In the time period in which Elizabeth Gaskell wrote, "Novels were somehow frivolous and corrupting unless they had a clear moral or spiritual message". (Uglow 134). Gaskell's novel Mary Barton can be viewed as socially conservative, as it upholds important moral values of Victorian society including the role and duty of women, the importance of the family and the ideal state of marriage. Through examining Mary Barton as a social problem novel encompassing poverty and death and addiction, the author's accord with the social values of the time will become clear. .
It has been suggested that all discourses regarding Victorian social problems are gendered. (Poovey) Social problem novels such as Mary Barton are gendered feminine due to the human aspect found in the writing, which persuades and manipulates the reader to react emotionally. Dangers such as hunger and disease are familiar presences in the novel allowing emotion to be felt by the reader. Perhaps one of the best examples of the capability of the novel in arousing emotion is in chapter six, when John Barton and George Wilson witness the horrific filth in which the poor Davenport family reside. Cazamian states, "There is no scene in any novel of the time which more powerfully evokes the conditions of social distress than that in which Barton and Wilson go to the aid of their comrade Davenport's family" (222). In the following passage, real squalor is evoked. "They went along till they arrived in Berry Street as they passed, women from their doors tossed household slops of every description into the gutter; they ran into the next pool, which over-flowed and stagnated.Going into the cellar inhabited by Davenports, the smell was so fetid as almost to knock the two men down" (Gaskell 59-60). In this social problem novel, it becomes evident that the author has quite an understanding of the social problems that surrounded her.