The Last Samurai

by Helen Dewitt

  It wasn’t all that easy to understand the book anyway, and with my father interrupting all the time it was practically impossible; what if he never stopped? What was it going to be like hearing it for 80 years? I thought of giving up and going home. Then I thought of Sibylla, jumping up and sitting down, jumping up to walk here and there, jumping up to read this book and that book a paragraph a sentence a word at a time.

  I got up again, and I started walking quickly through the gallery, past the Fragonards, past the Caravaggios, past a room of Rembrandts and a room of followers of Rembrandt, looking for one of the boring little rooms people never visit to hide from him there. What about this? Still Life with Drinking Horn of the Saint Sebastian Archer’s Guild, Lobster and Glasses, not to mention a half-peeled lemon—but beside it was a Vanitas by Jan Jansz Tech, a picture of a skull, an hourglass, a silk scarf, a drawing & other precious things, meant according to the caption to remind the viewer of the absurdity of human ambition. This was exactly the type of thing my father liked to comment on in philosophical moments, generally in the presence of a crumbling temple or tomb, what about the next room? Here was Cuyp’s large painting, A Distant View of Dordrecht with a Milkmaid and Four Cows, and his small painting, A Distant View of Dordrecht with a Sleeping Herdsman and Five Cows—no one would look for me here.

  I made myself read to the end of the chapter. I had to read every paragraph about eight times but at last I had finished it. I reread the Kutta-Joukowski Theorem five or six times. I thought of reading another chapter, but he kept saying Thanks, & instead I started flipping through the book, stopping at one page or another, looking for something so fascinating I wouldn’t hear him any more. Mach Waves — incompressible flows—Tollmien-Schlichting instability— Flight of small insects—Control and Maneuvering in Bird Flight—

  ‘My observation of the flight of buzzards leads me to believe that they regain their lateral balance, when partly overturned by a gust of wind, by a torsion of the tips of the wings …’ This passage is from Wilbur Wright’s first letter to Octave Chanute, dated 13 May 1900. It describes the crucial observation that led the Wright brothers to the invention of the aileron and thus to the achievement of lateral control and in turn to man’s first powered flight.

  Now I believe you read my book, said my father. I really mean that I’m not just saying that said my father. It means a lot said my father. At the end of the day it’s not just how many buy them said my father. I’ve got kids of my own said my father Sesame Street was about the right level said my father Now I believe you read my book said my father Now I believe you read my book.

  There was no point in staying so I left. There is a painting over the main stairs by Lord Leighton of Cimabue’s Celebrated Image of the Virgin Borne in Procession; for years I had looked at this painting every time I left, wondering what was wrong with it.

  When I got home Sibylla was watching Seven Samurai. She couldn’t have been watching long; the farmers had only just left the village. Tough-looking samurai were striding through the streets of a large town; you’d have to have a lot of nerve to ask one to fight for three meals a day.

  I sat on the sofa beside her. Fair enough, said my father.

  Kambei was handing a razor to the priest with a bow. He sat by the river and splashed water on his head; the priest began to shave off his hair.

  Fair enough, said my father.

  Kambei put on the clothes which the priest had brought. He met the eyes of the shiftless Mifune with a face of stone. I think you’re going to have to wait a while, said my father.

  Kambei took the two rice cakes and walked to the barn. The thief shrieked inside. I am only a priest, said Kambei. I won’t arrest you. I won’t come in. I’ve brought food for the child. Thanks, said my father. I mean that. That’s the nicest thing I’ve heard in a long time.

  I stood up and began walking around the room, looking for something I could do for an hour or even ten minutes without hearing his voice. I picked up my book on judo but after two lines I saw his face, and I started reading Ibn Khaldun and he said Now I believe you read my books.

  Have you seen him yet? asked Sibylla. This was her idea of delicacy, to bring the thing out in the open rather than leave me to wonder what she knew & whether I should say anything.

  I saw him, I said. I don’t know what you saw in him.

  You know as much as I know, said Sib, delicately indicating that she knew for a fact that I’d also read through her papers.

  I didn’t tell him, I said.

