The Readers Review: Literature from 1714 to 1910 discussion

Wilkie (William) Collins. 1824 to 1889 was a Victorian success with an income of approximately 10,000 pounds. Hr was the son of a landscape painter, William Collins. Godson to painter Sir David Wilkie, where he got his name. He lead a bohemian existence, and traveled extensively on long trips abroad with family. Collins struggled with choosing a career - studying painting, training with a tea merchant, studying law (1846), and called to the bar (1951). He had been writing throughout this time period. First published a short story in 1843, and in 1848 published a biography of his father. Later Collins would live n two serial common law families.

Collins is known for expert plotting of complex narratives, precise descriptive powers, and inventive approaches to narrative voice and point of view. In the story Ann Rodway (1856) published in Household Words, he uses a female de to give and starts using the diary form of narrative. He was a friend of Dickens. All the Year Round, successor of Household Words) first published Women in White in installments starting November 1859. Moonstone was also published by them in 1868.

Besides detective fiction, Collins wrote documentary type fiction about illegitimate children and prostitution. He also used that fiction to attack vivisection and the Jesuits. This type of fiction is considered sensationalist.

T.S. Elliot declared The Moonstone to be “the first, the longest, and the best of modern English detective novels.” Collins forte was raising the mystery novel to a higher level and creating the full length detective novel,

Source: Oxfor Companion to Crime and Mystery Writing

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Deborah wrote: "Wilkie (William) Collins. 1824 to 1889 was a Victorian success with an income of approximately 10,000 pounds. ............He was a friend of Dickens. All the Year Round, successor of Household Words) first published Women in White in installments starting November 1859. Moonstone was also published by them in 1868..."

As well as collaborating on stories/plays, Collins and Dickens took trips together. One of these tours, The Lazy Tour Of Two Idle Apprentices is well worth reading as it describes their visit to the North of England. On this trip, in one of the many inns/hostelries where they stayed, Collins heard a strange story from the locals about a ‘Woman in White.’ They were staying near Maryport at a remote location on the coast adjacent to the English Lake District. It was after hearing this tale that his famous novel was created. The Woman in White is set in London and at a coastal location in the Lake District.

Trev wrote: "Deborah wrote: "Wilkie (William) Collins. 1824 to 1889 was a Victorian success with an income of approximately 10,000 pounds. ............He was a friend of Dickens. All the Year Round, successor o..."

Interesting. He also traveled to Italy and used that as a location for the book The Haunted Hotel