GREAT LITERARY LADY: Marian Halcombe
This early sensation novel from 1860 is also arguably the first mystery novel. But whatever the merits of its complex, melodramatic plot, one unusual figure stands out: Marian Halcombe, devoted friend and companion to her half-sister Laura Fairlie.
When she first appears, Walter Hartright, the hero of the novel who is in love with Laura, is struck by Marian’s ‘dark, ugly’ appearance. While not conventionally beautiful, the intelligent and loyal Marian plays an important part in solving the mystery of her half-sister’s disappearance: Laura’s evil husband, Sir Percival Glyde, together with the repulsive and machiavellian Count Fosco, have engineered a case of switched identities to fake Laura’s death and confine her to an asylum, in order to get hold of her inheritance.
Marian narrates a large part of the novel by means of her diary, is as skilled at billiards as at conversation, and shows admirably rapid thinking to save Laura from the grim fate that Glyde and Fosco have plotted. She is no damsel in distress but an adventurous risk taker, willing to climb on to the roof to eavesdrop on the villains.
Marian also makes it clear that she is a New Woman avant la lettre when she remarks: ‘No man under heaven deserves these sacrifices from us women… they take us body and soul to themselves, and fasten our helpless lives to theirs as they chain up a dog to his kennel. And what does the best of them give us in return?’
When she first appears, Walter Hartright, the hero of the novel who is in love with Laura, is struck by Marian’s ‘dark, ugly’ appearance. While not conventionally beautiful, the intelligent and loyal Marian plays an important part in solving the mystery of her half-sister’s disappearance: Laura’s evil husband, Sir Percival Glyde, together with the repulsive and machiavellian Count Fosco, have engineered a case of switched identities to fake Laura’s death and confine her to an asylum, in order to get hold of her inheritance.
Marian narrates a large part of the novel by means of her diary, is as skilled at billiards as at conversation, and shows admirably rapid thinking to save Laura from the grim fate that Glyde and Fosco have plotted. She is no damsel in distress but an adventurous risk taker, willing to climb on to the roof to eavesdrop on the villains.
Marian also makes it clear that she is a New Woman avant la lettre when she remarks: ‘No man under heaven deserves these sacrifices from us women… they take us body and soul to themselves, and fasten our helpless lives to theirs as they chain up a dog to his kennel. And what does the best of them give us in return?’