Walter Hartright and Marian Halcombe are the main narrators of The Woman in White, but the book contains a number of tertiary narrators as well. While this variation in narrators offers the reader access to several voices within the novel and perspectives on the novel's events, the tone nonetheless remains rather consistent. The tone is influenced by the novel's mimicking of a trial in a court of law.
Most of the narrators give their accounts with an open and honest tone—like witnesses speaking in a court room, they feel that the stories and details they're in the midst of sharing are very important, and they present their experiences with a sense of gravity and ceremony, just like people who have been called to the stand to provide an account for some sort of legal proceeding. This combined openness and seriousness influences the reader to take the narrative seriously.
To hold onto the reader's engagement, the narrators strike a fine balance between narrating with enough intensity to build suspense and enough measuredness to avoid melodrama. Collins uses the tone of the narrators to sustain the sensational flair of the novel while always attempting to keep the over-sensational at an arm's length.
