Monthly Archives: August 2011

Governor Christie did his Duty

29 Monday Aug 2011

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This morning, the CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) reported that New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie had been criticized for over-protecting (my wording) his constituents. Governor Christie responded to this criticism by stating that he had simply served the people of New Jersey, which is his duty as Governor.

As it turned out, the storm was less devastating in New Jersey than had been originally envisaged. But Governor Christie had no way of knowing this would be the case. Satellites can follow a storm and meteorologists can make certain predictions, but storms have a mind of their own.  What if Irene had intensified and killed citizens of New Jersey? Would we be hearing from the same people that Governor Christie had not protected his constituents sufficiently?

Once again, stones were being thrown at “Big Government.” It was not the big government in Washington, but it was government. The truth is that the citizens of New Jersey were well served. They were treated with dignity and should rejoice that the damage was not as extensive as was expected.

In my opinion, the naysayers of New Jersey had no business criticizing Governor Christie. These remarks resemble the criticism directed at the élite Navy Seals who killed Bin Laden. A guilty finger was pointed at them because they shot a man who was unarmed. Wait a minute.  Was anyone expecting an aristocratic duel?

Prudence is a virtue.  It would seem appropriate to thank Governor Christie and all elected officials who exercised vigilance as Irene approached, thus protecting human lives:  your life!

Michele Bachmann’s Magic Wand

28 Sunday Aug 2011

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A month ago, during the debt-ceiling crisis, poor, elderly or disabled citizens of the United States worried. Would they receive their government cheque?  Some miscreants among Republicans would not raise the debt ceiling and the problem was, in their mind, that President Obama was finding it extremely difficult to achieve a balanced budget.  I then spoke of hypocrisy and amnesia.

And now, it’s Irene, a combination of powerful winds and unforgiving floods.

In a not-so-distant past, no one could predict at what time a hurricane would hit its various targets, nor could anyone determine the velocity of the storm.  As a result, hurricanes and tornadoes functioned as social equalizers.  They did not spare anyone.

In this regard, times have changed.  It is now possible to predict the course and speed of such natural disasters, which makes it possible for those who have the financial  means to do so to get out of the danger zone.  Moreover, the well-to-do can have safer homes built.  Windows can be shielded at the push of a button, even from afar, which does not require the owner to cover the windows of a house manually.

I am not saying that hurricanes discriminate. Irene will harm everyone.  However, the affluent had the option of getting out of harm’s way and they can now stay in a comfortable hotel while their homes are being repaired.  They have been inconvenienced, so I feel sympathy for them, but…

Hospitals have been evacuated and many poor individuals have been told to get out of their ground-floor or first-floor apartments, as these will be flooded, but where will these less fortunate individuals go if their home requires extensive and lengthy repairs.

Given that New Orleans has yet to rise again, we can probably expect the worst. Thanks to former Bush’s Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), members of the middle-class living on the east coast may be helped in that they may be able to get a 3rdmortgage—they are already paying a 2nd mortgage—and repair their homes.  If they succeed in obtaining a 3rd mortgage, they will be in debt for a very long time, which is extremely sad, but what about the very poor?  They will not be able to rebuild.  Some already sleep under bridges.  They will be like the citizens of New Orleans:  homeless in the most powerful nation on earth.  It doesn’t seem acceptable.

There will be a bill to pay, and this bill will be humongous. One can only imagine the cost of putting ships and planes out of harm’s way, and the cost of evacuations, where evacuation was an option. The bill will be extremely high and it will likely be sent to Washington. Private insurance companies have clauses that limit liability in the case of floods, but Americans have the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA, and under FEMA’s umbrella, they have the Federal Flood Damage Program.  But that is  Washington, and Washinton is big government. Recent rhetoric from Republicans leads me to think that all God-fearing Americans hate big government.

So, am I about to hear, once again, that the current administration is financially  inept: a “Hang Obama!” Will President Obama and his administration once again be the scapegoats? They are paying the debts incurred by a former administration and they must now rebuild what fickle nature has destroyed, at a staggering price.

I realize that President Obama is a powerful man, but no President can prevent natural disasters. That is the human condition, stated in the simplest manner. His title does not bestow divinity upon president Obama.  And presidents cannot revive the dead.

