Essays in Idleness

DAVID WARREN

Cakes & ale

The character of Orsino, Duke of Illyria in Twelfth Night, and for that matter the beautiful Countess Olivia whom he woos in his overstated way, are wonderful reminders that narcissism is not a modern invention. The parade of “feelings” — which begins in what might be truly felt, and ends in keeping up the appearances — has been wending through the City of Man since it was first incorporated. The narcissism isn’t in the feelings, of course. It is in the parade of them.

Things may have been worse in Shakespeare’s day, when people could more skilfully articulate their feelings, in dress and manner as well as words; when they could sing, and dance, and play upon musical instruments. Shakespeare gives us full in the face what today would slap noodling — stale and wet and second-hand. Our own narcissistic performances are cliché-ridden, seem almost taped. The Elizabethans knew far better how to emote for attention, wording for surprise. It was less like whining, more like physical attack.

Nor is the self-righteous Malvolio other than a character we still see all around us — differing only in facundity, his ability to express himself. He is humourless, officious, conceited, and a prig. It is evident his own creator hates him, and it is interesting to learn that the subplot, in which the story of Malvolio nearly takes over the play, may have been entirely of Shakespeare’s invention. The rest of the machinery he lifted from the usual Italian sources, making a few startling improvements; but the Malvolio subplot is edgier than that.

Malvolio is high steward in the young widow Olivia’s extensive household, but his like may be observed today in every government department, or mixing into any controversy as uptight spokesman for the “politically correct.” He is a person who brashly presents himself as a moral improvement on the rest of mankind; a man whose interest is excited exclusively by power. “The personal is the political” for him, and the focus is upon personal advancement. He is a character who flourishes in business, too — I’ve seen him climbing corporate ladders, and one cannot watch one’s back too carefully when the office politician is at large. I’ve even seen his like in the Church hierarchy.

At the other extreme, Sir Toby Belch, Olivia’s drunken uncle, rowdy and careless to a fault, whose frolicsome nature is untainted by any ambition higher than a practical joke; and whose Sancho, Sir Andrew Aguecheek, would be characterized today as “a complete idiot.” The whole play, it seems to me, is about the art of making a spectacle of oneself, but Sir Andrew is presented as artless. He thinks he can do things like speak French, and boogie, but no one could take offence at his pretensions. His suit of Olivia is all but ignored. Still, he serves his loyal turn by Sir Toby’s side as the gloves come off, and the fight is starting.

The whole play turns, to my mind, on the scene where these two are returning to the household from the evening’s revels — the worse for wear already, but wanting more wine. They are confronted by the august Malvolio, there, as ever, to lay down the law. Maria, Olivia’s magnificent gentlewoman, has already warned our knights against what they are stepping into. Feste, Olivia’s Fool or Clown, is trying to run some interference. But the full horror of Malvolio’s Puritanism — and through Maria and Sir Andrew, Shakespeare drops the “P” word in plain sight — has commoved the household. Something must be done.

Sir Toby is still merrily singing when the Clown intervenes for his own good. Taking the Clown for Malvolio’s proxy, Sir Toby observes: “Out o’tune sir.”

Then taunts: “Art any more then a Steward?”

Then throws down the gauntlet entirely: “Dost thou thinke because thou art vertuous, there shall be no more Cakes and Ale?”

“Yes by Saint Anne,” saith the Clown, still perhaps trying to lower the temperature. “And Ginger shall bee hotte y’th mouth too.”

Malvolio tells Maria that her job is no more secure than his next report to her Lady, marching off in his highest dudgeon.

But Maria, clever girl, has conceived a scheme that will see Malvolio into the madhouse, and the others join heartily in. She has mastered her mistress’s handwriting, and will write a note to Malvolio, as if from Olivia. It will persuade him that Olivia herself would welcome his romantic advances, and tell him in ludicrous detail how he may dress and behave to please her. It will be a list, naturally, of everything the Countess most detests.

