Victorians! discussion

Welcome to the group read for Gothic Tales by Elizabeth Gaskell! I'm automatically excited about anything with the word "Gothic" in it, and the creepy cover looks very promising. I look forward to sharing these "chilling tales" (quote from the back cover) with you.

Do you have any interesting facts about the book or the author to share? Please do!

The reading schedule for this book is as follows:

June 29 - July 5 - Week 1 -- "Disappearances," "The Old Nurse's Story," and "The Squire's Story" (48 pages)
July 6 - 12 - Week 2 -- "The Poor Clare," and "The Doom of the Griffiths" (89 pages)
July 13 - 19 - Week 3 -- "Lois the Witch" (88 pages)
July 20 - 26 - Week 4 -- "The Crooked Branch" and "Curious, if True" (59 pages)
July 27 - Aug. 2 - Week 5 -- "The Grey Woman" (53 pages) and final thoughts

Enjoy the read and the discussion!

From what I’ve read these are not all “ghost” stories, but all may have some mysterious aspect.

At least one is vampiric but I won’t spoil which one it is.

Having read all Mrs. Gaskell's novels and most of her short stories, it is her 'supernatural' tales that surprise me most of all. After all, she married and seemed devoted to her husband who was a Unitarian minister. Much was made of the scandal surrounding her novel 'Ruth,' particularly the reaction of her husband's congregation, yet her Gothic tales do not seem to have roused any similar disaffection.

The University of Manchester has made available an excellent digitised online resource, consisting of many important manuscripts, letters and other artefacts relating to Elizabeth Gaskell.
I usually access them through this link
http://elizabethgaskellhouse.co.uk/ab...
which is a page from the Elizabeth Gaskell House website.
If you can't visit the house or John Rylands library to view these artefacts, then the online resource is an ideal alternative.

Trev wrote: "Having read all Mrs. Gaskell's novels and most of her short stories, it is her 'supernatural' tales that surprise me most of all. After all, she married and seemed devoted to her husband who was a ..."

Thanks so much for sharing this, Trev! Here are a few more resources for information about Elizabeth Gaskell and her writings:

https://spartacus-educational.com/Jga...

Literary Ladies Guide

Also, here are some interesting points from the introduction of my book about the stories we will be reading.

"This juxtaposition of the ghastly and the everyday suggests one of the defining characteristics of the Gothic genre, that of the uncanny double, the shadowy world that is the complex underbelly of familiar experience," (xi).

It goes on to talk about "Gaskell's playful exploration not just of the supernatural, but of other Gothic themes and motifs such as the doubled identity, the discovered manuscript, and the conflict with history and forms of authority. In Gaskell's Gothic scenarios, it is usually the female characters who are victimized by the males, and it is this investment in exposing the conflict between the powerful and the powerless that links these stories and novellas most explicitly with the themes of her better-known full-length works," (xi-xii).

"Part of what constitutes the Gothic experience in these stories is the split between different forms of identity and between different forms of authority--in terms of gender, history and textuality--and how those boundaries are themselves transgressed. In Gaskell's stories and novellas, what has been repressed continues to return, fact continually merges into fiction, and it is these shifts between what is real and what is imagined--seeing that ghost in the everyday street--that makes these stories so compelling," (xii).

Hopefully, this will give you some guidance on what to look for as you read.

The Victorians in many ways were very macabre and ghost stories for Christmas were the norm and many authors wrote such for the public demand. Life was filled with much to fear in terms of disease, infection, accident, death during childbirth. Infant mortality was higher and it was not uncommon for a mother to lose several of her children. Their behavior such as taking photos of the dead and making jewelry out of a deceased person's hair was not frowned upon.
Christianity is very much about life and death, good and evil, God and the devil. Gothic tales are in many ways a way of expressing repressed emotions and fears as well as trying to make sense of the frailty of life, in which we are in the midst of death. People look for answers and always have, whether it's building a great stone henge or trying to describe what may lay beyond this life.

Tracey the Bookworm wrote: "The Victorians in many ways were very macabre and ghost stories for Christmas were the norm and many authors wrote such for the public demand. Life was filled with much to fear in terms of disease,..."

Great points, and well-said!

What I like about Gaskell is her stories seem much more "real" than other gothic fiction I've read.

Gaskell is a truly wonderful writer! I really enjoy her capacity to create realistic characters.