Sarah Waters, Fingersmith

Louisa Yates (University of Chester)

Ed. by Cristina Sandru, The Literary Encyclopedia
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.09: English Writing and Culture: Postwar and Contemporary Britain , 1945-present.
Vol. editors: Kerry Myler (Newman University), Jenni Ramone (The Nottingham Trent University)

Dates

First circulation or publication 2002

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

In 2002, Sarah Waters expressed the sadness she had felt at putting Margaret Prior, protagonist of Affinity and victim of a terrible deception, “through the mill” (Q&A session, Guardian Online). Fittingly, then, her next novel, Fingersmith, detailed the guilt and sorrow of two women who intentionally swindle one another. It is told in three parts, in a loose reference to the Victorian triple-decker novel, and the first-person narrative voice switches from the first woman to the second, and back again. The reader is privy only to that which is revealed by the narrative voice, for there is no omniscient narrator. The novel's technique of maintaining secrecy and revelation through the switching of narrative …

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1983 words

Citation: Yates, Louisa. "Fingersmith". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 09 January 2008 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=23070, accessed 22 November 2024.]

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