However, an innovative and comforting thought has just surfaced.  If Michele Bachmann can provide gasoline at $2.00 a gallon, it would appear the United States has a magic wand.  So I fully expect Republicans finally to rally behind their fairy-godmother ably assisted by Ann Coulter, Sarah Palin, Arianna Huffington, etc.  Not only will Mrs Bachmann repair, at no cost, the devastated east coast, but, at long last, New Orleans will be rebuilt.

How is it that those in need go to big Government asking for financial assistance, only to blame same big government when it helps the otherwise helpless and an unexpected debt has to be paid.

E Pluribus Unum

P.S. I congratulate those journalists, particularly CNN’s fearless and truly humane team, for putting themselves at risk to make sure people could follow Irene’s cruel path. Moreover, let me express my most sincere sympathy to all who have been the victims of Irene and to those Irene has inconvenienced.

Computers and the Human Condition

26 Friday Aug 2011

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Not unlike humankind, my computer is fallible. If I erase a line, it erases the paragraph in which the line is embedded.  So my computer erased a few sentences, almost a complete paragraph, from my blog on Pascal and the Human Condition.

Putting the paragraph back into the blog seemed injudicious. I therefore decided
to paraphrase, at some length, my missing and rather short paragraph.

Here we go:

Pascal was not the first, nor would he be the last, to muse on humankind’s duality. That duality was Montaigne’s (1533-1592) and Descartes’ (1596-1650) “humaine condition.” It would also be central to Milton’s (1608-1674), a contemporary of Pascal, Paradise Lost, 1667.

In fact, according to Pascal, we were both “angels” and “beasts,” (Pensées, 141-418). As mortals, we were fallen (déchus) angels, hence our ability to think and know that  we combine misère and grandeur. This would be the source of what was later called “metaphysical Angst,” an acute sense of the meaninglessness of life, misère, which, according to Pascal, humans attempt to silence through diversion (le divertissement).

Pascal does not mention metaphysical Angst or angoisse, a nineteenth-century twist on misère and grandeur.  Pascal wrote that “[i]t is dangerous to show human beings to what extent they are on the same level as beasts without showing them their grandeur.  And it is also dangerous to let human beings see their grandeur without showing them their bassesse (lowliness, misère).” (Pensées, 121-418, my translation) His thinking shows symmetry or symmetricality.  Besides, Pascal was a believer.  Spirituality was his refuge.

On behalf on my computer, I apologize.  With respect to these machines, I resemble Pascal. I find computers both great and abominably capricious.

Pascal on the Human Condition

25 Thursday Aug 2011

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Blaise Pascal (1623–1662). The Jansenist apologia Provincial Letters, written 1656 and 1657, a literary masterpiece written from a Jansenist perspective, and remembered for denunciation of the casuistry of

Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This post is not altogether about Blaise Pascal’s description of the human condition. I used Pascal to write about Ann Coulter who was not allowed to give a speech at the University of Ottawa, Canada. She had labelled President Obama’s Dreams From My Father a “Dimestore Mein Kampf.” Officials in Ottawa and the University of Ottawa feared a disturbance.

When this article was published, I had just started to post web logs. It is informative, but links to newspapers and other sources are lacking. Fortunately, I have now learned to use WordPress. But this post has relevance. I thought of deleting it, but this no longer seems appropriate. (22 April 2014)

—ooo—

Seventeenth-century French writer and scientist Pascal (Blaise Pascal, 1623-1662) described the human condition as both misère (pitiful, vulnerable, weak, poor) and grandeur (dignity, nobility).  It was Pascal’s view that human beings were repeatedly being deceived by “puissances trompeuses” (deceitful, misleading powers), such as vanity, imagination, self-interest, and other influences that prevented self-scrutiny and, therefore, debased human beings. Those were the reasons why humans were misérables. Moreover, to make matters worse, humans sought frivolous entertainment instead of thinking and coming to terms with their dual condition.

