The Heart of the Matter

“This is the original Tower of Babel. West Indians, Africans, real Indians, Syrians, Englishmen, Scotsmen in the Office of Works, Irish priests, French priests, Alsatian priests.”

This comment from Harris in the opening pages sets up the culturally diverse backdrop of the novel. From the outset, two major interrelated themes are signaled through the reference to the Tower of Babel: religion and linguistics. In biblical literature, the Tower of Babel represents the follies of human overreach. Furthermore, it is an origin myth for explaining linguistic diversity, or God’s attempt to confound human communication. Likewise, in the novel, written communication is often thwarted, while issues of textual and scriptural interpretation are interrogated from both religious and linguistic perspectives.

“Why do I love this place so much? Is it because here human nature hasn't time to disguise itself? Nobody here could talk about a heaven on earth. Heaven remained rigidly in its proper place on the other side of death, and on this side flourished the injustices, the cruelties, the meanness that elsewhere people so cleverly hushed up.”

Scobie reflects on what he perceives to be a strict divide between the temporal and spiritual worlds. This divide, which religion historian Mircea Eliade has delineated as the “sacred and the profane,” is a hallmark of secular Christianity. Throughout the novel, Scobie struggles with the problem of theodicy and feels that in the temporal world God’s justice is absent. This is a key moment in Scobie’s nascent spiritual crisis.

“A man was surely entitled to that much revenge. Revenge was good for the character: out of revenge grew forgiveness.” 

This reflection from Scobie is one of many proverbs of despair expressed in his monologues. It sheds light on Scobie’s deeply pessimistic and gloomy nature, while also alluding to an important motif: forgiveness and