This article examines how Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s The Daughter of Doctor Moreau (2023), an adaptation of H. G. Wells’s The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), offers a defence of pluralist society. Moreno-Garcia reshapes Wells’s tale of atavism into one of an emergent multicultural society using elements from the 1932, 1977 and 1996 film adaptations of Wells. Her critique of imperialism draws on the films’ representations of empire, and her depiction of Wells’s Beast People as humanized ‘hybrids’ relies on the film adaptations’ long fascination with the Panther Woman. Moreno-Garcia’s novel re-historicizes Wells’s tale by setting it during the 1870s Caste War on the Yucatán Peninsula, making imperial power and self-determination an explicit concern. The Caste War also racializes the hybrids, placing them in the midst of an ongoing struggle over recognition and self-determination. The resulting tale, a hybrid of its many precursors, represents what it means to struggle against imperialism, racism and patriarchy.
Joshua Gooch (Wed,) studied this question.