Fortunately, although Pascal considered human beings not only as misérables but also as fragile, as fragile as fabulist La Fontaine’s (1621-1695) humble reed (“The Oak Tree and the Reed”), he granted them superiority over beasts by making his roseau “un roseau pensant,” or “a thinking reed”(Pensées [Thoughts] 113-348). In this respect, he expressed himself beautifully. “La grandeur de l’homme est grande en ce qu’il se connaît misérable; un arbre ne se connaît pas misérable.” Humans have nobility, or grandeur, in that they at least “know they are miserable,” to which he added that “a tree does not know it is miserable,” (Pensées, 114-397) with the notable exception of La Fontaine’s previously-mentioned boastful but unbending oak tree, felled by a powerful wind.

Has anything changed in our contemporary society? We still have “puissances trompeuses.”  

Given most of their recent statements, Michele  Bachmann, Sarah Palin, Ann Coulter and Arianna Huffington might indeed be looked upon as “deceitful powers.”  When Ann Coulter was not allowed to speak at the University of Ottawa, for security reasons, she commented that she “was guessing the scores to get into the University of Ottawa are not very challenging.” (Stephen Chase, The Globe and Mail, Tuesday  23 March 2010) Civil libertarians protested, but there was a very real possibility of violence. “The move [to cancel the address] followed boisterous demonstrations outside that sponsors of the appearance feared could turn violent,” (Stephen Chase, The Globe and Mail), which justified Ann Coulter’s not being allowed to give an address.

There is freedom of speech in Canada, but there exist inappropriate speeches. Responsible parents protect children from exposure to hateful discourse and to discrimination towards minorities, such as the disabled and homosexuals. Responsible parents also protect their children from discrimination against coloured individuals and from depictions of violence. Besides, as French poet, novelist (Les Enfants terribles, 1946), illustrator, artist, playwright and filmmaker (Beauty and the Beast, 1929) Jean Cocteau (1889-1963) put it, “[t]ack in audacity is knowing just how far one can go too far.” “Le tact dans l’audace c’est de savoir jusqu’où on peut aller trop loin.” 

As the Greeks taught us, there are limits to everything, including freedom of speech. They spoke of moderation. We also know that the end does not, of necessity, always justify the means and that when means are unacceptable, they become an end in themselves, an unacceptable end. In other words, since, in April 2008, Ann Coulter allowed herself to describe Barack Obama’s book Dreams From My Father as a “Dimestore Mein Kampf,” thereby comparing the future president with Hitler, it was quite legitimate on the part of University of Ottawa and Ottawa city officials to fear that Ann Coulter may create a violent disturbance. There are laws against violent disturbances in Canada and, I should think, the United States. As well, her above-mentioned statement about the future President of the United States was needlessly provocative. Untruths and offensive speeches have no place on public podiums in Canada, which, I believe, is also the case in the United States.

There was hope for Pascal’s fragile roseau. He could think. He was “un roseau pensant.” However, is redemption a possibility for persons who speak and write like Ann Coulter?  Unlike the fragile reed, le roseau, it is unlikely that she indulges in any form of serious contemplation. When godliness was distributed, little was apparently bestowed on such persons as  Ann Coulter, Michele Bachmann, Sarah Palin and Arianna Huffington. The afore-named ladies and their followers and rich sponsors are not about to grant godliness to the disinherited. They do not seem to care for the common man. If they cared for the people, Americans would have long ago had access to universal health-care and Republicans and Tea Party members would be supporting the creation of more social programs as well as job-creation projects.

These individuals should cease whining about preserving their unnecessary and underserved tax cuts for the rich. And they should also rally behind people who are protecting the environment. As things stand, these people are eating their children’s bread. Ann Coulter is seemingly an educated person, but it would appear her education was not put to good use. When disorder enters the debate, it is best to end it. Even in a world where relativity has gained considerable ground, there is still a right and a wrong.  Look at sports where we find an abundance of rules. All games have rules. But let me reassure you. It could be that the afore-named persons’ private Hell will be in the here and now.

As Sartre put it:  “L’enfer, c’est les autres” (others are hell). Well, do consider that there are plenty of others. Moreover, we always stand a second away from catastrophes of all kinds and death, despite the grandeur granted us as Pascal’s roseau pensant. In this regard, all of us are the same. Humans are mortals who know they are mortals. This is the human condition.  However, thinking does not preclude enjoying our journey into infinity.

