The Woman in White Wilkie Collins 9781542707251 Books
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The Woman in White is an epistolary novel written by Wilkie Collins in 1859, serialized in 1859–1860, and first published in book form in 1860. It is considered to be among the first mystery novels and is widely regarded as one of the first (and finest) in the genre of 'sensation novels'. As was customary at that time, The Woman in White was first published as a magazine serial. The first episode appeared on 29 November 1859, following Charles
The Woman in White Wilkie Collins 9781542707251 Books
I never expected to love this book as much as I did and I'm so happy I tried it. It's a long one, so be prepared for that. Be prepared, also, for twists and turns and that slam you feel when you thought you knew what was going on and had it all figured out and you got the rug pulled out from under you!This was written in that grand style English that you just don't find in modern literature. I adore reading it, and if you love the classics, and a good mystery, then this is for you. These people came from a different time, and what was considered a huge scandal years and years ago wouldn't raise an eyebrow today, so keep that in mind as you read. This is truly a different world. But, human nature is fairly consistent, and you will recognize in these characters, people you have read in more modern tomes, or even people you know yourself. They are well developed, complex characters that I enjoyed immensely. I love the dramatic swooning...the formal language...and a time in history when restraint was a highly regarded quality.
This Kindle edition was free...and won't cost you anything to give it a go. I'm sure you will be as engrossed as I was.
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The Woman in White Wilkie Collins 9781542707251 Books Reviews
This book, along with Collins' other famous novel, "The Moonstone", has been recommended to me at times by reader friends and teachers who know how much I love English literature and mystery novels. It's supposed to be a seminal classic, one of the first mystery-romance-Gothic, a prototype for the genre. It was wildly popular when it was published in 1860.
So when my mystery book club chose read it I did. Gentle reader, it's very very long, so be prepared. A young drawing teacher is stopped for directions as he travels to London on a dark night by a woman in white who places a hand on his shoulder, evidently coming up behind him. I'm afraid I got bogged down here right away. What woman would do this in 1860? What woman would be walking to London alone today?
Onward. A long and convoluted narrative begins, involving two mysterious women in white, insanity, their mother, a cometery, the drawing instructor, a fortune, an evil friend and a dead father. The father insists the woman marry a friend of his, which she doesn't want to do but does because she feels she has a moral obligation. Lots of back and forth about class structure, the place of women, what's proper, temptation resisted.
I was reminded of "Clarissa", written in 1748 by Samuel Richardson. It too, was scandalous and wildly popular. It’s discussed in Leslie Fiedler's famous book of literary criticism, "Love and Death in the American Novel", a must read in 1960. Clarissa Harlowe is seduced by the evil Lovelace, somehow against her will, and ruined. I got really exasperated with both Clarissa and the characters in TWIW because of their endless sensitivities, worries, mulling over and over about what to do.
I wasn't surprised when I found out that Henry James thought that Collins had cloned "Clarissa". "...Margaret Oliphant hailed it as "a new beginning in fiction", while at the same time Edward Bulwer-Lytton dismissed it as "great trash". And while Henry James disliked the "ponderosity" of The Woman in White (calling it "a kind of 19th-century version of Clarissa Harlowe"), he acknowledged that the book had "introduced into fiction those most mysterious of mysteries, the mysteries which are at our own doors". (The Manchester Guardian review).
Sometimes it seems to me that the English novel really has but one theme, the problem of patriarchy, and the plight of women and the evil sins committed against them. Think of Thomas Hardy. Think of the insane women in English literature (Virginia Woolf, T.S. Eliot's wife), Rebecca, Jane Eyre.
“Above all, perhaps, “The Woman in White” shows how unusually attuned Collins was to the vulnerability of women in Victorian society and the ease with which they could be tumbled from their place. Only a couple of years earlier, Bulwer-Lytton had had his own fractious wife committed to an asylum.” - The New Yorker
So, I think I've made my case that "The Woman in White" deserves to be read, and needs to be on any serious reader's completed list. It's elegantly and beautifully written, filled with sensuous and vivid imagery. I gave myself over to the languid pace, but still was sustained by suspense as I read on and on.
It is easy to understand why Wilkie Collins’ book has never been out of print since 1859 once you plunge into its spectacle. Victorian England serves as the setting. A drawing teacher is hired to tutor two affluent sisters. He forms a romantic attachment to the younger of the two and learns later to his chagrin that she is supposed to marry a man she doesn’t love. Collins shows the fragile nature of women in a male-dominated world. In this instance, the novel resembles a Jane Austin soap opera. The heroine is truly a damsel-in-distress. Her father wanted her to marry the despicable Percival Glyde, and she abides by his decision. Sir Percival strips Lady Glyde of all her financial worth to pay off his gambling debts. Collins created a first-class jackal of a villain with Sir Percival. The ultimate villain is the Italian born Count Fosco. Rotund Sidney Greenstreet played the role in the Warner Brothers adaptation. All of Collins’ characters stand out, even the viper-like Madame Fosco. Laura Glyde suffers heavily under a yoke of oppression when she balks at paying Sir Percival’s bills. Secrets play an important part in this sprawling novel. The villains are detestable and they suffer grievously for their conspiracy. One dies in a burning church, with the other is stabbed to death in the chest. Fortune favors the woebegone hero and heroines. The description of Sir Percival’s demise is stirring stuff. A great novel that I thought I might not get around to reading.
I never expected to love this book as much as I did and I'm so happy I tried it. It's a long one, so be prepared for that. Be prepared, also, for twists and turns and that slam you feel when you thought you knew what was going on and had it all figured out and you got the rug pulled out from under you!
This was written in that grand style English that you just don't find in modern literature. I adore reading it, and if you love the classics, and a good mystery, then this is for you. These people came from a different time, and what was considered a huge scandal years and years ago wouldn't raise an eyebrow today, so keep that in mind as you read. This is truly a different world. But, human nature is fairly consistent, and you will recognize in these characters, people you have read in more modern tomes, or even people you know yourself. They are well developed, complex characters that I enjoyed immensely. I love the dramatic swooning...the formal language...and a time in history when restraint was a highly regarded quality.
This edition was free...and won't cost you anything to give it a go. I'm sure you will be as engrossed as I was.
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