The Disruption of Victorian Moral Order: A Todorovian Analysis of Ethical Ambiguity and Unresolved Morality in Treasure Island

Abstract

Victorian literature often promotes moral clarity, yet Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island complicates this convention by presenting a world where ethical boundaries blur. Despite being framed as a children's adventure tale, the novel raises unresolved moral questions that challenge Victorian ideals of virtue and vice. The problem this study addresses is the novel's refusal to restore the moral order expected in Victorian narratives, leaving readers with an ethically unstable conclusion. This research is significant as it demonstrates how Stevenson anticipates modernist scepticism about universal moral truths. Using a qualitative textual approach, the study applies Todorov's three-stage narrative model: equilibrium, disruption, and new equilibrium to examine how the novel structurally produces moral ambiguity. Findings reveal that the work deliberately disrupts narrative restoration, allowing ethical uncertainty, pragmatic survival, and unpunished wrongdoing to dominate the conclusion. The study recommends further exploration of moral ambiguity in Victorian adventure fiction and the application of Todorovian analysis to other canonical texts.

Keywords: Treasure Island; Todorov; Moral Ambiguity; Victorian Literature; Narrative Structure