Love is a Fallacy

by Max Shulman

Cool was I and logical. Keen, calculating, perspicacious, acute and astute—I was all of these. My brain was as powerful as a dynamo, precise as a chemist’s scales, as penetrating as a scalpel. And—think of it!—I only eighteen.

It is not often that one so young has such a giant intellect. Take, for example, Petey Bellows, my roommate at the university. Same age, same background, but dumb as an ox. A nice enough fellow, you understand, but nothing upstairs. Emotional type. Unstable. Impressionable. Worst of all, a faddist. Fads, I submit, are the very negation of reason. To be swept up in every new craze that comes along, to surrender oneself to idiocy just because everybody else is doing it—this, to me, is the acme of mindlessness. Not, however, to Petey.

One afternoon I found Petey lying on his bed with an expression of such distress on his face that I immediately diagnosed appendicitis. “Don’t move,” I said, “Don’t take a laxative. I’ll get a doctor.”

“Raccoon,” he mumbled thickly.

“Raccoon?” I said, pausing in my flight.

“I want a raccoon coat,” he wailed.

I perceived that his trouble was not physical, but mental. “Why do you want a raccoon coat?”

“I should have known it,” he cried, pounding his temples. “I should have known they’d come back when the Charleston came back. Like a fool I spent all my money for textbooks, and now I can’t get a raccoon coat.”

“Can you mean,” I said incredulously, “that people are actually wearing raccoon coats again?”

“All the Big Men on Campus are wearing them. Where’ve you been?”

“In the library,” I said, naming a place not frequented by Big Men on Campus.

He leaped from the bed and paced the room. “I’ve got to have a raccoon coat,” he said passionately. “I’ve got to!”

“Petey, why? Look at it rationally. Raccoon coats are unsanitary. They shed. They smell bad. They weigh too much. They’re unsightly. They—”

“You don’t understand,” he interrupted impatiently. “It’s the thing to do. Don’t you want to be in the swim?”

“No,” I said truthfully.

“Well, I do,” he declared. “I’d give anything for a raccoon coat. Anything!”

My brain, that precision instrument, slipped into high gear. “Anything?” I asked, looking at him narrowly.

“Anything,” he affirmed in ringing tones.

I stroked my chin thoughtfully. It so happened that I knew where to get my hands on a raccoon coat. My father had had one in his undergraduate days; it lay now in a trunk in the attic back home. It also happened that Petey had something I wanted. He didn’t have it exactly, but at least he had first rights on it. I refer to his girl, Polly Espy.

I had long coveted Polly Espy. Let me emphasize that my desire for this young woman was not emotional in nature. She was, to be sure, a girl who excited the emotions, but I was not one to let my heart rule my head. I wanted Polly for a shrewdly calculated, entirely cerebral reason.

I was a freshman in law school. In a few years I would be out in practice. I was well aware of the importance of the right kind of wife in furthering a lawyer’s career. The successful lawyers I had observed were, almost without exception, married to beautiful, gracious, intelligent women. With one omission, Polly fitted these specifications perfectly.

Beautiful she was. She was not yet of pin-up proportions, but I felt that time would supply the lack. She already had the makings.

Gracious she was. By gracious I mean full of graces. She had an erectness of carriage, an ease of bearing, a poise that clearly indicated the best of breeding. At table her manners were exquisite. I had seen her at the Kozy Kampus Korner eating the specialty of the house—a sandwich that contained scraps of pot roast, gravy, chopped nuts, and a dipper of sauerkraut—without even getting her fingers moist.

Intelligent she was not. In fact, she veered in the opposite direction. But I believed that under my guidance she would smarten up. At any rate, it was worth a try. It is, after all, easier to make a beautiful dumb girl smart than to make an ugly smart girl beautiful.

“Petey,” I said, “are you in love with Polly Espy?”

“I think she’s a keen kid,” he replied, “but I don’t know if you’d call it love. Why?”

“Do you,” I asked, “have any kind of formal arrangement with her? I mean are you going steady or anything like that?”

“No. We see each other quite a bit, but we both have other dates. Why?”

“Is there,” I asked, “any other man for whom she has a particular fondness?”

“Not that I know of. Why?”

I nodded with satisfaction. “In other words, if you were out of the picture, the field would be open. Is that right?”

“I guess so. What are you getting at?”

“Nothing , nothing,” I said innocently, and took my suitcase out the closet.

“Where are you going?” asked Petey.

“Home for weekend.” I threw a few things into the bag.

“Listen,” he said, clutching my arm eagerly, “while you’re home, you couldn’t get some money from your old man, could you, and lend it to me so I can buy a raccoon coat?”

“I may do better than that,” I said with a mysterious wink and closed my bag and left.







“Look,” I said to Petey when I got back Monday morning. I threw open the suitcase and revealed the huge, hairy, gamy object that my father had worn in his Stutz Bearcat in 1925.

“Holy Toledo!” said Petey reverently. He plunged his hands into the raccoon coat and then his face. “Holy Toledo!” he repeated fifteen or twenty times.

“Would you like it?” I asked.

“Oh yes!” he cried, clutching the greasy pelt to him. Then a canny look came into his eyes. “What do you want for it?”

“Your girl.” I said, mincing no words.

“Polly?” he said in a horrified whisper. “You want Polly?”

“That’s right.”

He flung the coat from him. “Never,” he said stoutly.

I shrugged. “Okay. If you don’t want to be in the swim, I guess it’s your business.”

I sat down in a chair and pretended to read a book, but out of the corner of my eye I kept watching Petey. He was a torn man. First he looked at the coat with the expression of a waif at a bakery window. Then he turned away and set his jaw resolutely. Then he looked back at the coat, with even more longing in his face. Then he turned away, but with not so much resolution this time. Back and forth his head swiveled, desire waxing, resolution waning. Finally he didn’t turn away at all; he just stood and stared with mad lust at the coat.

“It isn’t as though I was in love with Polly,” he said thickly. “Or going steady or anything like that.”

“That’s right,” I murmured.

“What’s Polly to me, or me to Polly?”

“Not a thing,” said I.

“It’s just been a casual kick—just a few laughs, that’s all.”

“Try on the coat,” said I.

He complied. The coat bunched high over his ears and dropped all the way down to his shoe tops. He looked like a mound of dead raccoons. “Fits fine,” he said happily.

I rose from my chair. “Is it a deal?” I asked, extending my hand.

He swallowed. “It’s a deal,” he said and shook my hand.







I had my first date with Polly the following evening. This was in the nature of a survey; I wanted to find out just how much work I had to do to get her mind up to the standard I required. I took her first to dinner. “Gee, that was a delish dinner,” she said as we left the restaurant. Then I took her to a movie. “Gee, that was a marvy movie,” she said as we left the theatre. And then I took her home. “Gee, I had a sensaysh time,” she said as she bade me good night.

I went back to my room with a heavy heart. I had gravely underestimated the size of my task. This girl’s lack of information was terrifying. Nor would it be enough merely to supply her with information. First she had to be taught to think. This loomed as a project of no small dimensions, and at first I was tempted to give her back to Petey. But then I got to thinking about her abundant physical charms and about the way she entered a room and the way she handled a knife and fork, and I decided to make an effort.

I went about it, as in all things, systematically. I gave her a course in logic. It happened that I, as a law student, was taking a course in logic myself, so I had all the facts at my fingertips. “Poll’,” I said to her when I picked her up on our next date, “tonight we are going over to the Knoll and talk.”

“Oo, terrif,” she replied. One thing I will say for this girl: you would go far to find another so agreeable.

We went to the Knoll, the campus trysting place, and we sat down under an old oak, and she looked at me expectantly. “What are we going to talk about?” she asked.

“Logic.”

She thought this over for a minute and decided she liked it. “Magnif,” she said.

“Logic,” I said, clearing my throat, “is the science of thinking. Before we can think correctly, we must first learn to recognize the common fallacies of logic. These we will take up tonight.”

“Wow-dow!” she cried, clapping her hands delightedly.

I winced, but went bravely on. “First let us examine the fallacy called Dicto Simpliciter.”

“By all means,” she urged, batting her lashes eagerly.

“Dicto Simpliciter means an argument based on an unqualified generalization. For example: Exercise is good. Therefore everybody should exercise.”

“I agree,” said Polly earnestly. “I mean exercise is wonderful. I mean it builds the body and everything.”

“Polly,” I said gently, “the argument is a fallacy. Exercise is good is an unqualified generalization. For instance, if you have heart disease, exercise is bad, not good. Many people are ordered by their doctors not to exercise. You must qualify the generalization. You must say exercise is usually good, or exercise is good for most people. Otherwise you have committed a Dicto Simpliciter. Do you see?”

“No,” she confessed. “But this is marvy. Do more! Do more!”

“It will be better if you stop tugging at my sleeve,” I told her, and when she desisted, I continued. “Next we take up a fallacy called Hasty Generalization. Listen carefully: You can’t speak French. Petey Bellows can’t speak French. I must therefore conclude that nobody at the University of Minnesota can speak French.”

“Really?” said Polly, amazed. “Nobody?”

I hid my exasperation. “Polly, it’s a fallacy. The generalization is reached too hastily. There are too few instances to support such a conclusion.”

“Know any more fallacies?” she asked breathlessly. “This is more fun than dancing even.”

I fought off a wave of despair. I was getting nowhere with this girl, absolutely nowhere. Still, I am nothing if not persistent. I continued. “Next comes Post Hoc. Listen to this: Let’s not take Bill on our picnic. Every time we take him out with us, it rains.”

“I know somebody just like that,” she exclaimed. “A girl back home—Eula Becker, her name is. It never fails. Every single time we take her on a picnic—”

“Polly,” I said sharply, “it’s a fallacy. Eula Becker doesn’t cause the rain. She has no connection with the rain. You are guilty of Post Hoc if you blame Eula Becker.”

