Mary Barton A Tale of Manchester Life (Audible Audio Edition) Elizabeth Gaskell Juliet Stevenson Audible Studios Books
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Following the death of his wife and the government's refusal to pass his local trade union's chartist petition, John Barton sinks into a depression so deep that not even his doting daughter can lift him out of it. Seeing the poverty that her family has been reduced to and the desperation in her father's eyes, Mary Barton realises she must reject the proposal of her working-class lover, Jem. Instead, she sets her sights at a master's son, the wealthy heir of a Manchester mill, Henry Carson, in the hope that his situation will improve her own.
In a shocking turn of events, Mary discovers Mr Carson has been shot and her former lover, Jem, accused of his murder. As life-altering secrets emerge and the lives of those around her are put on the line, Mary must decide who to trust and who to denounce.
Elizabeth Gaskell's first novel, Mary Barton A Tale of Manchester Life, is an emotive condition of English work in which she artfully intertwines the socio-political struggles of the 'hungry forties' with elements of a classic love story. Mary Barton is a pioneering work of fiction which has ensured that Gaskell's name will forever be included in a list of England's greatest authors. Its success was such that it even won the attention of Charles Dickens and Charlotte Brontë, forging a great working relationship between the writers, and later leading Gaskell to write Brontë's biography.
Narrator Biography
Multi-award winning actress, Juliet Stevenson has graced the stage and screen with a myriad of powerhouse performances for over 40 years. Aged nine, she developed a passion for the spoken word after performing a reading of a WH Auden poem in front of her entire school. She graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and later became a member of its artistic council. Her theatre experience is vast and includes parts in Measure for Measure, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Burn This and Death and the Maiden.
She is also known for her film career in works such as Bend It Like Beckham, Emma, Truly Madly Deeply and Mona Lisa Smile. Stevenson has been BAFTA-nominated and been the winner of a Laurence Olivier Award. In 1999, she was awarded the Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the Queen's Birthday Honours List, for her services to Drama.
Juliet's other audiobook narrations include Sense and Sensibility, North and South, The Portrait of a Lady and Madame Bovary. These and many more can be found at Audible.
Mary Barton A Tale of Manchester Life (Audible Audio Edition) Elizabeth Gaskell Juliet Stevenson Audible Studios Books
Mary Barton may be a grueling, knotty read at times, but it nonetheless is a fine example of the Victorian novel, and it is well worth any intellectual effort required to read it. The author covers some of the same ground as Charles Dickens -- the ills associated with the industrialization of England -- as he did in Hard Times, but Gaskell does a far better job of inhabiting her characters, thus making them more vivid than any Dickens character. Gaskell gives her characters life like no other writer.The book is thematically rich and not merely a polemic against the evils of industrialization. It is a love story. It is a political story. It is an economics study. It is a story about class. It is a murder mystery. It is a story about the actual lives of working class people as they struggle with the industrialization of England.
Although Gaskell is guilty of following some of the Victorian tropisms -- stilted and tormented language, ornate sentence structure -- it is not obvious in this text. This book is one that should be read slowly so that the reader may benefit from the author's genius. The language at times is almost poetic.
This is a Norton Critical Edition, which I always recommend if it is available. The text of Mary Barton itself is 339 pages, but the volume adds some 200 additional pages of supplemental material. The critical apparatus is particularly strong in this volume including an early plan for Mary Barton written out by Elizabeth Gaskell, three plays based on the novel, and a wealth of contemporaneous and current criticism.
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Mary Barton A Tale of Manchester Life (Audible Audio Edition) Elizabeth Gaskell Juliet Stevenson Audible Studios Books Reviews
In this first novel by Elizabeth Gaskell, we follow the life of Mary Barton, daughter of a mill-worker and union man, growing up in Manchester during a time of unrest between workers and employers.
