Wilkie Collins

[Nash]

So what's the general consensus on this chap then?

I've just finished reading The Woman in White and I thought it was bloody great, I think I actually enjoyed it more than most of Dickens' stuff. It's a lot ballsier, very funny in places and has a surprisingly modern feel. It also has wonderful characterisation, Marian Halcombe must be the best 19th century female character by far.

Has anyone read any of his other work? I'm thinking about The Moonstone next.

[k-j]

Always interesting to hear opinions like this. Best C19 female character is rather high praise (or is it?)

I vaguely recall reading The Moonstone, but it would have been when I was quite young and I probably didn't finish it. Can't say old Wilkie is all that high on my list of authors to try. Just not enough days in a life.

[Ros]

I vaguely recall The Moonstone, too. Must have been on some sort of school curric I think. I reckon I remember hating it, but I guess I might just have been too young for it.

Ros

[Mic]

I think Wilkie Collins is great. Read both WinW and Moonstone. Compulsive stuff. Enjoyed more than Dickens too.

Mic

[David]

I remember enjoying The Woman in White, and I remember enjoying The Moonstone too. I don't remember being so struck by Marian Halcombe, but I agree that a lot of Dickens's heroines are pretty milquetoasty.

[Nash]

Thanks guys, so two for and two against(ish) then. I'm glad that you enjoyed him more than Dickens too Mic, I thought that would just be me.

Best C19 female character is rather high praise (or is it?)

It's just that she seems to be a fully formed character unlike most 19th C female heroines that I've read. They usually tend to be either harridans or, as David said, milquetoasty. Great word that David, had to google it, cheers.

On to the Moonstone then!

[k-j]

They usually tend to be either harridans or, as David said, milquetoasty. Great word that David

I agree, and "milquetoasty" is extra-great because it contains all the vowels plus a 'y', once only, one of only 599 such "euryvocalic" words so-far identified in English.

List here (note, not me).

[delph_ambi]

Wilkie Collins is far more readable than Dickens, definitely, and Marian Holcombe is pretty much the best female character in a novel by a male 19th Century novelist, though an honorable mention should go to Thackeray's Becky Sharp. Dickens didn't do any females that weren't caricatures, and Hardy's pathetic women just make me want to spit. The one time he wrote a decent one (Eustacia Vye in Return of the Native) he lost his nerve and made her suicidal. That woman would never have been suicidal. Cop out! God, I hate Hardy... *ahem*

[David]

Great list there, k-j. And it's got a q. Bonus points for that, surely?

And, Catherine, is Dorothea in Middlemarch the best female character of all? Or does Elizabeth Bennett creep in there at the start of the century?

I certainly don't agree that Wilkie Collins is more readable all-round than Dickens, though.

[delph_ambi]

Can't comment on Dorothea, as I find George Eliot unreadably dull, and always have done. If you want to include Jane Austen, then my favourite character would be Anne Elliot (Persuasion). I was more thinking in terms of the Brontes, especially Anne and Charlotte, and to a lesser extent, Elizabeth Gaskell. They all created superb female characters. Personal favourite is Caroline Helstone, in C. Bronte's 'Shirley'. An incredibly subtle and sensitive portrait of a woman with great, though certainly not obvious, inner strength. If you want obvious strength, then there is always Jane Eyre, of course.

[Nash]

Marian Holcombe is pretty much the best female character in a novel by a male 19th Century novelist

A very good distinction there Delph, and I completely agree with you about Hardy.

I think that the main difference between Marian Halcombe and the usual 19th century heroine is that she's more of an adventuress. I know that characters like Elizabeth Bennet (am I alone in not getting Jane Austin at all?) have their nice little romantic dilemmas, but I can't imagine many of them taking off their crinolines (ok, I know that they weren't fashionable in Austin's day) and climbing across the rooftops in their underwear during a storm to spy on the villains.

[delph_ambi]

Yes, but isn't comparing Austen with Collins a bit like saying Mozart's a trifle dull because he didn't push diatonic harmony as far as Wagner did?

[David]

Austen is Mozart, but Collins isn't Wagner. Is he Mendelssohn? But then who's Wagner?

[delph_ambi]

Okay, Collins certainly isn't Wagner. That's true. I'd go for Charlotte Bronte in that role, as she pushed the boundaries further than should have been possible. Nobody managed to go further without inventing essentially a new lingua franca. However, one can take these parallels just so far. It's easier to see the parallels between music and the visual arts than music and literature, in my very subjective view, but this may be because I'm a professional musician, and also know far more about fine art than I do about literature.

I've read some books. Written a few. That's it.

[Suzanne]

You all have me ordering books faster than I care to confess!

But!! milquetoasty should get an award for "The best word of the month". What a great word, David.

I love the banter around here.
Suzanne

[Nash]

Yes, but isn't comparing Austen with Collins a bit like saying Mozart's a trifle dull because he didn't push diatonic harmony as far as Wagner did?

I'm not really comparing Collins to Austen, just Halcombe to Bennett.

I've no idea what diatonic harmony is, but if I did then that sounds like just the sort of thing I'd be likely to say though!

[David]

I've read some books.

Mmm. Me too. Fun, isn't it?

[brianedwards]

Austen is Mozart, but Collins isn't Wagner. Is he Mendelssohn? But then who's Wagner?

Collins is Donovan. Guess that makes Dickens Wagner?

What a bloody great thread! Thanks for bringing this to my attention Nash. Is it me or do discussions of Victorian writers always throw up diverse opinions and great discussion? Perhaps that is their greatest, collective legacy . . .

It's fucking great to be back! k-j's list is worth the entrance fee alone!

B.

[Nash]

It's good to have you back Brian!

Who's Wagner? Hmm. Let's see, big, brash, overly dramatic.....Sheridan La Fanu anyone?

[BenJohnson]

Collins is great, his short stories are well worth reading he invented the Sherlock Holmes type detective well before Sherlock Holmes appeared. But where does Satie fit into all of this?