“I’ll never do it again,” she promised contritely. “Are you mad at me?”

I sighed. “No, Polly, I’m not mad.”

“Then tell me some more fallacies.”

“All right. Let’s try Contradictory Premises.”

“Yes, let’s,” she chirped, blinking her eyes happily.

I frowned, but plunged ahead. “Here’s an example of Contradictory Premises: If God can do anything, can He make a stone so heavy that He won’t be able to lift it?”

“Of course,” she replied promptly.

“But if He can do anything, He can lift the stone,” I pointed out.

“Yeah,” she said thoughtfully. “Well, then I guess He can’t make the stone.”

“But He can do anything,” I reminded her.

She scratched her pretty, empty head. “I’m all confused,” she admitted.

“Of course you are. Because when the premises of an argument contradict each other, there can be no argument. If there is an irresistible force, there can be no immovable object. If there is an immovable object, there can be no irresistible force. Get it?”

“Tell me more of this keen stuff,” she said eagerly.

I consulted my watch. “I think we’d better call it a night. I’ll take you home now, and you go over all the things you’ve learned. We’ll have another session tomorrow night.”

I deposited her at the girls’ dormitory, where she assured me that she had had a perfectly terrif evening, and I went glumly home to my room. Petey lay snoring in his bed, the raccoon coat huddled like a great hairy beast at his feet. For a moment I considered waking him and telling him that he could have his girl back. It seemed clear that my project was doomed to failure. The girl simply had a logic-proof head.

But then I reconsidered. I had wasted one evening; I might as well waste another. Who knew? Maybe somewhere in the extinct crater of her mind a few members still smoldered. Maybe somehow I could fan them into flame. Admittedly it was not a prospect fraught with hope, but I decided to give it one more try.







Seated under the oak the next evening I said, “Our first fallacy tonight is called Ad Misericordiam.”

She quivered with delight.

“Listen closely,” I said. “A man applies for a job. When the boss asks him what his qualifications are, he replies that he has a wife and six children at home, the wife is a helpless cripple, the children have nothing to eat, no clothes to wear, no shoes on their feet, there are no beds in the house, no coal in the cellar, and winter is coming.”

A tear rolled down each of Polly’s pink cheeks. “Oh, this is awful, awful,” she sobbed.

“Yes, it’s awful,” I agreed, “but it’s no argument. The man never answered the boss’s question about his qualifications. Instead he appealed to the boss’s sympathy. He committed the fallacy of Ad Misericordiam. Do you understand?”

“Have you got a handkerchief?” she blubbered.

I handed her a handkerchief and tried to keep from screaming while she wiped her eyes. “Next,” I said in a carefully controlled tone, “we will discuss False Analogy. Here is an example: Students should be allowed to look at their textbooks during examinations. After all, surgeons have X-rays to guide them during an operation, lawyers have briefs to guide them during a trial, carpenters have blueprints to guide them when they are building a house. Why, then, shouldn’t students be allowed to look at their textbooks during an examination?”

“There now,” she said enthusiastically, “is the most marvy idea I’ve heard in years.”

“Polly,” I said testily, “the argument is all wrong. Doctors, lawyers, and carpenters aren’t taking a test to see how much they have learned, but students are. The situations are altogether different, and you can’t make an analogy between them.”

“I still think it’s a good idea,” said Polly.

“Nuts,” I muttered. Doggedly I pressed on. “Next we’ll try Hypothesis Contrary to Fact.”

“Sounds yummy,” was Polly’s reaction.

“Listen: If Madame Curie had not happened to leave a photographic plate in a drawer with a chunk of pitchblende, the world today would not know about radium.”

“True, true,” said Polly, nodding her head “Did you see the movie? Oh, it just knocked me out. That Walter Pidgeon is so dreamy. I mean he fractures me.”

“If you can forget Mr. Pidgeon for a moment,” I said coldly, “I would like to point out that statement is a fallacy. Maybe Madame Curie would have discovered radium at some later date. Maybe somebody else would have discovered it. Maybe any number of things would have happened. You can’t start with a hypothesis that is not true and then draw any supportable conclusions from it.”

“They ought to put Walter Pidgeon in more pictures,” said Polly, “I hardly ever see him any more.”

One more chance, I decided. But just one more. There is a limit to what flesh and blood can bear. “The next fallacy is called Poisoning the Well.”

“How cute!” she gurgled.

“Two men are having a debate. The first one gets up and says, ‘My opponent is a notorious liar. You can’t believe a word that he is going to say.’ ... Now, Polly, think. Think hard. What’s wrong?”

I watched her closely as she knit her creamy brow in concentration. Suddenly a glimmer of intelligence—the first I had seen—came into her eyes. “It’s not fair,” she said with indignation. “It’s not a bit fair. What chance has the second man got if the first man calls him a liar before he even begins talking?”

“Right!” I cried exultantly. “One hundred per cent right. It’s not fair. The first man has poisoned the well before anybody could drink from it. He has hamstrung his opponent before he could even start ... Polly, I’m proud of you.”

“Pshaws,” she murmured, blushing with pleasure.

“You see, my dear, these things aren’t so hard. All you have to do is concentrate. Think—examine—evaluate. Come now, let’s review everything we have learned.”

“Fire away,” she said with an airy wave of her hand.

Heartened by the knowledge that Polly was not altogether a cretin, I began a long, patient review of all I had told her. Over and over and over again I cited instances, pointed out flaws, kept hammering away without letup. It was like digging a tunnel. At first, everything was work, sweat, and darkness. I had no idea when I would reach the light, or even if I would. But I persisted. I pounded and clawed and scraped, and finally I was rewarded. I saw a chink of light. And then the chink got bigger and the sun came pouring in and all was bright.

Five grueling nights with this took, but it was worth it. I had made a logician out of Polly; I had taught her to think. My job was done. She was worthy of me, at last. She was a fit wife for me, a proper hostess for my many mansions, a suitable mother for my well-heeled children.

It must not be thought that I was without love for this girl. Quite the contrary. Just as Pygmalion loved the perfect woman he had fashioned, so I loved mine. I decided to acquaint her with my feelings at our very next meeting. The time had come to change our relationship from academic to romantic.

“Polly,” I said when next we sat beneath our oak, “tonight we will not discuss fallacies.”

“Aw, gee,” she said, disappointed.

“My dear,” I said, favoring her with a smile, “we have now spent five evenings together. We have gotten along splendidly. It is clear that we are well matched.”

“Hasty Generalization,” said Polly brightly.

“I beg your pardon,” said I.

“Hasty Generalization,” she repeated. “How can you say that we are well matched on the basis of only five dates?”

I chuckled with amusement. The dear child had learned her lessons well. “My dear,” I said, patting her hand in a tolerant manner, “five dates is plenty. After all, you don’t have to eat a whole cake to know that it’s good.”

“False Analogy,” said Polly promptly. “I’m not a cake. I’m a girl.”

I chuckled with somewhat less amusement. The dear child had learned her lessons perhaps too well. I decided to change tactics. Obviously the best approach was a simple, strong, direct declaration of love. I paused for a moment while my massive brain chose the proper word. Then I began:

“Polly, I love you. You are the whole world to me, the moon and the stars and the constellations of outer space. Please, my darling, say that you will go steady with me, for if you will not, life will be meaningless. I will languish. I will refuse my meals. I will wander the face of the earth, a shambling, hollow-eyed hulk.”

There, I thought, folding my arms, that ought to do it.

“Ad Misericordiam,” said Polly.

I ground my teeth. I was not Pygmalion; I was Frankenstein, and my monster had me by the throat. Frantically I fought back the tide of panic surging through me; at all costs I had to keep cool.

“Well, Polly,” I said, forcing a smile, “you certainly have learned your fallacies.”

“You’re darn right,” she said with a vigorous nod.

“And who taught them to you, Polly?”

“You did.”

“That’s right. So you do owe me something, don’t you, my dear? If I hadn’t come along you never would have learned about fallacies.”

“Hypothesis Contrary to Fact,” she said instantly.

I dashed perspiration from my brow. “Polly,” I croaked, “you mustn’t take all these things so literally. I mean this is just classroom stuff. You know that the things you learn in school don’t have anything to do with life.”

“Dicto Simpliciter,” she said, wagging her finger at me playfully.

That did it. I leaped to my feet, bellowing like a bull. “Will you or will you not go steady with me?”

“I will not,” she replied.

“Why not?” I demanded.

“Because this afternoon I promised Petey Bellows that I would go steady with him.”

I reeled back, overcome with the infamy of it. After he promised, after he made a deal, after he shook my hand! “The rat!” I shrieked, kicking up great chunks of turf. “You can’t go with him, Polly. He’s a liar. He’s a cheat. He’s a rat.”

“Poisoning the Well ,” said Polly, “and stop shouting. I think shouting must be a fallacy too.”

With an immense effort of will, I modulated my voice. “All right,” I said. “You’re a logician. Let’s look at this thing logically. How could you choose Petey Bellows over me? Look at me—a brilliant student, a tremendous intellectual, a man with an assured future. Look at Petey—a knothead, a jitterbug, a guy who’ll never know where his next meal is coming from. Can you give me one logical reason why you should go steady with Petey Bellows?”

“I certainly can,” declared Polly. “He’s got a raccoon coat.”

A Time for Everything (Ecclesiastes 3)

Ecclesiastes 3
New International Version (NIV)

A Time for Everything

 1 There is a time for everything,

   and a season for every activity under the heavens:

 2 a time to be born and a time to die,

   a time to plant and a time to uproot,

  3 a time to kill and a time to heal,

   a time to tear down and a time to build,

 4 a time to weep...

and a time to laugh, 

   a time to mourn and a time to dance,

 5 a time to scatter stones and a time to gather them,

   a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,

 6 a time to search and a time to give up,

   a time to keep and a time to throw away,

 7 a time to tear and a time to mend,

    a time to be silent and a time to speak,

  8 a time to love and a time to hate,

    a time for war and a time for peace.

