Edwin Drood in the original six parts
Author: Charles John Huffam Dickens (1812-1870)
Year: 1870
Publisher: Chapman and Hall
Place: London
Description:
6 parts (190 pages). with12 illustrations and engraved title and portrait of Dickens in Part VI. Octavo (8 3/4" X 5 1/2") bound in original pictorial blue-green wrappers, in a modern morocco backed box. 9 x 5 1/2 inches Wood-engraved plates after Luke Fildes, engraved by Dalziel, C. Roberts. Complete as issued. First edition.
The Mystery of Edwin Drood is Charles Dickens's final, unfinished novel, published in 1870, which centers on the mysterious disappearance of Edwin Drood after his engagement to Rosa Bud is broken off, leaving his uncle, the opium-addicted choirmaster John Jasper, as the prime suspect. The story, set in the cathedral town of Cloisterham, involves opium dens, secret desires, and a detective figure named Datchery, but Dickens died before revealing the ending, leaving the central mystery unsolved and sparking centuries of speculation.
At the death of Dickens on 9 June 1870, the novel was left unfinished in his writing desk, only six of a planned twelve instalments having been written. He left no detailed plan for the remaining installments or solution to the novel's mystery, and many later adaptations and continuations by other writers have attempted to complete the story.
There have been four film adaptations of The Mystery of Edwin Drood. The first two are silent pictures, released in 1909 (British, directed by Arthur Gilbert), and 1914 (American, directed by Herbert Blaché and Tom Terriss), and are unavailable to the general public and have been little seen since they were released.
Condition: Some wear and soiling to wrappers with some losses, occasional light spotting and dampstains to text, and one front joint of the box worn else very good in like enclosure.
