MOLL FLANDERS Isabel Medrano Historical and literary context ................................................................................... - history vs.

. fiction - Defoe and fictionality Main themes ............................................................................................................... - criminal biography - Defoe and morality - women and economic independence - mercantilism Characterisation ......................................................................................................... - Moll - male characters - female characters - Mother Midnight Structure .................................................................................................................... Setting ........................................................................................................................ Style ........................................................................................................................... Self-assessment questions .......................................................................................... (The quotations refer to the Penguin edition of the novel)

Historical and literary context

Molls life can be summarised as one of transgression and rebellion; two necessary elements for a destitute girl determined to climb up the social ladder. At an early age she sets up her two main goals in life -financial self-sufficiency and gentility- and in search of those two objectives she follows a path, leading from innocence to experience, along which she meets the most varied types, usually disreputable, but representative of all social levels. The novel, narrated by the heroine at the end of her life, can be placed within the subgenres of spiritual autobiography -which related the acts of Gods grace to the life of a person moving from sin to redemption- and criminal biography -inspired by the confessions of real criminals that supposedly dictated the story of their life to the priest in charge of the prison, who was allowed to sell these stories right out of the gallows front door. Both were popular narrative forms in the 18th century. Together with many of the characteristics of popular criminal biography, Moll Flanders includes other elements present in Defoes own educational books, in which he warned young girls against the dangers of courtship, or proposed a range of measures for the improvement of social protection. Moll Flanders has also been considered a picaresque novel, but current criticism agrees that it does not fulfil with many of the features that characterise the genre, in which a rogue, the protagonist and narrator, moved by fortune and self-interest, leads a geographically and socially mobile life that enables the author to offer a comprehensive vision of contemporary society. Moll does coincide with Lazarillo de Tormes in their both having infamous parents, and with Guzmn de Alfarache in the fact that both heroine and hero have social aspirations, in spite of their humble background; but Defoes novel cannot be properly considered picaresque novel, for, according to du Sorbier, (Dtis, 8), Defoes stress is more on sociological determinism than on spiritual predestination, and his heroes end up bridging the gap between respectable people and themselves. But beyond the question of the categorisation of the novel, the most interesting fact raised by Moll Flanders is its contribution to the consolidation of the rising novel, a genre that was fighting to gain ground among the written forms of thetime. The preface to the work already gives a hint of Defoes preoccupation with form and ideology, of his view of the dichotomy history/fiction -a problem that worried the practitioners of the newly-born genreand anticipates his answer to these slippery matters: ambiguity. Defoes protestations at the beginning of the preface that Molls story is a true account of her life, written by herself though told in modester Words than she told it at first, give an idea of the authors interest in tackling the difficult matter of realistic fiction, and of the opposition between history and fiction. He appears as a mere editor of the story and literary counsellor, somebody who knows how to put it into a dress to be seen and decides which passages should be left out and which ones shortened so as not offend the chaster Reader or the modestest Reader. The writer, in fact, begins by making a distinction between the fiction of popular Novels and Romances and a private History to be taken for genuine, a genuineness that he endeavours to consolidate in the next pages. At the beginning of the eighteenth century, novel was a derogatory term that referred to a form of writing which should not be taken seriously. There was a widely held view that novels were immoral, and depicted low life, because they were a product of popular culture. That is why Defoe, as many other writers throughout the century, disclaimed any authorship with respect to his stories, which amounted to denying their fictionality. Defoe attempts to validate the term history against the imposture of Novels and Romances. Yet the presumably real biographies of criminals so popular at the time, with which Moll Flanders evidences certain similarities both in structure and content, had little in the way of genuine accounts and much of constructs; the self-proclaimed tellers of such biographies often manipulated -in fact fictionalised- data to provide a life of transgression with an exemplary conclusion, repentance and conversion before hanging. On the other hand, while these biographies not only judge and condemn criminals but also guide the reader towards a

predictable denouement, Molls story offers twists and an open ending, her moral regeneration is not evident, and the reader is let free to provide a personal response. For Faller, Defoes criminal novels remain highly significant as novels that is, as instances of a discourse that, setting itself against other discourses even as it includes and builds on them, produces a sense of [what Bakhtin defines as] indeterminacy, a certain semantic openendedness, a living contact with unfinished, still-evolving contemporary reality (Faller, 246). Moll Flanders is a novel in the sense that the word novel speaks of something new, of a transformation of what has always been there, redefines inherited narrative paradigms and helps the reader in the process of changing social habits. The fact that, as many critics have acknowledged, Defoe was not a deliberate writer of novels does not mean that his work should not be considered innovative in a literary sense. Moll Flanders reflects the economic problems a great part of the population endured in the first decades of the eighteenth century. As a consequence of the migrations from the country to the cities, and especially to London, a great deal of unskilled, simple-minded people became the victims of, and in many cases the perpetrators themselves of criminal actions. The crowded city of London was a most appropriate setting for all kind of transgressions. As a result of this increase in crime, many laws were passed that were more often based on repression than prevention. Henry Fielding, who was greatly concerned with the matter, gives eight determinants of crime in his essay An Enquiry into the Causes of the Late Increase of Robbers: social inequalities, vagrancy, entertainment venues, alcoholism, gambling, dissolute manners, violence and greed. Crime was not a matter of concern only for politicians and moralists, but a subject society in general was deeply interested in, and so Moll Flanders found a wide response among readers. Defoe himself had contributed numerous writings to the field; his sensitivity to social justice led him to the analysis of the different circumstances that, in his opinion, impelled law-breakers towards that type of life: broken homes, parental neglect, poor education, negative social environment and youthful mistakes. Even if men are also victims of social hardship, Moll Flanders dramatises the particular difficulties women underwent as a consequence of their economic dependence on men, emphasising Molls peculiar ability to overcome adverse circumstances. Main themes

