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Wilkie Collins (William 1824-89)
Who?
Invented the genre called the novel of sensation, which later became the detective novel.
Must reads
The Woman in White (1860) and The Moonstone (1868).
Darkest hour
After he left school at 17, he had an unhappy spell as a clerk in a tea broker's office.
Greatest triumph
Collins had many fans in the United States and did a lecture tour there in 1873-74. He also travelled in France and Italy, often with his friend Charles Dickens. He wrote for Dickens' periodicals, and his books were widely translated into European languages.
Essential quotes
'This is a story of what a woman's patience can endure, and what a man's resolution can achieve.' (The Woman in White)
'There stood the figure of a solitary woman, dressed from head to foot in white garments; her face bent in grave inquiry on mine, her hand pointing to the dark cloud over London.' (The Woman in White)
Gossip
He was addicted to opium for the last 27 years of his life. He never married but lived for years with Caroline Graves, a widow, and also had three children with Martha Rudd, a younger woman.
Did u know?
He was named after his godfather, the painter David Wilkie, a friend of his father, who was a landscape painter.
What to say
The Woman in White is the first and greatest sensation novel, dominated by one of the finest creations in Victorian fiction: Count Fosco, the 'Napoleon of Crime'.
Don't say
Wee Willie Winkie and crime doesn't pay.
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