Depecting many of the well-known themes of all of Gaskell's works (rich vs. poor, relationships between children and parents), this is a deeply realistic novel. It's not a pleasant read, with all the sorrow going on in the story, but I think in her (Gaskell's) time this was a novel that should be written, clearly depicting the social problems of the mid-19th century. It is a very Victorian novel, with among others typical high (melo)drama and noble 'savages' playing an important part. Comparing it to other Gaskell books I've read, I wasn't surprised finding out this was her first novel. The prose is a bit rusty and I think in her later books she comes more into her own with more realistic character development and better story pacing.
Mary Barton, published in 1848, was Elizabeth Gaskell's first novel. Originally titled "John Barton," it's a book with many elements - starting out as a exploration of the lives of the poor in Manchester, England and ending as a more traditional love story with a focus on economic justice.
Mary is John's daughter, a young dressmaker who enters into a flirtation with the son of a factory owner. She hopes to marry him and rescue herself and her father from poverty. Jem, a factory foreman who is the son of one of her father's closest friends, is in love with Mary. As economic conditions worsen in Manchester, Mary's father is radicalized and drawn into Chartism (not incredibly well known now, this was a working class labor movement).
As all these elements come together, Gaskell mixes romance, a murder trial, a strike, and heartrending descriptions of poverty and death. There are a handful of characters who are economically well-off and they're not presented unsympathetically, but it's clear that Gaskell's heart was with the working class characters of this novel. Their dialect is carefully presented (with glosses in the text, provided by her husband) and her desire is clearly that her readers would understand - if not condone - how their lives are lived. Esther, an aunt of Mary's who has become a prostitute, is even given a chance to explain her actions and why she has made the choices that she has made.
While I did enjoy this book, parts of the second half did drag for me. Gaskell had not yet mastered the art of authorial injections and the constant breaking in began to feel a bit intrusive. There were also some bits of high-Victoriana I could have done without (a "fit of madness" that leaves one ill for a few weeks, etc). Wives and Daughters, from the end of her career, was a much stronger novel. However, there is still a great deal to enjoy here and I look forward to reading more novels by this unfairly underknown novelist.
I don't generally read Victorian fiction, but I do regularly visit Manchester and wanted to read some Elizabeth Gaskell. I had watched two BBC dramatizations of her work and opted to break the binding of MARY BARTON. It's a very strong and compellingly written piece, although much better with some of the social history than the eventual plot that focuses on a murder (come on, say it like John Houseman, "Muuuurder") and Mary Barton is the only one who fights for the truth to come out. The joy for me was Gaskell's brilliant portrayal of the northern English people. There are great scenes in Manchester and Liverpool. I do wish that the ending didn't wrap up so fairy tale neatly in the last page or two. Oh well, considering that I was entertained and educated for the other pages, I'd just have to say, "Luv, what a fine novel."
(I read a Norton Critical edition of the novel and have no idea about its faithful transfer to an ebook format.)
Mary Barton may be a grueling, knotty read at times, but it nonetheless is a fine example of the Victorian novel, and it is well worth any intellectual effort required to read it. The author covers some of the same ground as Charles Dickens -- the ills associated with the industrialization of England -- as he did in Hard Times, but Gaskell does a far better job of inhabiting her characters, thus making them more vivid than any Dickens character. Gaskell gives her characters life like no other writer.
The book is thematically rich and not merely a polemic against the evils of industrialization. It is a love story. It is a political story. It is an economics study. It is a story about class. It is a murder mystery. It is a story about the actual lives of working class people as they struggle with the industrialization of England.
Although Gaskell is guilty of following some of the Victorian tropisms -- stilted and tormented language, ornate sentence structure -- it is not obvious in this text. This book is one that should be read slowly so that the reader may benefit from the author's genius. The language at times is almost poetic.
This is a Norton Critical Edition, which I always recommend if it is available. The text of Mary Barton itself is 339 pages, but the volume adds some 200 additional pages of supplemental material. The critical apparatus is particularly strong in this volume including an early plan for Mary Barton written out by Elizabeth Gaskell, three plays based on the novel, and a wealth of contemporaneous and current criticism.
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