First published in 1857, The Life of Charlotte Brontë marries documentary rigor to novelistic grace, tracing Brontë from the Haworth parsonage through schoolroom ordeals, governess work, Brussels study, and the making of Jane Eyre, Shirley, and Villette. Gaskell situates her subject within Yorkshire's moorland culture and the gendered literary marketplace, quoting copiously from letters. This Illustrated Edition adds portraits, facsimiles, and sites that clarify networks, manuscripts, and myths the biography itself helped to shape. Gaskell-novelist of industrial Manchester and a Unitarian steeped in social ethics-met Brontë after Jane Eyre and became a close friend. At Patrick Brontë's and Smith, Elder's urging, she wrote the authorized life soon after Charlotte's 1855 death, using family papers. Her sympathy for women's labor and prudence under libel pressures shaped both emphasis and omissions. Recommended to scholars of Victorian literature, women's writing, and life-writing, as well as general readers, this edition offers a lucid narrative and an archive in miniature. It humanizes genius without sentimentality and remains a foundational case study in how friendship, evidence, and culture construct a literary life. Quickie Classics summarizes timeless works with precision, preserving the author's voice and keeping the prose clear, fast, and readable-distilled, never diluted. Enriched Edition extras: Introduction · Synopsis · Historical Context · Author Biography · Brief Analysis · 4 Reflection Q&As · Editorial Footnotes.