Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell Read Free Book Online Page A

characters. As such, Wives and Daughters is much more interested in venality—specifically, Mrs. Gibson’s liberality with the truth, and Cynthia’s tendency to fickleness, both to others and her own self—than in actual sin. So the fairy tale is rewritten; there is a dreaded stepmother, but Molly is no Cinderella, Cynthia is no evil stepsister, and Mrs. Gibson, though selfish and silly, does not advance her daughter at the expense of her stepchild.
    Instead, the novel refigures that tale as a tale of second families—what we today call blended families—with all their complications, both happy and painful. One of the ways the novel seems most modern, and most astute to the contemporary reader, is in its dissection of the small but persistent tensions within a blended family. Molly resents the changes in her routine and environment that Mrs. Gibson makes, and Mr. Gibson (whose unromantic vision was for a manager of his house and daughter) resents his wife’s banishing of his favorite vulgarity, the eating of bread and cheese for supper. One could point to any number of scenes in the novel that carefully trace the nuances of petty resentments, annoyance, and discomfort that can sometimes emerge in these living situations. In the following example, taken from the scene in which the stepmother-to-be and her future stepdaughter first meet, the narrative captures the sense of suppressed feelings within a scene of forced felicity:
    Molly did not speak, but it was by a strong effort that she kept silence. Mrs. Kirkpatrick fondled her hand more perseveringly than ever, hoping thus to express a sufficient amount of sympathy to prevent her from saying anything injudicious. But the caress had become wearisome to Molly, and only irritated her nerves. She took her hand out of Mrs. Kirkpatrick’s, with a slight manifestation of impatience (p. 138).
    And in this second example, taken from the first time Molly and Cynthia meet as sisters, the narrative is explicit about the pleasures, as well as the inevitable awkwardness, of new relations:
    Molly fell in love with her, so to speak, on the instant. She sat there warming her feet and hands, as much at ease as if she had been there all her life; not particularly attending to her mother—who, all the time, was studying either her or her dress—measuring Molly and Mr. Gibson with grave observant looks as if guessing how she should like them.
    “There’s a hot breakfast ready for you in the dining-room, when you are ready for it,” said Mr. Gibson. “I’m sure you must want it after your night journey.” He looked round at his wife, at Cynthia’s mother, but she did not seem inclined to leave the warm room again.
    ... Cynthia rose and followed Molly upstairs.
    “I’m so sorry there isn’t a fire for you,” said Molly, “but—I suppose it wasn’t ordered; and, of course, I don’t give any orders. Here is some hot water, though.”
    “Stop a minute,” said Cynthia, getting hold of both Molly’s hands, and looking steadily into her face, but in such a manner that she did not dislike the inspection.
    “I think I shall like you. I am so glad! I was afraid I should not. We’re all in a very awkward position together, aren’t we? I like your father’s looks, though” (p. 215).
    The particular oddness of Cynthia and her mother’s relationship is here drawn for the first time, made more stark by the warmth of the newly met stepfather and sister; Mrs. Gibson not only does not meet her daughter where she is dropped by the coach, but she forgets to order a fire for her bedroom. Cynthia here alludes quite directly to what the narrative elsewhere works hard to suggest through the details of domestic life: the “very awkward position” they are in as strangers and yet also the nearest of relations. Wives and Daughters, although ostensibly structured around a slowly emerging marriage plot, is in fact an extraordinary depiction of the contours of blended families and, more