Class Blog

Throughout The Woman in White, Wilkie Collins uses a lot of flowery, over the top language to describe simple interactions between Walter Hartright and Laura Fairlie. These interactions, exclusively described from Walter’s perspective, convincingly portray the pent up sexual and romantic tension between the two. In Victorian society, English men and women were forbidden from discussing topics such as sex and desire openly, because they were considered extremely taboo. According to an excerpt from Sex, Scandal, and the Novel “sexual unspeakability does not function simply as a collection of prohibitions for Victorian writers. Rather, it affords them abundant opportunities to develop an elaborate discourse – richly ambiguous, subtly coded, prolix and polyvalent – that we now recognize and designate by the very term literary” (Cohen 3). Essentially, the strict nature of Victorian society as it relates to sexuality caused Victorian authors to develop their own covert methods for describing sexual desire and passion. Many of Walter’s passages are devoted to romanticizing his relationship with Laura, especially when describing their early interactions when they were merely student and teacher. When lamenting about his feelings for her, he writes “Yes my hardly-earned self-control was completely lost to me as if I had never possessed it; lost to me, as it is lost every day to other men, in other critical situations, where women are concerned” (Collins 66). With this statement, Walter is acknowledging an age-old sentiment that women are “temptations” to men, and that the trap of womanly wiles must be avoided for it can be disastrous in certain situations. He continues “I should have asked why any room in the house was better than home to me when she entered it, and barren as a desert when she went out again-why I always noticed and remembered the little changes in her dress that I had noticed and remembers in no other women before- why I saw her, and heard her, and touched her (when we shook hands at night and morning) as I had never seen, heard, and touched any other woman’s before” (Collins 66). It is evident in the way that Hartright carefully chooses his words so as not to so much as approach vulgarity when describing his attraction to Laura, that he is trying to be the perfect British gentlemen. For example, when he mentions the thrill of touching her, he immediately clarifies that they only made physical contact through the chaste gesture of shaking hands. Because Walter is prevented from acting on his feelings due to his position and the expectations of polite Victorian society, he is relegated to waxing poetic about his painful experience of falling for Laura.  

“I had taken Anne to the north with me; having my whims and fancies, occasionally, about my child, and getting, at times, jealous of Mrs. Clements’s influence over her. I never liked Mrs. Clements…and I was, now and then, not averse to plaguing her by taking Anne away. Not knowing what else to do with my girl… I put her to school in Limmerridge. The Lady of the manor, Mrs. Fairlie… amused me wonderfully, by taking a violent fancy to my girl. The consequence was, she learnt nothing at school, and was petted and spoilt at Limmeridge House. …They put some nonsense into her head about always wearing white. Hating white and liking colors myself, I was determined to take that nonsense out of her head as soon as we got home again.” (Collins 535)

This passage from Mrs. Catherick’s letter to Walter emphasizes the unequal and superficial nature of her relationship with Anne as well as establishing the self interest that drives her character. This is presented through the excessive use of commas and denigrating terms that she uses to describe other’s affection for Anne.

First, the excessive use of commas in the first sentence of the passage disrupt the sentence’s flow and implies that for Mrs. Catherick, admitting jealousy over someone she dislikes and considers beneath her, deeply hurts her pride to admit. The pauses of the commas in turn are read as empathic pauses or slow and careful formulation of thoughts. Both imply a truth that she is not willing to admit. In contrast, if the admittance of jealousy had a continuous uninterrupted flow, it would signify it as a comfortable truth that has no underlying negative association through how easy and smooth the formulation of phrasing for the sentence would be. 

Mrs. Catherick continues the depiction of her lack of affection for Anne by describing Mrs. Farlie’s affection and care for her as “violent fancy”. This phrase undermines and downplays the sincerity and depth of their connection through “violent” and “fancy”’s shared association with a sense of uncontrolled irrational judgement. Through this, she implies affection for her daughter as irrational. She cannot understand why Mrs. Fairlie would hold such affection for Anne and is only interested in maintaining and having “influence” over her daughter. In fact, she blames Mrs. Fairlie for causing Anne’s “horrible” attachment to only wearing white. She dismisses something that brings Anne comfort for her own preference for colors and indicates through this that she is not interested in knowing Anne, but rather in controlling her. 