The book deals with some of the moral, economic and social questions that worried readers in Defoes time. One of the most popular themes was, as we have seen, criminality and the social handling of law-breakers. By the 1670s public interest in the lives, crimes and fates of ordinary criminals had grown so great as to propitiate the printing of regular accounts of the trials at the Old Baily the central criminal court in London- as well as the reports made by the chaplain or Ordinary of Newgate -the principal London prison in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries- whose job it was to prepare condemned prisoners for death. Such reports summarised the very last acts and dying words of the convicts hanged at Tyburn -the principal place of public excution in London. If at first the ordinarys Accounts dedicated no more than a paragraph to each criminal by the 1730s such accounts and the Old Bailys session papers could stretch to more than fifty pages. Great collections of convicts lives began to appear, thus marking the establishment of criminal biography as an English cultural institution. In an age of increasing individualism and anonymity, people liked to identify with outlaws and other defiant disturbers of the social order. Reading about criminals violation of

rules, common people would experience a kind of vicarious release from social control, while reading about punishment and correction would relieve their feeling of comparative lack of freedom. In Defoes time, criminals were powerful cultural symbols that aroused great interest in the reading public. Contemporary observers were worried by the rise of criminal behaviour in early eighteenth-century England, where crime was mainly seen as a sign of the breakdown of traditional social authority, and thieves and murderers often considered rebels. Criminal biography was almost exclusively concerned with convicts who had been sentenced to death and, in a way, this type of writings helped to reinforce the exemplary character of capital punishment. The fact that public executions offered criminals the opportunity to speak to the assembled crowd, confess their sins and express their last reflections and final repentance, allowed them to play an active role in the affair. They could have the possibility to apologise for their offenses, as crime was considered by moralists an act of war against all mankind and a violation of the social contract that governed human relationships. But readers often suspected of the authenticity of criminal biography because of the ease with which most criminals repented for even the worst of sins, turning from thieves or murderers into saints. Not only were the methods used by the ordinaries at Newgate put into question, but these methods served to undermine the publics trust in writers of criminal biography; some of them went as far as offering histories in which the criminal described his own death. In other cases, the readers distrusted the writers interpretation of the presumed repentance of convicts who went to the gallows protesting their innocence, or the criteria used to judge such claims of innocence. Some writers even dared to give their own versions of the secret motives that drove a criminal to corruption. On the other hand, the uncommon adventures of highwaymen and other dangerous criminals were often lively presented in order to capture the readers imagination, suggesting that such actions enabled them to relish a life of freedom and power that transformed them into popular heroes. This heroism would last until the moment they were captured, their guilt proven and, according to the notably cruel English law, condemned to ignominious death. At this point, according to the chaplains at Newgate, they repented and were admitted again to the Christian community. Given the problems of lack of authenticity posed by these accounts, the readers could hardly have avoided making their own constructions, guessing or supplementing the texts. Even if they wanted to take the stories for granted, in most cases they could not help having powerful doubts as to the veracity or even the adequacy of criminal biography. As Faller argues alternatively disordering and distorting the real, endowing it with certain meanings and depriving it of others, criminal biography was very much in its own right a kind of fiction. This was the source of its power, for unless it manipulated the facts of cases -enlarging some, suppressing others, often simply inventing what was needed- it could not achieve its ends (Faller, 22). Defoe certainly disliked criminal writing for its fictitiousness, that is to say, for its distortion of the truth about crime and criminals. His fiction, in contrast, may have wanted to achieve more solid, more truly serious effects; his novel prepared the reader to ask himself a variety of questions, to make all sort of inferences and constructions. In Fallers opinion, Defoes novels differ from actual criminal biographies in that, rather than pretending to be literal renderings of the actual truth, they allow their readers to treat them as fictions; their meanings -or intentions- are to a large extent mysterious, they are more teasing, provoking, and capacious, more daring and inviting than actual criminal biographies. They encourage far more complicated reading strategies, placing the readers into highly self-conscious, intensely abstracted reading positions (Faller, 31). The religious aspect of criminality was a matter of both curiosity and manipulation. Questions such as how criminals had fallen away from religion, what had made them succumb

