{"id":622,"date":"2020-10-23T21:48:49","date_gmt":"2020-10-23T21:48:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/?p=622"},"modified":"2020-10-23T21:52:03","modified_gmt":"2020-10-23T21:52:03","slug":"power-justice-and-colonialism-in-the-moonstone","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/2020\/10\/23\/power-justice-and-colonialism-in-the-moonstone\/","title":{"rendered":"Power, Justice, and Colonialism in “The Moonstone”"},"content":{"rendered":"

In <\/span>The Moonstone, <\/span><\/i>the titular stone\u2019s origins are in India, where it is described as an object of great spiritual and monetary value. After the moonstone is violently stolen by Herncastle, it almost immediately brings paranoia and misfortune to anyone who possesses it. After it is gifted to Herncastle\u2019s niece Rachel Veridner, three mysterious Indian jugglers start appearing in their town, even coming to their house the night the stone is stolen. Despite evidence that absolves the Indians from prosecution, the Veridner family has the societal power to arrest them anyway. Betteredge narrates, \u201c<\/span>when the police came to investigate the matter… he would contrive, by committing them as rogues and vagabonds, to keep them at our disposal, under lock and key, for a week. They had ignorantly done something (I forget what) in the town, which barely brought them within the operation of the law\u201d (Collins 82).<\/span><\/p>\n

This passage reveals the power dynamics related to policing in the novel. The adjectives \u201crouges and vagabonds\u201d do not imply criminality necessarily, but rather that the jugglers are untrustworthy and suspicious. Their \u2018crimes\u2019 have \u201cbarely\u201d brought them into custody, and are so trivial that Betteridge cannot even remember them, but the Veridners\u2019 influence allows them to utilize this to arrest them. Betteridge\u2019s language places him and the Veridners above the Indians; by describing them \u201cat [the Veridners] disposal, under lock and key,\u201d the Indians are completely dehumanized. The jugglers are at their disposal, revealing the Veridners\u2019 absolute power over their fates.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When Betteridge states that \u201cevery human institution (justice included) will stretch a little, if you only pull it the right way\u201d further emphasizes the power dynamics at play (Collins 82). The \u201cyou\u201d in this statement is ultimately referring to upper class, white English individuals. Betteridge assumes the reader is part of this privileged group. The Veridners\u2019 influence allows them to treat concepts like justice as malleable to their own interests, ultimately revealing the corruption of policing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The language utilized to describe the Indian jugglers is related to colonialism. India is portrayed as a threatening \u2018other,\u2019 associated with unknown magical powers. The Veridners have almost absolute societal power over the Indians due to their higher class, race, and nationality, reflecting England\u2019s colonization of India. Their suspicion and fear of the Indians is, while not completely unreasonable, ultimately based in colonialist attitudes. They are able to wield their social influence to legitimize their baseless allegations. This portrays the police as not an ultimate moral authority, but a force swayed by who is in power. While the beginning of the novel is just beginning to explore these themes, I am curious to see how colonialist views of Indians and police corruption will influence the novel.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In The Moonstone, the titular stone\u2019s origins are in India, where it is described as an object of great spiritual and monetary value. After the moonstone is violently stolen by Herncastle, it almost immediately brings paranoia and misfortune to anyone who possesses it. After it is gifted to Herncastle\u2019s niece Rachel Veridner, three mysterious Indian … Continue reading Power, Justice, and Colonialism in “The Moonstone”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3607,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[138877],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fall-2020"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3607"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=622"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/19thcennovel\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}