P.S.  Pascal’s Pensées were not assembled during his short lifetime.  He bundled them up.  They were in liasses (tied bundles).  The numbers I have used correspond to two of three classifications.  The first is Louis Lafuma’s and the second, Léon Brunschvicg (in italics). The third is Philippe Sellier’s.

In Praise of Jack Layton (1950-2011)

23 Tuesday Aug 2011

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On August 22nd, 2011, Canada lost one of its finer citizens and representatives in Ottawa, Jack Layton (b. July 18th, 1950).

Earlier this year, on May 2nd, 2011, under the leadership of Jack Layton, the New Democratic Party won a total of 103 seats in Parliament, which meant not only that Mr Layton would form the Official Opposition, but that seats formerly occupied by members of the Bloc québécois had become NDP seats.  Canadians could now count on greater solidarity in Parliament.  The party won 59 of Quebec’s 75 seats.

Jack Layton won the heart of Québécois during his appearance, on April 3rd, on Radio-Canada’s French-language’s CBC’s most popular talk show:  Tout le monde en parle (Everybody is talking about it).  The televised French-language party leaders’ debate, held on April 13th, also touched the heart of Québécois and it is largely from the heart that Québécois vote.

It was clear to them that this gentleman could listen to the people and wanted to serve the people.  And it would seem that what was clear to Québécois was just as clear to people in the other provinces of Canada.

I believe the message is simple.  This smiling gentleman had charisma and he was genuine.  He loved playing his guitar and singing at various gatherings, including political events.  He was liked.  The nation was hearing hollow words, or what it perceived as hollow words, at a time of global unrest and financial insecurity.  So the likeable Mr Layton and members of his party seemed a safe choice in circumstances that were no longer safe.

In short, Mr Layton inspired confidence.  He was the kind of person one wants as a  neighbour.

* * *

John Gilbert “Jack” Layton was born in Montreal and raised near Hudson, Quebec.  His  mother was the grand-niece of William Steeves, a Father of Confederation, and his father, Robert Layton, a Progressive Conservative MP (Member of Parliament).

Jack Layton studied political science at McGill University and, after his family moved to Toronto, in 1970, he obtained a PhD in political science at York University, in Toronto.  He then became a professor at Ryerson University, also located in Toronto.

Having served for several years on Toronto’s City Council, Dr Layton was elected leader of the New Democratic Party, in 2003, and gathered the support of voters in elections held in 2004, 2006 and 2008.

Jack Layton is the author of several books. 

He married Sally Halford in 1969, and the couple had two children:  Mike and Sarah.  The marriage ended in 1983 but Layton met Olivia Chow, also a politician, in 1985, and married her in 1988.

A State Funeral will be held on August 27th at Toronto’s Roy Thomson Hall.

* * *

A Message for Michele Bachmann

21 Sunday Aug 2011

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imagesRKRHAKFZ

(Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Michele Bachmann

It saddened me to learn that, during one of your recent public appearances, a member of your entourage had forcibly pushed CNN’s Don Lemon into a golf cart. Therefore, I would ask that you never again allow your staff to push people around. I consider that behaviour to be inappropriate, rude and arrogant.

There are and there have been bad apples among us. Yet I believe most of us possess, to a lesser or greater extent, a degree of godliness, hence the need to respect others and to treat them with dignity. If human beings were kind to one another, there would be no wars and members of Congress would think, first and foremost, of the poor, the disabled, the elderly, the unemployed, the veterans and the needs of the children.

With all due respect, if you continue to permit aides to accost others, you should remove yourself for consideration from the list of Presidential hopefuls.

On November 4th, 2008, when Barack Obama was elected to his post as President of the United States, I was delighted. However, I did not suspect that he would subsequently earn my admiration because of his courtesy and humanity. Former President Bush had brought the US to the brink of a financial collapse, but President Obama treated him with dignity, the dignity the former President deserved and still deserves as a human being, whatever his failings. I was very impressed and very touched.  The new President was a good human being.

Some individuals are more gifted than others or are born in a family that will encourage them to pursue their goals and has the means to help them do so. However, others are less gifted, or are not receiving an education for want of financial resources.