to their worst impulses, whether they were confident of salvation and if so in what terms, not only aroused the curiosity of readers, but were also insisted upon by the clergy in charge of condemned criminals repentance. Clergymen from all religious orientations strove to persuade sinners to follow the path of God, given that a criminals repentance was a powerful advertisement for any particular religion; the general effect of the unbelievable conversions they achieved was, they assured, to testify to the redeeming power of Christian faith. On the other hand, crime always rises doubts, for the criminal impulse is not only mysterious but socially threatening. Criminals were normally accused of having committed their crimes under the devils seduction, but, given the general depravity of human nature, any person was thought susceptible to such seduction, and crime was in a sense a natural phenomenon. Only Gods grace could keep humans from a shameful death in the gallows; thus, if criminals proved that any person can become the greatest sinner, they also stood among the most notable instances of the acts of divine grace and mercy. Defoes novels have an undeniable moral outlook and his Puritan militancy undoubtedly influences his view of criminal behaviour. Several moral questions are raised in Moll Flanders, even if Defoes answer to many of them is clearly ambiguous. Defoes heroes and heroines arouse our sympathy but also call for moral judgement. G. A. Starr, in his well-known book Defoe and Casuistry, argues that such paradox is a reflection of the way seventeenth-century Puritan ethics solved cases of conscience in which there appeared to be a conflict of duties; the particular circumstances surrounding each case were then given especial importance. In line with this doctrine, the author often introduces details that call into question the assumptions or values which ordinarily shape our judgement and attempts to make us judge certain attitudes more favourably; frequently certain details or additional information appeal for our sympathy, or try to turn contempt into compassion, no matter how reprehensible a characters behaviour may be. There is an uninterrupted sequence of motives and sanctions, choices and circumstances, explanations and justifications throughout the novel inviting the reader to abhor Molls crimes, but urging him not to despise the person herself, even to overlook her errors (in Moll Flanders, Norton edition, 422-23). At times Molls story tends to subvert that form of classical morality the book apparently seeks to adopt, casting doubts on the legitimacy of rigid distinctions between goodness and badness. With this object in mind, considerable emphasis is put on the principle that circumstances alter cases. In Starrs words

Moll never explicitly maintains that her extraordinary situation alters the sinful or criminal character of an action, but she often adduces circumstances that serve to palliate if not justify what she has done or is about to do. In the process, the notion that an act is inherently right or wrong is at least called into question (in Moll Flanders, Norton edition, 424). The first important episode in Molls story, her seduction by the elder brother of the Colchester family (p.57 and following), is not regarded by her at the time as a case of conscience, but as an instance of foolish behaviour. Her opinion of the preliminaries to her seduction is that Nothing was ever so stupid on both sides. Defoe does not explicitly deny Molls responsibility, in fact he emphasises her actions foolishness and thoughtlessness and that she was abused, which allows Moll to maintain the sympathy of the reader. As in later episodes, her behaviour is seen as a consequence of personal circumstances -her dependence on the family-, of external motives -the gold she receives from her lover-, the persuasiveness and cunning of others, or even the Devils temptation. Along with her passivity and navet, Moll admits her vanity; but the fact that she speaks French, plays the harpsichord, sings, and dances, and that she was taken for very Handsome, or, if you please for a great Beauty seems to be a natural justification for her actions.

Not even when, after her seduction, she becomes further entangled with the younger brother, does she experiment a crisis of conscience; her doubts about how to behave are more tactical than ethical. When she learns her lover is ready to free leave her, she candidly declares to him Marriage that had passd between us as if we had been publickly Wedded by the Parson of I was your Wife intentionally, tho not in the Eye of the World, and...it was as effectual a the Parish (p.80). Yet, the reader cannot deny her argument has a degree of plausibility. Another complex situation from a moral perspective is Molls discovery that her husband is actually her half-brother (p.124 ff.). What had been an ethical dilemma for earlier Puritan writers -the case of incestuous matches contracted through ignorance- is for Moll chiefly an emotional question: ... as I was but too sure of the Fact, I livd therefore in open avowed Incest and Whoredom...and tho I was not much touched with the Crime of it, yet the Action had something in it shocking to Nature, and made my Husband ... nauseous to me (p.137). Moll stresses the element of physical revulsion but her main worry is whether she can regain her peace of mind without causing the Ruin of the whole Family. Finally, she has to choose between her horror of poverty and public exposure, but her conscience plays a minor part in the episode. Defoes ambiguous attitude towards his criminal heroes and heroines seems to be a consequence of his social views on the matter. If personal circumstances, along with inclination, are at the basis of criminal behaviour, then Moll, who was born in Newgate to a mother who escaped hanging because of her pregnancy, was abandoned in bad Hands when she was half a year, and lived for some time with gypsies who used her for begging, is definitely a case bound for a criminal life. In Dtis opinion poverty is repeatedly referred to as the grand cause of villainy in the novel (Dtis, 18). Real poverty threatens Moll twice in her life; when her nurses death means her being turnd out of Doors to the wide World (p.54), and after her banker husbands death, just before she commits her first theft: ... a time of Distress is a time of dreadful Temptation, and all the Strength to resist is taken away; Poverty presses, the Soul is made Desperate By Distress, and what can be done? (p.254). However, later in the book Moll herself confesses how necessity may lead to avarice and corruption may contrive peoples fate: ... my Fate was otherwise determind; the busie Devil that so industriously drew me in, had too fast hold of me to let me go back; but as Poverty brought me into the Mire, so Avarice kept me in, till there was no going back (p.268). Avarice, fate and the Devil are then responsible for depravity. Early in the book Moll herself identifies her imperfect education as one of the causes of her future degeneration. She laments the absence in England of an institution similar to the French House of Orphans, where they are Bred up, Cloathd, fed, Taught, and when fit to go out, are placd out to Trades, or to Services, so as to be well able to provide for themselves by an honest industrious Behaviour (p.44). Defoe wrote several pamphlets on the importance of education for the prevention of criminality, and Molls view is undoubtedly his own. But she is lucky enough as far as her education is concerned. First, Compassion moved the Magistrates of the Town to order some Care to be taken of me, and I became one of their own, as much as if I had been born in the Place (p.45). The nurse under whose care she was put bread up the Children she took with a great deal of Art, as well as with a great deal of Care ... she Bread them up very Religiously ... very Housewifely and Clean ... and very Mannerly and with good Behaviour (p.46). This scenario was far from common, as this type

