Trauma And Scriptotherapy:Mrs. Gaskell’s Trauma In Mary Barton And North And South

Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell (1810-1865) was an outstanding female writer in England in19th century. She gave a true-to-life portrait of the serious social problems of her time in her two novels:Mary Barton and North and South. Karl Max praised her as one of the excellent English novelists in the19th century who had revealed more political and social truth in their novels than all the professional politicians, political writers and moralists. Mrs. Gaskell experienced a lot of misfortune all her life, the misfortune in her family and the social disturbance traumatized her deeply. But Mrs. Gaskell was not a person who could not recover after a setback, on the other hand she took up her pen and wrote down all the traumatic events she experienced, worked through her traumatic memory, got healed, and became an important writer in the English literature history eventually. This thesis tries to take the perspective of Mrs. Gaskell’s trauma, combined with the trauma theory and through the method of textual analysis, explains Mrs. Gaskell’s way of reconstructing her traumatic memory and getting healed through scriptotheropy.This thesis consists of three parts:an introduction, a body of three chapters and a conclusion.The first part gives a brief introduction about Mrs. Gaskell and her works, a literature review of the researches abroad and at home on Mrs. Gaskell and her works, especially her two industrial novels.Chapter One gives a brief introduction of trauma theory, including the definition of trauma, the characteristics of traumatic memory and scriptotherapy. This chapter also depicts the family trauma and social trauma suffered by Mrs. Gaskell. Mrs. Gaskell’s mother died shortly after her birth; her father remarried, which left her dependent on her relatives; her only brother never returned from his expedition at sea; her only son died in his infancy. In addition, the British society was experiencing great upheavals. The industrial revolution brought not only huge economic wealth, but also serious social conflicts. Living in Manchester, Mrs. Gaskell witnessed the workers’ miserable life, strikes, and a series of social disturbances. Serious social clashes traumatized her greatly.Chapter Two is mainly about the re-enactment of Mrs. Gaskell’s traumatic memory in her two industrial novels. This chapter analyzes the writer’s family trauma and social trauma’s reappearance in Mary Barton and North and South. Due to her lack of motherly love in her childhood, the theme of the loss of maternal love is fully presented in both novels. Mrs. Gaskell’s complex about her lost brother and her only son are replayed in her works. Meanwhile, social events which traumatized her deeply like serious conflicts between the workers and the millowners, the miserable living condition of the poor are all described in detail. It is through this kind of therapeutic re-enactment of traumatic events in her works that Mr. Gaskell could face her trauma bravely, which enables her to get out of her trauma.Chapter Three analyzes Mrs. Gaskell’s recovery from trauma through reconstruction of her family trauma and social trauma in the two novels. Mrs. Gaskell’s lack of maternal love gets compensated through rewriting love in Mary Barton and North and South. The character’s reunion with the sailor brother in the novels alleviates Mrs. Gaskell’s miss for her brother John. Mrs. Gaskell’s social trauma is also reduced. The conflicts between the workers and the millowners are solved in the novels. The resolving of all kinds of conflicts in the novel is the symbol of Mrs. Gaskell’s working through her trauma.The closing part concludes that traumatic memory is the drive and fountain of Mrs. Gaskell’s creation. Writing heals the pain of her psychological trauma. Trauma is inevitable in everyone’s life journey, how to work through it is a subject we should explore. Mrs. Gaskell’s way of getting healed testified the healing function of literature. Writers can get healed from writing; meanwhile, readers can also get healed and enriched from reading.