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'Lingering on the Borderland': the Meanings of Home in Elizabeth Gaskell's Fiction

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'Lingering on the Borderland': the Meanings of Home in Elizabeth Gaskell's Fiction LINGERING ‘ON THE BORDERLAND’: THE MEANINGS OF HOME IN ELIZABETH GASKELL’S FICTION Carolyn Shelagh Lambert Doctor of Philosophy University of Sussex March 2012 I hereby declare that this thesis has not been and will not be, submitted in whole or in part to another University for the award of any other degree. Signature: UNIVERSITY OF SUSSEX CAROLYN SHELAGH LAMBERT DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY LINGERING ‘ON THE BORDERLAND’: THE MEANINGS OF HOME IN THE FICTION OF ELIZABETH GASKELL SUMMARY This thesis explores the meanings of home in Elizabeth Gaskell’s fiction. I argue that there are five components to Gaskell’s fictional iteration of homes, each of which is explored in the chapters of this thesis. I analyse the ways in which Gaskell challenges the nineteenth-century cultural construct of the home as a domestic sanctuary offering protection from the strains and stresses of the external world. Gaskell’s fictional homes frequently fail to provide a place of safety. Even the architecture militates against a sense of peace and privacy. Doors and windows are ambiguous openings through which death can enter, and are potent signifiers of entrapment as well as protective barriers. The underlying fragility of Gaskell’s concept of home is illustrated by her narratives of homelessness, which for her, is better defined as a psychological, social and emotional separation rather than the literal lack of shelter. Education takes place within the home and is grounded in Gaskell’s Unitarian beliefs and associationist psychology. Gaskell creates challenging paradigms for domestic relationships in her fictional portrayals of feminized men and servants. Her detailed descriptions of domestic interiors provide nuanced and unconventional interpretations of character and behaviour. I draw on Gaskell’s letters, her non-fiction writing and a range of other contemporary documents for insights into her fictional presentations of home. This methodology provides a creative, holistic interpretative framework within which Gaskell’s achievement can be more adequately measured. I argue that Gaskell’s own experience of home was that of an outsider lingering on the borderland, and her concept of home was therefore unstable, fluid and unconventional. The tensions she experienced in her personal life found their way into her fiction, where her portrayal of home is multi- faceted and complex. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Elizabeth Gaskell would have enjoyed the research journey I undertook for this thesis, combining, as it did, food, drink, laughter, conversation and elements of fairytale with, of course, serious scholarship. The journey started in my 'home library' at the University of Sussex, where Helen Webb provided the luxury of individual tuition into the wonders of internet searching and the virtual reality of any number of nineteenth century periodicals and documents. The British Library was a constant source of information and an entertaining day spent poring over the Catalogue of the Great Exhibition of 1851 could be rounded off with a trip round the current exhibition at the Library on a wide variety of topics. An unannounced visit to Harris Manchester College library in Oxford, found a warm welcome from the Librarian Sue Killoran who provided tea, cake, and the first Gaskell letter I held in my hand - not all together of course! The archive proved to be a rich source of dissenting and Unitarian material and Sue was indefatigable in her support and help. Gaining access to Dr Williams's library in Bloomsbury was a bit like breaking into Sleeping Beauty's castle. Once past the prickly bureaucratic barricades however, the Victorian Gothic splendour of the building, now undergoing renovation, was suitably atmospheric. The floor to ceiling bookcases of the Reading Room with its creaking floorboards provided an appropriate setting for reading William's sermons, overlooked by the marble busts of Dissenting Divines. Several trips to Manchester were perhaps the highlight of my research journey. Janet Allen, Chair of the Manchester Historic Buildings Trust, was supremely generous with her time, support and information and provided my first introduction to the Portico Library as well as a conducted tour of every nook and cranny of the house in Plymouth Grove. The Portico Library offered a joyous combination of tea, books and friendly staff - unlike Elizabeth, I had access to all the current periodicals! The new reading room at the John Rylands library is a worthy addition to the older building and the staff were unfailingly helpful. Professors Jenny Bourne Taylor and Lindsay Smith - my 'more than' supervisors - have been truly wonderful. It has been a privilege to be supervised by them, and with their help, I have been able to turn a loose and baggy monster into something more appropriately