The Woman In White
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4.5 • 662 Ratings
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Publisher Description
Walter Hartright, a young art teacher, meets a mysterious and distressed woman dressed in white. He helps her on her way, but later learns that she has escaped from an asylum. Next day, he travels to Limmeridge House in Cumberland, having been hired as a drawing master on the recommendation of his friend, Pesca, an Italian language master. The Limmeridge household comprises the invalid Frederick Fairlie, and Walter's students: Laura Fairlie, Mr Fairlie's niece, and Marian Halcombe, her devoted half-sister. Walter realises that Laura bears an astonishing resemblance to the woman in white, who is known to the household and whose name is Anne Catherick. The mentally disabled Anne had lived near Limmeridge as a child and was devoted to Laura's mother, who first dressed her in white.
Customer Reviews
Excellent read
This was an enjoyable read that provoked thought and provided entertainment. It was a pleasant diversion from the usual mindless dribble that seems to be written everywhere these days.
The Novel which left London on edge.
How true! That, when it was released in the All Year Round offices, hundreds of people crowded to receive this manuscript. Naturally, what shocked Victorian’s delicate senses then, though hypnotizing to us now, causes us no protestations of lack of manners and shocking material, can you imagine what the Victorian’s would consider of our shocking literature today?
This book is truly a captivating story-the writing has full control-the story is laid out plainly through the stance of different characters. Of course Laura doesn’t get a chance to speak, in order to emphasize her bewilderment. This novel has all sentiments of good read-and hence, I certainly recommend it,
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
The rather long-winded style of this compatriot & contemporary of Charles Dickens is a compelling tale of virtue and loyalty beset by perfidy and greedy self-interest.
While there is a female character possessing strength, courage and intelligence, she is as degraded by the patronizing morès of the mid-18th century culture as were nearly all women of that time.
Whether intentional or not, the generalized servitude required of women in that patriarchal, class-divided society is blatantly unfair and leads to inequities for all members of that society.