79 pages • 2 hours read
Hannah TintiThe Good Thief: A Novel
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2008A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Crime and Redemption
Named after the so-called Good Thief who is crucified beside and forgiven by Jesus Christ, Tinti's novel addresses not only crime but redemption. Many of the novel's characters, including Benjamin, Tom, Dolly, Dr. Milton, and even Ren, make their living by committing various crimes. Rather than offer a clear judgment on her characters' dubious actions, Tinti allows for some ambiguity. To excuse his many crimes, including "arson, train robbery, bank robbery, horse robbery, and general thieving" (236), Benjamin refers to theft as "borrowing, with good intent" (51). Ren, having been raised Catholic, believes theft to be a sin, punishable by God. However, Ren has his own transgressions, as "most of the lost things being prayed for at the statue of Saint Anthony" (15) have disappeared because of Ren's theft. When Ren comes to live with Benjamin and Tom, Benjamin tells Tom that Ren is "already one of us" (75), meaning the boy has experience with thieving. Later in the novel, Benjamin redeems himself in Ren's eyes by confessing to his paternity and helping him escape from his uncle, Silas McGinty. Ren also comes to believe, like Mrs. Sands, that God must be "too busy to go around punishing little boys" (123), or that some crimes can be forgiven.
Both Dolly and Dr. Milton also rely on crime to support themselves. Dolly justifies his actions through his belief that he is "made for" (150) murdering. He feels no remorse and has come to the point that Dr. Milton describes as "a kind of numbness" (267). Dolly receives his absolution when he sacrifices his own life to save Ren from McGinty's hat boys. Unlike Dolly, Dr. Milton doesn't commit crimes with his own hands. Instead, his medical research relies on body theft and graverobbing to continue. Dr. Milton also seems obsessed with amputation, even cutting off a patient's leg while the patient begs Dr. Milton to "leave it on" (130). Though Dr. Milton's medical practice seems unscrupulous and predatory, he redeems himself by saving Tom's leg and life, and by eventually releasing Ren from his agreement to sell his body to Dr. Milton after he dies.
Loss and Recovery
Beginning with the novel's emphasis on Saint Anthony, the Catholic patron saint of lost things, The Good Thief introduces one of its major themes: loss. Ren, the protagonist, lost his left hand as a baby and spends The Good Thief's entirety trying to assemble the family he lost as an infant. Benjamin’s first interaction with Ren, closing his eyes as though "trying to remember something" (29), then embracing him, foreshadows their relationship to come. Though Benjamin's lifestyle proves too risky for him to remain in North Umbrage, reunited with his son, Ren assembles a surrogate family for himself. Mrs. Sands, the near-deaf landlady, serves as Ren's mother. From Ren's first night in her home, Mrs. Sands cares for Ren, tailoring the clothes of the "drowned boy" (120) and feeding Ren a sumptuous breakfast. Tasked with caring for Brom and Ichy as a boy, Ren cares for them as he would younger brothers. Ren consistently regards Brom and Ichy as "more like children, even though they were nearly his age" (209) and, despite his occasional annoyance at them, looks after the twins. Dolly, while he's alive, acts as a kind of paternal figure for Ren, though mostly in terms of physical protection. Tom, too, though often drunk, acts as a kind of father to Ren and the twins. Finally, Jenny, the mousetrap girl with the harelip, plays a sororal role, helping Ren escape McGinty.
The Good Thief also addresses the loss and recovery of other things, both material and immaterial. In the novel's first section, Benjamin refers to theft as "borrowing, with good intent" (51). With this definition, recovery of certain items seems inevitable, as borrowing implies future return. For example, Ren steals McGinty's "gold pocket watch" (238) though McGinty later recovers it when he goes through Ren's pockets. Even McGinty's amputation of Ren's hand could be framed as a kind of borrowing in that by keeping it, McGinty hoped to someday find Ren. As a final example, McGinty's hat boys try to rob Dolly of his life while Benjamin and Tom unwittingly spare Dolly's life by trying to steal his body. However, Dolly seems to live his days on borrowed time, finally being laid to rest while defending Ren.
The History of Medicine
Body snatchers—or “resurrection men,” as they were called in the 19th century—like Benjamin and Tom provide the story's secondary plotline. At that time, medical schools only had access to the bodies of those executed for major crimes. These cadavers could not satisfy the medical schools' demands. For this reason, doctors came to rely on the work of resurrection men like Benjamin and Tom. The novel's first encounter with medicine comes with Mister Bowers, the dentist to whom Tom tries to sell teeth "in various stages of decay" (73) that he and Benjamin stole from dead bodies. Mr. Bowers, with his cabinet filled with "rows and rows of dentures" (81), rejects the teeth but refers the men, obviously unafraid of this kind of work, to Dr. Milton.
The teaching hospital Dr. Milton works for depicts an environment typical of 19th-century medicine, though Dr. Milton himself, with his predatory methods, may not provide an accurate depiction of a typical 19th-century doctor. Dr. Milton has no qualms about procuring bodies via resurrectionists and has a morbid fascination with amputation and gigantism. Dr. Milton also takes a "thin sliver of tissue from the top" (133) of Ren's amputation scar without Ren's consent. However, Tinti takes care to present technology and methods contemporary to the 19th century. For example, Dr. Milton preserves cadavers' bodies with whiskey, which "keeps the bodies from decaying too fast" (267). The operating room where doctors-in-training observe procedures has sawdust on the floor and Dr. Milton, though his methods and motivations may be unorthodox, does what he can to "further the understanding of anatomy, for the benefit of the human race" (269).