And Malvolio, easily seized by ambition, and totally incapable of smoaking a jest, takes it hook line and sinker. He makes a side-splitting fool of himself, after which he is carted away as insane.

The main plot — the usual Plautine round of twins and mistaken identities, comic love triangles, messages and messengers gone astray, nefarious manoeuvres dissolving into farce — with cross-dressing for additional sport — proceeds to a triple-deck ending, and happy marriages all round. Each character gets better than he deserves, and as the conspiracy finally unravels, even Malvolio gets released from the loony bin. By the tradition of the times, in England, the twelfth day of Christmas leading into Twelfth Night (eve to the Epiphany), was a jolly party. The play is in this spirit, & the subtitle, “What You Will,” promises only slapstick entertainment.

The big thrill is in the subplot; in the wicked glee with which the playwright drags Malvolio across the stage, and administers the kicking. Yes, Mr Shakespeare is declaring: we shall have cakes and ale!

*

Twelfth Night was first performed at Court (in Whitehall probably), and despite some cute references to the town — for instance to the Elephant, a Southwark pub (transposed to Illyria) — it was pitched to an audience that only ever went there slumming. Had it been played instead before the pit at the Globe, I doubt the author would have left in the tongue-lash Maria delivers on the Puritan “dogs.” This would have been equally acceptable to Catholic and Anglican at Court, for whom Puritans were the common enemy. But “out there,” budding Roundheads could be scattered through the audience, and looking for trouble. Things might not have ended so well. The Globe theatre cost money to build, and was made of wood entirely; you wouldn’t want to tease them.

In this respect we are in a parallel situation today, with our contemporary “progressive” canines. Behind their backs, we say what we think, but it would be unwise to say it to their faces, for their pride is incontestible, and sensitive to the slightest nudge, and they play for keeps. Prudence dictates Maria’s more subtle strategy of revenge: set them up to perform their own self-destruction.

Swiss banking & you

Switzerland’s oldest bank, Wegelin & Company, whose foundation pre-dates that of the United States, is to close permanently after surrendering in a New York court battle against the U.S. Internal Revenue “Service.” The directors admitted to helping more than 100 wealthy Americans shelter their income from taxation. They were the last of the Swiss banks to offer this (actual) service, every other having been hounded “voluntarily” out of the business by the jackboots in Washington, DC.

Wegelin’s ability to resist was cracked last year, by a series of IRS moves against its directors which forced the bank to sell off its core non-American assets quickly, to protect the deposits of its non-American customers. The IRS prosecution tactics, against Wegelin & other Swiss banks, exhibit the lawlessness with which U.S. government agencies now habitually operate. They were able to exploit the honour of the Swiss banking system, in which directors still hold personal liability. They went after the directors individually, to get at a bank which itself had no U.S. branches, & was entirely outside IRS jurisdiction. As well, by publicizing their prosecution, they were able to wreck the bank’s business internationally: for few customers will take the risk of dealing with a bank that the U.S. government is determined to harm.

To his moral credit, the bank’s managing director, Karl Hummler — who is also incidentally the president of Neue Zürcher Zeitung, among the world’s oldest & most reliable daily newspapers — risked personal ruin to fight for the privacy of his clients. He pushed the Swiss government to defend banking customs & practices that had been recognized for centuries. Several of his fellow directors buckled, however, once their personal assets were attacked, & one at least has delivered a puling “admission” to the media that what his bank had been doing (entirely within Swiss law since time out of mind) was “wrong.” Perhaps he thought this would make the hard-faced goons at the IRS go a little easier on him personally.

The Swiss are under attack from foreign tax departments on several fronts. Their government had just come to an arrangement with the German tax authority, to turn over a large proportion of the “hidden” assets of every German national with a Swiss bank account. Unsatisfied with this act of rapine, the German Bundesrat (upper house) has refused to ratify the agreement, & now the German authorities are pushing for more.

