John Qualen

            On Wednesday morning I worked out the chords for the verses and most of the instrumental parts of “Nicotine" by Serge Gainsbourg. 

            I logged on to Quercus at noon for my Brit Lit 2 tutorial. Carson was a little later than usual but he came on a few minutes before the official start time. I told him I was trying a new mic and asked if I was loud enough. He said he could hear me fine and asked about my set-up. I told him I had a Samson Meteorite. He said that all TAs were given $200 to buy the equipment they needed and so he got himself a podcast mic. 

            I asked about the footnotes that the professor mentioned on Gothic tropes in Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey. He said that we are missing important information if we don’t have them, but Carson said he doesn’t have them either and a lot of students said they don’t either. 

            This would be our last tutorial for two weeks because next week is reading week. I asked if we are going to get the details of our next assignment before reading week so we can start working on it. He said he hasn’t heard from the professor about it yet. 

            This tutorial turned into a very lively discussion on the end of Northanger Abbey. He asked us to comment on how the story turned out, since Catherine and Henry were only brought together by the general because of a misunderstanding on his part about Catherine’s family having money. 

            I said the message seems to be that society is what it is and so go with the flow. These marriages would not have occurred if not for the general’s greed. I added that Henry is the first person to ask Catherine to dance. If it had been someone else she might have attached herself to an entirely different family. I said that I disagree with the professor when he says that Catherine grows in the novel. Carson told me he agrees with my disagreement. I said that this novel is a comedy in the classical sense and that no one grows or changes and that the outcome is inevitable. 

            A lot of other students offered arguments that Catherine did grow. 

            I said she should have gone to Woodston to seek out Henry upon being cast out from the abbey rather than passively going home. 

            Some said it’s unfair to expect her to be assertive in that era at the age of seventeen. 

            I said Isabella is assertive and about the same age. 

            Someone pointed out that Isabella was three years older. 

            Henry’s repudiation of Catherine’s suspicions of his father having murdered his wife involved a list of arguments such as “This is England”. 

            I added that he mentioned that there are newspapers that would report such a thing and that there are voluntary spies. So basically the neighbours would have ratted on the general. 

            It is said that she was wrong about the general being a Gothic villain but that her suspicions of him were right but just in the wrong genre. 

            I said her suspicions might have been only coincidentally right, since there was nothing that she really picked up from him as being untoward. I admitted though that things were easier when he wasn’t around and that Eleanor seemed to be scared of him. I also reminded everybody that the general was a general and being in command was part of his makeup. Carson admitted there is a martial sensibility about the family. 

            One of the students read a passage and in her home her brother was giving a violin lesson. Carson thought that the music made a great soundtrack for her reading. 

            I had saltines and five year old cheddar for lunch. 

            I took a siesta at 14:00 but woke up to the sound of knocking at 14:20. There was no one there and so I think it was another one of my many knocking dreams. I couldn’t get back to sleep and so I got up at 15:00. 

            I took an early bike ride to Ossington and Bloor, south to Queen and then home. 

            I re-read the poem "To India" by Sarojini Naidu a few times. I assume she is talking about a romantic notion of the more than 200 cultures of India united in a kind of homogenous general culture within the borders created by British colonization but independent. It’s possible to entertain the concept if one unfocuses enough. 

            I started re-reading the selections from On the Origin of Species by Charles (Chuck D) Darwin but I got sleepy again and took another siesta, for an hour this time. When I got up I had my energy back and almost finished the Chuck D readings. 

            I made naan pizza with salsa for sauce, ground beef and old cheddar. I had it with a beer while watching Andy Griffith. 

            In this story Barney spreads the rumour that Henry Bennett is a jinx because he lost a game of checkers at Floyd’s barber shop while Henry was staring over his left shoulder. Floyd and other of his patrons suddenly remember events in which bad luck ensued because of Henry’s presence. Andy walks in just as Henry is being made upset by these claims. Henry storms out but Andy goes after him and invites him to fish with and Barney in their boat at the annual competition. Barney is very worried about the idea of Henry coming along and tries to counter the jinx by looking for charms in a book called "Signs, Omens, Portents and Charms to Ward Off Bad Luck". Andy comments on what a catchy title it is. One of the good luck charms is to rub the head of a red headed boy and Barney keeps ruffling Opie’s hair. Barney tries to explain to Andy the “science” behind jinxes: “There are atmospheric rays which control bodily motions. Now, if a person containing negative or hexin' qualities gets between you and them rays, why, he creates a static that jars any successful motion into an unsuccessful motion and jinxes ya - and THAT is a scientific fact!” Andy and Andy win the fishing competition every year and it looks like they are going to do it again even with Henry in the boat, as Andy begins to reel in the biggest fish he ever caught. But suddenly the boat sinks. The next day Henry comes to the barber shop and announces that he is leaving Mayberry because he doesn’t want to be blamed for every bad thing that happens. Andy tells everyone they should be ashamed of themselves and they feel bad. There is a dance and a raffle coming up for a portable TV and Andy convinces the whole town to cheat in order to keep Henry from leaving. Everyone is given the same number and the same numbers are put in the hat. They expect Henry to win but he has accidentally grabbed the hat size tag. Andy confesses to Henry that they were all cheating but he explains that this is proof of Henry’s good luck because he'd have to be very lucky to have a whole town full of friends that would do this for him. 

            Henry was played by famed Canadian character actor John Qualen, who was born in Vancouver, Canada and moved with his parents to Illinois. After high school he attended the University of Toronto but quit to join a Toronto based troupe of actors. In 1931 he became a member of John Ford’s stock company and worked for him in movies for the next thirty five years. His performance as Muley Bates in Ford’s The Grapes of Wrath brought the director to tears. John Wayne had a clause in his contract that insisted on Qualen appearing in his films. He appeared in more than a thousand TV shows and more than a hundred films. 

            I finished my Chuck D re-readings.