The Man Who Was Thursday

The mission to infiltrate and defeat anarchy is the initial premise of the novel. It is the catalyst for both character and plot development. Gregory’s appearance at the end of the novel as the true anarchist unveils his hatred of government and his desire for destruction. He is the personification of the policeman’s warning to Syme about intellectual fanatics and the dangerous educated criminal: “[…] they are too intellectual to think that man upon this earth can ever be quite free of original sin and the struggle. When they say that mankind shall be free at last, they mean that mankind shall commit suicide” (27).

Anarchy represents the social and political customs of Chesterton’s time. The Edwardian era was still heavily influenced by Victorian ideals which strictly governed what was proper and what was improper. These ideas were inflexible and unforgiving and primarily related to identity: appearance, attitude, relationships, and sexuality. Social norms also separated classes of people and contributed to the disparities between the rich and the poor. The anarchy movement of the early 20th Century coincided with a greater awareness of these disparities.