With the exception of her powerful "Life of Charlotte Brontë," Mrs. Gaskell wrote only novels or short stories. The enormous difficulties which attended the writing of a biography of the author of "Jane Eyre" would, we venture to think, have baffled any other writer of that time. It is easy now, years after Charlotte Brontë's death, to criticise the wisdom of this or that page, to hunt up slight mistakes, to maintain that in some details Mrs. Gaskell was wrong. To be wise too late is an easy and, to some apparently, a most grateful task; but it would, nevertheless, be hard to find a biography of more fascinating interest, or one which more successfully grappled with the great difficulty of the undertaking.
As Mr. Clement Shorter remarks, the "Life of Charlotte Brontë" "ranks with Boswell's 'Life of Johnson' and Lockhart's 'Life of Scott.'" It is pleasant, too, to read Charlotte Brontë's own words in a letter to Mr. Williams, where she mentions her first letter from her future friend and biographer:
"The letter you forwarded this morning was from Mrs. Gaskell, authoress of 'Mary Barton.' She said I was not to answer it, but I cannot help doing so. The note brought the tears to my eyes. She is a good, she is a great woman. Proud am I that I can touch a chord of sympathy in souls so noble. In Mrs. Gaskell's nature it mournfully pleases me to fancy a remote affinity to my sister Emily. In Miss Martineau's mind I have always felt the same, though there are wide differences. Both these ladies are above me--certainly far my superiors in attainments and experience. I think I could look up to them if I knew them."
For lovers of the author of "Mary Barton" it is hard, however, not to feel a grudge against the "Life of Charlotte Brontë"--or, rather, the reception accorded to it. Owing to the violent attacks to which it gave rise, to a threatened action for libel on the part of some of those mentioned in the book, and to the manifold annoyances to which the publication of the Biography subjected the writer, Mrs. Gaskell determined that no record of her own life should be written.
It is pleasant to find that there were gleams of light mixed with the many vexations. Charles Kingsley writes to Mrs. Gaskell in warm appreciation of the "Life":