Adam Nightingale - The Shipwreck Cannibals

In terms of vitality and relative human complexity, Boon Island’s main exception is Swede Butler. Swede is the most vibrant character in the novel. He is a force of nature. He is funny. He is likeably opinionated. He rebukes the crew for naivety. He argues with Langman. He even argues with Deane and in doing so succeeds in making Deane seem a bit more human.

John Deane is virtuous, pious and more than capable in a crisis. He is seldom wrong about anything. As a dramatist, Kenneth Roberts seems to miss the point of John Deane entirely. Deane’s paradoxes and contradictions make him interesting. In Boon Island there is never any question that there might even be the trace elements of something true in Christopher Langman’s complaints against Deane. In Boon Island , John Deane’s unquestioned virtuousness and virtuosity becomes boring after a while. Only towards the end of the novel, when Deane is wilting under the effects of the cold, exhaustion and starvation, does he exhibit any real form of vulnerability. Only in New England, while convalescing in Jethro Furber’s house, does John Deane finally become interesting. While observing Furber’s children during dinner time Deane catches himself wondering what it would be like to eat them. It proves to be the only real interior conflict Deane experiences in the entire novel and comes far too late in the narrative to be of any real dramatic use.

The epilogue is largely botched. Any drama that might have been gleaned from Langman’s visit to the magistrate is neutered by the fact that the whole of Portsmouth believes John Deane. Langman is virtually drummed out of New England. Miles Whitworth and Neal Butler are offered jobs by the locals. Deane is also offered employment but knows that Langman intends to make trouble for him back in London. Deane prepares to return to England and fight for his reputation.

The postscript informs the reader that John Deane defended his reputation so well that he was offered the position of consul for the port of Flanders and Ostend. There is no mention of his time in Russia or his work as a spy.

A. The young John Deane is shot at by gamekeepers while out poaching.