“A look of intentness and intensity–a look of hungry, exacting, watchful, and yet devoted affection” is evident in Jasper’s face as he regards his nephew.ĭrood is at both elated that it’s the birthday of his betrothed and dismayed that he’s part of an arranged marriage. Crisparkle leaves just as Edwin Drood arrives.īeing only six-and-twenty, Jasper is part uncle, part brother to Drood. Jasper expresses that he loves his nephew dearly. Jasper, Crisparkle inquires after the man’s health and comments on Jasper’s nephew, Drood. It seems Jasper arrived dazed but “has gone home quite himself.” His nephew’s imminent arrival in town is also remarked upon.Īsked to look in on Mr. Tope discuss how the man has taken ill of late and are joined by the Reverend Mr. Two gentlemen are conversing about the choir master, Mr. Our story begins in earnest in chapter two with the close of choir practice. Who might this man be? And what importance may this chapter hold? Unseemingly for Victorian times, the first chapter takes readers to an opium den! The opening paragraph has been a strange vision, but by chapter’s end “the jaded traveller” has made haste to return to the Cathedral. A third person present, “a haggard woman … is blowing at a kind of pipe.” She tells the man, “Ye’ve smoked as many as five since ye come in at midnight.” “Shaking from head to foot, the man whose scattered consciousness has thus fantastically pieced itself together, at length rises, supports his trembling frame upon his arms, and looks around.” This man sees he is not alone in a den of iniquity.
The opening is a bit odd in its questioning of how a Cathedral could have come to be in its locale and the appearance (or lack thereof) of some “grim spike.” Yet the second paragraph may contain some illumination. The novel begins in “an ancient English Cathedral town…” Join me in reading this unfinished classic and speculated as to what might have been. Since its ending cannot truly be spoiled, this novel makes for a perfect study of the mystery story and its construction. Unwittingly, it became one of the greatest mysteries in literature as none have convincingly determined or discovered Dickens’ true intentions as to the novel’s conclusion. Presumably this was to be a true mystery story akin to The Moonstone and The Woman in White, novels written by Dickens’ friend Wilkie Collins. It would be Dickens’ last novel and one left unfinished at the time of his death. In April 1870, Charles Dickens’ The Mystery of Edwin Drood began appearing in installments. Illustration for cover of Oxford University Press paperback edition of Dickens’ Drood.
0 kommentar(er)