Lastly, Mrs. Catherick’s negative portrayal of the pseudo maternal figures’s care indicates that she views her daughter as beneath her, similar to the way that she would view an animal or a pet. Her pointed use of “petted and spoilt” to describe Anne’s treatment at Limmeridge along with her attempts to control the focus of Anne’s affections and the way she dresses is reminiscent of the way that one would talk about and treat a pet. Specifically, petted is a term that one would very rarely use to describe another human being as the action can be a demeaning way of showing affection for an equal. While wanting control over the education and treatment of her daughter can fit into expectations of parenthood, the desire for control over appearance and affection, along with the usage of “petted” indicates that her interest is on a more superficial level. The jealousy she feels isn’t due to desire for familial love but rather stems from her desire for control, respect and attention. The repeated use of “My girl” and “my child” also supports this claim through the emphasis on possession and control created by repetition of the phrases. She claims possession in response to the care of Mrs. Fairlie and Mrs. Clements, and uses it as a reminder of her parental control over Anne. 

Through sentence flow, usage of phrasing that diminishes Anne and implies affection for her daughter as irrational, Mrs. Catherick repeatedly emphasizes that her only concern is her power and influence. This understanding of character shows how the intensity of her commitment to reputation drive her actions and character in the plot and brings her to callously disregard the harm caused to others .

Count Fosco, as discussed in class, is a sleazy, grimy, Robert-California-esk character. In “Sugar” by Laura Eastlake, she describes Count Fosco as “both unmasculine and distinctly un-British” using his child-like approach to sugar to cover for his commanding attitude and mesmerism over many of the characters. She then goes on to contradict herself stating that “sugar and chocolate were proffered as fuel for masculine performance, from the physical endurance” and sugar was a “masculine endeavor whether physical, commercial, or imperial” which directly followed her description of The Count. By contradicting herself, she is now stating that chocolate and sweets are both childlike as they offer a sense of wonderment, but mainly because they help the physical being of a man. And by following up Count Fusco’s reading, it almost feels like she is describing him as childlike but also a man with power, who knows how to use his childlike innocence to get what he wants.

To then circle back to Count Fosco (ew), he is described as the man who could “tame anything” and has a “rod of iron with which he rules her…it is a private rod, and is always kept upstairs”. Following this quote, he is described as a “good-humored father, ” juxtaposing the “rod” image. Using the lens of the Laura Eastlake piece, these paints Count Fosco in an even worse light. If we are assuming that sugar made The Count “unmasculine” and “un-British” she is pointing out his “otherness” in being a foreigner, implying he is not masculine as he enjoys sugar just a little too much and those around him may not accept him because he is not British. But if we are then using her contradictory statement, the “rod…with which he rules her” insinuates a dominatrix-type attitude, where he is ruling over his wife and other women in his company. This imagery within itself is disturbing as he is now painted as this father figure who likes sugar just a little bit too much and rules over women in bed with a rod. This now changes the way in which I personally read Count Fosco, as I didn’t like him before, but I certainly don’t like him now. This may be completely incorrect, but I would like to know if this somehow connects back to Collins, as we had discussed in class that he has some ties to the story, as well as hypnotism as a cure for various issues. Did he personally relate to Count Fosco? Was he writing Count Fosco based on someone he knew or who he wished he could be? Overall, The Count is not a pleasant person, but I would like to know how he connects back to Collins

When Laura is freed from the asylum, she is a changed person. Not only are her looks different, but so is her mental capacity and ability to remember. Simply speaking, she has repressed the negative memories that had led to her confinement. Walter Hartright explains that Laura’s mind is “too evidently unfit to bear the trial of reverting to [her memories]” and that in order to help lead her back to health, she must continue to repress those horrifying memories (Collins 428). Freud believes that the repression of memories means that one is repressing their sexuality. Marian and Hartright encourage this repression of memories and therefore encourage Laura in repression of her sexuality and do so by treating her as a child.

