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    The Frozen Deep
    The Frozen Deep
    The Frozen Deep
    Ebook141 pages1 hour

    The Frozen Deep

    By Wilkie Collins

    3.5/5

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    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArchive Classics
    Release dateMay 1, 1996
    Author

    Wilkie Collins

    William Wilkie Collins was born in London in 1824, the son of a successful and popular painter. Collins himself demonstrated some artistic talent and had a painting hung in the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in 1849, but his real passion was for writing. On leaving school, he worked in the office of a tea merchant in the Strand but hated it. He left and read law as a student at Lincoln's Inn but already his writing career was flowering. His first novel, Antonina, was published in 1850. In 1851, the same year that he was called to the bar, he met and established a lifelong friendship with Charles Dickens. While Collins' fame rests on his best known works, The Woman in White and The Moonstone, he wrote over thirty books, as well as numerous short stories, articles and plays. He was a hugely popular writer in his lifetime. Collins was an unconventional individual: he never married but established long term liaisons with two separate households. He died in 1889.

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    Reviews for The Frozen Deep

    3.5/5

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    • 3/5
      After reading Collins' A Woman In White, this novella fell short, though it has its own merits. As a typical piece of Victorian England, it represents the utter reliance by women on men. The element of the supernatural (visions, trances, etc.) gave it an extra depth.

      Overall, I enjoyed reading this as an important piece of Wilkie Collins' repertoire and found the connection to Charles Dickens quite intriguing. I am amazed to find that this novella (and its original play format) inspired the famous A Tale of Two Cities. I recommend this for fans of Victorian Gothic literature or Wilkie Collins.
    • 3/5
      I give this book a solid three and two-thirds stars. It was a good story, but - more action! Less love triangle!
    • 4/5
      It’s about two men and two women–the women are the dearest of friends; the men, bitter rivals, though only one knows that, but I get ahead of myself. One of the women is married to a First Lieutenant on a ship bound for the arctic. She’s very close to the younger woman, Clara. Both of the previously mentioned men are also sailors–one, Richard, has just returned from Africa and the other, Frank, is set to go to the arctic with First Lieutenant Crayford. Richard left for Africa some years ago under the assumption that Clara was his for the taking upon his return, but she’s in love with Frank. When her spurned paramour finds out she’s no longer his (she never was, really, he just presumed she was) he vows revenge on his rival, even though he’s no idea who that man is.Once he discovers the man he so despises is on the arctic expedition, Richard wrangles his way aboard though he’s only just returned home. The boats get trapped on the ice and all of the men come to depend (even moreso than usual) upon one another for their sanity and survival. Richard spends this time trying to figure out which one of his compatriots is his rival in love and eventually does so. The ending wasn’t what I expected, but in a good way–I highly recommend this taut, suspence-filled, beautifully written, little-known gem by Mr Collins.
    • 4/5
       Wilkie's Collins' novella "The Frozen Deep" is based on the play of the same name he co-wrote with Charles Dickens. The setting is a British naval expedition to discover the Northwest Passage (loosely inspired by John Franklin's ill-fated voyage). The story is a melodrama about two men on the voyage -- one of whom is engaged to be married to a woman that the other has just broken up with. This fact is discovered after they have been shipwrecked in the Arctic for over a year, with predictably melodramatic consequences. Suffice it to say it all turns out better than Franklin's actual expedition and that the play this is based on was the basis of the ending of a Tale of Two Cities.Nowhere nearly as good as any of Collins' novels that I've read with little in the way of real suspense, mystery or psychological depth. But still enjoyable nonetheless and worth reading.
    • 4/5
      In 1845, an English vessel set sail to explore the Artic. The expedition failed, ending in tragedy and death. Wilkie Collins used the events of the adventure as a setting for his gothic tale of revenge and redemption, [The Frozen Deep].Clara Burnham is afflicted by clairvoyant abilities; afflicted because her friends routinely dismiss her visions as symptoms of a nervous and frail constitution. On the night before two English vessels set sail for an Artic expedition, Clara refuses a marriage proposal from Richard Wardour, a sailor from one of the expeditionary vessels and accepts a proposal from Frank Aldersly, a sailor from the companion ship. On the following morning, Clara is struck with a vision of terrible tragedy, foreseeing that Wardour will meet Aldersly during the voyage and vengefully murder him. Clara’s dark dream plays out across the frigid tundra and icy waters of the Artic as Aldersly battles to stay alive, and Wardour descends into madness.Collins trickles out the gothic tale in fits and starts, swinging wildly between narrative perspectives and frequently lurching forward in time. The disjointed result, while somewhat suspenseful, frustrates any smooth pace from developing. On the other hand, Collins mastery of the foibles of human relationships and his faith in the ultimate valiance of the human spirit makes the story a rewarding read.A couple of points of trivia about the short novel. Originally, the story was produced as a stage play starring Collins himself and his close friend Charles Dickens. Can you imagine watching such a production? What a treat. Second, the underlying themes of the story also inspired Dickens’ [A Tale of Two Cities] character Sydney Carton.Bottom Line: A solid Collins read, though not in the tradition of Collins’ other more well-rounded and complete narratives. Read it if you’re a Collins or Dickens fan and have a compunction over completeness or if you’re a fan of the traditional gothic tale.3 ½ bones!!!!