 9 What do workers gain from their toil? 10 I have seen the burden God has laid on the human race. 11 He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet[a] no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. 12 I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. 13 That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God. 14 I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it. God does it so that people will fear him.

 15 Whatever is has already been,
   and what will be has been before;
   and God will call the past to account.[b]

 16 And I saw something else under the sun:

   In the place of judgment—wickedness was there,
   in the place of justice—wickedness was there.

 17 I said to myself,

   “God will bring into judgment
   both the righteous and the wicked,
for there will be a time for every activity,
   a time to judge every deed.”

 18 I also said to myself, “As for humans, God tests them so that they may see that they are like the animals. 19 Surely the fate of human beings is like that of the animals; the same fate awaits them both: As one dies, so dies the other. All have the same breath[c]; humans have no advantage over animals. Everything is meaningless. 20 All go to the same place; all come from dust, and to dust all return. 21 Who knows if the human spirit rises upward and if the spirit of the animal goes down into the earth?”

 22 So I saw that there is nothing better for a person than to enjoy their work, because that is their lot. For who can bring them to see what will happen after them?

The Dummy

Since my situation is intolerable, I have decided to take steps to
resolve it. So I have constructed a lifelike dummy made of various brands
of Japanese plastic simulating flesh, hair, nails and so forth. An electronics
engineer of my acquaintance, for a sizable fee, built the interior
mechanism of the dummy: it will be able to talk, eat, work and,walk,. I
hired an important artist of the old realistic school to paint the features; it
took twelve sittings to make a face that perfectly resembles mine. My
broad nose is there, my brown hair, the lines of each side of my mouth.
Even I could not tell the dummy and myself apart, were it not that from my
peculiar vantage point it is quite obvious that he is he and that I am I.
What remains is to install the dummy in the center of my life. He will
go to work instead of me, and receive the approval and censure of my
boss. He will bow and scrape and be diligent. All I require of him is that he
bring me the check every other Wednesday; I will give him carfare and
money for his lunches, but no more. I’ll make out the checks for the rent
and the utilities, and pocket the rest myself. The dummy will also be the
one who is married to my wife. He will watch television with her every
evening, and eat her wholesome dinners. (My wife who also works, pays
the grocery bills out of her salary.) I will also assign the dummy Monday
night bowling with the team from the office, the visit to my mother on
Friday night, reading the newspaper each morning, and perhaps buying
my clothes (two sets – one for him, one for me). Other tasks I will assign
as they come up, as I wish to divest myself of them. I want to keep for
myself only what gives me pleasure.
An ambitious enterprise, you say? But why not? The problems of
the world are only truly solved in two ways; by extinction or by duplication.
Former ages had only the first choice. But I see no reason not to take
advantage of the marvels of modern technology for personal liberation. I
have a choice. And, I have decided to duplicate myself.
On a fine Monday morning I wind the dummy up and set him loose,
after making sure he knows what to do – that is, he knows just how I
would behave in any familiar situation. The alarm goes off. He rolls over
and pokes my wife, who wearily gets out of the double bed and turns off
the alarm. She puts on her slippers and robe, then limps, stiff-ankled, into
the bathroom. When she comes back and heads for the kitchen, he gets
up and takes her place in the bathroom. He, gargles, shaves, comes back
into the bedroom and takes his clothes out of the dresser and closet,
returns to the bathroom, dresses then joins my wife in the kitchen. My
children are already at the table. The younger girl did not finish her
homework last night, and my wife is writing a note of excuse to the
teacher. The older girl sits haughtily munching the cold toast. “Morning,
Daddy,” they say to the dummy. The dummy pecks them on the cheek in
return. Breakfast passes without any incident, I observe with relief. The
children leave. They haven’t noticed a thing. I begin to feel sure that my
plan is going to work and realize, by my excitement, that I had greatly
feared it would not – that there would be some mechanical failure, that the
dummy would not recognize his cues. But no, everything is going right,
even the way he folds The New York Times is correct; he reproduces
exactly the amount of time I spent on the foreign news, and it takes him
just as long to read the sports pages as it took me.
The dummy speaks to my wife, he steps out the door, he enters the
elevator. (Do machines recognize each other, I wonder.) Into the lobby,
out the door, on the street walking at a moderate pace – the dummy has
left on time, he does not have to worry – into the subway he goes. Steady,
calm, clean (I cleaned him myself Sunday night), untroubled, he goes
about his appointed tasks. He will be happy as long as I am satisfied with
him. And so I will be, whatever he does, as long as others are satisfied
with him.
Nobody notices anything different in the office, either. The secretary
says hello, he smiles back as I always do; then he walks to my cubicle,
hangs up his coat, and sits at my desk. The secretary brings him my mail.
After reading it, he calls for some dictation. Next, there is a pile of more
unfinished business from last Friday to attend to. Phone calls are made;
an appointment is set up for lunch with a client from out of town. There is
only one irregularity during the morning; I usually smoke between ten and
fifteen. But I set this down due to the fact that he is new at his work and
has not had the time to accumulate the tensions that I feel after working
six years in this office. It occurs to me that he will probably not have two
martinis – as I always do – during the lunch, but only one, and I am right.
But these are mere details, and will be to the dummy’s credit if anyone
notices them, which I doubt. His behavior with the out-of-town client is
correct – perhaps a shade too deferential, but this, too, I put down to
inexperience. Thank God, no simple matter trips him up. His table
manners are as they should be. He does not pick at his food, but eats with
appetite. And he knows he should sign the check rather than pay with a
credit card; the firm has an account at this restaurant.
In the afternoon there is a sales conference. The vice president
explains a new promotional campaign for the Midwest. The dummy makes
suggestions. The boss nods. The dummy taps his pencil on the long
mahogany table and looks thoughtful. I notice he is chain-smoking. Could
he be feeling the pressure so soon? What a hard life I led! After less than
a day of it, even a dummy shows some wear and tear. The rest of the
afternoon passes without any incident. The dummy makes his way home
to my wife and children, eats my dinner appreciatively, plays Monopoly
with the children for an hour, watches a Western on TV with my wife,
bathes, makes himself a ham sandwich, and then retires. I do not know
what he dreams he has, but I hope they are restful and pleasant. If my
approval can give him an untroubled sleep, he has it. I am entirely pleased
with my creation.
The dummy has been on the job for several months. What can I
report a greater degree of proficiency? But that is impossible. He was fine
the first day. He could not be any more like me than he was at the very
beginning. He does not have to get better at his job but only stick at it
contentedly, unrebelliously, without mechanical failure. My wife is happy
with him – at least, no more unhappy than she was with me. My children
call him Daddy and ask him for their allowance. My fellow workers and my
boss continue to entrust him with my job.
Lately, though – just past week, really – I have noticed something
that worries me. It is the attention that the dummy pays to the next
secretary, Miss Love. (I hope it isn’t her name that aroused him
somewhere in the depths of that complex machinery; I imagine that
machines can be literal-minded.) A slight lingering at her desk when he
comes in the morning, a second’s pause, no more when she says hello;
whereas I – and he until recently –used to walk to that desk without
breaking stride. And he does seem to be dictating more letters. Could it be
from increased zeal on behalf of the firm? I remember how, the very first
day, he spoke up at the sales conference. Or could it be the desire to
detain Miss Love? Are those letters necessary? I could say he thinks so.
But then you never know what goes on behind that imperturbable
dummy’s face of his. I am afraid to ask him. Is it because I do not want to
know the worst? Or because I am afraid he will be angry at my violation of
his privacy? In any case, I have decided to wait until he tells me.
Then one day it comes – the news I had dreaded. At eight in the
morning the dummy corners me in the shower, where I have been spying
on him while he shaves, marvelling how he remembers to cut himself
every once in a while, as I do. He unburdens himself to me. I am
astonished at how much he is moved – astonished and a little envious. I
never dreamed a dummy could have so much feeling, that I would see a
dummy weep. I try to quiet him. I admonish him, and then I reprimand him.
It’s no use. His tears become sobs. He, or rather his passion, whose
mechanism I cannot fathom, begins to revolt me. I am also terrified my
wife and children will hear him, rush to the bathroom, and there find this
berserk creature who would be incapable of normal responses. (Might
they find both of us here in the bathroom? That, too, is possible.) I run the
shower, open both the sink faucets, and flush the toilet to drown out the
painful noises he is making! All this for love! All this for the love of Miss
Love! He has barely spoken to her, except in the way of business. And yet
he is madly, desperately in love. He wants to leave my wife. I explain to
him how impossible that is. First of all, he has duties and responsibilities.
He is the husband and father to my wife and children. They depend on
him; their lives would be smashed by his selfish act. And second, what
does he know about Miss Love? She is at least ten years younger than he
is, has given no particular sign of noticing him at all, and probably has a
nice boyfriend her own age whom she’s planning to marry.
The dummy refuses to listen. He is inconsolable. He will have Miss
Love or – here he makes a threatening gesture – he will destroy himself.
He will bang his head against the wall, or jump out of a window,
disassembling irrevocably his delicate machinery. I become really
alarmed. I see my marvelous scheme, which has left me so beautifully at
my leisure and in peace the last months, ruined….
Why, if only you knew how I have spent these last months, while
the dummy was administering my life. Without a care in the world, except
for occasional curiosity as to the fate of my dummy. I have slid to the
bottom of the world. I sleep anywhere now: in flophouses, on the subway
(which I only board very late at night), in alleys and doorways. I do not
bother to collect my paycheck from the dummy anymore, because there is
nothing I want to buy. Only rarely do I shave. My clothes are torn and
stained.
Does this sound very dreary to you? It is not, it is not. Of course,
when the dummy first relieved me of my own life, I had grandiose plan for
living the lives of others. I wanted to be an Arctic explorer, a concert
pianist, a great courtesan, a world statesman. I tried being Alexander the
Great, then Mozart, then Bismarck, then Greta Garbo, then Elvis Presley –
in my imagination, of course. I imagined that, being none of these people
for long, I could have only their pleasure, none of their pain; for I could
escape, transform myself, whenever I wanted. But the experiment failed,
for lack of interest, from exhaustion, call it what you will. I discovered that I
am tired of being a person. Not just tired of being the person I was, but
any person at all. I like watching people, but I do not like talking to them,
dealing with them, or offending them. I do not even like talking to the
dummy. I am tired. I would like to be a mountain, a tree, a stone. If I am to
continue as a person, the life of the solitary derelict is the only one
tolerable. So you will see that it is quite out of the question that is should
allow the dummy to destroy himself, and have to take his place and live
my old life again.