Throughout the whole of the novel, Laura is infantilized by her sister, Hartright, Mr. Gilmore, and almost everyone else who has been around her. Marian decides to not share with Laura that she and Hartright are investigating Anne Catherick even though it has a direct influence on Laura’s life and after she escapes the asylum, the new investigation of Sir Percival Glyde is kept secret from her. One of the moments of infantilization that sticks out the most to me is when Laura tries to assert herself as an equal to Hartright and Marian when they are living in London because she wants to contribute to the household financially. When she begs to help out, Laura exclaims “oh, don’t, don’t, don’t treat me like a child” (478). The repetition of “don’t” is reminiscent of a child stuttering when they are overwhelmed with emotions. As she is sharing her feelings to Hartright, she has laid her head on his shoulder in order to be comforted but also places her lower than him. Hartright, therefore, has to hold Laura up, if he were to move away, she would fall. Hartright tries to comfort her, but in the way a father would comfort his toddler and responds that she will sell her paintings. Rather than keeping his word, Hartright hides those drawings and gives her money of his own earnings, much like a parent putting a drawing from their child from the daycare onto the fridge. 

Hartright, in this moment, openly goes against Laura’s wishes of being treated like the adult that she is and continues to infantilize her. Laura then internalizes this treatment and believes and acts like she is younger than she actually is, always having to be told what to do and being comforted by those around her, and almost never asserting herself. Essentially, Laura has the same amount of agency that a toddler would have. Her repression of her memories and what that means for Freud is in direct connection to her internalization of the infantilizing treatment from Marian and Hartright.

Freud claims “that the patient repeats instead of remembering, and repeats under the conditions of resistance” (Freud 151). Laura, in this case is not only just repeating her words when speaking through her stuttering, but she is also repeating the toddler-like behaviors but under the condition of trying to resist her sexuality, as both children and women at this time should not be sexual beings. Hartright and Marian’s treatment of her furthers this repetition and repression, especially with the fact that they do not push Laura to remember but rather would prefer to keep her in the dark of her memories or her marriage, an experience that a child usually would not have, and later of her confinement and therefore of her sexual impulses.

In the first scene after the jarring switch in narrative that occurs at the revelation that Laura Glyde/Fairlie is alive, we find Walter, Laura, and Marian hiding out in a two-floor apartment “in a populous and poor neighborhood” in London (Collins 412). Several dramatic shifts have occurred at this point, following the empty one-week period Hartright insists “must remained unrecorded” (Collins 412). The first of these shifts is a matter of class—Walter, Marian, and Laura, who were once well-respected, wealthy British citizens, have been reduced to living in anonymity and poverty.

The second shift which has rattled the story is the change in the dynamic between Walter, Laura, and Marian—particularly the first two. This unsettling subversion is encapsulated in the following quote from Hartright’s story, which is the subject of my focus for this blog post: “In the right of her calamity, in the right of her friendlessness, she was mine at last! Mine to support, to protect, to cherish, to restore. Mine to love and honour as father and brother both. Mine to vindicate through all risks and all sacrifices…” (Collins 414).

My first point of interest with this quote is the conspicuous repetition of the word “mine” four times, emphasized by its placement at the front of each sentence. Each use doubles down on Walter’s possession of Laura after their long time apart. The initial use of “mine” is not capitalized, yet its significance comes from the words surrounding it: “she was mine at last!” This exclamation alludes to Walter and Laura’s previous connection and unresolved longing. The specific term “at last” implies yearning for something, and what has Walter been yearning for? A romantic connection with Laura!

Repetition takes center stage in this passage, appearing as well in Walter’s list of actions which he will perform for Laura. This includes “to protect,” “to cherish,” and “to love,” all words reminiscent of marriage vows. Walter repeatedly pledges himself to Laura in all the ways a husband would…and yet he surprisingly circumvents this expectation soon after.

The crucial paradox of this paragraph centers around the line, “mine to love and honour as father and brother both.” Here Walter takes two positions in relationship to Laura, both of which are familial—a dramatic departure from his previous feelings for her. The word “both” emphasizes the multiplicity of their relationship, and yet “lover” is noticeably left out of the list. The first half of The Woman in White has revolved around Walter and Laura’s budding romance, which had to be suppressed because of her engagement to Sir Percival Glyde. Yet now that Laura has seemingly escaped her marriage—the main obstacle in their way—the romance has been sidestepped.

