{"id":1984,"date":"2025-02-06T03:43:28","date_gmt":"2025-02-06T03:43:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/?p=1984"},"modified":"2025-02-06T03:43:28","modified_gmt":"2025-02-06T03:43:28","slug":"unexplained-feelings-and-paying-attention-to-subtext-in-the-woman-in-white","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/2025\/02\/06\/unexplained-feelings-and-paying-attention-to-subtext-in-the-woman-in-white\/","title":{"rendered":"“Unexplained Feelings” and Paying Attention to Subtext in The Woman in White"},"content":{"rendered":"

Throughout the first third of The Woman in White<\/em> \u201cunexplainable feelings\u201d often become entirely explainable. Walter Hartright\u2019s first unexplainable uneasiness upon the prospect of his going to teach at Limmeridge House is enlightened given his disastrous love for Miss Fairlie. His unexplainable tension upon first seeing Miss Fairlie is realized when he at last connects her similarities with Anne Catherick. These \u201cunexplainable\u201d feelings have generally been found to be very explainable, when the situation is placed in the correct context. Mr. Gilmore\u2019s obliviousness over the situation between Walter and Laura during Mr. Hartright\u2019s last night at Limmeridge House is an excellent example of dramatic irony; the reader understands the situation the character is confused about.<\/p>\n

When Miss Halcombe is obliged (perhaps coerced is the better word here) by Percival Glyde to write a letter to Anne Catherick\u2019s mother, his behavior seems entirely by-the-book to Mr. Gilmore, but it is clear to the reader that Mrs. Halcombe doubts his character despite herself. She had \u201ca certain hesitation of manner,\u201d and \u201clooked uneasy\u201d (WIW<\/em>, 132). There are small moments in the text that reinforce the importance of paying attention to \u201cunexplainable uneasiness,\u201d regardless of what a character is trying to convince themselves of \u2013 here, it is Percival\u2019s upstanding character. The reader is encouraged to trust observations before the character\u2019s feelings, and try to separate the two the best they can.<\/p>\n

An excellent example of this is Percival\u2019s interaction with Miss Fairlie\u2019s dog. The reader has observed, along with Mr. Hartright in his account of events, that the dog is loyal to her mistress; she always accompanies Laura on walks, and the dog is \u201cpressed against her dress impatiently for notice and encouragement,\u201d \u00a0when Walter observes her from his window. Even as Mr. Gilmore is entirely convinced (or determined to convince himself) that Percival is a good man, he still details his observations; when Percival \u201cgood-humouredly\u201d calls out to the dog, she instead \u201cshrank away from his outstretched hand, whined, shivered, and hid itself under a sofa\u2026 As he opened the door, the [dog] poked out her sharp muzzle\u2026 and barked and snapped at him\u201d (133-134). This makes the reader question what is real and what is not: we haven\u2019t seen the dog interact beyond Walter\u2019s observance of her with Miss Fairlie; perhaps this is just how she behaves.<\/p>\n

Mr. Gilmore entirely attributes this behavior to the dog, but Miss Halcombe hesitates around him; Anne Catherick sent a warning letter; Walter is suspicious of Percival\u2019s character \u2013 the investigation is ongoing. How much of the doubt can be attributed to easy explanations: young, foolish love between Walter and Laura; Anne Catherick\u2019s mental illness; Marianne\u2019s desire to see her sister in a happy relationship? Mr. Gilmore has thus far described Percival\u2019s behavior as entirely morally upstanding. Walter and Miss Halcombe have received no concrete proof their suspicions are founded in fact. And yet the dog cowers away and snaps at him. When Mr. Gilmore himself later approaches Miss Fairlie and her dog on his own, he expects the dog to snap at him, too. Instead, \u201cthe whimsical little brute falsified [his] expectations by jumping into [his] lap, and poking its sharp muzzle familiarly into [his] hand\u201d (141). Who is a better judge of character: Mr. Gilmore, or the dog?<\/p>\n

When Mr. Gilmore leaves his meeting with Laura, he recalls that though he had entered the room \u201cbelieving Sir Percival Glyde had fair reason to complain of the manner in which she was treating him\u2026 [he] left it, secretly hoping that matters might end in her taking him at his word and claiming her release\u201d (145). By the end of his account, Mr. Gilmore has completely changed his attitude towards Percival \u2013 \u201cno daughter of mine should have been married to any man alive under such a settlement as I was compelled to make for Laura Fairlie\u201d (161). Character\u2019s \u201cunexplained feelings\u201d or suspicions are often validated by the surrounding subtext \u2013 Anne and Laura\u2019s white clothing, and the dog’s behavior are examples of this. The unreliability of narrators in this novel serves to encourage the reader to pay closer attention to what is written between the lines. What is real, and what is imagined? Paying attention to patterns and \u201cunexplainable feelings\u201d will very likely yield explanations in due time, if this trend stays consistent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Throughout the first third of The Woman in White \u201cunexplainable feelings\u201d often become entirely explainable. Walter Hartright\u2019s first unexplainable uneasiness upon the prospect of his going to teach at Limmeridge House is enlightened given his disastrous love for Miss Fairlie. His unexplainable tension upon first seeing Miss Fairlie is realized when he at last connects … Continue reading “Unexplained Feelings” and Paying Attention to Subtext in The Woman in White<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5320,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[135984],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2025-posts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5320"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1984\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}