-taken from I, etcetera, by Susan Sontag, Farrar,
Straus, and Giroux, 1988, Toronto, Canada.

The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare

"If you prick us, do we not bleed?

If you tickle us, do we not laugh?

If you poison us, do we not die?

And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?"

The Merchant of Venice

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Title page of the first quarto for the Merchant of Venice (1600)
Title page of the first quarto of Merchant of Venice (1600)
Written by     William Shakespeare
Characters    

Antonio
Bassanio
Gratiano
Solanio, Salarino, Salerio
Lorenzo
Portia
Nerissa
Balthazar
Stephano
Shylock
Tubal
Jessica
Lancelot Gobbo
Old Gobbo
Leonardo
Duke of Venice
Prince of Morocco
Prince of Aragon
Magnificoes of Venice
Officers of the Court of Justice
Gaoler
Servants
Original language     English
Setting     Venice, Italy

The Merchant of Venice is a tragic comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Though classified as a comedy in the First Folio and sharing certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps most remembered for its dramatic scenes, and is best known for Shylock and the famous 'Hath not a Jew eyes' speech. Also notable is Portia's speech about the 'quality of mercy'.

The title character is the merchant Antonio, not the Jewish moneylender Shylock, who is the play's most prominent and most famous character. This is made explicit by the title page of the first quarto: The moſt excellent Hiſtorie of the Merchant of Venice. With the extreame crueltie of Shylock the Iewe towards the ſayd Merchant, in cutting a iuſt pound of his fleſh: and the obtayning of Portia by the choyſe of three cheſts.

Characters

Antonio – a merchant of Venice
Bassanio – Antonio's friend, in love with Portia; suitor likewise to her
Gratiano, Solanio, Salarino, Salerio – friends of Antonio and Bassanio
Lorenzo – friend of Antonio and Bassanio, in love with Jessica
Portia – a rich heiress
Nerissa – Portia's waiting maid
Balthazar – Portia's disguise as a lawyer
Stephano – Nerissa's disguise as 'Balthazar's law clerk.
Shylock– a rich Jew, moneylender, father of Jessica
Tubal – a Jew; Shylock's friend
Jessica – daughter of Shylock, in love with Lorenzo
Launcelot Gobbo – a foolish man in the service of Shylock
Old Gobbo – father of Lancelot
Leonardo – servant to Bassanio
Duke of Venice – Venetian authority who presides over the case of Shylock's bond
Prince of Morocco – suitor to Portia
Prince of Aragon – suitor to Portia
Magnificoes of Venice, officers of the Court of Justice, Gaoler, servants to Portia, and other Attendants

Synopsis

In the 16th century, the city of Venice in Italy was one of the richest of the world. Among the wealthiest of its merchants was Antonio. Among the Christian community, he was known as a kind and generous person. Bassanio, a young Venetian, of noble rank but having squandered his estate, wishes to travel to Belmont to win the beautiful and wealthy heiress Portia. He approaches his friend Antonio, who has previously and repeatedly bailed him out, for three thousand ducats needed to subsidise his travelling expenditures as a suitor for three months. Antonio agrees, but he is cash-poor; his ships and merchandise are busy at sea. He promises to cover a bond if Bassanio can find a lender, so Bassanio turns to the Jewish moneylender Shylock and names Antonio as the loan’s guarantor.

Shylock hates Antonio because of his antisemitism, shown when he insulted and spat on Shylock for being a Jew. Additionally, Antonio undermines Shylock's moneylending business by lending money at zero interest. Shylock proposes a condition for the loan: if Antonio is unable to repay it at the specified date, he may take a pound of Antonio's flesh. Bassanio does not want Antonio to accept such a risky condition; Antonio is surprised by what he sees as the moneylender's generosity (no "usance" – interest – is asked for), and he signs the contract. With money at hand, Bassanio leaves for Belmont with his friend Gratiano, who has asked to accompany him. Gratiano is a likeable young man, but is often flippant, overly talkative, and tactless. Bassanio warns his companion to exercise self-control, and the two leave for Belmont and Portia.

Meanwhile in Belmont, Portia is awash with suitors. Her father has left a will stipulating each of her suitors must choose correctly from one of three caskets – one each of gold, silver, and lead. If he chooses the right casket, he gets Portia; if he loses, he must go away and never trouble her or any other woman again with a proposal of marriage. The first suitor, the luxury- and money-obsessed Prince of Morocco, reasons to choose the gold casket, because lead proclaims "Choose me and risk hazard", and he has no wish to risk everything for lead, and the silver's "Choose me and get what you deserve" sounds like an invitation to be tortured, but "Choose me and get what most men desire" all but spells it out that he that chooses gold will get Portia, as what all men desire is Portia. Inside the casket are a few gold coins and a skull with a scroll containing the famous verse All that glisters is not gold / Often have you heard that told / Many a man his life hath sold / But my outside to behold / Gilded tombs do worms enfold / Had you been as wise as bold, / Young in limbs, in judgment old / Your answer had not been inscroll'd: / Fare you well; your suit is cold.

The second suitor is the conceited Prince of Aragon. He decides not to choose lead, because it is so common, and will not choose gold because he will then get what many men desire and wants to be distinguished from the barbarous multitudes. He decides to choose silver, because the silver casket proclaims "Choose Me And Get What You Deserve", which he imagines must be something great, because he egotistically imagines himself as great. Inside the casket is the picture of a court jester's head on a baton and remarks "What's here? the portrait of a blinking idiot... / Did I deserve no more than a fool's head?"[1] The scroll reads: Some there be that shadows kiss; / Such have but a shadow's bliss: / ...Take what wife you will to bed, / I will ever be your head – meaning that he was foolish to imagine that a pompous man like him could ever be a fit husband for Portia, and that he was always a fool, he always will be a fool, and the fact that he chose the silver casket is mere proof that he is a fool.

The last suitor is Bassanio, who chooses the lead casket. As he is considering his choice of caskets, members of Portia's household sing a song which says that "fancy" (not true love) is "engend'red in the eyes, / With gazing fed."[2] Seemingly in response to this little bit of philosophy, Bassanio remarks, "So may the outward shows be least themselves. / The world is still deceived with ornament." And at the end of the same speech, just before choosing the least valuable, and least showy metal, Bassanio says, "Thy paleness moves me more than eloquence; / And here choose I; joy be the consequence!" He has made the right choice.

At Venice, Antonio's ships are reported lost at sea. This leaves him unable to satisfy the bond (in financial language, insolvent). Shylock is even more determined to exact revenge from Christians after his daughter Jessica flees his home to convert to Christianity and elope with Lorenzo, taking a substantial amount of Shylock's wealth with her, as well as a turquoise ring which was a gift to Shylock from his late wife, Leah. Shylock has Antonio arrested and brought before court.

At Belmont, Portia and Bassanio have just been married, as have Gratiano and Portia's handmaid Nerissa. Bassanio receives a letter telling him that Antonio has been unable to return the loan taken from Shylock. Shocked, Bassanio and Gratiano leave for Venice immediately, with money from Portia, to save Antonio's life by offering the money to Shylock. Unknown to Bassanio and Gratiano, Portia has sent her servant, Balthazar, to seek the counsel of Portia's cousin, Bellario, a lawyer, at Padua. The climax of the play comes in the court of the Duke of Venice. Shylock refuses Bassanio's offer of 6,000 ducats, twice the amount of the loan. He demands his pound of flesh from Antonio. The Duke, wishing to save Antonio but unwilling to set a dangerous legal precedent of nullifying a contract, refers the case to a visitor who introduces himself as Balthazar, a young male "doctor of the law", bearing a letter of recommendation to the Duke from the learned lawyer Bellario. The "doctor" is actually Portia in disguise, and the "law clerk" who accompanies her is actually Nerissa, also in disguise. Portia, as "Balthazar", asks Shylock to show mercy in a famous speech ("The quality of mercy is not strain'd, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest: It blesseth him that gives and him that takes."—IV,i,185, arguing for debt relief), but Shylock refuses. Thus the court must allow Shylock to extract the pound of flesh. Shylock tells Antonio to "prepare". At that very moment, Portia points out a flaw in the contract (see quibble): the bond only allows Shylock to remove the flesh, not the "blood", of Antonio. Thus, if Shylock were to shed any drop of Antonio's blood, his "lands and goods" would be forfeited under Venetian laws. Further damning Shylock's case, she tells him that he must cut precisely one pound of flesh, no more, no less; she advises him that "if the scale do turn /But in the estimation of a hair, /Thou diest and all thy goods are confiscate."

