Saturday, November 21, 2009

Woman in White - 150th Anniversary



I just signed up to receive email pdfs of Wilkie Collins' most famous novel, The Woman in White, following the same publication schedule as the novel received in Charles Dickens's periodical All The Year Round 150 years ago this Monday.

Visit WomaninWhite.co.uk for details on how you can sign up to get emails of weekly installments. A separate pdf will be published each week on the website as well, and the pdf is designed to capture the feel of the original.

I've been wanting to reread this book for awhile and this is the perfect way to do so--reading the installments on the same publication schedule as they originally had. What a cool idea!

As an aside, in looking for an appropriate image for this post, I found this painting shown above. It's called The Somnabulist, and it was painted in 1871 by Sir John Everett Millais, who might have been inspired by the immense popularity of The Woman in White. Here's a bit about the painting.

4 comments:

  1. What a cool idea!

    If you like that idea, you may be just the person to try out my great all-Dickens-at-once, but serialized idea.

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  2. The painting is perfect, especially as the Pre-Raphaelite's play such an important role in the text. I am signing up, even though I've been a bit burnt out on this story since college, when it played an enormous role in my thesis on Victorian madwomen.

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  3. I've heard about this book, but have never read it...it's on the list, though. And I love the painting and the only reason I know what somnambulist is from speaking Spanish! Gotta love Latin!

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  4. I love Collins' work and while his lesser known novels are very well worth exploring there is nothing like going back to 'The Woman in White' and 'The Moonstone' when you want a real feel good read. It's no accident that he was one of the very first authors I looked up in the audio book catalogues. I can't think of a better way of spending cold winter evenings.

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