AQA (A): NEA recommended text
Wilkie Collins’ The Woman in White (1859–60) was one of the best-selling novels of its day, ushering in the trend for sensation fiction that defined the ‘sensational sixties’. Part of what makes the novel ‘sensational’ is Collins’ depiction of his characters’ bodies, which are consistently described in such a way as to shock the reader, even as the characters shock each other. From tiny Pesca to ‘immensely fat’ Fosco and moustachioed Marian Halcombe, these physically unusual characters produce in each other a whole range of ‘sensations’ they ‘would rather not feel’ (Pt II, Sn I, Ch. 2), including fright, desire and disbelief. Even the appearance of the conventionally attractive, apparently ordinary heroine, Laura Fairlie, causes Walter Hartright a ‘thrill’ of horror: he is ‘chilled’ as he recognises her extraordinary similarity to Anne Catherick, the mysterious woman in white (Pt I, Sn I, Ch. 8).
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