Intention, Identity, and Personality Theme Analysis

The theft of the Moonstone from Julia and Rachel Verinder’s estate is far from an ordinary crime not only because of the Diamond’s immense value, but also because—unlike most stereotypes of precious gem heists—it was not executed by a master thief according to a master plan, but rather resulted from the confluence of various circumstances and actions that complicate the question of who is truly guilty, and to what extent. In fact, both the crime and the investigation disrupt straightforward notions of character and identity, suggesting that people, like events (the Diamond’s theft) and innovations (the Diamond’s discovery), are in fact the intersection of often-conflicting desires, relationships, and beliefs, both conscious and unconscious.

The theft of the Moonstone is not a conventional crime, masterminded and committed by a single person, and neither is the investigation. Rather, it is a product of different people’s interlocking circumstances, and each of these people ends up partially responsible for the crime. Franklin Blake actually takes the Moonstone, but he does so unwillingly after the doctor Mr. Candy secretly slips him laudanum (opium) to treat his restless sleep. Rachel sees Franklin take the Diamond, but declines to confront him and shuts down Sergeant Cuff’s search to protect him. The man with the guiltiest intentions, Godfrey Ablewhite, in fact neither plans nor intends to steal the Diamond; rather, he sees an opportunity because of the other characters’ circumstances. Just like the theft, the investigation into the Diamond’s loss is far from a conventional, hierarchical affair; despite the involvement of the crack detective Sergeant Cuff, the mystery of the Diamond’s loss is only resolved because of the confluence of different interested parties’ knowledge, ability, and circumstances. Cuff only enters the picture after the local officer Superintendent Seegrave alienates everyone, and after Cuff does the same and gets fired, Mr. Bruff, Franklin Blake, and Gabriel Betteredge take over the investigation in their own ways, and Ezra Jennings’s scientific insights propel this collective investigation forward. In The Moonstone, then, it is never easy to assign responsibility for the crime and for uncovering the criminal(s); these are both collective efforts, and by writing them as such Collins begins to challenge the very value of individual intention.

Collins’s decision to show a crime and investigation not attributable to any particular agent allows him to make a more fundamental point about human acts and personhood: contrary to stereotypes of Victorian characters as one-dimensional moral archetypes, he depicts conflicted, complicated people struggling to understand their own identities and adapt to imperfect situations. The novel lacks a prototypical, morally pure hero—Franklin Blake is reckless and partially responsible for the theft, and the characters who believe themselves most moral, Miss Clack and Godfrey Ablewhite, are frauds. All of Collins’s characters grapple with internal contradictions; for instance, Miss Clack insists that any kind of sensual thought is sinful and yet swoons in carnal ecstasy every time Godfrey Ablewhite kisses her hand; her conscious moralism is in fact a way of covering up her unconscious sexual desire. Rachel feels obligated both to resolve the case (for her family’s sake) and to protect Franklin (who she believes to be the thief, but loves dearly). Betteredge turns this sense of conflict into comedy when he declares that he is delighted to accommodate Ezra Jennings’s experiment “speaking as a servant,” but personally thinks that Jennings’s “head is full of maggots.” Rachel and Betteredge are both torn between conflicting obligations to themselves and others, so much so that they struggle to decide which part is their true self; Collins’s fixation on internal contradictions gives way to an examination of identity itself.

In fact, the novel frequently pushes the boundaries of human identity, with characters who lose track of who they are, multiply or divide themselves, or turn out to be other characters. When he discovers that he stole the Diamond from Rachel’s room, Franklin begins to reckon with the possibility that he might not truly know himself, and that there is some unconscious, foreign entity in his personality. Conversely, the doctor Mr. Candy becomes completely unable to speak after an accident, and Franklin hardly recognizes him on a visit; if Franklin finds out he is harboring a secret personality, Candy loses the only one he had. The novel is full of characters who mirror one another: Godfrey Ablewhite and Franklin Blake have opposite personalities, fight for Rachel’s heart, and both (in their own way) steal the Diamond, yet one ends up dead and the other happily married; later, Franklin Blake and Ezra Jennings undergo drug withdrawal at the same time, both hoping to repent for the “horrible accusation[s]” that hang over their heads. During the final section of Franklin Blake’s narrative, the problem of identity gets completely twisted: the young prodigy Gooseberry investigates the case narratively as a stand-in for Sergeant Cuff, who then shows up the next day, just before Mr. Bruff sends a surrogate in his place. The sailor who they believe has the Diamond turns out to be Godfrey Ablewhite, wearing a  mask. With people constantly replaced by and replacing themselves with others, The Moonstone turns individuals themselves into as much a mystery as the disappearance of the Diamond.

Ultimately, Collins’s novel is a peculiar precursor of the mystery genre because he chooses to show an ambiguous crime with multiple perpetrators, solved by multiple detectives (one of whom is one of the perpetrators), after which nobody is punished and everyone celebrates a happy resolution even though they never get the Diamond back. This is possible only because Collins’s characters are not united in their desire to retrieve the Diamond, but rather all confront their own individual demons, desires, obligations, and loyalties throughout the search for the stone—they are not sure about themselves and their plans, but in fact constantly grappling with their own identities and trying to make sure they have become the people they meant to be.