Nanny States everywhere, themselves surpassing bankruptcy from incredibly irresponsible fiscal behaviour, are working both directly & in consort against all “offshore” locations where banking privacy is still maintained, & where they consider the tax rates to be too low. In previous generations, they tried to “make the rich pay” with ruinous graduated income taxes. The rich escaped by offshore accounts, by leaving the country themselves if necessary, or through the loopholes their lobbyists were able to get the politicians in their pay to write into tax legislation. This latter remains the American “compromise,” & the (grievously mislabelled) “fiscal cliff” deal struck two days ago contains all kinds of new loopholes & subsidies for the sort of corporations that contributed generously to the Obama campaign, especially Hollywood & media & “wind farms” (in the broadest sense).

The whole promise of democracy, as the Athenian mob quickly discovered, is the appropriation of wealth. As a great Scotsman said (Alexander Fraser Tytler, in one of the few quotations that can be traced to him on paper): from its Hellenic beginnings democracy consisted of servility to demagogues, who “maintained their influence over their partisans by the most shameful corruption & bribery, of which the means were supplied alone by the plunder of the public money.”

We (the living) now witness an advanced stage of this development, in which cooperative international efforts are directed to removing the last places on Earth where wealth might be preserved from the demonic grasp of “progressive” tax collectors. Once this object has been achieved, the agents of “democracy” may impound whatever they wish, from anyone, utilizing that monopoly of power which they have achieved by the reduction to impotence of every agency in civil society not already under the thumb of the government bureaucracy.

That is what Obama is about, & all that Obama is about, though let us say in his defence that he is only the latest demagogic embodiment of “progress” to enjoy the support of an idiotized electorate, & hardly among the more intelligent of the political operators. Woodrow Wilson might be presented as the first U.S. president to openly espouse “progressive” totalitarianism, articulating the ratcheting principle that has not changed from his day to this. One century after he first won election, the last restraints of the old U.S. Constitution are now being overturned, on Wilson’s own expressly anti-Constitutional argument.

It is also the centenary of the ratification of the 16th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. This was required to enable the central government to impose income taxes, supposedly to offset tariff reductions. The basic rate was set at 1 percent; but only a tiny fraction of the population made enough money to pay even that. Who could object? The top rate of 7 percent applied only to income at a level beyond the dreams of their avarice. So why shouldn’t people who were that rich pay “a little more”?

The real significance of the income tax system was that it gave government agents the ability & right to pry into every aspect of any citizen’s private life, in search of “hidden income.” The graduated tax rates could themselves be jacked up later: the progress of progressive “progress,” as it were.

This speech, by the intelligent American pundit George Will, to a student audience in Washington University at St Louis, does a fairly good job of twirling the strands together. Will, who has no religion, is speaking in defence of the citizen’s right to practise his religion. But hear him out, O ye agnosticks, for by extension he is also defending that citizen’s right to be anything at all, outside government control; & he is defending the original American Constitution on grounds which every True British Tory happens to share. He exquisitely “pins the tail on the donkey” — showing that by “progressivism” he does not mean anything vague; & if he associates it with the Democrat Party he is not merely expressing an opinion. From Wilson to FDR, to LBJ, to Carter, to Clinton, to Obama it has been, demonstrably, their constant theme.

Why do I defend the rich? Not for their own sakes; God knows they have done me no favours. It is because they are used by the politicians to excite that public envy & greed, by which the liberties of all the people are ultimately undone. For what can be brought down upon the rich — who can afford lawyers for good fellowship — can then be brought down so much more easily upon you, gentle reader — who face the hard-faced goons of “progress” & “democracy” all by your lonely little self. And with the fate of your children bundled nicely on the table.

She who must be portrayed

We are told, in a series currently being aired on BBC Two (“Queen Victoria’s Children”) & by a book flaunted on their website (Jane Ridley, A Life of Edward VII) that the home life of Victoria, Albert, et famille, was not an embodiment of perfect bliss; that paintings & photographs projecting “an image of a virtuous, devoted young couple surrounded by obedient, fair-haired children” may have been misleading.

