Charles Dickens, The Mystery of Edwin Drood

Jonathan Taylor (The University of Leicester)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.07: English Writing and Culture of the Victorian Period, 1837-1901.
Vol. editors: Gillian Fenwick (University of Toronto), Jessica Gossling (Goldsmiths College, University of London)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1869 - 1870

Places

England (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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Recommended Reading

Arguably the most famous unfinished novel in the English language,

The Mystery of Edwin Drood

is also itself all about incompletion, fragmentation, interruption, endings and the failure of endings. The novel, that is, anticipates its own incompletion. After all, the pawnbroker in Cloisterham “offers vainly […] unredeemed […] odd volumes of dismal books” (p.52, Penguin Edition, 1985), one of which, presumably, might be

The Mystery of Edwin Drood

itself. In this way, Dickens's final novel continues and, indeed,

dis

continues the narratorial strategy of Dickens's previous novel,

Our Mutual Friend

(1864-5), in which stories are continually breaking up and clashing with one another.

Dickens began work proper on the novel in August 1869. The projected length of the novel was twelve

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2050 words

Citation: Taylor, Jonathan. "The Mystery of Edwin Drood". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 25 October 2002 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=114, accessed 19 April 2024.]

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