Consequently, the poor may not have access to the information they require to choose a leader or may not be capable of understanding fully the information they are given. Yet, they are to be treated with respect rather than be made to swallow the poisoned and vacuous rhetoric of irresponsible politicians, particularly those politicians who make frivolous promises.

As human beings, the citizens of the United States should not be induced into thinking that, under a different administration, America would not have a debt and that the price of gasoline can be magically reduced to $2.00 a gallon.

Let us be realistic. If the rich do not pay their fair share of taxes, America’s debt will beleaguer several administrations. If there are to be tax cuts, the poor and the middle-class should be given a break. For example, if one builds a mansion when a humbler dwelling would suffice, why should mortgage interest for the oversized mansion be tax deductible?

As well, the US has to create and repatriate jobs, which, initially, may cost money, but will eventually benefit the citizens of the United States. It is money well invested. Suffice it to say that even the most ill-informed citizen knows that the government has a role to play in this endeavor.

So, if ever again any of your mignons shoves a person into a golf cart, the people may come to realize that your manners are unbefitting a presidential hopeful and, moreover, that, if elected, you are unlikely to serve your nation with the dignity it

© Micheline Walker
August 28, 2011
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Carlos Fuentes on Ramsay Wood’s Kalila and Dimna, and Micheline’s little house

20 Saturday Aug 2011

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“It is at the source of Spanish literature:  no picaresque novels even no Quixote, without these wise and vigorous, sly and funny tales. They are contemporary:  they are eternal… Today, when we need, more than ever, to understand the Muslim world, Ramsay Wood’s fresh recreation of the tales becomes indispensable reading for the West.  Indispensable, more than for political, for human, artistic, glad reasons. Wood’s superb stories should be set alongside Italo Calvinos’s recent retelling of the folk tales of Italy.  No higher praise is necessary.”

The above is what Carlos Fuentes (b. 1928) has to say about Ramsay Wood’s translation of the The Tales of Kalila and Dimna, the Arabic translation, by Ibn al-Muqaffa, of Vishnu Sharma’s Panchatantra, written in Sanskrit.  Indeed, “no higher praise is necessary.”

In order to understand the Muslim world, it is also useful to gather information on the Crusades.  It is during the Crusades that the West first entered the Muslim world.  There was criticism of the Crusades expressed in a very long Latin-language beast-epic entitled Ysengrimus, written by Nivardus of Ghent in 1148-1149, or a little later.  Nivard de Gand’s Ysengrimus is the birthplace of Reynard the Fox, arguably the most famous character in beast literature.  Reynard is the  protagonist in countless fables.

This is a very short blog.  Not that I have run out of words, but that I am tired.  I suffer from Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, also called Myalgic Encephalomyelitis.  In 1976, I caught a viral infection from which I never fully recovered.  However, do not feel sorry for me.  There are so many books to read and so much beautiful music to listen to.  Moreover, there are clipboards or portable desks.

In 2002, I sold a house I loved.  So, during the last few weeks, I have attempted to draw a little house that would suit me.  It was a challenge.  The house had to be small:  12,000 sq. feet.  How does one fit so many books and a piano in a small space?  Besides, I have always enjoyed having a guest room.

I am happy to report that I have finally drawn the floor plan of my little house and did so using a clipboard as desk.  I may not move out of this apartment, but I have decided to keep my drawing.  Fantasy can be a very cozy refuge.

La Fontaine’s “Les Grenouilles qui demandent un roi” (The Frogs Who Desired a King)

18 Thursday Aug 2011

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“Les Grenouilles qui demandent un roi”

“Le Chêne et le Roseau”  is an exquisite fable, containing many lessons, one of which is the Vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas (Vanity of vanities; all is vanity, Ecclesiastes 1:2) that permeates French seventeenth-century literature. We all die, even kings. Death is the equalizer.

More timely, however, is a fable entitled “The Frogs who desired a King” (book three, number IV of La Fontaine’s first volume of Fables [1668]).

“Les Grenouilles qui demandent un roi” tells the story of “silly and frightened” frogs who live in a democracy, but, tired of democracy, ask Jupiter for a monarch. Jupiter acquiesces. From the skies  descends a peace-loving king who makes a huge noise as he lands. This king is a beam (un soliveau) often represented as a log.

