"Learn the Law. Say the words": Discourse and exclusion in The Island of Dr Moreau

The term discourse is here defined as the shared language of a society. In Foucault’s "Discourse on Language", three methods for controlling discourse are defined which operate around the principle of exclusion: first, objects (what can be spoken of); second, ritual (how and where we can speak); and third, privilege (who has the right to speak) (1). In The Island of Dr Moreau, Wells demonstrates how, through these methods, discourse is a powerful tool for controlling and constructing social identity.

By defining certain subjects as forbidden, discourse functions to control thought. If certain concepts cannot be spoken about, they can be removed entirely from consciousness. Moreau forbids Prendick from speaking about the possibility of injury or death befalling the Ones with the Whips, because they cannot allow the Beast-Men to conceive of the idea. By speaking about it, it becomes a possibility; unspoken, it cannot exist.

With regard to how one can speak, certain types of language are proscribed. Anything that threatens to erode the boundary between man and beast is punished harshly: "'None, none,' said the Ape-man, -- 'none escape. See! I did a little thing, a wrong thing, once. I jabbered, jabbered, stopped talking. None could understand'" (2). Discourse separates man from beast and defines what is human. Prendick’s first objection to the notion that the men he meets have originated from beasts is that he has heard them use language: "But...these things -- these animals talk!" (3). Ritual also functions on a meta-discursive level through "the Law". Repetition of the Law is how the Beast-Men hold themselves to the behaviours it prescribes: the very act of saying the Law aloud is at once a reminder about how to behave and an affirmation of their status as a law-abiding language-speaker, a subject of the discourse: "Punishment is sharp and sure. Therefore learn the Law. Say the words" (4).

Ritual feeds into privilege. Who may speak? Only men may speak. If one speaks, one is a man: if one gibbers, one is a beast: "He says nothing," said the Satyr. "Men have voices" (5). Within the novel, Latin functions as a privileged discourse: Prendick and Moreau use it to exclude the Beast-Men from their communication. Privilege also functions to enshrine Moreau (the originator of the language, the one who defines meaning, and dictates "what", "how" and "who") as the centre of power. Once Moreau is gone, the first sign of their reversion into beast-nature is the loss of language:

It was about May when I first distinctly perceived a growing difference in their speech and carriage, a growing coarseness of articulation, a growing disinclination to talk. My Monkey-man's jabber multiplied in volume but grew less and less comprehensible, more and more simian. Some of the others seemed altogether slipping their hold upon speech, though they still understood what I said to them at that time. (Can you imagine language, once clear-cut and exact, softening and guttering, losing shape and import, becoming mere limps of sound again?) (6).

One interesting aspect of ritual in the novel is how on a meta-discursive level the gap between signifier and signified is described. The monkey-man, by virtue, one supposes, of his closer genetic relationship to humanity, is able to employ language on a level that is at once more sophisticated and more absurd than the base communication level employed by the other beast-people. 

The Monkey-man ... was for ever jabbering at me, -- jabbering the most arrant nonsense. One thing about him entertained me a little: he had a fantastic trick of coining new words. He had an idea, I believe, that to gabble about names that meant nothing was the proper use of speech (7).

Written language functions at level above social discourse, because some elements of the dynamic relationship between interlocutors is removed. At the end of the book, Prendick, aware of the eroded border between man and beast, describes human speech in non-verbal animalistic terms: people "mew" and "gibber". It is in the language of books that he finds real humanity. All beasts communicate with one another though non-verbal means. Communication within a society functions through a shared discourse. Removing these bestial elements of communication leaves pure language. So Prendick turns to books written by long-dead authors as a more purely human endeavour: he "spend[s] [his] days surrounded by wise books, -- bright windows in this life of ours, lit by the shining souls of men" (8).

Notes:

1) Foucault, 149.

2) Wells, chapter 12.

3) Wells, chapter 14.

4) Wells, chapter 12.

5) Wells, chapter 16.

6) Wells, chapter 21.

7) Wells, chapter 21.

8) Wells, chapter 22.

Works cited:

Foucault, Michel. “The Discourse on Language”. Critical Theory Since 1965. Eds. Hazard Adams and Leroy Searle. Tallahassee: Florida State University Press, 1986. 148-162.

Wells, Herbert George. The Island of Dr Moreau. Project Gutenberg: Oct 14 2004. Web. Sep 3 2012.