As relevant now as when it was first published, Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South skilfully weaves a compelling love story into a clash between the pursuit of profit and humanitarian ideals. When her father leaves the Church in a crisis of conscience, Margaret Hale is uprooted from her comfortable home in Hampshire to move with her family to the North of England. Initially repulsed by the ugliness of her new surroundings in the industrial town of Milton, Margaret becomes aware of the poverty and suffering of local mill workers and develops a passionate sense of social justice. Here the impact of the industrial revolution can be fully seen as tensions between workers and employers over poor working conditions and the growing divide between the rich industrialists and poor factory workers escalate into violent conflict. Margaret's sense of social justice is intensified by her tempestuous relationship with the mill-owner and self-made man John Thornton, and her fierce opposition over his treatment of his employees. In Margaret Hale the author created one of the most original heroines of Victorian literature.