Robert Emhardt

            On Thursday morning I finished my run through in English of “Mozart avec nous” (Mozart Is With Us) by Boris Vian and now it’s ready to upload to Christian’s Translations. It’ll probably take a long time to edit it there because it’s a long song and I only work on it for ten minutes a day. 

            I worked out the chords for the refrain and the first couple of lines of “Mesdames, mesdemoiselles, mes yeux" (Madames and Madmoiselles, My Eyes) by Serge Gainsbourg. I might have gotten a little more than that done but the power went out for a couple of minutes and so I lost about ten minutes waiting for my computer to restart and getting back online. 

            In the late morning I took a bike ride and on the way back I stopped at Freshco. I bought ten avocados, three bunches of vine ripe tomatoes, a jalapeno, two scotch bonnet peppers, seven bags of red grapes, a jug of orange juice and two bottles of Garden Cocktail. 

            When I got home I weighed myself and I was up to 90 kilos from 88.3 yesterday. Sometimes it just depends on the time of day. 

            I had tomatoes and avocados for lunch. 

            In the afternoon I found that I’d gotten one question wrong in yesterday’s reading quiz. I disagreed with the answer that was listed as the correct one and I emailed the assistant professor to argue my point. In the poem “Fra Lippo Lippi” Lippi gives a quarter floren to the night watch that stops him. I said it was a bribe but the supposed answer is that he did so to make them forget that he mentioned the name of his benefactor. I say that there is nothing in the poem to indicate that he cares if Cosimo Medici’s name is mentioned and that he only dropped the name to add potency to the bribe. 

            I wrote some initial hand written notes in stream of consciousness on my idea for a possible essay. Then I typed the notes and sent them to my TA to make sure that what I’m considering follows the prescribed criteria for the paper. Here is what I wrote: 

            George Eliot’s Reality is a Lie and So It Is Art According to Oscar Wilde Oscar Wilde’s theory of art as presented in his "The Critic As Artist” and “The Decline of Lying" can be applied to George Eliot's argument for reality in novels. Even though the views on art of these two authors are diametrically opposed, in advocating the strictly authentic depiction of peasant life Eliot presents the peasants as an exaggeration of middle class life. As peasant life is a reality that is removed from that of the middle and upper class readership, even a realistic portrayal of the peasant would appear as an unreal exaggeration of the familiar middle class world of her readers. 

            Eliot’s presentation of the peasants as realistic is a lie and therefore it fits Wilde's insistence that the artist must distort the truth. Her perspective of the peasants is only real from a middle class perspective. While it is more real than the painting of the shepherd that she describes, in making it closer to the reality of middle class life she is bringing the peasants into the realm of comparison. This renders the peasants as no longer caricatures of the happy rustic from which the middle class had been able to distance themselves in complete separation. But in presenting the peasant as more real than before, that closeness creates a distance in proximity that holds more tension than the caricature that is fully removed from association. This is not dissimilar in effect for the middle class of this era than Darwin’s revelation that men are not separate from apes is for all humanity. 

            Once the peasants are real they are suddenly human, unlike the cartoon shepherd. Now that the peasant class is more similar to the middle class, this closeness allows the reader to more forcefully other it. Previously readers could like the peasants from a safe distance but now they are forced to like or dislike them in close literary quarters because they are set up as someone to identify with in fantasy. But whether liked or disliked the peasant is nonetheless now more othered than before because he can only be liked or disliked from a distance. 

            Wilde says that the artist must lie and it is clear that Eliot is lying. She presents the peasant as simple and wise. Her writing about the peasants is not meant for the peasants but for the middle class to read in order to look in on a fantasized world of the other that has been augmented by the fetish of authenticity. The reading of the peasant's life, even if Eliot had portrayed it accurately, would nonetheless be unreal for the middle and upper class reader because it is not their reality. It is more like a type of literary Roman holiday. The experience is similar for the reader to participating in a historical re-enactment that one expects to be as authentic as possible. 

            Prior to writing about the life of peasants Eliot did not live with them and participate in their lifestyle. Even if she drew her material from conversations with peasants her perspective is still that of an outsider. This viewpoint of looking in from outside to try to discern a distant reality leads to her inaccurate assessment of the peasants as having more of a group mind than the upper classes. This idea is born out of a “they all think alike” type of racism. 

            I had tomatoes and avocados sprinkled with a little too much scotch bonnet pepper for dinner while watching Andy Griffith. 

            In this story a businessman named Malcolm Tucker is on his way to Charlotte on the outskirts of Mayberry when his car breaks down. There’s a bit of a goof in it breaking down though because he puts on the brakes before the motor stops. He takes the long walk into Mayberry but it’s a Sunday and everything is dead. We see Andy and Barney as they are leaving church. The minister notes that Barney fell asleep during his sermon but Andy explains that he was on a stakeout until 4:00 looking for a chicken thief. They had a tip that Buzz Jenkins has been lifting fryers. The priest says, “Oh dear!” Andy asks the reverend if he knows Buzz and he responds in a worried tone, “That’s where I’m having supper this evening.” Tucker finds Andy and tells him of his car trouble. Andy says he’ll take him to Wally’s filling station but warns him that Wally doesn’t work on Sunday and the only person there is Gomer, who is not a mechanic. This is the first real appearance of Gomer Pyle as a major player on this show and he really does steal any scene he’s in. It is made clear from the start that Gomer is not particularly bright. He has yet to start using the catchphrase “Shazam” but rather says anytime he says goodbye, “Lotsa luck to and yours!” Tucker asks Andy why they leave a boy like that in charge?” Andy says it’s just a part time job while he saves up money for college to study to be a doctor. Andy takes him to Wally who can tell by the described symptoms that it’s the fuel line but he won’t do anything until Monday. Tucker goes back to Gomer and asks who else could fix his car. He says his cousin Goober could but on Sunday he’s always on his boat. This is the first mention of Goober, although we don’t meet him in this episode. Tucker then suddenly steals the gas station truck but after he is caught Andy doesn’t charge him because he understands he’s desperate. Tucker wants to make a call but Andy says he can’t because the town lets Maude and Cora Mendlebright tie up the line every Sunday because one lives in Mount Pilot and they are too old to visit each other. Andy invites Tucker to his place. He’s invited to sit down for dinner but he’s too impatient to eat. Later Andy and Barney sing folk songs on the porch and Tucker starts to quietly sing along. Finally Gomer comes to say Goober came back, they towed his car back to the filling station and fixed it. When Tucker wants to pay Gomer says there is no charge. Aunt Bee packs Tucker a home made lunch and Opie gives him his nickel that’s lucky because it was run over by a train. Tucker is about to leave when he is overwhelmed by all the kindness and suddenly he’s not in a hurry any more. He says the engine sounds wrong and he’d like to stay until Monday to have Wally fix it. He falls happily asleep in a chair on the porch with Andy and Barney.

            Tucker was played by Robert Emhardt, who did a lot of theatre work in the US and Britain in the 40s before he started doing movies in the 50s. He was in the original cast of the Broadway production of The Seven Year Itch. He won the Critics Circle award for his supporting role in Life With Mother. He acted in more than 250 TV shows, usually cast as a rotund villain.