Dickens Club: Wrapping up Week Two of The Mystery of Edwin Drood

Wherein your co-hosts of The Dickens Chronological Reading Club 2022-24 (#DickensClub) wrap up Week 2 (Installment 2) of our twenty-fifth read, The Mystery of Edwin Drood; with a chapter summary and discussion wrap-up.

By the members of the #DickensClub, edited/compiled by Rach

Friends, things are heating up between Neville and Edwin, and Jasper seems to be encouraging it. Or is he only watching them closely, as so many characters have been watching one another in these last two novels?

OR, did Jasper go so far as to drug the wine in Chapter Eight…?

This week, we’ve talked about the marvelous atmosphere that Dickens creates. We’ve also discussed the unique and intriguing Landless twins, the “hero” Minor Canon Crisparkle, and of course the “villain protagonist” John Jasper.

More to come this week. But first, a few quick links:

1. General Mems
2. The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Chapters 5-9 (Installment 2): A Summary
3. Discussion Wrap-Up (Week 2)
4. Questions, Theories, & Polls…
5. A Look-Ahead to Week 3 of The Mystery of Edwin Drood (3-9 Sept, 2024)

General Mems

SAVE THE DATE: Our final Zoom chat of The Dickens Chronological Reading Club (#DickensClub) will focus on The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Join us on Saturday, 5 October, 2024! 11am Pacific (US) / 2pm Eastern (US) / 7pm GMT (London)! Email Rach if you’d like the link; she will send out the link via email the week of the Zoom chat.

If you’re counting, today is Day 973 (and week 140) in our #DickensClub! This week, we’ll be reading the third installment, or Chapters 10-12, of The Mystery of Edwin Drood, our twenty-fifth read as a group. Please feel free to comment below this post for the third week’s chapters or use the hashtag #DickensClub if you’re commenting on twitter.

For Boze & Rach’s “introduction” to Drood, including our reading schedule, please click here. For Chris’s supplement with additional resources for consideration, please click here.

No matter where you’re at in the reading process, a huge “thank you” for reading along with us. Heartfelt thanks to our dear Dickens Fellowship, The Dickens Society, and the Charles Dickens Letters Project for retweets, and to all those liking, sharing, and encouraging our Club, including Gina Dalfonzo, Dr. Christian Lehmann and Dr. Pete Orford. Huge “thank you” also to The Circumlocution Office (on twitter also!) for providing such a marvellous online resource for us. And for any more recent members or for those who might be interested in joining: the revised two-and-a-half year reading schedule can be found here. If you’ve been reading along with us but aren’t yet on the Member List, we would love to add you! Please feel free to message Rach here on the site, or on twitter.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood, Chapters 5-9 (Installment 2): A Summary

(Illustrated by Luke Fildes. Images below are from the Charles Dickens Illustrated Gallery.)

Jasper and Durdles talk, harassed by the stone-throwing of the “Baby-Devil,” the boy called “Deputy,” who hangs around the cathedral and teases Durdles. Jasper expresses such a “romantic interest” in Durdles’s mysterious trade among the tombs that he wants Durdles to allow Jasper to shadow him in his work.

“I am beginning to have some idea of asking you to take me on as a sort of student, or free ‘prentice, under you, and to let me go about with you sometimes, and see some of these odd nooks in which you pass your days.”

Durdles then demonstrates, with his hammer, his skill at discovering the location of bodies by the sounds emitted from his tapping on the stone. Jasper then returns to his own home at the Gate House, where he readies his pipe for smoking—“but not with tobacco”—and watches his sleeping nephew Edwin Drood “with a fixed and deep attention.”

We begin our new scene at Minor Canon Corner with the athletic, cheery Mr Crisparkle and his long-widowed mother.

“Minor Canon Corner was a quiet place in the shadow of the Cathedral, which the cawing of the rooks, the echoing footsteps of rare passers, the sound of the Cathedral bel, or the roll of the Cathedral organ, seemed to render more quiet than absolute silence.”

They read a letter from Mr Honeythunder, an eminent philanthropist who has put the living and education of his wards—the twin brother and sister from Ceylon named Neville and Helena Landless—into the care of the Crisparkles. Mr Crisparkle is to tutor Neville and give him lodgings in his own home, and Helena is to take up residence and schooling at the Nuns’ House. Crisparkle and his mother plan on having a welcome dinner for the siblings, with Edwin, Jasper, Rosa, Miss Twinkleton, and themselves.

When Crisparkle is introduced to the handsome siblings, he feels that they have an air about them of wariness, or of two who are used to escaping from a hunt. And they are all glad to be escaping Mr Honeythunder and his boisterous philanthropy.

