character sketch of lady mannering from chapter B24 please help
Answers
For me this short story seems to be another one detective story of this author, like, for example, one from "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes", but in here the author describes an idea throughout the narration. The idea that I found is the problem with the judging system that had its place in nowadays alongside with the previous centuries. Firstly I need to introduce the story in a short form: the main character, the narrator, is accused of a burglary and a murder of Lord Mannering- prosperous owner of a rich house; all the story is his own words of defending during judging process- he says that he did the burglary but the murder was done by Lady Mannering. He describes that night when both events happened and, according to his speech, Lady Mannering was mad at her husband because he tempted her with his riches to leave her loved once, so she helped the narrator to rob him- "to hit him where it would hurt him most—upon the pocket", but at some point she decided to kill her husband by herself and then she betrayed the main character as the murderer.
Explanation:
B. 24
By Arthur Conan Doyle
For me this short story seems to be another one detective story of this author, like, for example, one from "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes", but in here the author describes an idea throughout the narration. The idea that I found is the problem with the judging system that had its place in nowadays alongside with the previous centuries. Firstly I need to introduce the story in a short form: the main character, the narrator, is accused of a burglary and a murder of Lord Mannering- prosperous owner of a rich house; all the story is his own words of defending during judging process- he says that he did the burglary but the murder was done by Lady Mannering. He describes that night when both events happened and, according to his speech, Lady Mannering was mad at her husband because he tempted her with his riches to leave her loved once, so she helped the narrator to rob him- "to hit him where it would hurt him most—upon the pocket", but at some point she decided to kill her husband by herself and then she betrayed the main character as the murderer.
The moment of the story when I clearly got the idea is: "What I ask you to do is very simple. Make inquiries about this woman, watch her, learn her past history, find out what she is making of the money which has come to her, and whether there is not a man Edward as I have stated." In here the narrator tells the judge right straight away what he has to do, which is actually his job to find out. It made me think about the laziness and inactivity of justice even when it comes to some serious deeds like the one in the story (the accused is sentenced to a life imprisonment). I am not saying that all judges without exception are alike with the judge in the story, but you can easily find many examples of wrongful convictions all over the world. Possibly this judge could be even bribed by Lady Mannering, but that is where the story plays a trick on you: it does not say exactly whether the narrator is lying or giving only true information, so you can't actually judge anybody by yourself leaning only on the narrator's words. Even though, in real life the judge must pass a sentence without any bribe and this rule is constantly broken all around the world- I say it because it happens in my home country, Russia, and in some case, it is even famous for this (quite sad, isn't it). In the world starting from the ancient times judging systems in different countries were not perfect and even now there are some false convictions done time-to-time. This particular story (in my own opinion) describes one of these because I can see from the words of the accused that he tries to make somebody do at least something because he told his story two times already but no one would listen to him. I personally don't have any experience of being mischarged but my friend has: he got into a car accident with another car and its owner just gave money to the highway patrol and then drove away, leaving my friend to sort out the accident alone, because "officially" there was no another car.
So, this short story is actually not as blank as it would seem to be from the first look. It uncovers a great idea which was relevant at all times and still, it has its own puzzle that makes the story be a kind of detective. It will not create any specific emotion in you but I found it very interesting for myself and I believe it will be so for many others.