A Life of Sensation Read-a-Long: EPOCH ONE

And it begins! Welcome to the first check-in of the read-a-long hosted by Rambo Reads. We're reading Wilkie Collins: A Life of Sensation, a biography of the weirdly-shaped-headed author of The Woman in White and The Moonstone.
  
Here are the salient points of Epoch One:

• I do not much care about the life of Wilkie Collins' father and I admit to skimming much of it. I want to know about Wilkie, damn it!


• I did pick up that Mr Collins wanted his son to make something of himself professionally. Not objectively unreasonable, although it does make you raise an eyebrow when you realise that he was a painter. A successful one, mind, but still.


• His head had a strange bump, probably due to misapplication of the obstetric forceps at birth. 


• Wilkie Collins and Charles Dickens eventually became bestest buds after Wilkie filled in a minor role for Dickens in one of his self-promoting, Dickens-wank-fest plays.


• In later life, he told Dickens about losing his virginity to some older Italian woman when he was able thirteen. Whilst it's acknowledged that this may not be strictly true, NOBODY IS OUTRIGHT DISMISSING THIS AS IMPLAUSIBLE.

• He studied at the Bar, with Gray's Inn. I'm a Middle Temple girl myself, but there's no accounting for taste. *prances around in her robes*


• OH! My absolute favourite part was where he assisted in the secret wedding of a 31 year old friend and his 16 year old love interest. But, you know, it's fine, because it had been going since for four years. Since she was twelve, presumably. SEE!? FINE.

So yep, one Epoch down. I was super excited when I opened my second hand copy of this book and realised that I'd unknowingly bought a signed copy!

I'm rereading The Moonstone at the moment, alongside the autobiography. I loved it when we read-a-longed it (see my thoughts here and here), but I'm really, really loving it now. Mr Betteredge and Druscilla Clack are my favourite people in the whole world.

See you next week for Epochs 2 and 3!