of nurses were usually selfish women who only sought for their own economical benefit and were often cruel to the children. Such an unusual education is partly responsible for the subsequent period in Molls life. Her desire to become a gentlewoman, that is to say, be a self-sufficient person and not go into service, an ambition forged during her stay at the nurses school, seems to be finally fulfilled when, after the good womans death, Moll is taken under the care of the Colchester family, where she is given a ladys education. But her aspirations and her vanity are the cause of her ruin, as she herself admits, because it is that beauty she is so proud of what attracts the elder brothers attention; his lasciviousness and her false innocence create a risky situation that ends up causing Molls moral destruction: Thus I gave up myself to a readiness of being ruined without the least concern, and I am a fair Memento to all young Women, whose Vanity prevails over their Virtue (p.64). Thus the reader is given an early indicator of the didactic purpose of the book. Heredity and predestination are two other factors that seem to contribute decisively to Molls criminal behaviour. Having been born in Newgate, Moll is a child of vice, the Offspring of Debauchery and Vice, as stated by Defoe in the preface to the novel. When she is arrested for the same kind of theft that had caused her mothers disgrace, Newgate is for her the Place where my Mother suffered so deeply, where I was brought into the World, and from whence I expected no Redemption, but an infamous Death: To conclude, the Place that had so long expected me (pp.348-49). She seems to have always been convinced that fate would bring her back to a place that is a simile for her mothers womb. Her first impressions of the prison are dreadful: ... that horrid Place! my very Blood chills at the mention of its Name ... tis impossible to describe the terror of my mind, when I was first brought in, and when I lookd round upon all the horrors of that dismal Place ... the hellish Noise, the Roaring, Swearing and Clamour, the Stench and the Nastiness, and all the dreadful croud of Afflicting things that I saw there ... to make the Place seem an Emblem of Hell itself (pp.348-49). But after some time she acknowledges to experiencing a kind of adaptation to the place, as if her feelings and her reason had been anaesthetised by the degradation of her surroundings: ... I degenerated into Stone; I turnd first Stupid and Senseless, then Brutish and thoughtless, and at last raving Mad ... ; and in short, I became as naturally pleasd with the Place, as if indeed I had been Born there (p.354). The last sentence, with its ironical connotation -she has indeed been born there- is once more a means of expressing Defoes ambiguous attitude towards moral subjects in Moll Flanders. Was Moll predestined to return to Newgate and was that the reason why she became naturally pleased with the place? On the other hand critics have always argued about the sincerity of Molls repentance. Some see in her an excessive tolerance when she judges certain events of her own life, and consider that having been born a criminal, she dies a criminal, that fate overpowers freedom. On the other hand, events such as her marriage to her half-brother intensify the importance of destiny in the novel. Is there a criminal nature in Moll? She repeatedly speaks of her immorality, or rather, lack of clear moral indicators; her character pushes her into awkward situations, going to the wrong places, associating with the wrong kind of people -as her mother did before her. Defoes view seems to be that chance and disposition are more or less parallel forces in the making of a criminal. Yet, Moll herself emphasises the idea that human beings always have the power to say no, even if influenced by necessity. Another important theme in the novel is Defoes treatment of women, for the author draws his female characters like any other human being, without establishing any differences with respect to men. His heroines talent for improvement is limited only by the social and legal barriers society puts in their way, not because they are less able than men. For Dtis Moll

Flanders is based on a sympathetic understanding of the misfortunes of an unprotected woman in Defoes contemporary society. Given her social circumstances -her birth at Newgate, her dependence on charity during her childhood and youth- Moll has to create her own means to survive; but mere survival turns into prosperity thanks to her natural sagacity, her independent, spirited character, that will accept no victimising. Related to Defoes vision of Moll as a socially capable woman is the theme of money, a topic that has an ubiquitous presence in eighteenth-century novels both by men and women authors. Not only is Moll concerned with financial matters -an ordinarily male concern-, but her management is so skilful that at the end of her life she attains a status of prosperity and affluence, in spite of her having been born in the most adverse circumstances. The mercantile basis of Moll Flanders has to do with the heroines need to make a living in an inhospitable world. If, even at an early age, Moll is so concerned with her financial state and her position in life (pp.47-54), her seduction at the age of eighteen promises a stability she has never experienced; her lovers luxury and social position represent a lifestyle she has never dreamt of. After the death of the younger brother, whom she finally marries, she takes stock of her personal belongings only to realise that her Circumstances were not great. By now life has taught her that her childhood fantasies can became true and that money can really make her independent; in fact, when she next decides to marry a man who would rather keep her as a mistress, it is the thought that she is a woman of means that finally makes him change his mind: Thus my Pride, not my Principle, my Money, not my Virtue, kept me Honest (p.104). But she soon learns that marriage is not an economic safeguard and will not provide her with the security she is looking for. She realises that men also search for profitable matches, and that not love but business and interest are the foundations of marriage; that Beauty, Manners, Sence, good Humour, good Behaviour, Education, Virtue, Piety, or any other Qualification, whether of Body or Mind (p.112) are no advantage to compete in the marriage market. As a consequence, she feigns to have a fortune once and again, but husbands bring no security to her; in fact, they often ruin her. When she becomes a widow at forty-eight and her resources are finally exhausted, she faces with terror the prospect of poverty once again.Throughout, she often shows concern for the fact that, being a woman, she lacks the necessary information about investment or the way to keep control over her property. After five years of well-being and contentment with her banker husband, her financial situation deteriorates and misery leads her to her first theft (pp.252-54). In spite of her initial moral doubts, once she has decided that stealing is the only way of surviving, it becomes her business. She describes in detail here first theft (p.254), plans her outings carefully and gives exact descriptions of the stolen goods. She works diligently and takes all kind of precautions to prevent being caught. When she is finally taken to Newgate and later transported to America she not only makes all the necessary arrangements for her future life, but her self-assurance finally convinces Jemy that transportation is the best possible option for both of them. The money they have obtained from stealing is their only safeguard and it provides for all comforts available during the long voyage and success in their new life. Intelligently handled by Moll, for Jemy proves to be a loving but rather irresolute and inefficient man, their money can render all kind of services and buy respectability. With the invaluable help of her governess, Moll prepares carefully all the provisions for the voyage, buys all the goods they will need for the Business of planting when they arrive, and makes all the necessary arrangements with the captain of the ship so as to be eventually bought as servants and then set free as soon as they come ashore. Once in Virginia it is Moll who attends to their ever-increasing business, while Jemy, who was bread a Gentleman, devotes himself to hunting. The reader knows Molls enterprise will succeed because of her dedication, her good fortune and her expertise. She receives her mothers inheritance, spends some weeks with her son -during which time scenes of domestic affection are mingled with financial interest-, and at seventy she goes back to England with her

