VENICE-O-METER 3
Gripping Gothic novel and/or crime novel set in London, Ireland and Venice
“…the wonderful city of the waters…”
“… the dismal island…”
It’s one of those books that makes you stay up late because you just have to know how it ends. And when you know how it ends, you’re left with so many questions… If you’re into novels that probe the characters’ motivations and emotions, you may find The Haunted Hotel frustrating. Wilkie Collins is no psychologist and the characters often seem one-dimensional. But he keeps you guessing throughout, deftly weaving together tropes from both Gothic fiction and mystery novels, all while adding some unexpectedly modern strands. Indeed, one of the characters starts writing a play that may or may not be a confession, allowing the novel to reflect on theatricality, on story-telling and on what we choose to believe when reading.
But let’s get back to Venice —
Victorian novels that are partly set in Italy are aplenty. What makes Wilkie Collins unusual is that he lived in Italy as a teenager, becoming fluent in Italian. So I was a bit disappointed that his treatment of Venice felt superficial. The places he names are common tourist hotspots — the Danieli hotel, the Florian cafe, the Lido beaches — while the palazzo at the center of the novel is described in generic terms, without any specifics that allow you to identify it formally — a multi-story, canal-facing Palladian-style residence.
In The Haunted Hotel, Venice is merely an exotic, foreign place.
Reading Venice 