With this startling shift from forbidden lovers to siblings (or perhaps father/daughter), Collins avoids a potential major sex scandal. If they weren’t posing as a brother/father and two sisters, embodying the roles as if they were real blood relatives, they would be a bachelor living with his mistress and her sister(lover) alone in secret! What a scandal! This move of circumventing a potential illicit sexual relationship marks a very Victorian impulse within the text—to avoid discussion/description of sex at all costs. Collins replaces Walter and Laura’s sexual tension with a familial bond—presumably due to Laura’s ill health, which has reduced her to a childlike invalid. One can’t really blame Walter for avoiding sexual relations with such a woman, but the shift is still dramatic considering his many months of yearning (even on a ship headed to and from the West Indies!). In fact, yearning dominates this quoted passage from Hartright’s log, yet any possibility of a “completion” of this yearning is entirely warded off, as is the Victorian way.

On page 527, Hartright positions himself as a modern-day holy figure through his inability to understand how flippantly people view the death of Sir. Percival. He exclaims, “One of the village women, whose white wild face I remembered, the picture of terror, when we pulled down the beam, was giggling with another woman, the picture of inanity, over an old washing-tub…Solomon in all his glory, was Solomon with the elements of the contemptible lurking in every fold of his robes and in every corner of his palace” (Collins 527). This sentence references Matthew 6:29, where Jesus explains that even the extremely wealthy King Solomon did not have expensive clothes. With his extreme wisdom, he saw that worrying about worldly things like clothing inherently meant ignoring the more important things in life, like goodness and worship. This second sentence implies that Hartright is similar to Solomon in that they are both surrounded by heartlessness, yet he is able to see through their self-interest and remember the sanctity of death. Ironically, “elements of the contemptible” follow Hartright to his “castle”; this scene lies before he learns that Count Fosco has visited his apartment in London.  

The description of the two women falls in line with how Hartright processes and relays information about people as an artist; both of the women are described as being “pictures.” Although this is a common phrase, because of Hartright’s artistic background, the phrase can be taken more literally, like Hartright is imagining how he would paint the women. This word choice explicitly creates a hierarchy between the painter and the painted; Hartright gets to choose how the women are depicted. If Hartright is to be taken as a holy figure like Solomon, he has the perspective to accurately discern a person’s character. Any mention of “white” cannot go unnoticed in the novel, and is normally associated with Laura or Anne’s purity. In the moment of Percival’s death, the woman behaved morally through the amount of fear she displayed. However, now that she lives without fear, she loses the innocent “white” face, and Hartright judges her to be immoral. Hartright’s judgment is consistent throughout the novel. Like a holy figure, he decides who is good and who is evil; just as his name suggests, his heart is always correct. 

“Socially, morally, legally—dead” (Collins 413). This is how Laura Fairlie is described, in dramatic, definitive fashion, by Walter Hartright at the beginning of his long narrative after returning from abroad. It is important to note that Laura is not physically dead, and instead is in hiding, but that her “death” is still quite real in all of the senses that Hartright listed. Being a Victorian “sensation novel,” it combines gothic themes like death and mystery with romantic ideals (in the Romantic poetry sense) such as the thoughtful and noble artist: “Alive, with the poor drawing-master to fight her battle” Hartright says about himself and his determination to help (413). It is no surprise that the beginning of Hartright’s narrative reads as it does, then, full of scandal and daring. He frames Laura as practically dead, a fake-out that fills readers with mortal terror and then scandalous satisfaction, and himself as a moral protagonist against the world, reflective of poetic drama. Collins truly plays up the mystery and scandal of the novel during this portion.

