Victorians! discussion

Welcome to the final week of The Moonstone!

This section includes several narratives to take us from the experiment which proves Franklin’s innocence through what happened to the stone after it was removed from Rachel’s room. The truth is unveiled, the stone is seen to be returned to its rightful place, all strings are tied, and love triumphs in the end.

Questions

1. Did you find the ending satisfactory?
2. Which characters did you find the most memorable?
3. Is there anything more you would like to have had explored before the novel came to an end?

It was left to Sergeant Cuff to come out of retirement and provide the details of how the diamond left Franklin’s possession and ended up London. In fact it was a surprise revelation that Franklin gave it away in his trance-like state to Godfrey who knew all along that Rachel had seen Franklin take it. The revelation of Godfrey’s alter ego was less surprising, except the fact that he ‘kept’ a woman who was both well known and of high standing in society. Who was she?

His death was also to be expected due to the curse of diamond. The whole tavern scene was cleverly constructed as was the Brahmins’ escape back to India. Murthwaite’s epilogue describing the Moonstone back in its rightful place neatly brought the story full circle from where it began.

Apart from the knowledge of their marriage and Betteredge’s Robinson Crusoe prediction there was very little more of Franklin and Rachel. I would have liked to have read more about Rachel’s thoughts, particularly in relation to her cousin Godfrey and the fact that the diamond bequeathed to her had been taken back to India.

The characters who made the most impression on me were Ezra Jennings and Rosanna Spearman. They may have had smaller roles to play in the whole story but their contributions perhaps had the most dramatic impact. We didn’t get a narrative from Rachel herself which might have been interesting, particularly at the end.

Given that the rift between Rachel and Franklin plays a major part in the tension of the novel, the resolution was rather blah.

I was rather disappointed by the end too, though I expected the Moonstone to get back to its first place.