Frightened by the din, the frogs go into hiding, only to return slowly to look at the king. The peace-loving king is a beau, which is not very kingly. The frogs start jumping on the beam-king, which the king tolerates as Jupiter grumbles. The beam-king is a kindly monarch, but he does not move.

Dissatisfied, the people go back to Jupiter to ask for a king who moves. So Jupiter sends them a crane who starts eating them up. In Æsop’s  version of this fable, the crame is a stork.

Our silly frogs complain, and Jupiter tells them, first, that they should have kept their government (a democracy), second, that they should have been pleased to be sent a gentleman-king, the beam-king, and, third, to settle for the king they have for fear of encountering a worse one, La Fontaine’s celui-ci (this one) pointing to the voracious crane.

The Moral

One of the morals of this fable is the eternal “Leave well enough alone,” but we are also reading a “Beware-of-your-wishes-as-they-may-come-true” narrative. I would therefore suggest that my neighbours to the south take a good look at their duly-elected President and count their blessings. President Obama’s first gesture when he came into office was to save an economy that is no longer confined to the United States. Furthermore, as the US borrowed a huge amount of money to pay a debt incurred by the previous administration, President Obama set about providing the citizens of his country with social programs, beginning with health care. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had not succeeded in allowing the US to take this gigantic step toward nationhood, but she had traced a path. I salute her and thank her on behalf of her nation.

Then came July 2011! America could not default on its debt and the Republicans knew it, but the Tea Party, Michele Bachmann’s turf, and hardline Republicans were so slow in coming up with a relatively acceptable plan that the US lost its triple-A credit rating and left Europeans gasping for air. What on earth was Congress doing?

However and fortunately, because the rest of the world knows the US has an extraordinary President, the consequences were not catastrophic.  President Obama’s administration has credibility and America has great minds, people who, unlike Bachmann’s campaign aids, would not push CNN’s Don Lemon into a golf cart as he attempted to chronicle Bachmann’s campaign at the Iowa’s State Fair, in Des Moines.

Who are these pompous people? Could they be heirs to the “gent fort sotte et fort peureuse” (people so silly and so afraid) of La Fontaine’s fable, ready to throw stones mindlessly?

P.S.  By the way, Ramsay Wood has continued to translate of The Tales of Kalila and Dimna (tales told by Dr Bidpai), the Arabic version of Vishnu Sharma’s Panchatantra.  I own and cherish a 2000 paperback edition of the first volume of the Tales of Kalila and Dimna, published in 1986 by Inner Traditions (Rochester, Vermont).  Ramsay Wood writes in a manner that makes the reader think Wood himself wrote Kalila and Dimna, and the stories sound as young as the morning dew.  The first volume of Ramsay Wood’s translation of Kalila and Dimna has a brilliant and informative introduction by Doris Lessing.  (See my post on “Le Chêne et le Roseau”).

© Micheline Walker
18 August 2011
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Fables: La Fontaine’s “Le Chêne et le Roseau” (The Oak Tree and the Reed)

16 Tuesday Aug 2011

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Le Chêne et le Roseau, by Achille-Etna Michallon (1816)

Achille-Etna Michallon (1796-1822, aged 26)
The Fitzwilliam Museum
Jean de la Fontaine (I.22)
The Oak Tree and the Reed (Æsop, No. 70, Perry Index)
 

Under the reign of Louis XIV (1638-1715), the Sun-King, Jean de la Fontaine (1621-1695) published twelve books of fables.  The first book was published in 1668; the second, in 1678 and a collection, in the 1690s, shortly before La Fontaine’s death.

Fables, as you know, date back to Antiquity. Let us mention, first, Vishnu Sharma‘s Sanskrit Panchatantra (Pañcatantra [Five Principles]), 3rd century BCE or much earlier times: 1200 BCE. Its Arabic version, entitled Kalīla wa Dimnah (750 CE), was written by Persian scholar Ibn al-Muqaffa.  For most most of us, however, fables are Æsop’s Fables (c. 620-564 BCE) and they belong to an oral tradition. Æsop, if there ever lived an Æsop, was probably a freed slave from Samos, Greece.