As Crisparkle and the siblings walk together after parting with Honeythunder, Neville tells him that they know almost nothing of the man. We then learn that their mother died when the siblings were very young, leaving them in the care of a cruel stepfather “who grudged us food to eat, and clothes to wear.” Crisparkle is shocked to hear Neville rejoice in the man’s death, as he would have been tempted to kill him himself, but Neville says, “You never saw him beat your sister.” Helena, he reports, would have rather died than shed a tear; Neville finds himself lacking in many virtues, and is very hard on himself. Helena is clearly the strong personality of the two and has huge influence over her brother, even from their youngest days. They had run away from their cruel stepfather four times in the course of six years.

“…the flight was always of her [Helena’s] planning and leading. Each time she dressed as a boy, and showed the daring of a man.”

Both Helena and Neville had been disposed not to like Crisparkle, but find that they do, very much. We also learn that there is such a close connection between Helena and Neville as to be almost telepathic; one such instance of unspoken communication passed between them at the dinner that night, when Helena—who takes to Rosa immediately, and has her arm around Rosa while she sings to Jasper’s accompaniment on piano—looks at Neville with a suggestion of the discomfort that Rosa feels about Jasper. Rosa can finally handle Jasper’s close presence and attention no longer, and breaks away from the song. Helena takes charge and draws Rosa away to recover herself.

Later that night in their private room, Rosa confesses to Helena—with whom she has become fast friends—that she fears Jasper, that he has an almost mesmeric influence over her, as though in his looks he were forcing Rosa to an understanding between them. She desperately doesn’t want her fears to be known to Drood, who so looks up to him. Helena, at that moment, takes on the role of Rosa’s protector.

That evening, Neville and Drood have a chance to converse alone, with Neville asking polite questions and Drood half-rebuffing them with an annoyed, insolent, and condescending manner. The two appear to dislike each other from the first; Neville’s temper is open, and Edwin’s hides under a mask of smoothness and carelessness, which grates on Neville even more, as does Edwin’s careless, proprietary attitude towards Rosa. Jasper, who had been lurking about in the shadows, comes between them, ostensibly as a peacemaker. He invites them over to the Gate House.

“Jasper looks observantly from the one to the other, slightly smiles, and turns his back to mix a jug of mulled wine at the fire. It seems to require much mixing and compounding.”

Jasper mixes them a drink, which seems to go immediately to their heads, causing their tempers to boil over as Drood makes a racist comment.

“This insulting allusion to his dark skin infuriates Neville to that violent degree, that he flings the dregs of his wine at Edwin Drood, and is in the act of flinging the goblet after it, when his arm is caught in the nick of time by Jasper.”

Jasper intervenes, and Neville breaks the glass and leaves the house. Pondering on his situation, and on the kindness of Crisparkle, Neville regrets his violent action and goes to Crisparkle to confess what happened, and that, although he and Drood had had very little to drink, it had gone to their heads in the strangest manner. Crisparkle acts as an understanding mentor. Later, Jasper himself comes to Crisparkle, relating his exaggerated fears about Neville’s “murderous” behaviour.

“I shall never know peace of mind when there is danger of those two coming together with no one else to interfere. It was horrible. There is something of the tiger in his dark blood.”

Crisparkle gently reasserts his confidence in Neville.

Rumors of the altercation make their way to the Nuns’ House, and Helena is determined to find out more. Mr Grewgious, a barrister who is now overseeing several properties and who is the guardian of Rosa, comes to visit his ward for some practical matters related to her inheritance and what she is to receive for wedding costs, and to see how she is. She delicately asks that Jasper not be involved in any of the arrangements. Furthermore, she wonders whether there would be any forfeiture if she and Drood were not to marry. Though Grewgious doesn’t appear to follow her real reluctance, he reassures her that there will be no forfeiture of their inheritance if they do not marry; it was simply the wish of two old friends, their fathers.

Grewgious then pays an uncomfortable visit to Jasper, noticing his pale attentiveness about whether it appears that the marriage is still to move forward, and Grewgious gives him assurance of it.

“‘God save them both!’ cried Jasper.”

Discussion Wrap-Up (Week 2)

Miscellany & What We Loved (e.g. Grewgious)

First of all, our dear member Rob Goll popped in to say hello, and to let us know that he is reading along with us and following the comments, and he will be commenting when he is able!

Lucy shared with us a “completion” of the novel by Leon Garfield, made for a BBC radio drama in 1990:

And here is the link that Lucy shares above.

