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I would like to discuss one of the strong characters - Mrs Thornton.
What makes her so overly protective and sometimes overbearing ?
Why does she deny her son his pleasure in reading and generally gaining theoretical knowledge ?
Why does she immediatly take a dislike towards Margret ?
I am presuming you mean Mrs Thornton as Mrs Hale is Margarets mother and if so I believe she is so overprotactive of her son because of the loss of her husband. John has clearly replaced his father in his mother's life and she loves him as such as well as respecting his work ethic and management of their rise from poverty. She wants him to be happy and so is very protective of those that may stop this. On top of this eldest sons would often be treasured by their parents at this time so it wouldn't have been seen as particularly strange.
She is very proud of her heritage and their climb to power and is not ashamed of their being in trade. The growing middle class and their increasing wealth were often looked down upon by the titled, 'educated' and 'cultured' upper classes. I think Mrs Thornton doesn't think that you need to be well read to be a gentleman but honest and hardworking. (The difference between John and Henry hint at Gaskells' feelings regarding this.) I don't think she wants her son becoming like these upper classes and wants him to feel he has done well and has nothing more to prove.
This relates to why she doesn't like Margaret. When Margaret first arrives in Milton she romanticses the South and its 'cultured' and 'educated' people and defends it when the people of Milton talk better of the North. Some of these remarks make her seem like she thinks she is above the people of Milton which would make Mrs Thornton dislike her. This as well as the fact that Margaret has not worked hard for her relative wealth and position would affect Mrs Thorntons opinion of her.
Just some ideas.
We learn through a brief reference that Mrs Thornton lost an infant daughter which would explain her over-protectiveness of Fanny, but we also see how it may have an effect on her relationship with Thornton.
Gaskell wanted to write a relistic novel and thus made her characters reasonably complicated. Mrs Thornton is a good example of this. She is riddled with paradoxes and this is shown partly through this relationship she has with Thornton which explains her views on Margaret. She initially warns him not to "get caught by a penniless girl" but this statement is soon contradicted by her damning Margaret asking how could she "turn up her nose" at him. This highlights how she is unwilling to loose him as a son as, as he has helped support her and Fanny after the death of his father. However; it also shows just how proud she is of her son for managing to become to renouned in Milton.
Mrs Thornton's attitude towards Margaret also raises intersting psychological ideas in terms of the Oedipus complex. At times, the manner in which she refers to her son is slightly more emotional that we would expect from most mothers, suggesteing a stonger feeling towards her son than merely maternal. This would explain her dislike of margaret as she may appear as a threat to this relationship since she would not want to loose John in this sense. When Margaret no longer appears to be a threat, when she decides to move back to London, Mrs Thornton's attitude towards her is much more accepting, suggesting she feels in a safer situation.
These are just some random ideas that popped into my head as well as ideas that arose in my class whilst reading the novel for my exams. Hope it provided some insight.
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