Armadale

Paperback / softback

Main Details

Title Armadale
Authors and Contributors      By (author) Wilkie Collins
Introduction by John Sutherland
Notes by John Sutherland
Physical Properties
Format:Paperback / softback
Pages:752
Dimensions(mm): Height 198,Width 129
Category/GenreClassic fiction (pre c 1945)
ISBN/Barcode 9780140434118
ClassificationsDewey:823.8
Audience
General

Publishing Details

Publisher Penguin Books Ltd
Imprint Penguin Classics
Publication Date 26 January 1995
Publication Country United Kingdom

Description

When the elderly Allan Armadale makes a terrible confession on his death-bed, he has little idea of the repercussions to come, for the secret he reveals involves the mysterious Lydia Gwilt: flame-haired temptress, bigamist, laudanum addict and husband-poisoner. Her malicious intrigues fuel the plot of this gripping melodrama: a tale of confused identities, inherited curses, romantic rivalries, espionage, money - and murder. The character of Lydia Gwilt horrified contemporary critics, with one reviewer describing her as 'One of the most hardened female villains whose devices and desires have ever blackened fiction'. She remains among the most enigmatic and fascinating women in nineteenth-century literature and the dark heart of this most sensational of Victorian 'sensation novels'.

Author Biography

Wilkie Collins was born in London in 1824. From the early 1850s he was a friend of Charles Dickens' and contributed to Household Works. Collins began by writing plays, but is most remembered for his novels, including The Moonstone (1868) and The Woman in White (1860). He died in 1889. John Sutherland is Professor of English at University College, London. He has edited many books for Penguin Classics, including Anthony Trollope.