Subversion of gender stereotypes in Wilkie Collins’s The Woman in White and Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret

Abstract

Victorian sensation fiction strives to go beyond its time through issues and characters that do not conform to nineteenth century social norms. The novels of this genre depict the sensational lives with deceits and crimes which shocked the readers of their time, and they increase the reader’s tension with sensational narratives including untraditional matters and portrayals. Along with scandalous and criminal subjects, these works sometimes offer unconventional depictions of femininity and masculinity in the Victorian Age. Accordingly, this paper discusses Wilkie Collins’s The Woman in White (1860) and Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret (1862) focusing on male and female characters challenging traditional gender stereotypes. It examines how these novels describe characters rather dissimilar to the ones in the traditional fiction of the era through their cunnings, intrigues, and unconventional attitudes with regard to marriage, power, and gender roles.