Reflections on Closure, Identity, the Past and the Law in Michael Cox's The Meaning of Night and The Glass of Time and Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White

Abstract

This paper is focused on the subjects identity and closure in two novels by Michael Cox, The Meaning of Night (2006) and The Glass of Time (2008), and Wilkie Collins’s The Woman in White (1860). Both author’s have similar themes in their novels: stolen identities, rightful place in society, obsession with the past and the functioning of the law. The law is often helpless with cases of stolen identities, and the protagonists Walter Hartright in The Woman in White and Edward Glyver in The Meaning of Night take it upon themselves to find retribution and restore identities to their rightful owners. The mentioned themes are examined through a close-reading of all texts and related to narrative closure and identity.