Elizabeth Gaskell's Cranford

Thomas Recchio is associate professor of English at the University of Connecticut, USA

• Introduction: materiality as interpretation in Cranford; Cranford in Household Words, an accidental novel; Illustrating Cranford, illustrating the nation; 'Charming and sane': school editions of Cranford, 1905-1966; Dramatizing Cranford, 1899-2007; Epilogue: Cranford in the digital age; Appendices; Bibliography; Index.

'Thoroughly researched in every respect, this is an illuminating response to a long familiar text. It considers questions of illustration, the multiplicity of editions on both sides of the Atlantic, together with its dramatic and televisual adaptation, and conducts a detailed and revealing analysis of the implications of Cranford’s iconic significance.' Alan Shelston, University of Manchester, UK and President, The Gaskell Society ’This is an auspicious beginning to the "Ashgate Studies in Publishing History" series... Recchio writes with inviting clarity, providing not only the advertised publishing history of the novel [...] but also analyses of the social conditions that brought about changes in the text and, especially, packaging of the novel... Highly recommended.' Choice ’Recchio deals with Cranford's move onto stage and screen in an original, interesting and interdisciplinary manner.’ Times Literary Supplement 'Thomas Recchio's study of Cranford issued as part of Ashgate's series Studies in Publishing History, is more than a mere bibliographic record or even a simple publishing history... Thomas Recchio's book was published simultaneously in hardback and in a kindle version... It is exciting that Gaskell literary scholarship has joined the cutting edge publishing format.' Gaskell Journal ’... [Recchio] provides us with some intriguing readings and proves to be a deft interpreter of image-text relations... It is difficult to convey the rich detail of Recchio’s engaging account in such short space... Recchio’s study will be of central interest to Gaskell scholars and will also be useful for critics wishing to consider the ways in which illustration and adaption can be related to the reception history of literary texts.’ English Studies 'Recchio’s publishing history [...] is interesting on several counts: as a material history of cultural publication, as an interpretation of the Cranford text that benefits from a number of interrogativ