husband in good Heart and Health, Moll tells, to spend the Remainder of our Years in sincere Penitence, for the wicked Lives we have lived (p.427). Characterisation

The character of Moll is a complex one, thus posing a number of problems to Defoe scholars. Haste and carelessness in composition has often been blamed for such complexity, even if at the same time many critics acknowledge that Moll Flanders, a work of art almost universally praised, has a controlled literary craftsmanship that other novels by Defoe lack. Recent criticism has found excellence and skill in Defoes morally ambiguous depiction of the character and her world, considering it realistic. Perhaps the reasons for the complexity surrounding Molls character lie in Defoes claim, stated in the preface to the novel, that his main interest is moral and didactic. The reader can be misled if he takes this announcement at face value, for morality is not really a major determinant in Molls characterisation. This moral dimension amounts only to a somewhat elementary ethical lesson about crime and punishment, but even this is not substantiated by the narrative. Defoes role as author is twofold: in order to maintain the interest of his readers he knows he must side with his heroine and project himself as completely as possible into her mind, but, having done this, he knows he has to reform her. The author seems to be asking the reader to separate what Moll does from what she is, to distinguish between actor and action and excuse the actor; such attitude has originated a variety of readings. Moll is a criminal out of necessity; poverty, a deficient education, heredity and predestination lead her to a life of crime. But, according to Backscheider, the work also includes elements of romance in which its resolute heroine sets out to conquer a world full of obstacles. Even if Defoe condemned romances as unbelievable stories about improbable heroes that performed amazing adventures, the term romantic in Defoes time also referred to events that were more likely to happen in romance than in real life, and delighted the readers while fulfilling their innermost wishes. From the beginning of the novel, Moll makes herself a heroine and at a very early age she proclaims her aim to become an economically independent woman, a pursuit that will inform the whole story. Molls quest is both material and emotional, and it is always present in her struggle through life. The happy ending also contributes to the romantic character of the novel, even if it is somewhat improbable given the development of Molls career. The ambiguity of Molls figure encourages Robert Donovan (in Moll Flanders, Norton edition, 396) to speak about two heroines in the novel; for while Moll pretends to be led by moral considerations, she is mainly concerned with practical matters. It is physical and material well-being that constitutes the fundamental drive in her behaviour, even though she knows that she must somehow solve the moral and social issues that confront her if she wants to successfully manage her essential problem, that of survival. But together with her mercantile mind there is another significant aspect in Molls personality, the fact that her success lies in her ability to assume whatever role is appropriate to her immediate purpose. Molls role-playing is the very centre of her being. The Colchester episode is the first example in the novel of her duplicitous behaviour; she deceives the family about her real feelings and puzzles everybody with the sincerity of her confession, while her true intentions are quite different all the time. To everyone Moll appears as an unselfish, honest girl but, ironically, she ends up benefitting from the whole affair -even if it is true that the elder brothers deceitful behaviour hurts her deeply. From her childish dream of becoming a gentlewoman to her final role as a penitent, Molls career is a continuous role-playing exercise, says Donovan. Her very name, under which she becomes notorious, is an assumed one and the novel is full of dressing and feigning. For many feminist critics, however, Molls description as a character is determined by the way she deals with her economic problems. The fact that she is regarded as such an

