British novelist Wilkie Collins met Charles Dickens when they were both doing amateur theater. They became good friends, which was sometimes a drawback when critics pointed out that Collins’ novels weren’t as good as Dickens. Collins’ may not have been as gifted as his friend, but he left a lasting legacy in his works. Collins wrote melodramatic stories in what were called “sensation novels” at the time, that were written to play to the emotions and stir a physical reaction in the reader. Many of them used supernatural elements to elicit a response, but Collins never did. His horrors were real and based on the laws of the time.
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See, Collins had a law degree, even though he never practiced law. But he understood the laws of the day, and his novels incorporated them into “the worst that could happen” scenarios for women. Married women had no rights at all, even to their own property. They were at the mercy of their husbands, who, in Collins’ stories, could control their autonomy and their very lives. He also explored the themes of poverty, adultery, abuse, inheritance, illegitimacy, divorce, power, and murder. His years of writing coincided with a push for reform in women’s rights (which his sensation novels no doubt contributed to), and each story was carefully vetted for contemporary legal accuracy in consultation with Collins’ own lawyer. Read about Collins, his works, and the changing laws involving women’s rights in Victorian England at Smithsonian.
Source: neatorama