Elizabeth Gaskell was born in London but her mother died one
year after her birth and from then on she lived with her aunt
Hannah Lumb in Knutsford. She was educated there and at Stratford-on-Avon.
After she left school she spent time in London and in Newcastle
upon Tyne. On 30 August 1832 she married Rev William Gaskell
in Knutsford. They moved to Manchester where her husband became
the minister at Cross Street Unitarian Chapel. In 1841 they
travelled to Heidelberg in Germany and German literature influenced
her stories.
In 1848 her first and most successful
novel "Mary Barton" was published. Charles Dickens noticed her
and she started writing for his magazine Household Words. In
1850 they moved to a house 84 at Plymouth Grove that is now
a museum.
In 1853 her novel "Ruth" was published, followed
by "North and South" in 1854/1855. At Plymouth Grove she was
visited by Charlotte Brontė and after Charlotte died she wrote
her biography and published it in 1857. Other visitors were
Dickens, Harriet Beecher Stowe and Charles Hallé, who lived
in the neighbourhood.
She died in 1865 of a heart attack
during a visit to a house that she had bought in Hoybourne,
Hampshire. She was buried in Knutsford.
Related persons
• was visited by Beecher Stowe, Harriet
• wrote about Brontė, Charlotte
• was a friend of Clarke, Mary Elizabeth
• has a connection with Dickens, Charles
• was visited by Hallé, Charles
• was written about by Thackeray Ritchie, Anne
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