  Selbstverständlich, said Sib. I never could. I kept thinking I should, but I just couldn’t. I’d read something he’d written, thinking he might have changed, and he did change, but only in the way that someone from the Tyrone Power school of acting would show maturity: mouth set, furrowed brow, this is someone thinking tough thoughts. He woke up a boy and went to bed—a man. I’m sorry to speak ill of your sperm donor, though. I’d better stop.

  It’s all right, I said.

  No, it’s not all right, said Sib. She turned off the video. It is shocking to stop in the middle, she said, still at least Kurosawa will never know.

  It doesn’t matter, I said.

  All right, said Sib. Just remember that you are perfect, whatever your father may be. It may be that other people need a sensible father more.

  We’re not talking about an exhaustible resource, I said.

  We’re talking about luck, said Sib. Why should you have all of it?

  Was I complaining? I said.

  Look at it from his point of view, said Sib. It’s hard for a man to be upstaged by his son.

  I wasn’t complaining, I said.

  Of course you weren’t, said Sib.

  He said he had kids of his own, I said. He said they watched Sesame Street and it was about the right level.

  At what age? said Sib.

  He didn’t say.

  Hmmm, said Sib.

  She stood up and turned on the computer and picked up the Independent and sat down to read it.

  Did I tell you I was reading Die Zeit? said Sib. I was reading Die Zeit and I came across this lovely line, Es regnete ununterbrochen. It rained uninterruptedly. It sounded so lovely in the German. Es regnete ununterbrochen. Es regnete ununterbrochen. I shall think of it whenever it rains.

  Did you ever think of having an abortion? I said.

  I did, said Sib, but it was very late and I had to have counselling, they counselled adoption & I said Yes but how could I be sure your adoptive parents would teach you how to leave life if you did not care for it & they said What and I said—well you know I said what any rational person would say and we had an unprofitable discussion & she said

  Oh look! Hugh Carey is back in England.

  I said: Who?

  Sibylla said: He was the best friend of Raymond Decker.

  I said: Who?

  Sibylla: You’ve never heard of Raymond Decker!

  And then: But then who has?

  She said that Carey was an explorer and Decker, she did not know what Decker was doing these days but in the early 60s they had been legendary classicists at Oxford. A pirate copy of Carey’s translation of Wee sleekit cow’rin’ tim’rous beastie into Greek for the verse paper in the Ireland was passed from hand to hand, & Decker had won the Chancellor’s Latin with an amazing translation of Johnson on Pope, not said Sibylla the bit where he says It is a very pretty poem Mr. Pope but it is not Homer which was actually Bentley anyway now I think of it but the bit that goes

  … the distance is commonly very great between actual performances and speculative possibility. It is natural to suppose, that as much as has been done to-day may be done to-morrow; but on the morrow some difficulty emerges, or some external impediment obstructs. Indolence, interruption, business, and pleasure; all take their turns of retardation; and every long work is lengthened by a thousand causes that can, and ten thousand that cannot, be recounted. Perhaps no extensive and multifarious performance was ever effected within the term origi
nally fixed in the undertaker’s mind. He that runs against Time, has an antagonist not subject to casualities.

  Sib explained that this though Latinate was a diabolical piece to put into Latin because all the abstract nouns would have to be turned into clauses, she digressed to explain that Lytton Strachey on Johnson on the Poets, on the other hand, was the type of thing that was very easy to turn into Latin, Strachey she said for example said

  Johnson’s aesthetic judgements are almost invariably subtle, or solid, or bold; they have always some good quality to recommend them—except one: they are never right. That is an unfortunate deficiency; but no one can doubt that Johnson has made up for it, and that his wit has saved all

  the Latin she said practically wrote itself she seemed on the point of digressing to some other point of similar interest so before she could discuss somebody else on Strachey on Johnson and how they might easily be translated into Phoenician or Linear B or Hittite I said quickly

  But who ARE these people?

