Babbington Review 5
IT IS WINTER in Maine. Matthew Barber and Effie Parker are outdoors, on the patio behind their house, at night. The night is clear, and on clear nights their nighttime ritual is to spend some time outside, lying side-by-side on chaises longues—wearing wool underwear, two layers of socks, expedition-weight microfleece shirts and pants, goose down vests and overalls, quilted jackets, boots, balaclavas, hats, hoods, glove liners, and mittens—looking at the night sky and allowing the magnificent vastness of the universe to diminish the day’s difficulties and disappointments. Tonight, though, lowering clouds hide the stars, and the universe isn’t having its usual salutary effect. A long silence passes. At last Effie speaks.
“When I was a girl,” she says, wistfully, “I thought that the world would grow up as I grew up—that people would get better—that they’d mature as I matured—”
Matthew waits for her to finish. Time passes. She doesn’t say anything more, so he extends her thought for her.
“—they’d become better people—”
“—better, yes, better—kinder, wiser—”
“—and it hasn’t happened.”
“It hasn’t happened,” she says.
“It’s a great disappointment,” he says.
“A bitter disappointment,” she says.
“You expected people to become good.”
“At least better.”
“And reasonable?”
“At least more reasonable.”
“Benevolent, generous, honorable, just—”
“Yes.”
“—and even honest?”
“Yes,” she says, shaking her head at her folly.
“You expected the Yahoos to turn into Houyhnhnms.”
“That’s it. You’ve got it. That’s what I expected. A world of Houyhnhnms.”
Another silence passes. After a minute or two, Effie laughs a bitter little laugh and says, “You know what?”
“What?” asks Matthew.
“I’m going to make a confession.”
“Go ahead.”
“I don’t like them.”
“You mean Yahoos”
“That’s right. My generosity of spirit does not extend to Yahoos.”
He chuckles. Then he says, “Well, I’ll confess that I can’t stand them!”
They turn toward each other. They regard each other with astonishment. They’ve kept this from each other for years.
“They disgust me!” she nearly shouts.
“Me, too!” says Matthew.
“I tried,” says Effie, shaking her head. “You know I tried.”
“I do. I know that. I know you tried.”
“I really did. I tried to feel compassion for even the crudest and most vicious of people, but—” She doesn’t finish. She shakes her head again. She’s on the verge of tears.
“We’ve been trying to love all of our fellow creatures,” he says, “even the ones that in our heart of hearts we completely despise!”
Effie bursts out laughing. Again, it’s bitter laughter, but it is laughter. “What a pair of fools we’ve been!”
Matthew tries to join her in her laughing, but he can’t quite manage it.
“Can we go inside now?” he asks. “I’m freezing.”
“And I could use a drink,” says Effie.
INSIDE, Matthew pours a tumbler of scotch for each of them and begins building a fire.
“They’re greedy,” says Effie, “and I prefer generous people. I like the ones who say, ‘After you,’ not the ones who say, ‘Me first.’”
“Or, ‘Get outta my way!’” says Matthew.
“And they’re full of hate,” says Effie.
“There’s no love in their hearts,” says Matthew. “There’s hate in their hearts.”
“Well—they love to hate,” says Effie.
They take a swallow. Matthew’s eyes light up.
“I’ve got one,” he says. “They’re ignorant.”
“Not only ignorant, but willfully ignorant,” says Effie.
“They’re proud of being ignorant!”
Another swallow.
“My turn,” says Effie.
“Let’s hear it,” says Matthew.
“They’re slovenly. They live messy lives—and they like it that way!”
“They are as happy as pigs in shit.”
A little quiet chuckling.
“Your turn,” says Effie.
“They’re provincial,” says Matthew without hesitation. “Narrow-minded, hidebound, parochial—”
“Bigoted!”
“That’s the word.”
“They’re headstrong, impulsive, unthinking—”
“—unreasonable, irrational.”
“They’re stupid, too,” she says.
“Thick as a brick.”
“Impolite!”
“Rude, crude, boorish—”
“—vulgar, brutish and bestial!”
“The Yahoos are vicious people! The Houyhnhnms are virtuous people!”
“Well, to be strictly correct, I think you’d have to say ‘people who behave like Houyhnhnms,’ since the Houyhnhnms are, if I remember correctly, not people but horses.”
She punches him, playfully.
“I think I also have to point out that, exemplary as the Houyhnhnms were, they were not perfect.”
“Oh?”
