Woman`s fate in problem-theme integrity of "Mary Barton" by Elizabeth Gaskell

"Mary Barton" (1848), the first novel of Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, is analysed in the article from the maternity perspective as a specific form of the woman's fate theme that significantly determined the problem-theme structure of the novel. The conflict and the system of images are regarded in the light of religious and ethical imperatives of the writer. The core of the analysis is the principles of the female images creation; the emphasis is made on the use of Bible allusions. Special attention is paid to the artistic specificity of presentation of social roles of the working-class women in England in the industrialization epoch in the middle of the XIXth century.