attractive heroine in spite of her criminal conduct is a consequence of Defoes purpose to present her as a capable woman whose vicious actions are imposed by her circumstances. Defoe, says Scheuermann, believes in the self-made woman and is aware that society victimises her by limiting her ways of earning a living; consequently, he grants Moll all the necessary initiatives to procure her economical well-being, even if some of these alternatives border on illegality (Scheuermann, 12-13). As we have seen above, Defoes view of woman centres on her as an economically capable human being; as the options open to women for earning a living are severely limited, Moll marries or becomes mistress to several men and, when her age makes dependence on men impossible, she eventually turns tocrime. The theme of women needing money to enter the marriage market is emphasised at the beginning of the novel -consider once again the Colchester episode, which epitomises Molls life story: if a young Woman have Beauty, Birth, Breeding, Wit, Sense, Manners, Modesty, and all these to an Extreme; yet if she have not Money, shes no Body ... for nothing but Money recommends a Woman (p.58). Under such conditions, Moll deceives and steals when society does not allow her to earn her living otherwise. But thieving, like farming in the last period of her life, is a business for her. She plans her thefts with logical skills and good sense endeavouring to get the greatest rewards with the least risk; and that is exactly the way she applies hersel later when she sets out to make an honest living as a transported felon. According to Scheuermann what is fundamental from the point of view of Molls characterisation is the way her ambition to live independently moulds her behaviour, and her exceptional skill in financial management her money is one of the prevalent features of her personality. Besides the character of the heroine, around whose life and adventures the narrative centres, there are many other minor characters in the novel, described in more or less detail and depth, that represent a variety of social classes and lifestyles. An initial distinction could perhaps be made between male and female characters in the sense that Moll tends to turn to men for economic security and to women for advice, something that is already made clear in the Colchester episode. Even if Moll is really in love with the elder brother, the fact that he will inherit most of the familys property should not go unnoticed. There is not only sex in their relationship, but a search for security. Having seduced Moll, he displays all the arrogance and insensitivity of his class. He flatters her, gives her gold, promises to marry her, but when difficulties arise he breaks the affair off with the excuse that, if the family finds out, he will be disinherited; his provokes in Moll a state of psychic and physical feebleness. He is ready to hand Moll to his younger, honest brother, who courts her seriously and marries her; for Moll he was a tender, kind, good humourd Man as any Woman could desire (p.102) and after his death she appears as destitute as she had been before, and let loose the World. The Colchester episode also provides us with a female figure, the family mother, who treats Moll much more kindly than most women in her station might have had and behaves almost like a mother to her. As we have seen, during her stay with them Moll receives an education, even if class distinctions between her and the other members of the family are openly stated. The mother believes in Molls sincere wish to marry Robin, and, although she does not want her son to marry a poor person, she finally consents -even if it is true that her elder sons partial opinion plays an important part in the discussion. The nurse who takes care of Moll when she is taken from her real mother is a sober, thrifty, pious woman who exerts a maternal role. Moll lives happily with her for some years, during which she internalises an ideal of neatness, civility and good management -for the nurse is an example of self-sufficiency- and develops a strong feeling against economic dependence. From among the various female mentors the heroine is related to the figure of Mother Midnight, with whom she develops a strong friendly relationship, is undoubtedly the most relevant. Her name refletcs her trade -bawd, midwife, even abortionist and infanticide if it is necessary- but she has a good influence upon Moll from the bebinning: Every Word this Creature said was a Cordial to me, and put new Life and new Spirit into my very Heart; my Blood began to circulate immediately, and I was quite another Body (p.220). Such women

were notorious enough in London at the time and there was a certain feeling both of awe and aversion about them. Mother Midnight is for Erickson the heroines spiritual mother. Molls old governess is a Mistress of her Tongue and, in spite of some initial doubts, her realistic discourse finally convinces Moll of the reasonableness of putting herself in her hands when she is overwhelmed by all kind of difficulties. On the other hand, we are soon informed that the governess practical philosophy of life is, similarly to Molls, that any activity that generates money is worth doing. They speak the same language, they are both self-made women with a skill for business, as the presentation of the three bills in ascending order of expense (p.223) soon makes clear. Mother Midnight provides for anything a woman in trouble may need, from helping her delivering a child to disposing of -that is selling- new-born babies if they prove a nuisance to their mothers. She is also a bawd and a pawnbroker who will later dispose of Molls stolen goods as she once did with her child. She advises and protects Moll but also encourages her to participate more and more actively in crime, expecting a good Share of the Booty; however, from the moment Moll is arrested she becomes a real friend, visits all kind of persons in her behalf, sends her the minister who arranges her transportation instead of receiving the death penalty, and finally becomes her banker, making all kind of arrangements for her, and Jemys, voyage to America. Eventually, we are told, she becomes a penitent and dies an honest woman. The male figures with whom Moll is acquainted come from all social classes and, as it has already been mentioned, she usually joins them for safety reasons, although inclination is also an important reason, as she herself acknowledges: It is true, and I have confessd it before, that...I resolved to let him lye with me if he offerd it; but it was because I wanted his help and assistance, and I knew no other way of securing him than that: But when we were that Night together...I found my Weakness, the Inclination was not to be resisted (p.172). Some of the men are vain and foolish, like Molls second husband, the draper; others are weak -two die of heartbreak because they go bankrupt and several cowardly carry on adulterous affairs. They are all compared, either implicitly or explicitly, to Molls intrepid struggle for life. Some of Molls lovers are lascivious men who repent in the end not without having previously afforded Moll some kind of benefit. Jemy, the most similar in character to Moll, is also the husband she loves best, being the most entertaining that I ever met in my Life before. Their first intention to deceive each other turns into real companionship; they live together as long as they can afford to, they go into criminal life -he in fact returns to it- and finally come together in Newgate. When she hears he is staying at the prison, she compares him to some of the most romanticised criminals of the time (p. 357). However, Defoes vision of Jemy is much more down to earth and, in spite of his initial opposition to transportation because, he argues, Servitude and hard Labour were things Gentlemen could never stoop to (p.381), he makes him accept Molls reasons and agree to be literally transported by her, who makes all the necessary arrangements and sets up the plantation where eventually he lives happily with her. Molls world is full of minor characters that populate the streets in which she dextrously struggles to make a living and which contribute to a vigorous description of Londons underworld. Perhaps the best image refecting this atmosphere is the gloomy description of Newgate, a dismal place where crowds of hopeless, hardened convicts awaited death in a kind of earthly hell, and where bribes and illegal practices increase the feeling that such institution was beyond the realm of law. Structure