“They were rigidly tribal.”
“Yeah, well, I’m certainly not perfect then, because when it comes to the people I want to spend the rest of my time with I prefer the knowledgeable to the ignorant, the flexible to the stubborn, the thoughtful to the thoughtless, the cultured to the crude, the—the—”
“—the generous to the greedy—the cosmopolitan to the provincial—”
“—the rational to the irrational—”
“—the honest to the dishonest—”
“—the literate to the illiterate—”
“—the friendly to the hostile—”
They’re really laughing now, laughing like a couple of drunks. (Actually, at this point, they are a couple of drunks.) They pause. They seem to have run out of virtues and vices.
“That felt good,” Effie says.
“Yes, it did,” says Matthew, “but—”
“I know what you’re going to say, ‘What are we going to do now?’”
“Does this call for another inch of scotch?”
“I’ll have half an inch.”
“I’ll have an inch.”
He pours.
“Are we giving up all hope of living in a better world?” he asks.
“No,” she says. “I have a plan—”
“Okay. Lay it on me, baby.”
“We’re going to avoid Yahoos.”
“Can that be done?”
“Not entirely, I’m sorry to say, but to the extent that it can be done, we will do it. We’re going to live the Houyhnhnm way, and we’re going to embrace everyone else who lives the Houyhnhnm way—all races, creeds, colors, and classes, as long as they live the Houyhnhnm way. We’re going to accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative, or as much of the negative as we can eliminate, and that’s it, that’s my plan.”
“We’re going to live the Houyhnhnm way,” he says, trying the phrase, trying the idea.
“You’ve got it. Run with the Houyhnhnms and shun the Yahoos.”
“So we will—”
“—support strivers, truth-tellers, truth-seekers, do-gooders, thinkers, lovers—”
“—and boycott liars and haters and cheaters and money-grabbers and pussy-grabbers and anti-vaxers. I get it—but will, thereby, the winter of our discontent be made glorious summer, and all the clouds that lour’d upon our house be buried in the deep bosom of the ocean?”
“Maybe. I hope so. We’ll see.”
He whinnies softly, nuzzles her, and says, “‘The Houyhnhnm Way’ is fun to say.”
“As these noble Houyhnhnms are endowed by nature with a general disposition to all virtues, and have no conceptions or ideas of what is evil in a rational creature, so their grand maxim is, to cultivate reason, and to be wholly governed by it. . . . Friendship and benevolence are the two principal virtues among the Houyhnhnms; and these not confined to particular objects, but universal to the whole race; for a stranger from the remotest part is equally treated with the nearest neighbour, and wherever he goes, looks upon himself as at home. They preserve decency and civility in the highest degrees, but are altogether ignorant of ceremony. . . . Instead of proposals for conquering that magnanimous nation, I rather wish they were in a capacity, or disposition, to send a sufficient number of their inhabitants for civilizing [us], by teaching us the first principles of honour, justice, truth, temperance, public spirit, fortitude, chastity, friendship, benevolence, and fidelity.” . . .
“My Houyhnhnm master . . . had heard, indeed, some curious Houyhnhnms observe, that in most [Yahoo] herds there was a sort of ruling Yahoo (as among us there is generally some leading or principal stag in a park), who was always more deformed in body, and mischievous in disposition, than any of the rest; that this leader had usually a favourite as like himself as he could get, whose employment was to lick his master’s feet and posteriors, and drive the female Yahoos to his kennel; for which he was now and then rewarded with a piece of ass’s flesh. . . . By what I could discover, the Yahoos appear to be the most unteachable of all animals. . . . Yet I am of opinion, this defect arises chiefly from a perverse, restive disposition; for they are cunning, malicious, treacherous, and revengeful. They are strong and hardy, but of a cowardly spirit, and, by consequence, insolent, abject, and cruel. It is observed, that the red haired of both sexes are more libidinous and mischievous than the rest.” . . .
“My design was, if possible, to discover some small island uninhabited, yet sufficient, by my labour, to furnish me with the necessaries of life, . . . so horrible was the idea I conceived of returning to live in the society, and under the government of Yahoos. For in such a solitude as I desired, I could at least enjoy my own thoughts, and reflect with delight on the virtues of those inimitable Houyhnhnms, without an opportunity of degenerating into the vices and corruptions of my own species.”
Gulliver, in Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (1726)
pity this busy monster, manunkind,
not.
e. e. cummings
I think I could turn and live with animals
Walt Whitman
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