Defeated, Shylock concedes to accepting Bassanio's offer of money for the defaulted bond, first his offer to pay "the bond thrice," which Portia rebuffs, telling him to take his bond, and then merely the principal, which Portia also prevents him from doing on the ground that he has already refused it "in the open court." She then cites a law under which Shylock, as a Jew and therefore an "alien", having attempted to take the life of a citizen, has forfeited his property, half to the government and half to Antonio, leaving his life at the mercy of the Duke. The Duke immediately pardons Shylock's life. Antonio asks for his share "in use" (that is, reserving the principal amount while taking only the income) until Shylock's death, when the principal will be given to Lorenzo and Jessica. At Antonio's request, the Duke grants remission of the state's half of forfeiture, but in return, Shylock is forced to convert to Christianity and to make a will (or "deed of gift") bequeathing his entire estate to Lorenzo and Jessica (IV,i).

Bassanio does not recognise his disguised wife, but offers to give a present to the supposed lawyer. First she declines, but after he insists, Portia requests his ring and Antonio's gloves. Antonio parts with his gloves without a second thought, but Bassanio gives the ring only after much persuasion from Antonio, as earlier in the play he promised his wife never to lose, sell or give it. Nerissa, as the lawyer's clerk, also succeeds in likewise retrieving her ring from Gratiano, who does not see through her disguise.

At Belmont, Portia and Nerissa taunt and pretend to accuse their husbands before revealing they were really the lawyer and his clerk in disguise (V). After all the other characters make amends, Antonio learns from Portia that three of his ships were not stranded and have returned safely after all.
[edit] Date and text

The date of composition for The Merchant of Venice is believed to be between 1596 and 1598. The play was mentioned by Francis Meres in 1598, so it must have been familiar on the stage by that date, and the title page of the first edition in 1600 states that it had been performed "divers times" by that date. Salerio's reference to his ship the "Andrew" (I,i,27) is thought to be an allusion to the Spanish ship St. Andrew captured by the English at Cadiz in 1596. A date of 1596–97 is considered consistent with the play's style.

The play was entered in the Register of the Stationers Company, the method at that time of obtaining copyright for a new play, by James Roberts on 22 July 1598 under the title The Merchant of Venice, otherwise called The Jew of Venice. On 28 October 1600 Roberts transferred his right to the play to the stationer Thomas Hayes; Hayes published the first quarto before the end of the year. It was printed again in a pirated edition in 1619, as part of William Jaggard's so-called False Folio. (Afterward, Thomas Hayes' son and heir Laurence Hayes asked for and was granted a confirmation of his right to the play, on 8 July 1619.) The 1600 edition is generally regarded as being accurate and reliable, and is the basis of the text published in the 1623 First Folio, which adds a number of stage directions, mainly musical cues.[3]

Sources

The forfeit of a merchant's deadly bond after standing surety for a friend's loan was a common tale in England in the late sixteenth century.[4] The test of the suitors at Belmont, the merchant's rescue from the "pound of flesh" penalty by his friend's new wife disguised as a lawyer and her demand for the betrothal ring in payment are all present in the 14th century tale Il Pecorone by Giovanni Fiorentino, which was published in Milan in 1558.[5] Elements of the trial scene are also found in The Orator by Alexandre Sylvane, published in translation in 1596.[4]

Shylock on stage

Jewish actor Jacob Adler and others report that the tradition of playing Shylock sympathetically began in the first half of the 19th century with Edmund Kean, and that previously the role had been played "by a comedian as a repulsive clown or, alternatively, as a monster of unrelieved evil." Kean's Shylock established his reputation as an actor.

From Kean's time forward, all of the actors who have famously played the role, with the exception of Edwin Booth, who played Shylock as a simple villain, have chosen a sympathetic approach to the character; even Booth's father, Junius Brutus Booth, played the role sympathetically. Henry Irving's portrayal of an aristocratic, proud Shylock (first seen at the Lyceum in 1879, with Portia played by Ellen Terry) has been called "the summit of his career".[11] Jacob Adler was the most notable of the early 20th century: Adler played the role in Yiddish-language translation, first in Manhattan's Lower East Side, and later on Broadway, where, to great acclaim, he performed the role in Yiddish in an otherwise English-language production.[12]

Kean and Irving presented a Shylock justified in wanting his revenge; Adler's Shylock evolved over the years he played the role, first as a stock Shakespearean villain, then as a man whose better nature was overcome by a desire for revenge, and finally as a man who operated not from revenge but from pride. In a 1902 interview with Theater magazine, Adler pointed out that Shylock is a wealthy man, "rich enough to forgo the interest on three thousand ducats" and that Antonio is "far from the chivalrous gentleman he is made to appear. He has insulted the Jew and spat on him, yet he comes with hypocritical politeness to borrow money of him." Shylock's fatal flaw is to depend on the law, but "would he not walk out of that courtroom head erect, the very apotheosis of defiant hatred and scorn?"

Some modern productions take further pains to show how Shylock's thirst for vengeance has some justification. For instance, in the 2004 film adaptation directed by Michael Radford and starring Al Pacino as Shylock, the film begins with text and a montage of how the Jewish community is cruelly abused by the bigoted Christian population of the city. One of the last shots of the film also brings attention to the fact that, as a convert, Shylock would have been cast out of the Jewish community in Venice, no longer allowed to live in the ghetto, and would still not be accepted by the Christians, as they might feel that Shylock has not changed.


The play is frequently staged today, but is potentially troubling to modern audiences due to its central themes, which can easily appear antisemitic. Critics today still continue to argue over the play's stance on antisemitism.

English society in the Elizabethan era has been described as antisemitic. English Jews had been expelled under Edward I in 1290 and were not permitted to return until 1656 under the rule of Oliver Cromwell. Jews were often presented on the Elizabethan stage in hideous caricature, with hooked noses and bright red wigs, and were usually depicted as avaricious usurers; an example is Christopher Marlowe's play The Jew of Malta, which features a comically wicked Jewish villain called Barabas. They were usually characterised as evil, deceitful and greedy.

During the 17th century in Venice and in some other places, Jews were required to wear a red hat at all times in public to make sure that they were easily identified. If they did not comply with this rule they could face the death penalty. Jews also had to live in a ghetto protected by Christians, supposedly for their own safety. The Jews were expected to pay their guards.
In the 2004 film, Antonio is seen to spit on Shylock in the beginning, in accordance with Shylock's line "you spit on my Jewish gaberdine", so that Shylock's hate for Antonio grows out of the antisemitic treatment he receives.

Readers may see Shakespeare's play as a continuation of this antisemitic tradition. The title page of the Quarto indicates that the play was sometimes known as The Jew of Venice in its day, which suggests that it was seen as similar to Marlowe's The Jew of Malta. One interpretation of the play's structure is that Shakespeare meant to contrast the mercy of the main Christian characters with the vengefulness of a Jew, who lacks the religious grace to comprehend mercy. Similarly, it is possible that Shakespeare meant Shylock's forced conversion to Christianity to be a "happy ending" for the character, as, to a Christian audience, it saves his soul and allows him to enter Heaven.

Hyam Maccoby argues that the play is based on medieval morality plays in which the Virgin Mary (here represented by Portia) argues for the forgiveness of human souls, as against the implacable accusations of the Devil (Shylock). On this reading, the Merchant is notably more antisemitic than The Jew of Malta, in which there are no good Christian characters and the Jewish villain seems to be regarded by the author with a certain covert sympathy.

Many modern readers and theatregoers have read the play as a plea for tolerance, noting that Shylock is a sympathetic character. They cite as evidence that Shylock's 'trial' at the end of the play is a mockery of justice, with Portia acting as a judge when she has no right to do so. The characters who berated Shylock for dishonesty resort to trickery in order to win. In addition, Shakespeare gives Shylock one of his most eloquent speeches:

    Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs,
    dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with
    the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject
    to the same diseases, heal'd by the same means,
    warm'd and cool'd by the same winter and summer
    as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed?
    If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us,
    do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?
    If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that.
    If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility?
    Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his
    sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge.
    The villainy you teach me, I will execute,
    and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.
    (Act III, scene I)

Regardless of what Shakespeare's own intentions may have been, the play has been made use of by antisemites throughout the play's history. One must note that the end of the title in the 1619 edition "With the Extreme Cruelty of Shylock the Jew..." must aptly describe how Shylock was viewed by the English public. The Nazis used the usurious Shylock for their propaganda. Shortly after Kristallnacht in 1938, "The Merchant of Venice" was broadcast for propagandistic ends over the German airwaves. Productions of the play followed in Lübeck (1938), Berlin (1940), and elsewhere within the Nazi Territory.

The depiction of Jews in literature throughout the centuries bears the close imprint of Shylock. With slight variations much of English literature up until the 20th century depicts the Jew as "a monied, cruel, lecherous, avaricious outsider tolerated only because of his golden hoard".

It is difficult to know whether the sympathetic reading of Shylock is entirely due to changing sensibilities among readers, or whether Shakespeare, a writer who created complex, multi-faceted characters, deliberately intended this reading.

One of the reasons for this interpretation is that Shylock's painful status in Venetian society is emphasised. To some critics, Shylock's celebrated "Hath not a Jew eyes" speech (see above) redeems him and even makes him into something of a tragic figure. In the speech, Shylock argues that he is no different from the Christian characters. Detractors note that Shylock ends the speech with a tone of revenge: "if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?" Those who see the speech as sympathetic point out that Shylock says he learned the desire for revenge from the Christian characters: "If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge. The villainy you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction."

Even if Shakespeare did not intend the play to be read this way, the fact that it retains its power on stage for audiences who may perceive its central conflicts in radically different terms is an illustration of the subtlety of Shakespeare's characterisations.

