A page from a woman's diary (3)

Dearest Diary,

It’s time again to share with you my personal thoughts that aren't about women’s rights or the great scourge AIDS, both of which I am expected by the public to dwell exclusively upon.

But neither am I not going to indulge on culinary fantasies such as how to improve my style of Penang laksa by varying the ulam that goes with it – the slightly astringent pucuk janggus would be a novel introduction – or kueh lapis miraculously and lavishly having alternative layers of rich kaya, an idea that I am currently entertaining – well, how about that for wicked indulgence but then, didn't we just say we aren’t writing all that tonight.

Tonight I want to discuss with you, dearest confidante, the immortal words of William Shakespeare, in particular Act 3, Scene 2 of his play Julius Caesar, and I want to examine the speech of Caesar’s ally and friend, Marc Anthony.

Why, you may ask? Because it’s rather relevant when Dad’s Brutus, his once-son and heir, had made much ado about Shakespeare while continuing to perpetrate verbal Ides of March, that Marc Anthony should come to Dad’s rescue. Shakespeare had portrayed Marc Anthony saying:

Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him;
The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interréd with their bones,

With his clever snake oil salesman’s talk, Brutus has lambasted Dad’s evil as if those were not collectively made or at least supported too by Brutus himself. But I ask myself, should people allow Dad’s good deeds to be interred with his bones? Si monumentum requiris, circumspice - if you seek his monument, look around (in our nation)

So let it be with Caesar … The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answered it ...

So what did my ‘ambitious’ Dad do? He retired, yes, voluntarily retired with clear handing over of the reins of power. He didn’t make himself perpetual dictator or for that matter, senior state minister like someone in a neighbouring nation. And in retiring, he witnessed how those who once fawned on him now ignore him as someone no longer useful, a political dead, yet continuing to accuse him of being an ‘ambitious Caesar’.

Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest,
(For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all; all honourable men)
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral …
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:

Yes, dearest diary, I speak for Dad, my friend, always faithful and just to me. As for Brutus the honourable man, once The Honourable So-and-So, a former Malaysian Yang Berhormat, well ... what can I say, but then don’t we have Yg Berhormats like Cyclops, Tebuans and Gatal.

But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man …
He hath brought many captives home to Rome,
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?

So when they were both serving the people, recall what positive things had Dad achieved for the people, and compare those with what positive things the honourable Brutus had.

When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.

People laughed at Dad when he wept in public because he felt he failed to transform some people. They called him a hypocrite, but did that make him ‘ambitious’? I related his motive for feting one who swam across the English Channel while another wasn’t. It should explain why Dad had cried for his sense of failure.

You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And, sure, he is an honourable man.

If he was ambitious, would he have resigned? And hand the reins to a man who once was against him, like Cassius and Brutus were against Caesar, yet forgiven?

I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then to mourn for him?

Oh, the fickle-mindedness of the Romans, but most certainly a characteristic not unique to them.

O judgement! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason … Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till it come back to me.

O men! Aren't they such paradoxical creatures, emotional yet cold-bloodedly practical, swayed principally by their personal interests, thus allowing their balanced judgements to flee from their conscience.

Good night, dearest diary.
M

Related:
(1) A page from a woman's diary
(2) A page from a woman's diary (2)