No Name (Penguin Classics)

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VIII. Mr Clare receives the offer of an opening for Frank in the City, which he takes up without any real enthusiasm. The moral of the story is pretty much as sensationalist as you can get for the time. Wilkie Collins is HOT for 1862. Scene One begins in 1846, at Combe-Raven in West Somerset, the country residence of the wealthy Vanstone family: Andrew Vanstone, his wife, and their two daughters. Norah, age 26, is happy and quiet; Magdalen, 18, is beautiful but volatile and willful. The family lives in peace and contentment, with the girls' former governess, Miss Garth. There are heroes and villains, as there are in many of his works as well. I really thought that Magdalen was a complex character who definitely goes against many of the Victorian conventions of her time (which is why some critics of Collins time rejected this novel). Unlike many of the other minor characters, she definitely has a character arc and there is a complexity to her, perhaps more so than any other character. Two other characters who come into play and are key to the plot are Captain Wragge (self-proclaimed scoundrel and scandalized member of the Vanstone family) and Mrs. Lecount, a faithful—and shrewd—governess for Noel Vanstone. Magdalen teams up with Wragge with her pursuits in mind, and probably the most entertaining essence of this novel is the chess match and battle of wits between Captain Wragge and Lecount as they try to outmaneuver each other in various ways through the course of so many shenanigans and deceptions.

He was one of the most highly paid authors of his day, yet he never became rich. This was partly because he maintained two separate families in expensive London houses, and partly because he had a fairly lavish life style. He also became a cocaine addict – although the drug at that time (in the form of laudanum) was relatively inexpensive, and obtainable over the counter in most chemists’ shops. The central figure in the novel is Magdalen Vanstone, but once her parents have both died she loses her family name – because they were not married at the time of their daughter’s birth. From this point on she assumes a number of alternative identities. The first is as Miss ‘Bygrave’ as part of Captain Wragge’s theatrical management. Next she successfully impersonates her own governess Miss Garth in her confrontations with Noel Vanstone and Mrs Lecount. Her desire for revenge over her rapacious relative is understandable – but neither she nor Wilkie Collins seem to have a clear objective or ‘plan of engagement’. She cannot recover the money by marriage; she cannot reverse the system of inheritance; and short of murdering her husband (which she never contemplates) she cannot gain control over the estate. Maybe one of the best readings this year, I think this novel should be more valued and that it should be occupying the place it deserves, among the masterpieces to be read and reread over and over again.

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III. The old Admiral and George Bertram discuss his marriage prospects. The Admiral objects to Norah because of her connection with the disgraced Magdalen. George agrees to spend a week at the home of a suitable alternative to test his resolve. Given the highly over-wrought state of Magdalen’s sensibility regarding her plan to regain the inheritance, it is also surprising that Collins makes absolutely no mention of the sexual consequences of her marrying Noel Vanstone. She does provide Robert Kirke with an account of her past, but by nineteenth century standards she has a lot of ‘past’ to account for. No Name (1862) was the follow-up to Wilkie Collins’ big success with The Woman in White (1860) which established him as a best-selling author specialising in the ‘sensation novel’. He was an amazingly prodigious writer who produced twenty-five novels, more than fifty short stories, at least fifteen plays, and more than 100 non-fiction essays. Basically the plot a devastating legal issue. Norah and Magdalen parents are not legally married. Mr Vanstone was married before abroad and was unable to divorce.

disguises herself as a maid, and takes a position in the Admiral's house. She narrowly fails in an audacious attempt to find the secret letter In 1873–74, Collins toured the United States and Canada, giving readings of his work. The American writers he met included Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., and Mark Twain. He began a friendship with photographer Napoleon Sarony, who took several portraits of him. [18] Norah and Magdalen are the daughters of Andrew Vanstone, who is the owner of a country estate in Coombe-Raven, Somerset. But unknown to them (and everyone else) they are both illegitimate children. This is because Vanstone as a much younger man married an American woman who was paid off by his family. He has been living with the woman who is mother to the two sisters, but doing so in an unmarried state. No Name is divided into parts as are much of 19th Century novels. In No Name, these parts are called Scenes. Each Scene takes place in a different location and is further divided into chapters. The Scenes, told in third person, are separated by short sections called, appropriately, Between the Scenes. These are groups of letters from/to the various characters. The story is told in strict chronological sequence.

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Magdalen is an unconventional Victorian woman, but a true Wilkie Collins heroine: a strong and brave woman who defies gender roles and sets out to save the day. She reminded me a lot of Marian Halcombe from Collins' most famous novel, The Woman in White. In his introduction Mark Ford examines themes of identity and illegitimacy within Victorian society and compares No Name to Collins's more 'sensational' fiction. This edition also includes notes and a bibliography. stays with Miss Garth, their staunch friend, and becomes a governess. Magdalen, resolved to earn her living on the stage, runs away to York. Here she encounters a disreputable cousin by marriage, Captain Wragge, When Michael Vanstone dies the inheritance passes automatically to his son Noel, a feeble, mean, and self-indulgent aesthete who is in thrall to the scheming housekeeper Mrs Lecount. When he marries Magdalen, it looks as if she has secured some re-attachment to an inheritance that she regards as hers by moral right. But there is a factor which neither she nor Wilkie Collins seem to take into account.