In doing so, The Woman in White exemplifies the obvious connections between Victorian “scandal” and “sensation novels.” William A. Cohen in Sex, Scandal, and the Novel connects Victorians’ lengthy novels with a want to explore scandalous topics dramatically, yet sensitively—sexual content, for example, must be conveyed by journalists “without offending their readership” (Cohen). Cohen generally speaks of sex being the “scandal” that these novels indulge in, and by extension, Victorian readers indulge in due to their fascination with scandal. But the topics beyond sex in The Woman in White also exemplify scandal at its finest: not only is Laura’s fake-out death “sensational,” as in grand and terrible, but it is also scandalous in the ways Hartright describes. First of all, she has gone from wealthy to “in poverty” as Hartright says, a fall from grace that leaves her less capable monetarily and, considering Victorian literature sometimes connects wealth not only with power but with morality, perhaps less able to act reasonably (413). Though, considering Hartright is framed as a moral protagonist and is described as poor, this novel may actually criticize the idea of wealth and standing as morality. Regardless, Laura is also “in hiding,” a stark contrast from her social standing beforehand. Her uncle has “renounced her,” a family connection that is massively important, and she is dead to any “persons in authority” who dictate the law, and who therefore stand at the middle and final steps to truly putting the mystery of the novel to rest in terms of the ledger and inheritance (413). Though none of this is sexual in nature, it is all opposed to “polite” or socially lawful Victorian society, which neither Laura nor Walter are a part of any longer at this point. In other words, Collins’ readers, at this point, are indulging in the affairs of some quite scandalous characters who have found themselves in a terrible and sensational situation. The brief plot summary of later events in The Woman in White provided by Walter Hartright in this first chapter of his return alone could make up a scandal headline. His expressive use of punctuation, especially exclamation points, and his imagined binary between the shunned family he has grown into with Laura against greater polite society (remember how he so exaggeratedly “fight[s]” Laura’s “battle”) do not need much remodeling to become fantastic news stories.

The overall effect of this on fiction readers, then, is not unlike the indulgence in real(ish?) scandal that Cohen describes: following these protagonists “provides the opportunity to formulate questions” and “discuss previously unimagined possibilities” (Cohen). In fact, one of these questions may be the criticism of wealth as morality or power I mentioned earlier. Portraying Walter as poor and cast aside, but also heroic and determined raises questions about the norm of being wary of folks who have been “cast out” by Victorian society (think of Anne Catherick, who is pure and modest and honest in a polite womanly fashion yet also “insane” or “mad,” othering her). Sensation novels like The Woman in White, then, clear the way for plenty of scandalous “dangers,” and help pave the way for a number of critiques of Victorian society that “true” scandals are also defined by. In this case of Laura and Hartright, wealth/estate/property and morality are called into question especially.

Cohen, William A. “Sex, Scandal, and the Novel.” From Sex Scandal: The Private Parts of Victorian Fiction, Duke University Press, 1996. The Victorian Web, www.victorianweb.org/gender/wac.html. 

Collins, Wilkie. The Woman in White. Penguin Books, 2003. 

When Hartwright first enters Mrs. Catherick’s house, he describes that “On the largest table, in the middle of the room, stood a smart Bible, placed exactly in the center” (484). This large size of this bible and its placement in the center of the room on a special table implies that it has intentionally been set up in order to be as noticeable as possible. Further, Mrs. Catherick brings up this bible when she feels Hartwright has insulted her reputation, saying “Is your mother alive? Has she got a better Bible on her table than I have got on mine?” (488). By emphasizing her bible in this context, Mrs. Catherick uses her supposed faith as a way of defending her reputation. She specifically depicts herself as being more religious than other women by comparing herself to Hartwright’s mother. Through her claim that she is a more religious woman because of the quality and size of her bible, Collins implies that a person is often judged more on the showiness and appearance of their religious beliefs rather than their actual faith and morals.

Ironically, Mrs. Catherick actually strays from most Christian ideals. She is incredibly selfish and cares little for other people other than herself, hardly even showing any care for her daughter’s death (she just puts on black mittens– a performative action). Her taking Anne away from Mrs. Clements even demonstrates a more active type of wickedness (her sole motivation being a whim of jealousy). Her desire for Sir Percival’s gifts indicate that she is very greedy and materially motivated. She is depicted to be very sensual, both in appearance and in her actions (her affair). Her betrayal of her marriage (not just to any man, but to a clergyman) emphasizes her betrayal of the church and its teachings. Interestingly, Hartwright also describes Mrs. Catherick’s hatred with serpent-like language (“serpent-hatred,” “lurking reptile”), evoking images of the original biblical, sinful woman, Eve. 

Through Mrs. Catherick’s immorality (but presentation as a religious woman), Collins suggests that religion is often used performatively to enhance one’s reputation, and can be treated as just another societally constructed way to judge people (especially women).