Chapter 1 Sets scene, the Cobb, in Lyme Bay, with the three main characters, Charles Smithson, Ernestine, his fiancee and Sarah Woodruff. Note satirical tone, Fowles as observer, almost a voyeur, patronising in tone. Chapter 2 Light, brittle tone between lovers, flirtatious and typically Victorian (what is typically Victorian?). Ernestine's revulsion at Sarah because of her reputation as a "fallen woman" is not untypical, nor insincere. Tragedy is apparent in SW ; note her appearance contrasted to Ernestine's. Her effect on Charles is "like a lance" (sexual connotations here cf. what happens later) Chapter 3 Background detail re. Charles. Note comment about time on p15/16 "existence was firmly adagio". Fowles describes him as an intelligent idler, but he has redeeming features - he is intelligent, and not stereotyped beyond hope for that age. Although engaged and sexually experienced, he is not involved in any real affair of the heart. He is an emotional virgin. Chapter 4 Mrs Poultney's house. Note contrast of setting - dismal, repressed and full of hypocrisy. Cruelty masked with propriety. Mrs P. a caricature (or is she really?) of Victorian respectability. Her Christianity is surface, she fears Hell, but note how patronising she is to the vicar, who is her social inferior. Mr Forsythe suggests she employs Sarah Woodruff as a companion,out of malice or real compassion for sarah? Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Sarah Woodruff's history. Note that she has not as far as we know, had an affair with the Frenchman, Mr.Varguennes, but has acted without respectability in following him to Weymouth on a promise of marriage. She lodged with a female cousin. Even so, this is conduct which has led to scandal. A lady could not do something like this and remain a lady. The fact that she had not slept with Varguennes is immaterial, her reputation is in ruins because she behaved without propriety in leaving her job and running after a man, and a Frenchman at