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 \u201cin a populous and poor neighborhood\u201d in London (Collins 412). Several dramatic shifts have occurred at this point, following the empty one-week period Hartright insists \u201cmust remained unrecorded\u201d (Collins 412). The first of these shifts is a matter of class\u2014Walter, Marian, and Laura, who were once well-respected, wealthy British citizens, have been reduced to living in anonymity and poverty.<\/p>\n
The second shift which has rattled the story is the change in the dynamic between Walter, Laura, and Marian\u2014particularly the first two. This unsettling subversion is encapsulated in the following quote from Hartright\u2019s story, which is the subject of my focus for this blog post: \u201cIn 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\u2026\u201d (Collins 414).<\/p>\n
My first point of interest with this quote is the conspicuous repetition of the word \u201cmine\u201d four times, emphasized by its placement at the front of each sentence. Each use doubles down on Walter\u2019s possession of Laura after their long time apart. The initial use of \u201cmine\u201d is not capitalized, yet its significance comes from the words surrounding it: \u201cshe was mine at last!\u201d This exclamation alludes to Walter and Laura\u2019s previous connection and unresolved longing. The specific term \u201cat last\u201d implies yearning for something, and what has Walter been yearning for? A romantic connection with Laura!<\/p>\n
Repetition takes center stage in this passage, appearing as well in Walter\u2019s list of actions which he will perform for Laura. This includes \u201cto protect,\u201d \u201cto cherish,\u201d and \u201cto love,\u201d all words reminiscent of marriage vows. Walter repeatedly pledges himself to Laura in all the ways a husband would\u2026and yet he surprisingly circumvents this expectation soon after.<\/p>\n
The crucial paradox of this paragraph centers around the line, \u201cmine to love and honour as father and brother both.\u201d Here Walter takes two positions in relationship to Laura, both of which are familial\u2014a dramatic departure from his previous feelings for her. The word \u201cboth\u201d emphasizes the multiplicity of their relationship, and yet \u201clover\u201d is noticeably left out <\/em>of the list. The first half of The Woman in White <\/em>has revolved around Walter and Laura\u2019s budding romance, which had to be suppressed because of her engagement to Sir Percival Glyde. Yet now that Laura has seemingly escaped her marriage\u2014the main obstacle in their way\u2014the romance has been sidestepped.<\/p>\n With this startling shift from forbidden lovers to siblings (or perhaps father\/daughter), Collins avoids a potential major sex scandal. If they weren\u2019t 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\u2014to avoid discussion\/description of sex at all costs<\/em>. Collins replaces Walter and Laura\u2019s sexual tension with a familial bond\u2014presumably due to Laura\u2019s ill health, which has reduced her to a childlike invalid. One can\u2019t 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 <\/em>from the West Indies!). In fact, yearning dominates this quoted passage from Hartright\u2019s log, yet any possibility of a \u201ccompletion\u201d of this yearning is entirely warded off, as is the Victorian way.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 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 \u201cin a populous and poor neighborhood\u201d in London (Collins 412). Several dramatic shifts have occurred at this point, following the empty one-week period … Continue reading Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4760,"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-2118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2025-posts"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2118","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\/4760"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2118\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/victorianlit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}