  Hugh Carey and Raymond Decker met when HC was 15 and RD was 19. HC was from Edinburgh. He had told his teacher he wanted to apply to Oxford and the teacher had told him to wait, & HC thought—but that’s stupid, if I get in at 15 people will always say He got into Oxford when he was 15. So he wrote independently to Merton to apply to take the exam, & he went down to take the exam.

  RD was largely self-taught.

  RD had read Plato’s Gorgias even before he came up, and being the type to take things to heart he had taken it to heart. In the Phaedrus the rhetorician Gorgias is said to boast that he can give a long or a short answer to any question, and in the Gorgias he says that when it comes to giving short answers he is unsurpassed. Socrates, on the other hand, knows only one way to answer a question, some questions can be answered with one word and others may take five thousand, and the philosopher, unlike the rhetorician or the politician, will take as long as he needs. This placed RD in a terrible dilemma. He had bought copies of past papers from the University Press & now he paced up and down declaiming to HC: All the interesting questions require a minimum of three hours apiece to answer and the rest are so stupid it is impossible to say anything intelligent about them, how can you make an intelligent reply to a stupid question? And he would tear his hair and say What am I to do?

  HC was surprised. He had done 13 O-levels because he had heard the most anyone had ever done before was 12, and he had done them at the age of 12 because he had heard when he was 9 that the youngest anyone had ever done more than 5 was 13 & he had instantly decided to beat the record.

  He said: Well what did you do for A-level?

  RD: I don’t want to talk about it.

  HC: Well what about O-level?

  RD: I don’t want to talk about it.

  HC: Well surely you must have taken some exam.

  RD: Of course I’ve taken an exam. It was horrible. Full of questions about long division. I don’t want to talk about it.

  Long division? said HC.

  RD: I don’t want to TALK about it. And he paced up and down the common room making further anguished references to the Gorgias crying What am I to do?

  HC said: Do you play chess?

  What? said RD.

  And HC said: Do you play chess?

  And RD said: Of course.

  And HC said Let’s play a game. He took out from one pocket a pocket chess set, and from his other pocket he took out a chess clock which he took with him wherever he went. It was the night before the first exam, and he had been planning to go over the chorus to Zeus of Aeschylus’ Agamemnon. He set out the board. RD was white.

  HC set the timer & he said: 20 minute game.

  And RD said: I don’t play that way.

  HC: 10 minutes each.

  And RD said: But that’s stupid.

  HC: I don’t have time to play longer. I need to look at the chorus to Zeus.

  RD: P-K4.

  HC: P-QB4.

  RD knew many responses to the Sicilian Defence but the question was what could be developed in the time available, still pondering this question he had not even moved his knight to KB3 when the timer went off, he moved his knight now to KB3 and HC said:

  Sorry. Game’s over.

  RD was furious & he started to argue but in the meantime HC had moved all the pieces back and turned the clock back & this time HC was white.

  HC: P-K4.

  RD liked the Sicilian Defence himself but debating inwardly the merits in the time allowed of the Najdorf Variation, the Scheveningen (which he generally preferred), the Nimzowitsch & others too numerous to mention he nearly made the same mistake, suddenly pulling himself together (P-QB4) he managed to make 10 moves before falling again into deep thought interrupted only by the timer.

  He reached his 10th move & the timer went off before he had moved a piece & HC said game’s over and moved the pieces back again and started the clock.

  By now RD was really furious. HC was only 15 and looked young for his age. RD made his first move and HC made his and this time RD made a move the instant it was his turn and HC won in 25 moves.

  RD put the pieces back. HC said he had to read the Agamemnon. RD said This won’t take long. He was black. This time he played the defence he knew the best, and he played a version of a middle game he had read in Keres & Kotov, and the end played itself.

  He said: Checkmate. And he said: I know what you think you’re doing, but it’s stupid. It’s not the same.

  And HC said: It’s a game. It’s a stupid game. Opening, middle game, endgame, opening, middle game, endgame, opening middle game endgame. Let’s set the clock to 5 minutes.

  RD said: It’s not the same.

  HC said: 10 minute game.

  HC set out the pieces and he started the clock. They played 5 games and RD won 4.

  RD said: It’s not the same.