tailored for the occasion. And finally my own family, who have endured more 'Gaskell moments' than anyone has a right to expect! My husband Roger has patiently proof read my draft thesis and managed not to cackle too much at the howling grammatical errors that I somehow missed - his composure throughout, has been, like William's, remarkable. CONTENTS ABBREVIATIONS In this thesis, references to Elizabeth Gaskell’s works are to the Pickering & Chatto collected edition. In the first instance, the full reference is given. After the first reference, the title of the work, volume number and page are given. LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1: Ordnance Survey, Manchester Sheet 44, 1851 Figure 2: Ordnance Survey, Manchester Sheet 45, 1851 Figure 3: Floor plan of Plymouth Grove Figure 4: Proposed restoration of William Gaskell’s study Figure 5: Proposed restoration of dining room at Plymouth Grove PAGE Introduction ‘Lingering on the borderland’: The meanings of home in Elizabeth Gaskell’s fiction 1 Letters and their uses in Gaskell’s fiction 16 Chapter 1 Home Sweet Home 36 Death and the home 49 Gaskell’s experience of death 56 Death in Gaskell’s fiction 58 The rescue compulsion 68 Chapter 2 A Man About the House: masculinity in Gaskell’s fiction 82 Gaskell and cross dressing 82 Cross-dressing in Gaskell’s fiction 86 Feminized men in Gaskell’s fiction 102 Chapter 3 Faith, home, and education: Unitarianism in its domestic context 120 The development of Unitarianism 121 Gaskell’s views on education 123 Gaskell’s faith 127 Unitarian Sunday Schools 132 A domestic faith 141 Chapter 4 The Invisible Hand: servants in Gaskell’s shorter fiction 155 The children’s nurse 165 The good and faithful servant 182 Chapter 5 Sex, Secrets and Stability: domestic artefacts and rituals 195 Chapter 6 The Discourse of Difference: homelessness in Gaskell’s fiction 225 Esther (Mary Barton, 1848) 232 Lois (‘Lois the Witch’, 1860) 243 Philip Hepburn (Sylvia’s Lovers, 1863) 252 The Meanings of Home: conclusion 261 BIBLIOGRAPHY 268 Primary sources 268 Nineteenth-Century Newspapers, Periodicals and reports 269 Nineteenth-Century books 271 Secondary sources 273 1 INTRODUCTION LINGERING ‘ON THE BORDERLAND’: THE MEANINGS OF HOME IN ELIZABETH GASKELL’S FICTION Elizabeth Gaskell’s experience of home was always that of an outsider, lingering on the borderland. She was never totally excluded, but equally, never fully belonged. Her mother’s death, when Gaskell was thirteen months old, meant that she was fostered with her mother’s sister, her Aunt Lumb, whose own experience of home was disrupted. Aunt Lumb’s husband had deserted her, and her adult daughter, Marianne, whom she brought up as a single parent, died the year after she took in Gaskell. There is no doubt that Aunt Lumb provided a secure and loving home for her niece, and she was welcomed into the extensive circle of her Unitarian relations, but it is hard to believe that the difficulties and sadness experienced by her aunt did not affect the, effectively orphaned, Gaskell. Some evidence of this might be gathered from the fact that Gaskell named her first surviving child Marianne, after her dead cousin. Gaskell’s father, as Jenny Uglow asserts, was absent from her early life.1 He remained in sporadic contact with her, but he was a restless character who frequently changed jobs and location, launching himself with enthusiasm into each new project, but often struggling financially.2 He re-married in 1814, and although Gaskell visited her father from time to time, her relationship with her step-mother and half-brother and sister was uneasy and distant. She did however form a close bond with her brother John Stevenson, who disappeared either at sea or in India some time in the winter of 1828, and his loss was followed, a year later, by the death of her father who was devastated by John’s unexplained disappearance. 1 Jenny Uglow, Elizabeth Gaskell: A Habit of Stories, (London and New York: Faber and Faber, 1999), p 13. 2 See Winifred Gerin, Elizabeth Gaskell, A Biography, (Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1976), pp 2 – 6. 2 Marriage to William in 1832 and a move to Manchester gave Gaskell the opportunity to create her own home and family, but the fault lines of death and loss continued to run beneath the apparently conventional surface of her life. Her first child was stillborn, and she was to lose two further children, including her beloved son, Willie, leaving her with a powerful residual anxiety about her remaining four daughters. She lingered on the borderland too, of life as a minister’s wife. Whilst she dutifully taught her servants and Sunday School class in her home, and undertook much charitable work, she chafed against the restrictions of domestic life and the expectations placed on her by others. She remained sensitive too about her status as a Unitarian. William was highly regarded by his colleagues in Manchester, but even a visit to the Bishop, although humorously described in a letter to Tottie Fox, reveals her expectation of criticism and her sense of exclusion.
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