Published in 1860, one of the two novels (with The Moonstone) for which Collins is most famous. It firmly established his reputation with the reading public and helped raise the circulation of All the Year Round. As Smith, Elder found to their cost, 'everyone was raving about it.' S. M. Ellis described how The Woman in White was so popular that 'every possible commodity was labelled "Woman in White". There were "Woman in White" cloaks and bonnets, "Woman in White" perfumes and all manner of toilet requisites, "Woman in White" Waltzes and Quadrilles.' It was parodied in Punch and even such a critical reviewer as Mrs Oliphant, was unusually favourable. Edward Fitzgerald read it several times and considered naming a sailing boat after the determined Marian Halcombe. Prince Albert read the book and approved. Thackeray was engrossed from morning to sunset, and Gladstone found the story so absorbing that he missed a visit to the theatre. The Woman in White has never been out of print since its first publication. In the twentieth century there have been theatre, film, television and musical adaptations and even a comic-strip version.
The Woman in White is generally regarded as the first Sensation Novel and inspired numerous imitations, most notably from Mary Braddon. The story is in part based on an eighteenth century case of abduction and wrongful imprisonment, taken from Mejan's Recueil des Causes Celebres. It uses the theme of substituted identity, a favourite with Collins, and also attacks the misuse of lunatic asylums.