a device to make the story seem more authentic, as if told by someone who witnessed it all and knew it to be true, because other 18th and 19thc novels would use devices like that (or discoveries of diaries/letters etc) to make out of the ordinary, outrageous or sensational events (especially if they involved vice of any kind) seem like true stories. The idea was to stress to the reader that the author wasn’t making it up themselves or approving of the characters’ actions, but just relating them as they happened - all to avoid the charge of corrupting the minds of readers, especially females with their habit of reading ‘silly novels’.

Just some musings of mine! I’d be interested to hear other people’s ideas for why GE uses the occasional I.

I was mystified by that 'I' as well! But my Penguin edition (edited by Angus Easson) has a note:

'Gaskell was familiar with the area around Snowdonia and the reference below (p. 55) to "I have seen - but I shall see no more", oddly personal, is a possible memory of a visit in July 1845 to Ffestiniog and Portmadoc, during which her only son, Willie, died of scarlet fever.'

So maybe it's a reference to her own personal grief which she has let intrude into her story.

About Ruth's name (yeah, I'm still thinking about that!), I also remembered that one of the most famous characteristics of the Biblical Ruth is that she's an orphan. And so is Gaskell's Ruth! And there's a lot in the Bible about the importance of looking after widows and orphans. That fits with one theme of the novel: some characters offer help and kindness to the orphaned Ruth, while others are ready to exploit her.

It's ironic, I suppose, that Mrs Mason, herself a widow, is so bad at extending charity and tolerance to Ruth.

There's an interesting and quite poignant footnote about this in the Penguin edition.

"Gaskell was familiar with the area around Snowdonia and the reference..."I have seen -but I shall see no more", oddly personal, is a possible memory of a visit in July 1845 to Ffestiniog and Portmadoc during which her only son, Willie, died of Scarlet Fever.

The slightly inconsistent use of I is intriguing me - a bit like breaking the 4th wall, Fleabag style.

Cross posted!

@ShabanahFazal , I also like your ideas about why the 1st-person sometimes appears in the novel: to create a bond with readers, and to make the story seem more authentic.

And I agree that the narrator does seem plausibly like Gaskell's authorial voice. I'm just committed to the author/narrator distinction, because I think narrators in literature are always a rhetorical construct, regardless of how closely they seem to mirror the author.

There's also an old-fashioned tendency in literary criticism to assume that male authors play around with the 'I', but women authors are earnest and sincere and so when they say 'I', we should take it literally. (I know you weren't implying this of course!) It's a pet peeve of mine. Most critics are less sexist now, but I still come across this assumption sometimes when reading about early modern women writers, and it never fails to make me cross. First-person narrators in the work of female authors can be just as complicated as first-person narrators in the work of male authors. OK rant over!! 😂

Ha, @BishyBarnyBee , great minds and all that! 😂

I love the Fleabag comparison; that's really apt.

Thank you for all your comments on chapter five! I went back to look for the mysterious 'I'. I think I overlooked that passage due to the shocking behaviour of Mr. B having guests removed from their rooms for his benefit. Awful man.

Well said, and I very much agree that narrators are rhetorical constructs, which is why I spoke of function and devices. The image I had in my head was of the author turning her face to the reader (or screen as some here are suggesting) for just a second, almost but not quite adopting a persona - so more of a device than a fully fledged character. And when talking about authenticating devices I was very much thinking of male writers like Daniel Defoe wg Robinson Crusoe.

Good point about narrators in the work of female authors being just as complicated and interesting as those in the novels of men!

I'm struggling a little with the content of Ruth as bereavement has struck here over Christmas and I'm in need of positive fiction. The writing does have me hooked though and the plot keeps offering hope.

I'm very sorry to hear of your loss @LiesDoNotBecomeUs My condolences to you 💐

I got caught up in the story and have been reading at night before bed, so I'm ahead in the book. I can't say much obviously, but recommend* *that you hang in there with it.