Original scientific paper
The Novel as Cultural Geography: Elizabeth Gaskell’s North and South
Borislav Knežević
Abstract
The article examines the work of cartography in the 1854/5 Gaskell novel North and
South, which has long been considered an example of the genre of the industrial novel
dealing with capital/labor relations. The novel is analyzed as a complex exercise in the
mapping of national space, which involves the creation of a map stretching from the
global to the domestic. An argument is made that in the mid-19th century the English
novel took it upon itself to take part in the articulation of knowledge about society
that the novelists felt was necessary at a time when society was rapidly changing and
new discourses on social relations were needed. The article claims that the spatiality
in Gaskell’s novel needs to be read in relation to three historical coordinates: the
topical imperative of the condition of England debate, the work of imagining the
nation that characterizes the novel as a genre, and the ability of the novel as a genre
to narrativize the mediations between the private and the public: in case of North
and South, there is a clear example of mediating conventions of domestic fiction and
social-issue topical literature.
Keywords
class; cultural geography; industrial capitalism; industrial novel
Hrčak ID:
101805
URI
Publication date:
2.5.2012.
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