The peripatetic plot of Moll Flanders has often obscured the tightness of its structure. The character of Moll may seem the only link between a series of self-contained episodes, as it was the case with the genuine confessions of criminals who recounted their villainies in a chronological order; such temporal succession was important because it underlined the causal relation between events. In Defoes novel, however, the fable had to be subservient to the moral, which implied a close control over the concatenation of events. Some critics have accused Defoe of improvisation and inconsistencies in matters of detail, and they argue that the author paid little attention to the internal cohesion of the story. For Ian Watt, Defoe did not plan his novel as a coherent whole, but worked hastily and without any subsequent revisions and, consequently, Moll Flanders has an undoubtedly episodic nature. Such practice, he acknowledges, would be due to the fact that Defoe follows the biographical form of writing so popular at the time, which derived whatever unity it possessed from thefact that all the incidents happened to the same person. Moll Flanders, then, would be closer to authentic biography, whether of criminals or travellers, than to the semi-fictional rogue biography (Watt, 103-111). Other critics, however, remark that the novel shows symptoms of plot circularity, which is a symbol of the tragic destiny of the heroine, dominated by fate. For Terence Martin (in Moll Flanders, Norton edition, 362-69), the episodes in the novel reveal a unity that complements structurally the design suggested by the heroines narrative. He thinks there exists a formal pattern in the novel associated to Molls psychological development. Martin illustrates this pattern in connection with the development of Molls thieving episodes. Once the years in which sex was her modus vivendi have passed, her financial insecurity leads her to struggle for survival rather than for middle-class respectability. First, she steals from impulse, not from a predesigned plan, and her initial thefts reveal her compulsion for goods; but the stolen goods -she steals baby clothes and what may be wedding rings, she robs a pregnant woman and a child under pretence of censuring its parents for their neglect (pp.254-60)- recall her past, by-gone days of fertility and mothering. Then she steals a great amount of watches as in an effort to steal back time. At the same time the narrative begins to emphasise subjective details that reveal a certain psychological evolution with respect to her new activity; after her first moral doubts and the terrifying experiences she undergoes as a consequence of her narrow escape from some of them, and once fully embarked in her new career, she begins to be more discriminating in her selection of articles and she becomes greedy. She begins to take elaborate disguises and, eventually, one of her thefts leads her again to her previous career of sex. In this first sexual encounter since the death of her banker husband, she is not so much interested in sex nor bothered by sexual scruples, but she again finds the economic security that allows her to give up stealing for some time. After this interval, in which she adopts the disguise of youth by using paint for the first and only time, she goes back to theft; she continues adopting new disguises and her career takes an air of caricature, for she dresses as a beggar, steals a horse which proves to be useless to her, is invited to join a band of counterfeiters and steals a portmanteau that gives her all kind of problems. This last thieving episode takes her back to Colchester, the place where she began her sexual career, but this return has no practical value in her adventures; she must continue a life of theft which will send her back to Newgate. At sixty she is literally back where she began, at the place of her birth. There she experiments two types of psychological evolution. First, she goes from initial terror into hardness of spirit and degeneracy (pp.349-54). In the midst of a state of personal disintegration the arrival of her Lancashire husband, Jemy, to the prison provokes in her new reflections about her wretched life; she blames herself for the misfortunes of all the people she has made miserable (p.356-57), and she is overwhelmed with grief for him (p.357). After she has been sentenced to death, she repents of her crimes with the help of the minister, and only then is she prepared to reveal her identity to Jemy. At their meeting they reveal their criminal careers to each other, a parallelism that makes possible their coming together again in prison.

Molls double psychic evolution at Newgate and the parallelism of the couples criminal lives have a formal significance, says Martin, because both factors taken together introduce a circular pattern which gives Moll a new opportunity to rebuild her life. In this sense, Molls second trip to America with her new husband serves to validate her new identity and is a sign of redemption and reward; such reward comes through the figure of her one and only child, as she acknowledges, or at least the only one that proves to be of any use. In old age she returns to England having acquired the means to live prosperously as a gentlewoman. The novel, then appears to offer a kind of circular unity, a certain pattern in the sequence of events that counterbalances Molls sequential account of her existence. Setting