In the trial Shylock represents the supposedly Jewish desire for justice (Old Testament) versus the Christian one for mercy (New Testament). The Christians in the courtroom urge mercy. Shylock is not able because he does not find love, but hate. The Christians in the courtroom urge Shylock to love his enemies, although they themselves failed in the past.
Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree as Shylock, painted by Charles Buchel (1895–1935).

Sexuality in the play
Antonio, Bassanio

Antonio's unexplained depression—"In sooth I know not why I am so sad"—and utter devotion to Bassanio has led some critics to theorise that he is suffering from unrequited love for Bassanio and is depressed because Bassanio is coming to an age where he will marry a woman. In his plays and poetry Shakespeare often depicted strong male bonds of varying homosociality, which has led some critics to infer that Bassanio returns Antonio's affections despite his obligation to marry:

    ANTONIO: Commend me to your honourable wife:
    Tell her the process of Antonio's end,
    Say how I lov'd you, speak me fair in death;
    And, when the tale is told, bid her be judge
    Whether Bassanio had not once a love.
    BASSANIO: But life itself, my wife, and all the world
    Are not with me esteemed above thy life;
    I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all
    Here to this devil, to deliver you. (IV,i)

In his essay "Brothers and Others", published in The Dyer's Hand, W. H. Auden describes Antonio as "a man whose emotional life, though his conduct may be chaste, is concentrated upon a member of his own sex." Antonio's feelings for Bassanio are likened to a couplet from Shakespeare's Sonnets: "But since she pricked thee out for women's pleasure,/ Mine be thy love, and my love's use their treasure." Antonio, says Auden, embodies the words on Portia's leaden casket: "Who chooseth me, must give and hazard all he hath." Antonio has taken this potentially fatal turn because he despairs, not only over the loss of Bassanio in marriage, but also because Bassanio cannot requite what Antonio feels for him. Antonio's frustrated devotion is a form of idolatry: the right to live is yielded for the sake of the loved one. There is one other such idolator in the play: Shylock himself. "Shylock, however unintentionally, did, in fact, hazard all for the sake of destroying the enemy he hated; and Antonio, however unthinkingly he signed the bond, hazarded all to secure the happiness of the man he loved." Both Antonio and Shylock, agreeing to put Antonio's life at a forfeit, stand outside the normal bounds of society. There was, states Auden, a traditional "association of sodomy with usury", reaching back at least as far as Dante, with which Shakespeare was likely familiar. (Auden sees the theme of usury in the play as a comment on human relations in a mercantile society.)

Other interpreters of the play regard Auden's conception of Antonio's sexual desire for Bassanio as questionable. Michael Radford, director of the 2004 film version starring Al Pacino, explained that although the film contains a scene where Antonio and Bassanio actually kiss, the friendship between the two is platonic, in line with the prevailing view of male friendship at the time. Jeremy Irons, in an interview, concurs with the director's view and states that he did not "play Antonio as gay". Joseph Fiennes, however, who plays Bassanio, encouraged a homoerotic interpretation and, in fact, surprised Irons with the kiss on set, which was filmed in one take. Fiennes defended his choice, saying "I would never invent something before doing my detective work in the text. If you look at the choice of language ... you'll read very sensuous language. That's the key for me in the relationship. The great thing about Shakespeare and why he's so difficult to pin down is his ambiguity. He's not saying they're gay or they're straight, he's leaving it up to his actors. I feel there has to be a great love between the two characters ... there's great attraction. I don't think they have slept together but that's for the audience to decide."

How Much Land Does a Man Need?

This is an 1886 short story about a man who, in his lust for land, forfeits everything. The question posed in the title is answered in the end - enough to bury himself.

How Much Land Does a Man Need?

by Leo Tolstoy

(Russian: Много ли человеку земли нужно?, Mnogo li cheloveku zemli nuzhno)

The protagonist of the story is a peasant named Pahóm, who at the beginning can be heard complaining that he does not own enough land to satisfy him. He states that "if I had plenty of land, I shouldn't fear the Devil himself!". Unbeknownst to him, Satan is present sitting behind the stove and listening. A short amount of time later, a landlady in the village decides to sell her estate, and the peasants of the village buy as much of that land as they can. Pahóm himself purchases some land, and by working off the extra land is able to repay his debts and live a more comfortable life. However, Pahóm then becomes very possessive of his land, and this causes arguments with his neighbours.Finally, he is introduced to the Bashkirs, and is told that they are simple-minded people who own a huge amount of land. Pahóm goes to them to take as much of their land for as low a price as he can negotiate. Their offer is very unusual: for a sum of one thousand rubles, Pahóm can walk around as large an area as he wants, starting at daybreak, marking his route with a spade along the way. If he reaches his starting point by sunset that day, the entire area of land his route encloses will be his, but if he does not reach his starting point he will lose his money and receive no land. He is delighted as he believes that he can cover a great distance and has chanced upon the bargain of a lifetime.

He stays out as late as possible, marking out land until just before the sun sets. Toward the end, he realizes he is far from the starting point and runs back as fast as he can to the waiting Bashkirs. He finally arrives at the starting point just as the sun sets. The Bashkirs cheer his good fortune, but exhausted from the run, Pahóm drops dead. His servant buries him in an ordinary grave only six feet long, thus ironically answering the question posed in the title of the story.

I Demand My Share

The essay, "I Demand My Share" is a powerful paradox about humanity's harsh reality: though man is created above all beasts, he remains a prisoner of his material wants. Although the author uses the pronoun "I", he is still speaking in behalf of the entire race of mankind - the race who labors and toils tirelessly and endlessly, oblivious of the true essence of life, held captive of materialism and wants. When he says "I demand my share", he is speaking as a human being, thus, he ultimately means "I, as a man, with all the other men in this society, demand my share”. By using the pronoun “I” instead of “We/They”, he is taking accountability of his words and convictions – yet, he is still speaking up in behalf of all and shares whatever benefits he might reap to the rest of humanity. This is a very powerful eye-opener. Everyone should read it. - Sherry

I Demand My Share
by Dr. Salvador P. Lopez

Few occasions lend themselves more easily to a mood of gentle philosophizing than the first few hours after pay day in the office. The feel of a pay envelope in the pocket seems to release the spring of quite reflection in the mind.



Not even death has power to startle so many stray reflections into life. Death challenges the mind and then smothers it with fear of the Unknown; money stirs the mind into asking questions and demanding appropriate answers.



What, it may be asked, has a pay envelope to do with the large question of human destiny? It has everything to do with it. Man it is true cannot leave by bread alone but neither can he live without it, and bread costs money. The bread and butter that I ate this morning thus becomes, by the simple process of reducing things to their elements, the cornerstone of a mansion of philosophy.



I like to think that I am as close to the hypothetical "average man" as it is possible to anyone to be. I have average wants and requirements. I like the good things in life. I love work, the work that best suits my abilities, less for material reward I get for it than for the pleasure of doing that which I know I can best perform.



I crave no of the luxuries that are dear to those accustomed to "conspicuous consumption." I despise meaningless luxury no less than severe asceticism. I believe that life is far too precious to be wasted on the expensive trifles with which the idle rich often burden day and night. But I believe also the fact of life is far too beautiful to be scared with the injuries of want and privation.



Every time I go out in the country and see men and women bent with toil in the fields form morn till night, I say to myself: Man is still very much of a brute, in the matter of securing a livelihood worse off than many a beast in the jungle. I need no other proof that human civilization is still primitive than the sight of a ricefield where poor ignorant peasants are hard at work to wrest a bare living out of the earth, and do little else besides.



Why must man, that superior being created in the image of God, master of all the surveys, live in the perpetual slavery to his physical needs? Man is separated from the brute, we are reminded, by his superior mental and moral equipment. He is dowered with gifts of mind and heart that are denied other creatures; he has the gift of laughter. He can thrill to the smell of fragrant flowers, the savor of good food, the splendor of infinite spaces and the stars that look down upon him, the beauty of art and nature, the illumination of great thoughts, the majesty of God.



But this noble and unique being is condemned to live in a world in which these extraordinary gifts must largely go to waste. Toiling in field or factory, he knows not the smell of flowers or the savor of good food. The stars shine down upon him unfeeling and cold. Beauty passes by and he may not turn his head to look, for he is to weary to care. The great thoughts of mankind are closed book to him. He may not even indulge his gift of laughter as freely as he might; life as he knows it is too terrible to permit the indulgence. His worship is born of a desire for material blessings and not of longing for spiritual meditation and communion with God.



And the thoughts occur to me: It is good to be alive. If only so much of life were not spent in the making of a living! How pathetic it is that man must waste himself earning a livelihood instead of earning a living!



And the thought gives rise to another: People talk of minimum living-wage, social security and so forth. They say that this is the way of progress and civilization. But I say that security is not itself the thing that really counts; it is rather what things of good account a man will be free to do when security has become truly his own.



Man is more than beast; therefore let him live as more than beast. Beast also work that they may eat and live; let man work, not alone that he may eat and live, but that he may achieve self-realization.



My pay envelope tells me more eloquently than anything else that I live in the prison of my wants. I want to shatter the walls of the terrible prison. I want to be free to look up to the star of my destiny and by its kind light be guided along the path of self-realization.



Science can be put to beneficent uses, instead of mass slaughter and ruthless destruction. Science can reduce the enormous effort that man now exerts in order to produce his bread and butter. As a matter of fact, it has already created the means by which these can be done even now. But first, greed must be rooted out of the heart of man. The desire for mere accumulation of wealth must be discouraged. Only then can science can be harnessed to the satisfaction of man's primary necessities.



It has been estimated that with the productive means at the disposal of fully civilized communities, each individual person needs to labor only four or five hours each day in order to produce the things he needs to satisfy his hunger, to clothe his body, and to raise a roof over his head. The rest of his waking hours he may then spend in fruitful leisure, in doing the things that have nothing to do with living.



