In this book Schor places the novels of Elizabeth Gaskell in the context both of Victorian society and Victorian fiction. She argues that Gaskell--long viewed as a private, gentle woman who wrote only from a sense of outrage at Industrial England--was in fact intensely interested in publication and in assuming a public voice. Schor also examines how Gaskell's efforts to write about those denied a voice within Victorian society led her to an awareness...