Author: sparkleponyprincess

In 1996, Walt Disney Pictures released their animated adaptation of Victor Hugo’s 1831 novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame to widespread critical acclaim. Though Disney’s take on the classic deviates in several major ways from its source material, Claude Frollo—in the film, the Parisian Minister of Justice—is consistently driven to madness by his attraction to Esmeralda, a young Roma woman. This desire culminates in Frollo’s primary sung number, “Hellfire,” in which he laments his attraction to Esmeralda and claims she has sown these sinful thoughts within his mind. Mona Caird’s 1892 short story “The Yellow Drawing-Room” similarly follows a self-proclaimed man of virtue in conflict with his own desire for the transgressive Vanora. As the two grow to see each other more often, the narrator grows nearly mad with desire, believing her to be exerting some sort of influence over him. 

“Hellfire” places Frollo’s confession within the larger framing device of a prayer: “Beata Maria, you know I am a righteous man / Of my virtue, I am justly proud,” he sings, “Beata Maria, you know I’m so much purer than / The common, vulgar, weak, licentious crowd,” (Hulce 2:19). Frollo is framed as possessing moral authority and “purity” compared to the public, whose attitudes he deems “licentious.” The Hunchback of Notre Dame has the privilege of being a long-form work, and by this point in the film adaptation, it has been established that Frollo is ostensibly villainous despite his claims. “The Yellow Drawing-Room,” on the contrary, works within the confines of its length and also through the narration of its morally-superior protagonist. He often skirts around directly addressing his broader perspective on morality beyond conservatism, but in his first exchange with Vanora, he claims that “‘people don’t know what is good for them,'” (Caird 107). He creates a dichotomy between himself, the moral authority, and the rest of society. Within these parameters, it is impossible for either Frollo or Caird’s narrator to be incorrect in their persuasions.

Frollo and Caird’s narrator are similarly quick to blame the object of their affections for their emotions and deny all responsibility. Frollo is more direct: “It’s not my fault / I’m not to blame,” he argues, “It is the gypsy girl, the witch who sent this flame,” (Hulce 3:26). Esmeralda is labeled a “witch” (and later a “siren” at 3:48), a dehumanized being with undue influence over her perceived targets. Caird’s narrator is marginally more subtle, instead entreating that Vanora “must release him” as he is “led away by qualities which ought to repel [him],” (107). Neither woman has, until and in this moment, suggested to either man that she is romantically interested in him, but as they cannot admit their own agency, they instead label these women as villains searching to dispel their moral purity.

Though The Hunchback of Notre Dame was written by a Frenchman and during the Georgian era (while Caird wrote in the Victorian), the larger theme of blaming women for men’s moral failings runs throughout both works and profoundly influences the audience’s readings of morality as it relates to gender. In learning that Frollo and the narrator’s moral authority is built upon their incrimination of innocents, it is firmly established that such authority is nothing more but a facade.

The Woman in White, as a rule, generally hinges upon the inaction of its characters as a device for furthering the catastrophe permeating its pages. This, of course, can refer to any number of the novel’s characters; but, more often than not, Laura Fairlie can be found at the center of Wilkie Collins’ intertwined conflicts. Since the very beginning of Walter Hartright’s residence at Limmeredge House, he and Marian Halcombe have maintained a level of secrecy concerning anything remotely “upsetting.” When it comes to Laura, the two of them grow protective, to the point where they fret over even slightly disturbing her mental state. This exercise in omission only intensifies with the reveal of her engagement to Sir Percival Glyde, and more when the marriage itself takes place. Throughout the entire narrative, those both close and far from Laura have engaged in a cycle of white lies. For our narrators (Marian and Walter), their desire to protect Laura supposedly justifies such behaviors. Laura herself seems initially content enough to let Marian and Walter pursue their own suspicions while she is in the throes of her engagement.

All those in The Woman in White, however, are not our narrators, and it is at a crucial moment that Sir Percival Glyde forces the reader to reevaluate the choices they have become accustomed to for the entirety of the novel. While berating Eliza Michelson after she announces her resignation due to his questionable actions, he asserts that the “deception” Laura has most recently been subjected to is “innocent” and “essential to her health,” answering her own needs in a way she could not consciously (Collins 392). Such language has been used for the past four hundred pages, justifying the keeping of critical information from Laura as something that is for her own good. Marian and Walter are sympathetic characters, and thus the audience will tend to align themselves morally with their protagonists. Sir Percival thus takes the comfortability the audience has established and uses the rhetoric of care to deal one final blow against his wife.

Such language of control has also appeared, perhaps obviously, in the portrayal of Anne Catherick and her consignment to an asylum. I believe Collins is drawing a direct parallel between Sir Percival’s deception of Laura and the lies surrounding Anne’s commitment to the asylum to demonstrate the negative influences the self-interests of others have on these two young women’s lives. In doing such, the reader is made to question the choices made earlier in the novel by Marian and Walter, prompting a reevaluation of a large part of the narrative thus far. Sir Percival and Mrs. Catherick have shown the reader that an “innocent deception” can result in far larger consequences than originally planned.

Throughout the narratives of both Walter Hartright and Vincent Gilmore, Limmeredge House is shown to have a profoundly transformative effect on those who visit. Particularly in these cases, Wilkie Collins introduces the narrator as an upright man whose appearance at the house pertains to a specific undertaking. However, as Mr. Gilmore demonstrates during his account of his visit, the expectation-defying natures of the house’s inhabitants have a way of altering the perspectives of its visitors. “In the case of any other client,” Mr. Gilmore writes, “I should have acted on my instructions, however personally distasteful to me,” (Collins 154). From his introduction, Mr. Gilmore is presented as a man of business and refinement. When it comes to Miss Fairlie, on the contrary, “[he cannot] do with this business-like indifference,” (154). Interestingly, the word “cannot” is chosen rather than one suggesting any level of agency. In a rare moment where Mr. Gilmore is denying that which is asked of him, the writing implies an unusual lack of personal involvement or choice. Collins immediately shifts into an uncharacteristically-emotional recollection of Mr. Gilmore’s longtime relationship with the fairlies. Though Mr. Gilmore has mentioned, in passing, his long relationship with the family, it has never been in such depth or length. Mr. Gilmore’s reverie ultimately leads him to the conclusion that “writing a second time to Mr. Fairlie was not to be thought of” (154). For the time, Mr. Gilmore’s choice to go behind the eyes of his client’s male guardian is very much subversive, and hallmarks an important change in his thinking that culminates in his argument with Mr. Fairlie.