The Woman in White

Second epoch Chap 1

Marian gets up the next morning and explores
Blackwater Park. She finds that parts of the house—the
upper floors and the “old wing”—are ruined and
uninhabitable, but that the modern part of the house has
been redecorated for the inhabitants to live in. Marian is
pleased to see that the “good old times” have been
“swept away” by 19th century furnishing and décor.
Outside in the drive, there is a fountain with a statue of a
monster on the plinth in the middle, which Marian passes
and observes as she ventures out to explore the grounds.
Analysis- Marian’s delight in the new furniture and
decoration reflects nineteenth-century interest in interior
design and aesthetics in the home. The industrial revolution
and new technology provided Victorian consumers with new
goods and materials to furnish their homes and encouraged
people to value comfort, personal taste, and leisure when
designing their living space. The monster on the fountain
reflects and foreshadows the monstrous reality of Laura’s
marriage and the secret concealed by Sir Percival, the owner
of Blackwater Park.

Marian wanders out of the garden and follows a path

through the trees which surround the mansion. The path
ends suddenly at the water’s edge, and she sees the
stagnant, murky lake of Blackwater, which is infested
with frogs, toads and snakes. A little further along the
bank there is a small hut, and Marian rests inside it
before the walk home.
Analysis- The swamp filled with reptiles forebodes the
conspiracy that will trap Marian and Laura at Blackwater,
hemmed in by its trees and lake. Snakes are associated with
lies and evil because of their biblical connotations in the story
of Adam and Eve, and Collins’s contemporary readers would
be aware of this symbolism.
Marian finds a dog in the shed breathing heavily and later
discovers that it is heavily wounded and then at the sight of
the poor creature in pain, Marian takes it to the house.
Analysis- The dog is yet another sinister omen of Laura and
Marian’s time at Blackwater, as it is an innocent creature that
has been deliberately injured. Also The servant girl does not
seem to have any sympathy or compassion for the dog and is
slightly sadistic in her reaction to the sight of the animal’s
suffering. All this adds to the mood of dread permeating the
entire property.
Mrs. Catherick’s mysterious visit, the sinister appearance of
Blackwater Park, and the sad incident with the dog
compound in Marian’s mind and make her anxious about the
future for Laura and herself.

Marian’s masculinity- Laura teases Marian because Marian is

so unfeminine and chooses to travel with ugly, practical
things, like books and an umbrella, rather than pretty or
decorative feminine things.

Madame Fosco- Madame Fosco has been transformed by her

marriage. As a young woman, she was the opposite of an
ideal nineteenth-century woman; vocal, rebellious, and
independent. Through her marriage, she has turned into the
opposite: she is submissive, silent, and modest, relies on her
husband for everything, and does everything in her power to
please him. Although this was commonly thought of as a
perfect set of qualities in a wife, Collins undermines this idea
by implying that this suppression of her outgoing nature has
made Madame Fosco bitter and unpleasant. She is now
totally focused on her marriage to the point of caring nothing
for anyone else around her. Madame Fosco used to advocate
the rights of women but now she just waits for her
“husband’s opinion” and looks down on women like Marian
who she used to be like before getting married to Count
Fosco. The transformation in her is extremely drastic which is
also quite scary.

Count Fosco-  Count Fosco is extremely

overweight. Marian admits that she distrusts overweight
people and dislikes the common stereotype that
overweight people are happy or jolly. However, despite
this, she trusts the Count. She thinks perhaps she likes
him because of his resemblance to Napoleon and the fact
that he looks very strange and not at all ordinary or
common. She is also impressed by how well he speaks
English for a foreigner and is fascinated by the way he
moves so quietly and delicately despite his size.
Collins plays with stereotypes here and suggests that just
because fat people are often portrayed as jolly and
benevolent, does not mean that they are. Napoleon was a
French General who tried to conquer all of Europe and who
went to war with Britain in the later 1700s. Like Count Fosco,
he is associated in the British Victorian imagination with
power, control, and foreign forces invading Britain. Count
Fosco also confounds expectations because he is light on his
feet despite his size. Count Fosco’s treatment of his pets
seems to imply that he has a sensitive nature and is kind to
vulnerable things. However, his attitude towards the fierce
dog suggests that he is also totally fearless and is confident
in his ability to tame anything, as Marian has already
discerned. Overall, the Count seems to have a special
connection to animals, which adds to his intriguing character.
Superiority of Count Fosco- Marian notes that with
herself, he “flatters her” by talking to her about serious
subjects as though she is a man. Marian even feels that
the Count “manages” Sir Percival and maintains an air of
superiority over him, dismissing comments that Sir
Percival makes about the Count’s odd, “effeminate”
habits.
Marian can see that Count Fosco is an extremely powerful
personality and is able to manipulate and control everyone
around him. He attempts to neutralize Laura’s dislike of him
by making it impossible for her to say anything unkind about
him. He also seems aware that Marian prefers to be treated
as an equal and, therefore, does so accordingly. Marian
stresses that he is kind to his wife “in public” because she
does not know how he treats her in private, and possibly
suspects that the Count has used force or violence to change
Madame Fosco’s personality. Although Marian is
intimidated by Count Fosco, she cannot help but admire
him. She notices that he has this effect on everyone and
that Sir Percival even seems afraid of him. Regardless of
his past or true nature, Marian observes that it would be
very dangerous to make an enemy of the Count. Marian
can tell that the Count is an extremely dominant personality
and that he is able to control people around him to get his
own way. Therefore, she feels that he would be ruthless if
someone tried to prevent him from doing as he pleases. In
all, he is a fascinating character and one of Collins’s most
interesting creations. Count Fosco is very manipulative unlike
Sir Percival. The conversation between Count Fosco and
Percival about the lake being a crime scene or not, this
conversation is very sinister and seems designed to
intimidate Laura and Marian, as it suggests that Sir Percival
and Count Fosco regularly plan ways in which they can cover
up crimes. Sir Percival appears naïve because he only thinks
about one aspect of a murder (the setting) while Count Fosco
comes across as truly frightening because he seems to have
a deep and detailed understanding of what is necessary to
get away with killing someone, which possibly comes from
real life experience.
Count Fosco suggests that it is natural and instinctive for
men to murder each other because it is part of human
nature. Again, Count Fosco comes across as very sinister as
he seems to have a deep knowledge of an underworld of
crime that escapes the attention or punishment of the
law.
Count Fosco says that epigrams such as “crime causes its own
detection” and “murder will out” are simply phrases that are used to
comfort people and to make up for the failings of the law and the
police, which Count Fosco thinks are very inefficient systems of
solving crime. Although the crimes which are solved are the ones
which the public hear about, Count Fosco suggests that there are
thousands of unsolved crimes which go undetected, and that the act of
committing a crime is really a game of wits between the individual
criminal and the police. When this individual is intelligent, the Count
says, the police generally lose, and society never finds out about the
criminal or his crimes.
Count Fosco does not have any faith in the legal or justice
system. He believes that the police make a show of the
crimes they do solve to distract the public from all the ones
they do not, and to make the public feel safe. The Count
believes that people are not really safe, as intelligent
criminals do not get caught, and he hints that he himself is
one of those intelligent criminals. It shows his confidence that
he can even boast like this.
Count Fosco does not believe he is immoral, but that morality
is relative and depends on the culture and society one
belongs to.