Realism is usually taken to be one of the major characteristics of Defoes novels; such realism is not only responsible for the creation of supposedly actual characters, but also for his depiction of a world distinguished by its cartographic authenticity. Editions of Moll Flanders often include a map of contemporary London in which the setting of the heroines wanderings can be traced. Precise streets, lanes and alleys, well-known areas like Covent Garden or St James, and nearby towns or villages are referred to; such descriptions are a sign of Molls spirit, more inclined to that constant mobility that propitiates her thieving than to reaming indoors and living from her needle. During her thieving phase, her state of mind determines the importance of space, thus becoming both a psychological denominator and a narrative intensifier. The first four thefts are depicted in detail, and precise location is given, especially in the first two (pp.255-58) -they stand as models of all the other that will follow-, while the following ones are given a general, vague treatment. Though London is not described at length, the physical presence of the city is intensely felt. Space, like characters, is handled realistically. The very anonymity the city provides emphasises Molls loneliness and alienation, a significant aspect in Defoes novels. The commercial nature of the city pervades the novel. Everything is bought and sold, not least Moll herself, who often bargains and cheats her way through life. After having spent some time in London, she takes the name of Mrs Flanders -a name which has an obvious association with prostitution as the bawdy houses placed on the south bank of the Thames were often run by Flemish women-, and begins to discover that the State of things was altered as to Matrimony, and ... that Marriages were here the Consequences of politick Schemes for forming Interests, and carrying on Business, and that LOVE had no Share, or but very little in the Matter ... Besides this, I observd that the Men made no scruple to set themselves out, and go a Fortune hunting, as they call it, when they had really no Fortune themselves to Demand it, or Merit to deserve it (pp.112-13). After various more or less successful marriages, her career as a thief gives her, for the first time in her life, true economic independence. According to Backscheider the city provides a perfect setting for the predatory world in which Defoe places his heroine. She uses various types of disguise to frequent different areas of London, always in search of some profitable goal. Dressed in rags she wanders about the south of London, Clerkenwell and the street around the Tower; dressed as a gentlewoman she visits the parks and fashionable shops. For Moll London means death and violence, but it is also the scenery in which she meets and makes the acquaintance of a whole variety of social types. For Ian Watt, Defoes heroes and heroines

make their way through the competitive and immoral metropolitan jungle in the pursuit of fortune ... Yet although the picture has its selfish and sordid aspects, it has one very significant difference from that presented by the modern city. Defoes London is still a community...and Defoe and his characters are a part of it, understanding and understood. (Watt, 187). Style

In a famous quotation from The Complete English Tradesman (1724) Defoe states:

If a man was to ask me, what I would suppose to be a perfect style or language, I would answer, that in which a man speaking to five hundred people should be understood by them all ... in the same sense which the speaker intended to be understood. A perfect style is for Defoe a clear, simple, easy to understand, sincere and unbiased language that should give the reader the illusion of authenticity. His style aims at sounding like that of individual men or women, by incorporating their favourite phrases and distinctive rhythms. Defoe means to give a powerfully vivid impression of a mind in motion. In Backscheiders opinion there are a number of things that make Molls language sound real, such as its specificity when she names actual streets and familiar paths wellknown to London readers, or the detail in which the various stolen items and her successive disguises are described. In many descriptions there is a strong sense of physicality that contributes to the realism and vividness of the scene. Such realist tecniques were common among most prose writers of the age in their desire to increase the credibility of their narratives, but Defoe excels in this practice. The language of Moll Flanders is idiomatic, colloquial, full of the features of spoken English. Molls use of euphemisms - having gone out of the World by the Steps and the Strings for the gallows-, rhetorical phrases -it is enough to tell you, in short or something I must not omit-, and other stylistic devices -like the repetition of I say, says I- contribute to the novels oral quality. Defoe uses metaphoric language, for example, to describe womans place in society: when a woman is thus left void of Council, she is just like a bag of Money, or a Jewel dropt on the Highway, which is a Prey to the next Commer. Some of the works most powerful images come from the authors familiarity with biblical language; consider, for example, how Molls expression of his feelings in Newgate -like the Waters in the Cavities, and Hollows of Mountains, which petrifies and turns into Stone whatever they are sufferd to drop upon ... I degenerated into Stone; I turnd first Stupid and Senseless, then Brutish and thoughtless, and at last raving mad- is reminiscent of the Psalms (Backscheider, pp.87-89). For Ian Watt Defoes prose is not well written, but it is remarkably effective in keeping the readers close to Molls consciousness as she struggles to make her life recollections clear. The simple and positive quality of Defoes language embodies the new values of the scientific and rational outlook of the late seventeenth century, the attempt to develop a more factual prose. In accordance to Lockes philosophy, Defoe usually denotes only the primary qualities of the objects he describes solidity, extension, figure, motion and number-, paying little attention to their secondary qualities colour, sound and taste (Watt, 105-6). As a journalist, Defoe had assured his readers that he had chosen a down-right plainness in order to be more generally instructing and clear to the understanding of the people and this is certainly the style he adopted in Moll Flanders.

Works cited

BACKSCHEIDER, Paula R. Moll Flanders. The Making of a Criminal Mind. Boston: Twayne, 1990. DTIS, lisabeth. Moll Flanders. Paris: Didier, 1997. ERICKSON, Robert A. Mother Midnight. Birth, Sex, and Fate in Eighteenth-Century Fiction (Defoe, Richardson and Sterne). New York: AMS Press, 1986. FALLER, Lincoln B. Crime and Defoe. A New Kind of Writing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. KELLY, Edward (ed.). Moll Flanders. Critical Edition. New York: Norton, 1973. SCHEUERMANN, Mona. Her Bread to Earn. Women, Money, and Society from Defoe to Austen. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 1993. WATT, Ian. The Rise of the Novel. Studies in Defoe, Richardson and Fielding. London: Hogarth Press, 1987 (1957).