Lady Audleys Secret Essay -- essays research papers

The Style and Genre of Lady Audley&8217s mysticLady Audley&8217s Secret, by Mary Elizabeth Braddon, is a novel of many elements. It has been placed in many different style or genre categories since its publication. I feel that it best fits under the melodrama or sensational genre, and under the subgenre of mystery. It contains significant elements of both types of writing, so I feel it is best to recognize both, keeping in mind that melodrama is its main device and mystery is a type of Victorian melodrama. In order to understand how the story fits into these categories, it is necessary to explore the Victorian characteristics of each, and apply them to the text. In addition to establishing the genres, it is important to explain wherefore and how these genres fit into Victorian culture.The term melodrama has come to be applied to any play with romantic plot in which an author manipulates events to act on the emotions of the hearing without regard for character development or logi c (Microsoft Encarta). In order to classify as a Victorian melodrama, several key techniques must be used, including proximity and familiarity to the audience, deceit rather than vindictive malice, lack of character development and especially the role of social status. The sensational novel is usually a narrative of our own times. Proximity is indeed one great element of sensation. A tale which aims to electrify the nerves of the reader is never thoroughly effective unless the view be laid out in our own days and among the people we are in the habit of meeting. In keeping with mid-Victorian themes, Lady Audley&8217s Secret is closely connected to the street literature and newspaper accounts of real crimes. The crimes in Braddon&8217s novel are concealed and secret. Like the crimes committed by see doctors and trusted ladies, the crimes in Lady Audley&8217s Secret shock because of their unexpectedness. Crime in the melodrama of the fifties and sixties is chilling, because of the i mplication that dishonesty and violence surround innocent people. A veneer of virtue coats ambitious conniving at respectability. Lady Audley&8217s Secret concludes with a triumph of good over evil, but at the same time suggests unsettlingly that this victory occurs so satisfyingly only in melodramas (Kalikoff, 9... ...r with seemingly no real purpose in the novel turns out to be the key to unlocking the whole plot. This technique was very popular in Victorian mystery.By using the elements of both melodrama and mystery apologue, Mary Elizabeth Braddon was fitted to create her approximately famous work of her long lasted career, Lady Audley&8217s Secret. Her ability to construe a mystery and keep the reader involved in her work shows the endowment she had for writing. Mary Braddon would not have been a popular Victorian novelist if she had not engaged in a certain amount of sentimentality (melodrama) in her fiction (Peterson, 165-166). Her choice of the mystery made her famous a nd revered by many of her colleagues. Robert Louis Stevenson wrote to her once that he wished his &8220days to be bound each to each by Miss Braddon&8217s novels, and Tennyson declared that he was &8220simply steeped in Miss Braddon (Peterson, 161). By exploring the elements of both melodrama and mystery, it becomes clear that Lady Audley&8217s Secret fits into both. Using these genres, Braddon was able to create a successful novel of her time that incorporated both reader emotion and Victorian culture.