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Definition of Motif
A motif is an element or idea that recurs throughout a work of literature. Motifs, which are often collections of related symbols, help develop the central themes of a book... read full definition
A motif is an element or idea that recurs throughout a work of literature. Motifs, which are often collections of related symbols, help develop the... read full definition
A motif is an element or idea that recurs throughout a work of literature. Motifs, which are often collections of... read full definition
Motifs
Explanation and Analysis—Darkness and Light:
As a novel that is partly about withheld secrets and obscured identities, Our Mutual Friend finds itself caught between darkness and light. Like the two extremes, secrecy and revelation often sit side-by-side. Through an emphasis on light or its absence, Dickens uses this motif to dramatize the tensions between knowledge and mystery.
Darkness readily lends itself to the novel’s atmosphere of conspiracy. Some of Our Mutual Friend’s most suspenseful scenes take place at night. Riderhood keeps Eugene and Mortimer up all night in his search for Gaffer—during which the moon “contended with the fast-flying clouds,” as if struggling against the obscurity of darkness. During an evening visit to the Bower, Mr. Boffin rummages through the Mounds with a “dark-lantern” while Silas Wegg and Mr. Venus sneak close behind. Eugene Wrayburn gets bludgeoned by Bradley Headstone while he eyes the pleasure boat caught in a “dark shadow.” Darkness embodies the unexplained and unknown, and characters often struggle to make out the truth.
These moments of obscurity are counterbalanced by discovery and foresight. Despite the novel’s confusion of appearances and reality, some of its characters still find strokes of insight. Fire—one of the novel’s most immediate symbols—represents truth as much as home. It is the source of Lizzie’s imagination as she bonds with Charley in front of “the hollow down by the flare.” More importantly, though, it affords Lizzie a preview of Charley’s future and a glimpse into Bella’s character. Fire brings forth a vision of her brother’s estrangement and the awareness of a heart that “never changes, and is never daunted.” As a source of light, fire provides rare clarity in the fogginess of self-interest and greed.
Related Themes:
Book 1, Chapter 2
Explanation and Analysis—Reflections:
Be it with mirrors or rivers, Our Mutual Friend takes careful note of reflections. The river by Plashwater Weir Mill gets likened to an “old mirror” that was “never yet made by human hands,” and the looking-glass keeps its “ministerial silence” before Bella. As a motif, reflections emphasize English society’s vanity and the novel’s clever character pairings.
Some of the earliest mentions of mirrors call attention to the superficial obsessions of the upper class. Mounted in the Veneerings’ dining room, the looking-glass points out the party’s superficial obsessions:
The great looking-glass above the sideboard, reflects the table and the company. Reflects the new Veneering crest, in gold and eke in silver, frosted and also thawed, a camel of all work. The Heralds' College found out a Crusading ancestor for Veneering who bore a camel on his shield (or might have done it if he had thought of it), and a caravan of camels take charge of the fruits and flowers and candles, and kneel down to be loaded with the salt.
Mirrors seemingly freeze the Veneerings’ dinner party in time. In this too-perfect, almost stuffy tableau, Mr. Veneering’s nose is perfect and “aquiline,” Mrs. Podsnap decked in a “majestic head-dress,” and to-be Mrs. Lammle luxuriating in her “raven locks." The looking-glass captures the gilded furniture, the highly improbable family crest, and all the glitzy trappings of new wealth. Dickens exposes a London upper crust that is only surface, sheer “veneering.”
Bella takes up a variant of this shallowness as she consults her mirror with money-lusting greed. The novel builds an association between the “mercenary” character and her obsession with reflections. She stares into her dressing room mirror after speaking with Mrs. Lammle and rejecting John Rokesmith, calling herself a little “Dragon.” The mirror becomes a close confidant of her vanity.
In a thematic sense, the motif literalizes the novel’s preoccupation with doubleness. As with mirror-like reflections, Our Mutual Friend features multiple characters who perform alternate personas or conceal their true identities. John Harmon assumes two different identities in just two chapters while Mr. and Mrs. Lammle stage facades that deceive each other. Most notably, Mr. Boffin plays the part of a stingy miser after he takes up the late Harmon’s fortunes. He distorts Bella’s greedy impulses to outlandish proportions by trimming expenses and abusing John Rokesmith. In doing so, he essentially mirrors the novel’s most mirror-obsessed character and sets her back to rights. Reflections expose a character’s failings to the reader and to themselves.
Related Themes:
