Private Selves and Public Conflicts: Mastery and Gender Identity in Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South

1Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South (1855) advances a radical social-moral agenda as it examines Victorian anxieties about public expressions of power and gender identity. The novel presents several competing articulations of the pragmatic industrialist, the intellectual gentleman, and the working class man. The true (164) in Industrial England, a term Gaskell employs to describe the factory owner, Thornton, comes under particular scrutiny, as does the now famous Victorian feminine ideal of the 'angel in the house.' The pragmatic industrialist identity is challenged by Margaret Hale, the novel's heroine. Margaret appropriates a stereotypically masculine role to advocate for a better life for the factory men working for Thornton, who also serves as her love interest in the novel. At odds with the strong industrialist man made of iron (213) represented by Thornton is the 'man of letters' represented by the heroine's father, Mr. Hale, whose values and forms of work are regarded as weak, effeminate, and outdated by Thornton. While these gendered divisions of work existed before the mid-nineteenth century, they came under pressure during the Industrial Revolution, as working-class men were increasingly ready to go on strike for better conditions and pay. This paper considers these gendered identities and competing forms of work and particularly examines Margaret's inner conflict, for she desires both to improve the condition of the factory workers in Milton-Northern and protect Mr. Thornton from mob violence and financial ruin.2Set in an industrialized town in northern England, Milton-Northern, Gaskell's North and South teases out the gendered layers of the 'soft' southerner, Margaret, and compares her journey to the harsh, industrialized north with the more refined lifestyle she enjoys on Harley Street in the novel's opening. Margaret leaves behind the south, where women often are depicted as clinging to the domestic ideal, and she both nurtures and fights for Milton's factory workers, repurposing the meaning of 'angel in the house' to incorporate the homes of the suffering poor. Her commitment to changing their living conditions means that she must enter a more public space. Rather than passively accepting the deplorable conditions for the working men around her, she listens to them, visiting their homes and families, some of whom are dying as a result of the poor factory working conditions. Fearless, she braves illness and contagion, stepping outside of her genteel social class to collect their stories to share with Thornton, who firmly maintains the older, patriarchal order and scoffs at her perceived 'southern' weakness for them.3Thornton is called master (110) by his workers, a class distinction with decidedly feudal resonances that Margaret deplores. Though Margaret disagrees with Thornton, she defends, rescues, and teaches him empathy. Her 'feminine' interference, as Thornton perceives it, nevertheless lessens social class tensions among the men, saving Thornton from near-mutiny even as it threatens his masculine authority and identity as a true (164) among his workers. By the end of the novel, however, Thornton comes to see the necessity of Margaret's intercession on their behalf. He is persuaded by her reasoning and persistence and also by her sexuality. Though frequently frustrated by Margaret, Thornton also finds her alluring and unlike any woman he knows. Her crossing of a hetero-normative gendered space to enact social change both frightens and excites him. It also emasculates him, stripping him of power in front of his men and causing an identity crisis for Thornton, who consistently shows contempt for male characters who are not what he considers masculine enough. The novel, however, validates Thornton's 'feminization' and Margaret's 'masculinity' and suggests that tearing down traditional Victorian gendered roles is a necessary precursor to breaking down the wall between Masters and Men (110). …