The complete online text of The Half-Brothers by Elizabeth Gaskell.

The English author Elizabeth Gaskell (1810-1865) wrote sociological novels that explored the ills of industrial England and novels of small-town life that are penetrating studies of character. Elizabeth Cleghorn Stevenson was born on Sept. 29, 1810. Her...

A recent review of Mrs. Gaskell's critical reputation divided her critics into three camps. One group, now fading, still treats her mainly as the author of Cranford (1853). A second emphasizes her "social-problem" novels but insists that they be regarded...

For some critics Elizabeth Gaskell was a conventional, middle-class Victorian wife and mother who accepted the values of her world and who also happened to write books--a feminine dove among literary eagles Charlotte Brontë and George Eliot, to borr...

Today's running of the 131st Irish Derby will bring a sense of deja vu to The Curragh. Three years ago Commander In Chief strode to victory and this afternoon his half-brother Dushyantor, representing the same team - owner Khalid Abdullah, trainer Henry Cecil, jockey...

THE HALF BROTHER LARS SAABYE CHRISTENSEN, TRANS. FROM THE NORWEGIAN BY KENNETH STEVEN. Arcade, $27 (696p) ISBN 1-55970-715-1 * Epic yet startlingly contemporary, this massive novel charts 50 years in the life of an unconventional Oslo family, lighted by gleams of the...

If O.J. Simpson picked it, here's how the Kentucky Derby would end: Tiago at the wire."I'm just loving Kentucky this week," Simpson said on a rainy Thursday morning on the backstretch. "It's just a great time."Simpson made his fourth straight trip to Churchill Downs since...

Prince Abdul-Majid bin Abdul-AzizRIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) _ Prince Abdul-Majid bin Abdul-Aziz, the governor of the Islam's holy city of Mecca, died Saturday after a long illness, a Saudi Arabian royal statement said. He was 65.Abdul-Majid, who was the half brother of Saudi King Abdullah,...