"I could no sooner choose a favorite star in the heavens!"

As stated in a previous post today, I got a wonderful gift for my birthday, the Elizabeth Gaskell Collection. Elizabeth Gaskell was a writer in the 19th Century who has had these books made into movies by BBC, just like Jane Austen. But that is about where the similarities end. Elizabeth Gaskell dealt with more political stuff than Jane Austen did. And Elizabeth had less romance. Although what little romance she did portray was great. :) I love the fact that they are both different, but both still offer so much pleasure.

Prior to purchasing this DVD set, I had watched "Wives and Daughters", a wonderful story about love and daily life in England in the 19th Century. I had also watched "North and South", one of the best endings in cinema history, I was almost in tears by the beauty of the moment. The movie is also about the industrial era of England and how the common man dealt with it. But the third movie I hadn't watched, it is called "Cranford". I knew that it was about a town called Cranford that is modeled after a town that Elizabeth Gaskell lived in or visited a lot growing up (I can't remember which one). Well I finally watched it last Sunday and Monday...

I LOVE it! It has everything in it; some laughter, some crying (at least 1/2 the main characters either die or come close), some romance, and some wonderful 19th century language. There was this wonderful scene where some old ladies are trying to clean a piece of old lace in buttermilk when they discover that the cat has eaten the buttermilk and the lace. They simply must get it back, so they give the cat an enema and then have it poop in a big boot. The looks of joy on their faces when the cat is pooping is priceless. Then of course the servant gets the lovely task of rinsing out the boot and out comes the brown piece of lace. They were so ecstatic. That was probably one of my favorite scenes. The whole movie was so great, and I want to go live in Cranford. I think that I will make myself an honorary citizen. Anybody want to join me???

The moral of this story is, you must watch all three. I honestly can't tell you which one is my favorite, because they are all so different. That is one thing that I love about Elizabeth Gaskell, she was a very diverse author. One word of warning, they are all about 5 hours long, but each one is so worth it. Let me know if you want to borrow any of them, or we will have a movie night and I will watch one with you! :)