This can come as a surprise only to the television audience, not to those previously exposed to a little history. Victoria’s temperament may be construed from her letters, & the anecdotes were circulating in her own day; though at least then the newspapers had the decency not to print them. That her relations with everyone around her were tempestuous, & those with her first-cousin husband compounded by a barely hinged sexual infatuation, were among those things “everyone who was anyone” knew, & none of them needed to know.

At Queen’s University up here in Kingston, Ontario, we have a huge collection of the letters of the late Benjamin Disraeli, novelist & sometime prime minister of the United Kingdom. Their number is astonishing — he turned them out like emails, sometimes thirty at a sitting, & of course in the good old days they were delivered around London at almost the speed of emails by the Royal Mail.

The late John Matthews, who was editing them (they will continue to appear in great thick annotated volumes for centuries to come), used to regale us at lunch with items illustrating the flirtatious tension between Disraeli & the old-widow Queen. A smart, but incredibly wilful woman, with an eye ever fixed on the trivial irritation, she adored Disraeli a little too openly, & hated his arch-rival Gladstone with a compensating serpentine passion. At one point Britain neared constitutional crisis, as she told her advisers that, election or no election, she would not have Gladstone as her prime minister. An ill & despondent Disraeli, loser of said election, had to be brought into the Palace to explain the situation to Her Majesty, & continue explaining until she scrawled a note to the effect that she was appointing Mr Gladstone, but only on the advice of her dear friend.

A little black-clothed bundle of crackling fire, through the decades after Prince Albert’s decease, she became almost ostentatiously reclusive, & left the impression she had no remaining interest in worldly affairs. In light of her correspondence & the anecdotes however, this will be seen as the opposite of the truth, & her meddling in the lives of her unfortunate children was among her many tracks of interest.

“Bertie,” later to become King Edward VII, was the first of her nine acute disappointments (four sons & five daughters). He was slow with his tutors, & she thought him a halfwit, referring obsessively to his narrow pointed head, & saying she shuddered at the sight of him. He had inherited her temper, & perhaps also her sexual intensity, but without her capacity to bottle them up, so that he lurched from scandal to scandal. But the flip side, also shared between them, was an inability to give anything up, so that the relationship between them remained constantly, & explosively, close. He made, in retrospect, as fine a King, as she made a Queen.

Some clever feminist should, by now, have written a biography of Her Late Majesty depicting her as the original “shriekie sister.” (Perhaps one has & we missed it.) Through all her pregnancies she remained revolted by the biologically distinguishing facts of womanhood, & later referred to her own grown daughters breastfeeding their babies as “cows.” She took inordinate relish in putting men down, & often reduced her own sainted husband to shoving gibbering apologetic notes under her door. Her “royal we” in conversation & correspondence has about it an air of the White Goddess, & when stipulating royal household arrangements she could leave her courtiers wincing from the blows of what felt like misandry; or perhaps, sudden emancipation from the female repression of the last ten thousand years.

As we hold, a magnificent Queen, all four-foot-eleven of her (at her accession; she had shrunk four inches by her Diamond Jubilee). To our mind her only flaw, besides not being Catholic, was her curious notion that she should hang the royal family up as an icon of “family values.” This had never been part of their job description, & was bound to lead to misunderstandings, & even muted suspicion of hypocrisy. She bequeathed this modernizing, public role to each of her successors (except Edward VIII), & through her progeny & example to many of the (mostly ill-fated) monarchies of the Continent. Add the paparazzi media, & we have these “democratic” monarchs today, with their offspring crushed under the burden of celebrity.

Whereas, a monarch should be remote; & journalists who get too close, for pictures, should be barracked in the Tower. People should mind their own business; & royal families should mind theirs.