    Book preview

    The Frozen Deep - Wilkie Collins

    The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Frozen Deep, by Wilkie Collins

    This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

    almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or

    re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

    with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

    Title: The Frozen Deep

    Author: Wilkie Collins

    Release Date: October 5, 2008 [EBook #1625]

    Last Updated: December 10, 2012

    Language: English

    *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FROZEN DEEP ***

    Produced by James Rusk, and David Widger

    THE FROZEN DEEP

    by Wilkie Collins

    CONTENTS

    First Scene—The Ball-room

          Chapter 1.

          Chapter 2.

          Chapter 3.

          Chapter 4.

    Between the Scenes—The Landing Stage

          Chapter 5.

    Second Scene—The Hut of the Sea-mew.

          Chapter 6.

          Chapter 7.

          Chapter 8.

          Chapter 9.

          Chapter 10.

          Chapter 11.

    Third Scene—The Iceberg.

          Chapter 12.

    Fourth Scene—The Garden.

          Chapter 13.

          Chapter 14.

          Chapter 15.

    Fifth Scene—The Boat-House.

          Chapter 16.

          Chapter 17.

          Chapter 18.

    First Scene—The Ball-room

    Chapter 1.

    The date is between twenty and thirty years ago. The place is an English sea-port. The time is night. And the business of the moment is—dancing.

    The Mayor and Corporation of the town are giving a grand ball, in celebration of the departure of an Arctic expedition from their port. The ships of the expedition are two in number—the Wanderer and the Sea-mew. They are to sail (in search of the Northwest Passage) on the next day, with the morning tide.

    Honor to the Mayor and Corporation! It is a brilliant ball. The band is complete. The room is spacious. The large conservatory opening out of it is pleasantly lighted with Chinese lanterns, and beautifully decorated with shrubs and flowers. All officers of the army and navy who are present wear their uniforms in honor of the occasion. Among the ladies, the display of dresses (a subject which the men don't understand) is bewildering—and the average of beauty (a subject which the men do understand) is the highest average attainable, in all parts of the room.

    For the moment, the dance which is in progress is a quadrille. General admiration selects two of the ladies who are dancing as its favorite objects. One is a dark beauty in the prime of womanhood—the wife of First Lieutenant Crayford, of the Wanderer. The other is a young girl, pale and delicate; dressed simply in white; with no ornament on her head but her own lovely brown hair. This is Miss Clara Burnham—an orphan. She is Mrs. Crayford's dearest friend, and she is to stay with Mrs. Crayford during the lieutenant's absence in the Arctic regions. She is now dancing, with the lieutenant himself for partner, and with Mrs. Crayford and Captain Helding (commanding officer of the Wanderer) for vis-a-vis—in plain English, for opposite couple.

    The conversation between Captain Helding and Mrs. Crayford, in one of the intervals of the dance, turns on Miss Burnham. The captain is greatly interested in Clara. He admires her beauty; but he thinks her manner—for a young girl—strangely serious and subdued. Is she in delicate health?

    Mrs. Crayford shakes her head; sighs mysteriously; and answers,

    "In very delicate health, Captain Helding."

    Consumptive?

    Not in the least.

    "I am glad to hear that. She is a charming creature, Mrs. Crayford. She interests me indescribably. If I was only twenty years younger—perhaps (as I am not twenty years younger) I had better not finish the sentence? Is it indiscreet, my dear lady, to inquire what is the matter with her?"

