SOURCE: “Our Mutual Friend and the Test of Worthiness,” in Dalhousie Review, Vol. 62, No. 2, Summer, 1982, pp. 292-302.

In the following essay, Horne suggests that three of the characters in Our Mutual Friend—John Harmon, Silas Wegg, and Bradley Headstone—can be compared to Homer's hero Odysseus.

Shortly before he reveals his real name to her, John Rokesmith tells his wife Bella, “The time will come … when you will be tried,”¹ and with his warning articulates one of the central themes of Our Mutual Friend. Others are sounded throughout this dark work—themes of greed, money, identity—but the theme of trial, in this case a test of worthiness, provides a distinctive underpinning for the narrative and its events. The test I wish to discuss is self-imposed, directed toward the goal of domestic happiness, and concerns three male figures—John Harmon, Silas Wegg, and Bradley Headstone. In Harmon's case...