  They played until 2:00 in the morning. RD kept saying It’s not the same, but he was laughing now because he was winning most of the time. You are probably thinking that HC was letting him win but he wasn’t. HC had none of the Socratic scruples that plagued RD, but he carried sportsmanship to so fanatical an extreme that it had a very similar effect; he knew he would have no real competition if RD was not there, & left to his own devices & composing Socratic answers to Gorgianic questions RD was certainly not going to be there. So even though he could hardly keep his eyes open he said to RD: Don’t think of arguments. Look at a question and say: Queen’s Indian. Sicilian Defence.

  RD thought this was ridiculous but no sooner had he dismissed it as ridiculous than it suddenly seemed to him, as a matter of fact, that you actually could start a discussion of the influence of Homer on Virgil using the Sicilian Defence.

  Ruy Lopez, said HC, pursuing his advantage.

  RD: Ruy LOPEZ! How can I POSSIBLY use the Ruy LOPEZ?

  HC hesitated—

  RD: If they set the question they are OBVIOUSLY, ALWAYS white.

  & he was again briefly plunged into despair.

  HC: Black to win in 4 moves. Two knights & a rook, checkmate in 6.

  No, said RD, and he stood up and wrapped his arms around his head in a pretzel formation. He paced up and down & at last he said: Yes. NOW I see. He said: You don’t actually ARGUE all the way THROUGH you decide the endgame you want to play you incorporate an opening which might lead to it by REFERENCE as it might be Black played an unusual version of the Queen’s Indian you incorporate the middle game largely by REFERENCE—

  Whether this really is what you do or not RD did get in under the impression that you did and get a scholarship on the strength of [opening] [middle game] endgame, and he and HC were friends & rivals. HC made him go in for prizes because if he won a prize RD had not gone in for it would not really count, & every time he had to play chess with RD to counterbalance the hold Socrates had regained on his mind in the meantime. He had to play chess to counteract the influence of Fraenkel.

  Fraenkel was a Jewish refugee from the Nazis, and on coming to England he h
ad been made Professor of Latin at Corpus Christi College and gave seminars on Greek. Very few undergraduates went to these, and the few that went went with the approval of their tutor because Fraenkel was very formidable. Somehow or other HC heard of these seminars and instantly decided to go. He asked his tutor and his tutor said he thought it would be better to wait, and HC thought: But that’s stupid, if I go now people will always say He went to Fraenkel’s seminar in his first term when he was only 15. His birthday was in mid-October, and if he waited even a term it would be too late.

  Now if HC went RD had to go too, because otherwise HC would have felt he was getting an unfair advantage. RD was naturally diffident and said he thought he should wait till his second or even third year; a chessboard was no use in a situation like this, but HC with the genius of desperation said That’s ridiculous, and stealing shamelessly from Socrates he said there was no shame in ignorance but in the refusal to learn. He said he had heard that Fraenkel had deplored the lack of rigour in English scholarship; he said surely it was of the ESSENCE that they should not pick up slipshod methods at the very OUTSET of their scholarly careers. RD said Yes but he probably won’t let us in the class and HC said Leave everything to me.

  HC was 15 and looked 12. He went over to Corpus before breakfast and waited outside Fraenkel’s room, and when the great man appeared he brought out the phrases ‘slipshod methods’ and ‘outset of scholarly career’. He was taken into the room and shown some Greek he had never seen before and made to comment on it, and when he did not absolutely disgrace himself he was told that he and his friend could come to the class on probation.

  Now Fraenkel once said in a class that a scholar should be able to look at any word in a passage and instantly think of another passage where it occurred; HC was unperturbed by this remark, but RD took it to heart, and the longer he worked the more any text was like a pack of icebergs each word a snowy peak with a huge frozen mass of cross-references beneath the surface. So that now in addition to Socratic reservations on answering any question was added a conviction that in any linguistic analysis a real scholar would haul up the whole iceberg. Meanwhile HC was horribly bored by the class, he found the business of loading a line with comment excruciatingly boring; he was only able to cheer himself up by remembering that he had only just turned 16.