    It might be indiscreet, on the part of a stranger, said Mrs. Crayford. An old friend like you may make any inquiries. I wish I could tell you what is the matter with Clara. It is a mystery to the doctors themselves. Some of the mischief is due, in my humble opinion, to the manner in which she has been brought up.

    Ay! ay! A bad school, I suppose.

    Very bad, Captain Helding. But not the sort of school which you have in your mind at this moment. Clara's early years were spent in a lonely old house in the Highlands of Scotland. The ignorant people about her were the people who did the mischief which I have just been speaking of. They filled her mind with the superstitions which are still respected as truths in the wild North—especially the superstition called the Second Sight.

    God bless me! cried the captain, you don't mean to say she believes in such stuff as that? In these enlightened times too!

    Mrs. Crayford looked at her partner with a satirical smile.

    In these enlightened times, Captain Helding, we only believe in dancing tables, and in messages sent from the other world by spirits who can't spell! By comparison with such superstitions as these, even the Second Sight has something—in the shape of poetry—to recommend it, surely? Estimate for yourself, she continued seriously, the effect of such surroundings as I have described on a delicate, sensitive young creature—a girl with a naturally imaginative temperament leading a lonely, neglected life. Is it so very surprising that she should catch the infection of the superstition about her? And is it quite incomprehensible that her nervous system should suffer accordingly, at a very critical period of her life?

    Not at all, Mrs. Crayford—not at all, ma'am, as you put it. Still it is a little startling, to a commonplace man like me, to meet a young lady at a ball who believes in the Second Sight. Does she really profess to see into the future? Am I to understand that she positively falls into a trance, and sees people in distant countries, and foretells events to come? That is the Second Sight, is it not?

    That is the Second Sight, captain. And that is, really and positively, what she does.

    The young lady who is dancing opposite to us?

    The young lady who is dancing opposite to us.

    The captain waited a little—letting the new flood of information which had poured in on him settle itself steadily in his mind. This process accomplished, the Arctic explorer proceeded resolutely on his way to further discoveries.

    May I ask, ma'am, if you have ever seen her in a state of trance with your own eyes? he inquired.

    My sister and I both saw her in the trance, little more than a month since, Mrs. Crayford replied. She had been nervous and irritable all the morning; and we took her out into the garden to breathe the fresh air. Suddenly, without any reason for it, the color left her face. She stood between us, insensible to touch, insensible to sound; motionless as stone, and cold as death in a moment. The first change we noticed came after a lapse of some minutes. Her hands began to move slowly, as if she was groping in the dark. Words dropped one by one from her lips, in a lost, vacant tone, as if she was talking in her sleep. Whether what she said referred to past or future I cannot tell you. She spoke of persons in a foreign country—perfect strangers to my sister and to me. After a little interval, she suddenly became silent. A momentary color appeared in her face, and left it again. Her eyes closed—her feet failed her—and she sank insensible into our arms.

    Sank insensible into your arms, repeated the captain, absorbing his new information. Most extraordinary! And—in this state of health—she goes out to parties, and dances. More extraordinary still!

    You are entirely mistaken, said Mrs. Crayford. She is only here to-night to please me; and she is only dancing to please my husband. As a rule, she shuns all society. The doctor recommends change and amusement for her. She won't listen to him. Except on rare occasions like this, she persists in remaining at home.

    Captain Helding brightened at the allusion to the doctor. Something practical might be got out of the doctor. Scientific man. Sure to see this very obscure subject under a new light. How does it strike the doctor now? said the captain. Viewed simply as a Case, ma'am, how does it strike the doctor?

    He will give no positive opinion, Mrs. Crayford answered. He told me that such cases as Clara's were by no means unfamiliar to medical practice. 'We know,' he told me, 'that certain disordered conditions of the brain and the nervous system produce results quite as extraordinary as any that you have described—and there our knowledge ends. Neither my science nor any man's science can clear up the mystery in this case. It is an especially difficult case to deal with, because Miss Burnham's early associations dispose her to attach a superstitious importance to the malady—the hysterical malady as some doctors would call it—from which she suffers. I can give you instructions for preserving her general health; and I can recommend you to try some change in her life—provided you first relieve her mind of any secret anxieties that may possibly be preying on it.'

    The captain smiled self-approvingly. The doctor had justified his anticipations. The doctor had suggested a practical solution of the difficulty.

    Ay! ay! At last we have hit the nail on the head! Secret anxieties. Yes! yes! Plain enough now. A disappointment in love—eh, Mrs. Crayford?

    "I don't know, Captain Helding; I am quite in

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