The Woman in Black
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| The Woman in Black | |
 1st edition cover |
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| Author | Susan Hill |
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| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Ghost story, Horror novel |
| Publisher | Hamish Hamilton |
| Publication date | 10 October 1983 |
| Media type | print (hardback & paperback) |
| Pages | 192 pp (hardback edition) |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-241-10987-6 (hardback edition) |
The Woman in Black is a 1983 horror novel by Susan Hill about a menacing spectre that haunts a small English town.
It was adapted into a stage play by Stephen Mallatratt. It was also made into a TV movie in 1989, based on a screenplay by the distinguished film and television writer Nigel Kneale, best known as the creator of the Quatermass science-fiction serials. The stage play was first performed at the Theatre-by-the-Sea in Scarborough, UK in 1987. It was very well received and moved to the Fortune Theatre in London's West End in 1989 where it still runs today, as well as at the Churchill Theatre in Bromley. The stage play is notable for having a very small cast, but it remains a popular and chilling theatre experience.
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[edit] Plot introduction
The story centres on a young solicitor, Arthur Kipps, who is summoned to Crythin Gifford, a small market town on the east coast of the United Kingdom to attend to the funeral of Mrs Alice Drablow, an elderly widow who lived alone in the desolate and secluded Eel Marsh House.
[edit] Plot summary
The house is situated on Nine Lives Causeway, and at high tide is completely cut off from the mainland with only the surrounding marshes and sea frets for company. Kipps soon realises there is more to Alice Drablow than he originally thought. At the funeral he spots a woman dressed in black and with a pale, wasted face, who is watched in silence by a group of children. Over the course of several days, while sorting through Mrs Drablow's papers at Eel Marsh House, he endures an increasingly terrifying sequence of unexplained noises, chilling events and hauntings by the Woman in Black. The hauntings included the sound of a horse and cart in difficulty which were closely followed by the screams of a young child.
Most of the people in Crythin Gifford are extremely reluctant to reveal information about Mrs. Drablow and the mysterious Woman in Black, and most attempts to find out the truth cause pained and fearful reactions. From various sources, Kipps learns that Mrs Drablow's sister, Jennet Humfrye, gave birth to a child, but, because she was not married when she became pregnant was forced to give the child to her sister. Mrs Drablow and her husband adopted the boy, called Nathaniel, insisting he should never know that Jennet was his mother. We later discover that the child's screams heard by Kipps were those of Nathaniel.
Jennet went away for a year but after realising she could not be parted for so long from her son, made an agreement to stay at Eel Marsh House with her son, so long as she never revealed her true identity to him. One day, a pony and trap carrying the boy across the causeway became lost and sank into the marshes, killing all aboard, while Jennet looked on from the window of Eel Marsh House. This was particularly distressing for Jennet Humfrye as she had planned to run away with her son.
Jennet died later, but returned to haunt Eel Marsh House and Crythin Gifford with a vengeful malevolence, as the Woman in Black. According to local tales, seeing the Woman in Black meant that the death of a child would follow.
After the affair is settled, Arthur Kipps returns to London, marries Stella, and has a child of his own. At a fair, while his wife and child are enjoying a carriage ride, Kipps suddenly sees the Woman in Black once more. She steps out in front of the horse pulling the carriage and startles the horse, so that it gallops away and collides with a tree, killing the child and fatally injuring Stella, who dies of her injuries ten months later. The Woman in Black has had her vengeance.
[edit] Theatrical Adaptations
[edit] Stage play
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It has been suggested that this section be split into a new article entitled The Woman in Black (play). (Discuss) |
An extra twist is added in the stage play, adapted from the book by Stephen Mallatratt. In this version, an older Kipps enlists a young actor to help him tell the story of the 'Woman in Black', hoping that this will help him to move on from those events.
The actor plays the part of the young Arthur Kipps, and as the play progresses it is implied that history may be about to tragically repeat itself.
As the basis of the entire play is a fictional stage rehearsal within the theatre where the play is staged, the brief, unexpected appearances to the audience of the unbilled Woman in Black, which at the end are revealed to have only appeared to the actor, give a further, darker implication, adding to the story's 'spine chiller' reputation.
An interesting aspect to the stage adaptation is a question posed by the play; will we be subject to revenge from the 'Woman in Black' as we too have meddled in her affairs?
The play is staged at the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden, London and the PacRep theatre in Carmel, CA, USA
The actor playing the role of the woman in black is listed as 'the vision' on the programme, alongside other technical roles, in an attempt to convince the audience that there are only two actors in the performance.
[edit] Radio and Television Adaptations
In 1989, the story was adapted for television for Britain's ITV network[1]. The production starred Adrian Rawlins as Arthur Kidd (not Kipps), Bernard Hepton as Sam Toovey (not Sam Daily) and Pauline Moran in a chilling performance as The Woman in Black.
In December 1993, BBC Radio 5 broadcast an adaptation of the novel. It starred Robert Glenister (as young Arthur Kipps) and John Woodvine (as old Arthur Kipps, who also narrates parts of the story). It was directed by Chris Wallis.
In October 2004, BBC Radio 4 broadcast a 56 minute version[2] in its Saturday Play slot, adapted by Mike Walker. It starred James D'Arcy as Arthur Kipps, was directed by John Taylor and was a Fiction Factory production.
[edit] Trivia
- The novel and play are not to be confused with Wilkie Collins's Victorian thriller The Woman in White.
- The Fortune Theatre in London where The Woman in Black has been running since 1989 is reputed to be haunted by a ghost - a woman in black - who began appearing shortly after a break-in at the Covent Garden theatre. She was witnessed being in the wings by all actors mid-performance, watching in silence.
- The novel is now part of the National Curriculum in England
- Award Winning Sound Designer Norman Kern had created five different surround sound productions.
