Major Henry Scobie is the antihero and protagonist of The Heart of the Matter. He is a somewhat cynical and naïve colonial police officer who is in charge of inspecting boats for wartime contraband. A somewhat melancholic figure, Scobie lacks self-awareness and craves peace and solitude. He excessively analyzes his wife Louise’s happiness, or lack thereof, and feels an overwhelming sense of pity and responsibility. Specifically, Scobie pities unattractive and downtrodden characters and often mistakes pity for love. Moreover, he is tormented by an obligation to tell the truth, but he constantly lies and rationalizes his deceit through self-delusion. Scobie doesn’t read literature or poetry, but keeps a diary which he tersely fills with the banal details of his life.

A convert to Catholicism from Protestantism, Scobie struggles to reconcile his sins. He unsuccessfully grapples with the problem of theodicy, or how to reconcile an omnipotent and all-loving God with the existence of evil. Scobie’s immoral actions and illicit entanglements culminate in the ultimate unforgivable sin, suicide, which he justifies on the grounds that it will save the objects of his pity, Louise and Helen. Though tormented, Scobie remains uncontrite about his transgressions throughout his moral descent.