This literary biographical study treats the life and works of the mid-Victorian novelist, Elizabeth Gaskell, whose popularity is now well established, among academics and general readers alike. Considering her as both a representative figure and a notable individual, it discusses her writing in the context of those forces which influenced and shaped it. It examines her attitudes towards creativity and artistic production, her relations with publishers, and her literary friendships; it also focuses on those elements of her domestic and social life, especially her passion for travel, which feed into her work. It pays particular attention to the conflicting demands made upon her, as woman and as artist, of which she, like many other women writers of the period, was not only constantly aware, but which she sought - not always successfully - to harmonize. The overall portrait of her is of an amazingly energetic and many-talented figure.