Fifth Business Character Analysis

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Pages: 4
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Tiffany. Hu
Mr. Uhrich
English B30
7 March 2017
Morality in Robertson Davies’ Fifth Business Robertson Davies’ novel Fifth Business develops the conflict between psychological morality and common morality. Through characters contrasts, childhood in Deptford, Mary’s death, Boy’s death and Irony in narration, Dunstan justifies himself from his false psychological morality and accuses others of being immoral. Ironically, Davies reveals that human perception about false psychological morality is destructive in the face of common morality. Some people may argue that Dunstan is a sympathetic protagonist who has righteous psychological morality. However, Dunstan’s blind pursuit of morality ironically destroys himself and others. By contrast, …show more content…
The conflict between psychological morality and common morality meaningfully resolved in Boy’s death. Boy’s death is determined as a “psychological suicide” (141) which Dustan advices long ago. Once Boy discovers that his perfect life is tainted by his immoral act from childhood, he has “found out he was no good and abolished him” (141). Boy uses Dunstan as a “keeper of his conscience” (256) and at the end, his life is resolved in Dunstan’s false psychological morality. Boy’s death solve Dunstan’s personal “ambiguity and paradox” (168) in the stage of life. Boy is the dark shadow of Dunstan and with the death of Boy, Dunstan goes back to his world of wonder and embraces his devil …show more content…
However, Dunstan more and more revealed himself later in the novel. Dunstan is a dishonest narrator because he always filtered himself and others through his notion of false psychological morality. According to Liesl, Dunstan is overwhelmed by his compassion and guilt towards Mary. His compassion and guilt makes him a “moral monster” (218). The narrator Dunstan always uses his psychological morality as a “moral monster” (218) to define others’ morality. He uses his illusion to justify himself when his disadvantages are revealed to the readers. Dunstan interpretation of himself obscures readers’ understanding of him as a character because he beautifies himself and uglify other when examining the conflict between one another. Ironically, Dunstan reveals that an individual is immoral when he justify himself through his notion of psychological truth.

In conclusion, an individual’s notion about false psychological morality becomes destructive in determining reality. Throughout the novel, Dunstan is a devil who pretends to be moral and justifies himself all the time. This connects to my real life experience that if I explain my conflict with my friend to my family, I always talked about it from my perspective as if it is totally another’s
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