And here, Chris writes of one of our benevolent benefactors, Mr Grewgious, of the Mr Lorry variety:

Dickens’s “Writing Lab”: Place & Atmosphere; The Cathedral as “A Character in the Mystery”; The Use of Present Tense

Father Matthew discusses the “disorienting” opening, “the ‘enjambment’ of the real world perception of the Cloisterham cathedral tower with the fragmentary dreams of Sultans and dancing girls,” and the marvelous atmosphere in this novel so far. He asks whether the Cathedral itself will prove to be a character in the drama:

I respond:

The Stationmaster is struck by the use of the present tense, and wonders about the “purpose” of the changes in tense:

Dana responds, and follows up with a question:

Boze shared this link, suggesting that Dickens was the first to use the present tense in a systematic/sustained way.

Chris shared this link, more focused on the use of the present tense by Dickens and Wilkie Collins.

Character Spotlight on Jasper: Enigmatic, Disturbing, Mesmerically Powerful; Like Claggart in Billy Budd

Dana is “good and hooked,” particularly by John Jasper. What exactly is his murky disposition about Edwin, the mysterious pain/agony that he suffers, his intentions? His “love-hate” attitude about Edwin is reminding her of Claggart’s towards Billy Budd in the Herman Melville novella. Budd’s/Edwin’s disposition is one that certain personalities cannot at all comprehend, but are perhaps envious of:

Chris comments, bringing in Jasper’s powerful gaze/eyes/look and relating it to Dickens’s own practice of mesmerism:

I comment on the violence of Jasper’s personality, as shown in his threats to Deputy…and whether his anger about Deputy’s presence suggests something else, too:

Father Matthew, like Dana, is “firmly in the ‘villain protagonist’ camp,” re: Jasper. He is haunting, enigmatic, violent. He also writes of the introduction by David Paroissien in the Penguin edition:

Further Speculations about Jasper: “When the Wicked Man…”

And here is another fascinating note from Father Matthew, in regards to the source of the hymn about “the wicked man,” which might(?) suggest where Dickens intended to take Jasper’s character:

I responded, agreeing that this makes complete sense that there would at least be a powerful moment of regret and opportunity for change/repentance. But would Jasper choose ultimate despair, or take the opportunity? Anyway, here is an image of the portion of the chant that Father Matthew found:

Spotlight on Chapter Eight, “Daggers Drawn”

The climactic chapter in this section of our reading is certainly Chapter Eight. Chris comments:

I strongly express my dislike of Edwin (and my sympathy with Neville) in this scene, and wonder whether Jasper has drugged the wine, to heighten their emotions & dampen their restraint:

Father Matthew wondered the same, and refers to the footnote in the Penguin Classics edition, which references Our Mutual Friend as another possible reason to believe that the drink is indeed drugged:

Character Spotlight on Helena & Neville Landless: Strength, Scapegoating, Racism and “Unrelenting Englishness”

The Stationmaster finds the Landless twins “intriguing,” and comments on Dickens’s interest here in going beyond his usual “unrelenting Englishness”:

Chris comments on the unique “duo,” and also on the telepathic connection between them:

I comment on my love of Helena’s characterization:

Character Spotlight on Minor Canon Crisparkle: “The Hero of this book”?

Perhaps the Stationmaster speaks for us all in wondering whether Minor Canon Crisparkle will prove to be “the hero of this book”:

Chris is delighted that we have “a truly good clergyman in Minor Canon Crisparkle,” and a delightful mother-son duo:

I comment, referencing the Landless twins’s confidence in him as testament to his goodness:

Father Matthew comments on his “favorite character so far,” and his “real kindness,” and compares the delightful mother-son relationship to that of Kit Nubbles and his mother:

I reply, also referencing George Bernard Shaw’s comment about Kit & the Minor Canon:

Questions, Theories, & Polls…

Last week, we asked our readers–and especially first-time readers–what they thought of Jasper. It was fairly split between the baddie/villain-protagonist, and a stance of unknowing. Now, let’s look at a few more questions left open by this week’s installment…

“Jasper looks observantly from the one to the other, slightly smiles, and turns his back to mix a jug of mulled wine at the fire. It seems to require much mixing and compounding.” –Chapter Eight, “Daggers Drawn”

A Look-Ahead to Week 3 of The Mystery of Edwin Drood (3-9 Sept, 2024)

This week, we’ll be reading the third installment, Chapters 10-12, of The Mystery of Edwin Drood. This section was published in All the Year Round in June of 1870. It was the final installment published in Dickens’s lifetime.

Please share your thoughts on this section in the comments below, or use the hashtag #DickensClub if commenting on Twitter/X.

If you’d like to read it online, it can be found at sites like Gutenberg.