Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Dickens Memento With Introduction by Francis Phillimore and "Hints to Dickens Collectors" By John F. Dexter: Catalogue With Purchasers' Names and Prices Realised of the Pictures, Drawings and Objects of Art of the Late Charles Dickens Sold by Auction in London by Messrs. Christie, Manson and Woods on July 9th, 1870
Whatever our criticism may be now, when many of us have never seen the master of whom we speak and write, the year 1870 saw another stage of public feeling. His sudden death revived an almost passionate public interest, not to be marred for many months to come by the biography; and the memorable sale of his collections caught the general sentiment at its height. The death of Dickens was in every sense sudden. After some years in which nothing more important than the annual Christmas numbers had been added to his works, a novel, published in the old familiar form of monthly parts, was appearing, and was gaining readers in numbers never before paralleled. The pen fell from the master's hand in the middle of Edwin Drood, and at its strongest and most dramatic work. Failing health and the menace of death had not dimmed the fire or dulled the impulse which formed so large a part of his genius. But in one or two comic passages the effort of weariness was too apparent; and the humours of the impossible lodging-house keeper in this book are the only dead failure ever made by Dickens. It had been said that he was resolved to be funny at all costs, and in this last novel it was obvious that he had determined to be funny at a very painful cost of physical suffering and mental exhaustion. It is clear that writers and others who create or perform for the public have always found something well worth living for in their faculty of evoking laughter. It is fine to command a world's tears and to move masses to action, whether by the pen or the tongue. But to excite at will the delightfully sympathetic response of a laugh would seem to be more precious than all to the possessor of the power. The comic actor clings longest to the stage; the teller of good stories dines out long after the age at which all other natural inclinations would lead him to prefer a modest meal at his own fireside, however solitary and the comic author spurs his failing force in order to win that form of applause which is his best reward. The power of humour failed in Dickens before those other powers which he prized less but it was precisely the power of humour that he would not forego. Hence some small parts of Edwin Drood were dismal reading on the appearance of the book, and are melan choly reading now. Otherwise it was a masterly story, and left its author in the fulness of his fame.
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