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August 12: You are a nun working at a hospital in Budapest. For the last six weeks, an Englishman with brain fever has been in your care, and he's finally coherent enough to dictate a letter to his fiancée. He's still in a bad way, and no one's sure what happened to him. Where's your head at?
I want to find whoever did this to my good friend Jonathan and fight them irl.
I'm praying for him.
I'm praying for ME. I'm tired.
I'm just relieved he's coherent now.
I'm worried, this whole thing has mega supernatural vibes.
I'm not scared, I have the power of Christ and anime on my side.
I'm not scared, I'm a minor character.
Honestly this is the most excitement we've had in years.
Same as the above, but negative, I didn't become a nun for excitement.
Does anyone ask librarians for book recs anymore? I really want to do reader advisory but I imagine these days people just google their favorite genre.
"We English don't like fellow with dark skin admiring our girls!"
That's way more directly than I thought they'd address it, especially given how sympathetic this version of Nevil is, but I wonder if Drood has had his eyesight checked.
I don't know whether Nevil Landless having had people whipped to death back in India is supposed to be true or just one of the many rumors floating about how dangerous he is. I guess that puts me in the same position as Crisparkle, giving him the benefit of the doubt about being a murderer or not.
I understand why the great-Victorian-literature-whitewashing-debate centres around Heathcliff, but can we talk about this for a second?
Scene context:
“I said that in the part of the world I come from, you would be called to account for it.”
“Only there?” cries Edwin Drood, with a contemptuous laugh. “A long way off, I believe? Yes; I see! That part of the world is at a safe distance.”
“Say here, then,” rejoins the other, rising in a fury. “Say anywhere! Your vanity is intolerable, your conceit is beyond endurance; you talk as if you were some rare and precious prize, instead of a common boaster. You are a common fellow, and a common boaster.”
“Pooh, pooh,” says Edwin Drood, equally furious, but more collected; “how should you know? You may know a black common fellow, or a black common boaster, when you see him (and no doubt you have a large acquaintance that way); but you are no judge of white men.”
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.
- Chapter VIII: Daggers Drawn - The Mystery of Edwin Drood by Charles Dickens
"This insulting allusion to his dark skin" is such a key line of narration - Dickens makes it clear that Edwin isn't just trying to say something like 'you [a white man] have grown up in a place where there are more non-white people than white people and I'm not convinced of your ability to form judgements in England which is a new cultural context for you'; Dickens's narration makes it clear that Edwin's speech is explicitly an "insulting allusion" to the fact that Neville has "dark skin". You would therefore think that any illustration of the scene ought to show Neville's skin as somewhat darker than Edwin's and Jasper's. Harold Piffard, however, did not seem to think so.
For comparison, here's Samuel Luke Fildes's illustration of (a little bit earlier in) the same scene:
We can see that Neville's skin (right) is shaded differently to Edwin's (seated), and differently to the shadows on Jasper's face (centre).
Fildes was the original illustrator during the serialisation of the novel in 1870 (or half-a-novel; Dickens died in the middle of writing it). We know that Fildes had meetings with Dickens about the illustrations; his work visualising the characters should therefore be considered as authoritative over Piffard's illustrations.
Here are some other Filde illustrations of Neville, also featuring Neville's twin sister Helena, and at least one white British character for comparison:
Again, I think we can see a distinctive difference between the shading on Neville's and Helena's faces and the faces of everyone else, even when those faces are in shadow. (Just a quick note on hands: the image on the left is an evening party, and on the right is outdoors on a winter's day, so presumably everyone's wearing gloves in both images which is why hands are sometimes shaded so differently to faces especially for Helena in the left image.)
I could also go into more detail about other things in Dickens's text which indicate that Neville and Helena are not fully-white-British (though no doubt they do have some white British heritage), but I would probably miss some things without first having a reread. I just saw that Piffard illustration for the first time this morning and was gobsmacked by it, considering it's meant to depict a man who has just within the last few seconds received an insult on the basis of his "dark skin"...
I think there should be a production of the Edwin Drood musical that's all female, including in-universe as an all female music hall with the men done as trouser roles. Historically dubious but fun.
Rather than being the only one in a trouser role, "Edwin Drood", being a primadonna who is not part of the usual company, is not getting into the spirit of a trouser role. Her Edwin Drood has cleavage and a curly updo.
"Sapsea's actress was hurt in a fight for her honor. Apparently the gentleman wished her to keep it."
Rosa soon made the discovery that Miss Twinkleton didn’t read fairly. She cut the love-scenes, interpolated passages in praise of female celibacy, and was guilty of other glaring pious frauds.
"during the spookiest time of the year there are a few guidelines all ghosts and goblins should follow. always stay on sidewalks. never go to a strangers house, and never go out alone."
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