I would say with flying colors it does so, and that No Name might be the best Wilkie Collins novel that flies under the radar of popularity. Mrs. Lecount è la governante (ma in un certo senso anche padrona) della casa di Noel Vanstone. Noel è un uomo troppo debole per fare qualsiasi cosa; dipende sempre da qualcuno soprattutto della sua governante, ed è talmente sciocco da non accorgersi di venire raggirato da entrambe le parti ma diventa incredibilmente furbo e scaltro quando si tratta di questioni di denaro. There are however a couple of serious problems lying at the heart of events and centred on Magdalen’s motivation. Having been disinherited by the combination of the law of primogeniture and the greed of her relatives, she embarks upon a scheme of recovering her inheritance by marrying the very man who has robbed her of her rights. Sue Lonoff, Wilkie Collins and his Victorian Readers: A Study in the Rhetoric of Authorship, New York: AMS Press, 1982. Collins was born at 11 New Cavendish Street, London, the son of William Collins, a well-known Royal Academician landscape painter, and his wife, Harriet Geddes. Named after his father, he was soon known by his middle name, which honoured his godfather, David Wilkie. The family moved to Pond Street, Hampstead, in 1826. In 1828 Collins's brother Charles Allston Collins was born. Between 1829 and 1830, the Collins family moved twice, first to Hampstead Square and then to Porchester Terrace, Bayswater. [3] Wilkie and Charles received their early education from their mother at home. The Collins family were deeply religious, and Collins's mother enforced strict church attendance on her sons, which Wilkie disliked. [4]in 1862 at the peak of Collins's career, one of his four major novels. Dedicated to Francis Carr Beard, his doctor and long standing friend. Following the success of The Woman in White, Sampson Low paid William Wilkie Collins (8 January 1824 – 23 September 1889) was an English novelist and playwright known especially for The Woman in White (1859), a mystery novel and early " sensation novel", and for The Moonstone (1868), which established many of the ground rules of the modern detective novel and is also perhaps the earliest clear example of the police procedural genre. [1] [2] Sullo sfondo di questa ricca e intricata vicenda emerge una rappresentazione singolare di personaggi sorprendenti, sia nel bene che nel male, caratterizzati meravigliosamente e magistralmente delineati. Vi è un caleidoscopio di caratteri eccentrici, odiosi, meschini, tenaci, virtuosi, accattivanti o diabolici; nessuno è bianco o nero, tutti i personaggi sono vivi, ben definiti, carismatici ed intensi, tanto da rendere il lettore coinvolto nelle loro vicende e di sentirli come se fossero degli amici. Ogni figura è descritta con maestria, ed è in perpetua evoluzione; si muove e agisce spinta dalle motivazioni più o meno nobili, più o meno giuste, o semplicemente legittime. Shall I tell you what a lady is? A lady is a woman who wears a silk gown, and has a sense of her own importance.”

IX. Magdalen feels oppressed. They leave for a few days, during which time Mrs Lecount does some snooping. Wragge makes elaborate plans to deceive Mrs Lecount and to get Noel Vanstone away from Aldborough. Well, it's c). Because a) is anachronistic, this is not steampunk, and b) is interesting but a bit too Zola and not as fun as c). Todo el mundo ama esta novela, y es una pena que yo no haya logrado disfrutar de esta historia tanto como esperaba, logró entretenerme, pero creo que no permanezca mucho tiempo en mi memoria...In 1858 Collins began living with Caroline Graves and her daughter Harriet. Caroline came from a humble family, having married young, had a child, and been widowed. Collins lived close to the small shop kept by Caroline, and the two may have met in the neighbourhood in the mid–1850s. He treated Harriet, whom he called Carrie, as his own daughter, and helped to provide for her education. Excepting one short separation, they lived together for the rest of Collins's life. Collins disliked the institution of marriage, but remained dedicated to Caroline and Harriet, considering them to be his family. [21] receives a dismissive reply from his formidable housekeeper Mrs Lecount. Determined on revenge, she visits Noel in London, disguised as Miss Before Wilkie Collins became an enormously successful novelist in the mid-nineteenth century, he studied law with the intent of becoming an attorney. Although he completed his studies he never actually practiced. His knowledge and interest in the field is revealed in the plots of many of his novels. No Name is an example of Collins’ training in estate law and the various intricacies of the rules and loopholes during that period in mid 19th century England. The novel is divided into 8 scenes, each one of them clearly separated, taking place in different settings and with several characters who cross the path of the brave Magdalen Vanstone.