Fables are usually looked upon as children’s literature because most feature animal protagonists. Some fables may be intended for children, but others encompass the wordly-wisdom a prince should acquire. Moreover, fables may feature plants or human beings speaking with animals. The latter are called libystic fables.

When reading “Le Chêne et le Roseau,” one may be reminded of Virgil’s Georgics (1st century BCE), but this fable is mostly a La Fontaine fable.  As mentioned above, it was published in 1668 and is the last fable (number XXII) of La Fontaine’s first book of Fables.  La Fontaine published a second book of Fables in 1678-1679, and a third book, in 1694 or somewhat earlier.

In “Le Chêne et le Roseau,” the Oak tree boasts to the Reed that he is strong and could protect the humble Reed from powerful winds.  The Reed’s response is that “he bends” in the wind, “and does not break:” “Je plie, et ne romps pas.” As the two, the Oak tree and the Reed, are conversing, a devastating wind fells the Oak tree.  As for the Reed, he is whipped back and forth by this ferocious wind, but survives.

Fables are lessons presented in Horatian (Horace, 1st century BCE) fashion:  “Prodesse et delectareˮ (To Delight and to Instruct, or plaire et instruire). So a lesson or lessons can be drawn from “The Oak and the Reed,” (La Fontaine [I.22]) lessons for the prince.

Usually, my students would respond that the oak tree is punished for boasting, which is a correct answer.  Destiny being fickle and life, fragile, one should not boast.

I would then remind them of the Roseau ’s statement:  “Je plie, et ne romps pas.ˮ  Not all of them could grasp readily that La Fontaine’s fable contained another lesson, one that could be useful for the prince or the man at court.

The lesson is simple.  If one is flexible, chances are one might survive and even blossom in the ruthless halls of the power.[i]

Could it be that nothing has changed, that one must still accept compromises or otherwise be totally ineffective in any office to which he or she is elected.

Ideally, the prince acts according to a set of principles.  He knows, for instance, that he must serve his people, so he listens.  He also knows how to serve his people.  But, rigidity is an extreme that precludes listening and militates against both reasoned and reasonable leadership.

____________________

[i] This lesson is obvious in Æsop’s “The Oak and the Reeds” [EBook #11339], Perry Index 70, but not in La Fontaine’s “Chêne et Roseau” (“The Oak and the Reed”)

© Micheline Walker
16 August 2011
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The Procrustean Bed

15 Monday Aug 2011

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In a version of this blog, now erased, I said that once some of my first-year students said to me that, since they were now adults, i. e. away from parental guidance, they were free to scream at the top of their lungs, during initiation. My response was that their freedom ended where mine began. And I also said that, henceforth, I would treat them as adults. When they were in a drunken stupor and screaming as loudly as they could, I would not phone Campus Security, but the local detachment of the Canadian Royal Mounted Police (RCMP).

However, in my next blog, I stated that many of these same students had matured and that, as adults, they had not ceased to amaze me. For instance, they had learned that, although they were individuals, they lived in a collectivity and that, under acceptable circumstances, they had to respect members of that collectivity.

Occasionally, those students would ask for my opinion on various topics. I did not like giving my opinion. They had to adopt their own values. As a result, the only comment  ever offered when we discussed thorny issues, was that, in my view, morality ended where inhumanity began. This, I would add, had often been my beacon when making decisions. There are so many murky areas and shades of grey galore.

I also told my students that there were times  when a rule had to be broken in the interest of justice or some higher value. Justice, I would explain, can be a Procrustean bed as is also the case with bureaucracy. Greek mythology’s Procrustes, had an iron bed. If a person he laid on his bed did not fit it from end to end, he would stretch that person. Conversely, if the person was too tall, Procrustes resorted to an amputation.

In other words, I would tell them that one cannot rearrange reality to fit a theory. Certain things change, others remain. Certain things are right and others, wrong, but what about the rest? The meaning of a word can change if the word is used in a different context:  denotation vs connotation i.e, “mistress” and “to record” vs “to throw away old records.”

Similarly, the notion of freedom has fluctuations. It is relative. However, I would add there are times when a crime is a crime is a crime.

Life can be a labyrinth. I hope my students got an education that is useful to them.  I loved them and I miss them.