47 pages • 1 hour read
The Mystery of Edwin Drood
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Symbols & Motifs
The Ring
When Edwin is still engaged to Rosa, Grewgious gives Edwin a ring that he has been safeguarding. The ring was given to Rosa’s mother by her father and retrieved after Rosa’s mother died in an accident. Grewgious tells Edwin to give Rosa the ring only if he decides to confirm their engagement; because Edwin and Rosa decide to break off their engagement, Edwin never presents it to her. He reflects that, the ring, “like old letters or old vows, or other records of old aspirations come to nothing […] would be disregarded” (145). The ring symbolizes the connection between past and present. It is a sentimental heirloom connected to the deep love between Rosa’s parents, and the deep pain her father experienced when her mother died suddenly. Since the ring was purposefully set aside to be used to confirm the betrothal between Edwin and Rosa, it symbolizes how this planned marriage is rooted in the past. The engagement between the two children arose primarily because of the grief that Rosa’s father suffered after losing his beloved wife. Edwin is frustrated by the lack of agency he feels around his relationship with Rosa, and the ring also symbolizes this inability for the two young people to make their own choices: The ring that Edwin is expected to give to Rosa is not one he chose, but one that was assigned to him, much like how he was not free to choose her as his fiancée.
Because Edwin and Rosa break off their engagement, he does not mention the ring to her, fearing that Rosa “would be grieved by those sorrowful jewels; and to what purpose?” (145). Edwin intends to take the ring back to Grewgious, as he was instructed to, but he disappears before he can do so. Some individuals who spoke with Charles Dickens while he was composing the novel indicate that Dickens intended to have the ring play a significant role in the conclusion of the plot. If Edwin had the ring with him when he died, it may have eventually been used to identify his body. If this was Dickens’s intention (and why he made a point of specifically noting that Edwin kept the ring with him), the ring would have gone on to have further symbolic significance for the relationship between past and present: Edwin’s death could not be concealed because of the web of relationships and interconnections that spanned multiple generations.
The Walking-Stick
Just before Christmas, Neville Landless prepares to go on a walking holiday and buys some supplies, including a heavy walking-stick. The stick symbolizes Neville’s ambiguous position in the text, and how it is hard to determine whether he is treated unjustly, or whether he could be a potential villain. The stick is presented in somewhat ominous terms, “strong in the handle for the grip of the hand, and iron-shod” (148); when Reverend Crisparkle sees the stick, he rebukes Neville, telling him that it is “much too heavy” (149). The symbolism of the stick becomes much more sinister later, when Neville is accosted by members of the Cloisterham community and people notice there is blood on the stick, “smears which the bright cold air had already dried” (163). While all of this evidence might be innocent and coincidental, it does contribute to implying that Neville could have been the one to murder Edwin (especially given the animosity and jealousy between the two young men). The symbolism of the stick adds to the complexity and suspense around the central mystery by ensuring that John Jasper is not the only suspicious individual in the text. The walking-stick works well as a symbol of ambiguity since it ostensibly serves a benign and useful purpose, but it could also readily be used as a dangerous weapon. Likewise, Neville is not inherently an evil person, but he has a temper that could cause him to attack someone if he was provoked.
Orphans
Orphans are a significant motif in the novel: Edwin, Rose, Neville, and Helena are all orphaned at young ages. There is no mention of John Jasper’s parentage, but it seems that Jasper and Edwin are each other’s only relatives, which might imply that Jasper has also lost his parents. The motif of orphans creates a sense of vulnerability and foreboding within the text; while none of the four orphans are children when the plot begins, they are all young enough that they might benefit from a protector and a guide. For example, Rosa keeps her fears about Jasper secret and is vulnerable to his predatory attention because she does not have parents to watch and protect her. Neville has few people to advocate for him after he becomes a primary suspect in Edwin’s disappearance. For Neville and Helena, being orphaned at a young age left them vulnerable to abuse and cruelty at the hands of their stepfather and subsequent guardian. For these two young people, the lack of parental guidance and oversight also seems to have affected their emotional maturity and character development: Neville laments that he has been “stinted of education, liberty, money, dress, the very necessities of life, the commonest pleasures of childhood” (60).
While being an orphan renders a character vulnerable, the motif also develops the possibility of close emotional bonds between individuals who are not related by blood. Grewgious and Reverend Crisparkle both act as surrogate parents to Rosa and the Landless siblings, respectively. They are protective, loyal, and highly invested in the welfare of the young orphans, even though both men are unmarried and not fathers to their own biological children. Helena and Rosa also form a sisterly bond that is very meaningful to both of them, and when Rosa breaks off the engagement to Edwin, she suggests that they treat one another like brother and sister instead. Through the motif of orphans, the novel interrogates the idea that love and support can only come from within biological families, especially since the relationship depicted between Jasper and Edwin is presented as a sinister and foreboding one.
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By Charles Dickens