But he cannot do this because there are people who would have more of the things of the world than they really need, and thus must deprive others of their just share of life's necessities. This is the situation, reduced to the simplest terms, that has given rise to the wealth of the few and the poverty of many.



If I emphasize man's material needs, I do not inference deny that there is a spiritual side to his being. I believe in the spirituality of man. But I also believe that the spirit is the flower of the body, and the flower can only be as beautiful and as fragrant as the well-being of the body will allow.



The spirit of the man cannot be free so as long as it is tethered to the urgencies of material want. If true happiness is best achieve through detachment from material things, then man can only be happy to the extent that he is exempted from worrying continually over the satisfaction of his primary wants.



I quite agree that the life spiritual is superior to the physical. Let our wants be simple as possible, let the enrichment of the spirit be our aim. But the admonition must apply to the rich and the poor alike, or rather to the rich more than the poor. Let the poor have first what material things lack most utterly and let the rich give themselves over to the pursuit of the joys of the spirit. Only then shall the spirit of man bloom luxuriantly in the creation of art and music and poetry and the enjoyment thereof, and in the worship of God.



Asceticism I consider to be negative and stultifying. Life can be simple without being ascetic: The doctrine of self-denial is valid but only up to a certain point; I cannot accept as the way true happiness and to the fullest flowering of the human personality, the way of renunciation, poverty and mortification. I love life and the good things it has to offer. Nothing in the world is too good for a man.



I am an inheritor of all good and beautiful things. Not only food and raiment for my body , but all things of good report-all that have power to make our brief sojourn upon the earth pleasant, generous, and fruitful. I feel that I am entitled to lay claim to these because I too am willing to give generously of myself to the sum of things.



I am the inheritor of the best that the spirit of man has created. I feel that I am worthy of it, and I demand my share.

The Brother Who Failed

What is the measure of success? Is it the cars we drive, the mansions we live in, the fat bank accounts we have, the designer clothes we wear? Or is it something greater (and intangible) than that? In the materialistic (and opportunistic) world we live in, the term “success” has always been associated with “wealth” … What a sad misconception. I read the below short story during my High School days and I have never forgotten it since then. I could say that it changed my life - or it changed the way I look at success. Please read on... - Sherry

THE BROTHER WHO FAILED

 by Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874-1942)

THE Monroe family were holding a Christmas reunion at the old Prince Edward Island homestead at White Sands. It was the first time they had all been together under one roof since the death of their mother, thirty years before. The idea of this Christmas reunion had originated with Edith Monroe the preceding spring, during her tedious convalescence from a bad attack of pneumonia among strangers in an American city, where she had not been able to fill her concert engagements, and had more spare time in which to feel the tug of old ties and the homesick longing for her own people than she had had for years. As a result, when she recovered, she wrote to her second brother, James Monroe, who lived on the homestead; and the consequence was this gathering of the Monroes under the old roof-tree. Ralph Monroe for once laid aside the cares of his railroads, and the deceitfulness of his millions, in Toronto and took the long-promised, long-deferred trip to the homeland. Malcolm Monroe journeyed from the far western university of which he was president. Edith came, flushed with the triumph of her latest and most successful concert tour. Mrs. Woodburn, who had been Margaret Monroe, came from the Nova Scotia town where she lived a busy, happy life as the wife of a rising young lawyer. James, prosperous and hearty, greeted them warmly at the old homestead whose fertile acres had well repaid his skillful management.

They were a merry party, casting aside their cares and years, and harking back to joyous boyhood and girlhood once more. James had a family of rosy lads and lasses; Margaret brought her two blue-eyed little girls; Ralph's dark, clever-looking son accompanied him, and Malcolm brought his, a young man with a resolute face, in which there was less of boyishness than in his father's, and the eyes of a keen, perhaps a hard bargainer. The two cousins were the same age to a day, and it was a family joke among the Monroes that the stork must have mixed the babies, since Ralph's son was like Malcolm in face and brain, while Malcolm's boy was a second edition of his uncle Ralph.

To crown all, Aunt Isabel came, too – a talkative, clever, shrewd old lady, as young at eighty-five as she had been at thirty, thinking the Monroe stock the best in the world, and beamingly proud of her nephews and nieces, who had gone out from this humble, little farm to destinies of such brilliance and influence in the world beyond. 

I have forgotten Robert. Robert Monroe was apt to be forgotten. Although he was the oldest of the family, White Sands people, in naming over the various members of the Monroe family, would add, "and Robert," in a tone of surprise over the remembrance of his existence.

He lived on a poor, sandy little farm down by the shore, but he had come up to James' place on the evening when the guests arrived; they had all greeted him warmly and joyously, and then did not think about him again in their laughter and conversation. Robert sat back in a corner and listened with a smile, but he never spoke. Afterwards he had slipped noiselessly away and gone home, and nobody noticed his going. They were all gayly busy recalling what had happened in the old times and telling what had happened in the new.

Edith recounted the successes of her concert tours; Malcolm expatiated proudly on his plans for developing his beloved college; Ralph described the country through which his new railroad ran, and the difficulties he had had to overcome in connection with it. James, aside, discussed his orchard and his crops with Margaret, who had not been long enough away from the farm to lose touch with its interests. Aunt Isabel knitted and smiled complacently on all, talking now with one, now with the other, secretly quite proud of herself that she, an old woman of eighty-five, who had seldom been out of White Sands in her life, could discuss high finance with Ralph, and higher education with Malcolm, and hold her own with James in an argument on drainage.

The White Sands school teacher, an arch-eyed, red-mouthed bit a girl – a Bell from Avonlea – who boarded with the James Monroes, amused herself with the boys. All were enjoying themselves hugely, so it is not to be wondered at that they did not miss Robert, who had gone home early because his old housekeeper was nervous if left alone at night.

He came again the next afternoon. From James, in the barnyard, he learned that Malcolm and Ralph had driven to the harbor, that Margaret and Mrs. James had gone to call on friends in Avonlea, and that Edith was walking somewhere in the woods on the hill. There was nobody in the house except Aunt Isabel and the teacher.

"You'd better wait and stay the evening," said James, indifferently. "They'll all be back soon."

Robert went across the yard and sat down on the rustic bench in the angle of the front porch. It was a fine December evening, as mild as autumn; there had been no snow, and the long fields, sloping down from the homestead, were brown and mellow. A weird, dreamy stillness had fallen upon the purple earth, the windless woods, the rain of the valleys, the sere meadows. Nature seemed to have folded satisfied hands to rest, knowing that her long, wintry slumber was coming upon her. Out to sea, a dull, red sunset faded out into somber clouds, and the ceaseless voice of many waters came up from the tawny shore.

Robert rested his chin on his hand and looked across the vales and hills, where the feathery gray of leafless hardwoods was mingled with the sturdy, unfailing green of the conebearers. He was a tall, bent man, with thin, gray hair, a lined face, and deeply-set, gentle brown eyes – the eyes of one who, looking through pain, sees rapture beyond.

He felt very happy. He loved his family clannishly, and he was rejoiced that they were all again near to him. He was proud of their success and fame. He was glad that James had prospered so well of late years. There was no canker of envy or discontent in his soul.

He heard absently indistinct voices at the open hall window above the porch, where Aunt Isabel was talking to Kathleen Bell. Presently Aunt Isabel moved nearer to the window, and her words came down to Robert with startling clearness.

"Yes, I can assure you, Miss Bell, that I'm real proud of my nephews and nieces. They're a smart family. They've almost all done well, and they hadn't any of them much to begin with. Ralph had absolutely nothing and to-day he is a millionaire. Their father met with so many losses, what with his ill-health and the bank failing, that he couldn't help them any. But they've all succeeded, except poor Robert – and I must admit that he's a total failure."

"Oh, no, no," said the little teacher deprecatingly.

"A total failure!" Aunt Isabel repeated her words emphatically. She was not going to be contradicted by anybody, least of all a Bell from Avonlea. "He has been a failure since the time he was born. He is the first Monroe to disgrace the old stock that way. I'm sure his brothers and sisters must be dreadfully ashamed of him. He has lived sixty years and he hasn't done a thing worth while. He can't even make his farm pay. If he's kept out of debt it's as much as he's ever managed to do."

"Some men can't even do that," murmured the little school teacher. She was really so much in awe of this imperious, clever old Aunt Isabel that it was positive heroism on her part to venture even this faint protest.

"More is expected of a Monroe," said Aunt Isabel majestically. "Robert Monroe is a failure, and that is the only name for him."

Robert Monroe stood up below the window in a dizzy, uncertain fashion. Aunt Isabel had been speaking of him! He, Robert, was a failure, a disgrace to his blood, of whom his nearest and dearest were ashamed! Yes, it was true; he had never realized it before; he had known that he could never win power or accumulate riches, but he had not thought that mattered much. Now, through Aunt Isabel's scornful eyes, he saw himself as the world saw him – as his brothers and sisters must see him. There lay the sting. What the world thought of him did not matter; but that his own should think him a failure and disgrace was agony. He moaned as he started to walk across the yard, only anxious to hide his pain and shame away from all human sight, and in his eyes was the look of a gentle animal which had been stricken by a cruel and unexpected blow.

Edith Monroe, who, unaware of Robert's proximity, had been standing on the other side of the porch, saw that look, as he hurried past her, unseeing. A moment before her dark eyes had been flashing with anger at Aunt Isabel's words; now the anger was drowned in a sudden rush of tears.

