Cover of Ruth by Elizabeth Gaskell Ebook Ruth
Ebook · Sovereign

Ruth

Author
Elizabeth Gaskell
Series
Timeless Classics
Language
English
Length
398 pages
ISBN
9781909904668
Published
15 October 2013
Imprint
Sovereign
  • Orphan
  • seamstress
  • dressmaker
  • poverty
  • love affair
  • societal pressure
  • social class
  • gender roles
  • fallen woman
  • judgment

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Description

"Ruth" by Elizabeth Gaskell is a novel that follows the story of a young orphan named Ruth Hilton who is taken in by Mrs. Mason, a seamstress in the town of Fordham. Mrs. Mason gives Ruth a home and a job as a dressmaker's assistant, and Ruth begins to rebuild her life after years of poverty and hardship. However, Ruth's world is turned upside down when she falls in love with a young man named Henry Bellingham, who comes from a wealthy family. Despite the social and cultural barriers between them, Ruth and Henry embark on a passionate love affair that threatens to tear both of their lives apart.

Author

Elizabeth Gaskell (1810–1865) widened the Victorian novel's moral imagination. Published by Dickens in Household Words and admired by contemporaries from Ruskin to George Eliot, she wrote fiction that refused to look away from social suffering — child labour, class division, the hidden cost of industrial progress — while never losing warmth or narrative pleasure.

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