“Oh, I can’t describe my home. It is home, and I can’t put its charm into words” Margaret Hale, North and South, 1855

From October 2024 to September 2025 Elizabeth Gaskell’s House is celebrating its 10-year anniversary of opening the public and will be exploring themes of house and home through a season of online events.

The stereotype of the Victorian home is a place of domestic bliss with an angelic woman caring for her devoted family. So, how did Elizabeth Gaskell portray ‘home’ in her novels and short stories? Did she subvert this ideal or gently endorse it?

Speaker Sherry Ashworth interrogates the meaning of ‘home’ as she looks at literary depictions, both good and bad, across Elizabeth Gaskell’s writing. You can enjoy the cosy houses of the amazons of Cranford, step inside the respectable working-class homes in Mary Barton and see the reality of industrial strife and starvation in North and South.

Join us from the comfort of your own home as Sherry asks the question, what did ‘home’ mean to Elizabeth Gaskell?

‘Loved it… gained many insights into the books.’ Visitor to previous event