She took a quick step after Robert, but checked the impulse. Not then – and not by her alone – could that deadly hurt be healed. Nay, more, Robert must never suspect that she knew of any hurt. She stood and watched him through her tears as he went away across the low-lying shore fields to hide his broken heart under his own humble roof. She yearned to hurry after him and comfort him, but she knew that comfort was not what Robert needed now. Justice, and justice only, could pluck out the sting, which otherwise must rankle to the death.

Ralph and Malcolm were driving into the yard. Edith went over to them.

"Boys," she said resolutely, "I want to have a talk with you."

The Christmas dinner at the old homestead was a merry one. Mrs. James spread a feast that was fit for the halls of Lucullus. Laughter, jest, and repartee flew from lip to lip. Nobody appeared to notice that Robert ate little, said nothing, and sat with his form shrinking in his shabby "best" suit, his gray head bent even lower than usual, as if desirous of avoiding all observation. When the others spoke to him he answered deprecatingly, and shrank still further into himself.

Finally all had eaten all they could, and the remainder of the plum pudding was carried out. Robert gave a low sigh of relief. It was almost over. Soon he would be able to escape and hide himself and his shame away from the mirthful eyes of these men and women who had earned the right to laugh at the world in which their success gave them power and influence. He – he – only – was a failure.

He wondered impatiently why Mrs. James did not rise. Mrs. James merely leaned comfortably back in her chair, with the righteous expression of one who has done her duty by her fellow creatures' palates, and looked at Malcolm.

Malcolm rose in his place. Silence fell on the company; everybody looked suddenly alert and expectant, except Robert. He still sat with bowed head, wrapped in his own bitterness.

"I have been told that I must lead off," said Malcolm, "because I am supposed to possess the gift of gab. But, if I do, I am not going to use it for any rhetorical effect to-day. Simple, earnest words must express the deepest feelings of the heart in doing justice to its own. Brothers and sisters, we meet to-day under our own roof-tree, surrounded by the benedictions of the past years. Perhaps invisible guests are here – the spirits of those who founded this home and whose work on earth has long been finished. It is not amiss to hope that this is so and our family circle made indeed complete. To each one of us who are here in visible bodily presence some measure of success has fallen; but only one of us has been supremely successful in the only things that really count – the things that count for eternity as well as time – sympathy and unselfishness and self-sacrifice.

"I shall tell you my own story for the benefit of those who have not heard it. When I was a lad of sixteen I started to work out my own education. Some of you will remember that old Mr. Blair of Avonlea offered me a place in his store for the summer, at wages which would go far towards paying my expenses at the country academy the next winter. I went to work, eager and hopeful. All summer I tried to do my faithful best for my employer. In September the blow fell. A sum of money was missing from Mr. Blair's till. I was suspected and discharged in disgrace. All my neighbors believed me guilty; even some of my own family looked upon me with suspicion – nor could I blame them, for the circumstantial evidence was strongly against me."

Ralph and James looked ashamed; Edith and Margaret, who had not been born at the time referred to, lifted their faces innocently. Robert did not move or glance up. He hardly seemed to be listening.

"I was crushed in an agony of shame and despair," continued Malcolm. "I believed my career was ruined. I was bent on casting all my ambitions behind me, and going west to some place where nobody knew me or my disgrace. But there was one person who believed in my innocence, who said to me, 'You shall not give up – you shall not behave as if you were guilty. You are innocent, and in time your innocence will be proved. Meanwhile show yourself a man. You have nearly enough to pay your way next winter at the Academy. I have a little I can give to help you out. Don't give in – never give in when you have done no wrong.'

"I listened and took his advice. I went to the Academy. My story was there as soon as I was, and I found myself sneered at and shunned. Many a time I would have given up in despair, had it not been for the encouragement of my counselor. He furnished the backbone for me. I was determined that his belief in me should be justified. I studied hard and came out at the head of my class. Then there seemed to be no chance of my earning any more money that summer. But a farmer at Newbridge, who cared nothing about the character of his help, if he could get the work out of them, offered to hire me. The prospect was distasteful but, urged by the man who believed in me, I took the place and endured the hardships. Another winter of lonely work passed at the Academy. I won the Farrell Scholarship the last year it was offered, and that meant an Arts course for me. I went to Redmond College. My story was not openly known there, but something of it got abroad, enough to taint my life there also with its suspicion. But the year I graduated, Mr. Blair's nephew, who, as you know, was the real culprit, confessed his guilt, and I was cleared before the world. Since then my career has been what is called a brilliant one. But" – Malcolm turned and laid his hand on Robert's thin shoulder – "all of my success I owe to my brother Robert. It is his success – not mine – and here to-day, since we have agreed to say what is too often left to be said over a coffin lid, I thank him for all he did for me, and tell him that there is nothing I am more proud of and thankful for than such a brother."

Robert had looked up at last, amazed, bewildered, incredulous. His face crimsoned as Malcolm sat down. But now Ralph was getting up.

"I am no orator as Malcolm is," he quoted gayly, "but I've got a story to tell, too, which only one of you knows. Forty years ago, when I started in life as a business man, money wasn't so plentiful with me as it may be to-day. And I needed it badly. A chance came my way to make a pile of it. It wasn't a clean chance. It was a dirty chance. It looked square on the surface; but, underneath, it meant trickery and roguery. I hadn't enough perception to see that, though – I was fool enough to think it was all right. I told Robert what I meant to do. And Robert saw clear through the outward sham to the real, hideous thing underneath. He showed me what it meant and he gave me a preachment about a few Monroe Traditions of truth and honor. I saw what I had been about to do as he saw it – as all good men and true must see it. And I vowed then and there that I'd never go into anything that I wasn't sure was fair and square and clean through and through. I've kept that vow. I am a rich man, and not a dollar of my money is 'tainted' money. But I didn't make it. Robert really made every cent of my money. If it hadn't been for him I'd have been a poor man to-day, or behind prison bars, as are the other men who went into that deal when I backed out. I've got a son here. I hope he'll be as clever as his Uncle Malcolm; but I hope, still more earnestly, that he'll be as good and honorable a man as his Uncle Robert."

By this time Robert's head was bent again, and his face buried in his hands.

"My turn next," said James. "I haven't much to say – only this. After mother died I took typhoid fever. Here I was with no one to wait on me. Robert came and nursed me. He was the most faithful, tender, gentle nurse ever a man had. The doctor said Robert saved my life. I don't suppose any of the rest of us here can say we have saved a life."

Edith wiped away her tears and sprang up impulsively.

"Years ago," she said, "there was a poor, ambitious girl who had a voice. She wanted a musical education and her only apparent chance of obtaining it was to get a teacher's certificate and earn money enough to have her voice trained. She studied hard, but her brains, in mathematics at least, weren't as good as her voice, and the time was short. She failed. She was lost in disappointment and despair, for that was the last year in which it was possible to obtain a teacher's certificate without attending Queen's Academy, and she could not afford that. Then her oldest brother came to her and told her he could spare enough money to send her to the conservatory of music in Halifax for a year. He made her take it. She never knew till long afterwards that he had sold the beautiful horse which he loved like a human creature, to get the money. She went to the Halifax conservatory. She won a musical scholarship. She has had a happy life and a successful career. And she owes it all to her brother Robert – "

But Edith could go no further. Her voice failed her and she sat down in tears. Margaret did not try to stand up.

"I was only five when my mother died," she sobbed. "Robert was both father and mother to me. Never had child or girl so wise and loving a guardian as he was to me. I have never forgotten the lessons he taught me. Whatever there is of good in my life or character I owe to him. I was often headstrong and willful, but he never lost patience with me. I owe everything to Robert."

Suddenly the little teacher rose with wet eyes and crimson cheeks.

"I have something to say, too," she said resolutely. "You have spoken for yourselves. I speak for the people of White Sands. There is a man in this settlement whom everybody loves. I shall tell you some of the things he has done."

"Last fall, in an October storm, the harbor lighthouse flew a flag of distress. Only one man was brave enough to face the danger of sailing to the lighthouse to find out what the trouble was. That was Robert Monroe. He found the keeper alone with a broken leg; and he sailed back and made – yes, made the unwilling and terrified doctor go with him to the lighthouse. I saw him when he told the doctor he must go; and I tell you that no man living could have set his will against Robert Monroe's at that moment.

"Four years ago old Sarah Cooper was to be taken to the poorhouse. She was broken-hearted. One man took the poor, bed-ridden, fretful old creature into his home, paid for medical attendance, and waited on her himself, when his housekeeper couldn't endure her tantrums and temper. Sarah Cooper died two years afterwards, and her latest breath was a benediction on Robert Monroe – the best man God ever made.

"Eight years ago Jack Blewitt wanted a place. Nobody would hire him, because his father was in the penitentiary, and some people thought Jack ought to be there, too. Robert Monroe hired him – and helped him, and kept him straight, and got him started right – and Jack Blewitt is a hard-working, respected young man to-day, with every prospect of a useful and honorable life. There is hardly a man, woman, or child in White Sands who doesn't owe something to Robert Monroe!"

As Kathleen Bell sat down, Malcolm sprang up and held out his hands.

"Every one of us stand up and sing Auld Lang Syne," he cried.

Everybody stood up and joined hands, but one did not sing. Robert Monroe stood erect, with a great radiance on his face and in his eyes. His reproach had been taken away; he was crowned among his kindred with the beauty and blessing of sacred yesterdays.

When the singing ceased Malcolm's stern-faced son reached over and shook Robert's hands.

"Uncle Rob," he said heartily, "I hope that when I'm sixty I'll be as successful a man as you."

"I guess," said Aunt Isabel, aside to the little school teacher, as she wiped the tears from her keen old eyes, "that there's a kind of failure that's the best success." 

"The Brother Who Failed." by Lucy Maud Montgomery (1874-1942)
From: Further Chronicles of Avonlea. by L. M. Montgomery. Boston: The Page Company, 1920. pp. 107-122.