Not Constant, Nor Respectful, But Decadent
With the discovering of a new type of human, the light man, society has been surmounted by a period of decadency and extreme hedonism[1]. A light man is defined as a person who has lost its humanistic view of the world and someone who just gets satisfied with ephemeral and quick pleasures which do not provide any spiritual and intellectual improvement. Suppressing their goals and filled with unconscious fear, light men do not procure the well being of the community, they just want their own benefit. Hedonism and selfishness are the concrete words that are written with blood in the light man’s forehead and this very same behavior is the central edge of both John Le Carré’s The Constant Gardener’s and Jean-Paul Sartre’s The Respectful Prostitute’s scheme whose antagonists are leaders of this philosophy of decadency. With a moral background that both authors try to teach to the readers, both works represent the fight for justice and truth. However, even through both plots are virtually different; they may have found the same philosophical essence.
Love is often mistaken with sex, which represents the hedonic satisfaction of a light man. John Le Carré portraits this situation in Sandy’s character, a British gentlemen that most than anything, he desires his friend’s wife. In The Constant Gardener, Sandy believes he is in love with Tessa when, actually, he is just infatuated because of her body and poise “Woodrow makes reference to Tessa’s necklace recalling his intimate moments of flirting with her” (Le Carré, 50). Nevertheless, Sandy’s needs are transformed, through the novel continues, into an obsession that clouds his mind and reason, and brings issues among the main characters “Justin appeared not to like this question […] Or perhaps he didn’t take kindly to being pinned down on the subject of Tessa, when he couldn’t pin her down himself” (Le Carré, 21). Sandy’s demonstration of lust can be compared with Fred’s actions, one of the protagonists in Sartre’s play. Within The Respectful Prostitute’s argument, Fred professes love to Lizzie, the prostitute, which at the end turns out to be uncertain “What have you done to me? You stick to me like the teeth in my gum. I see your belly, your dirty whorish belly; I feel your heat in my hands, your smell in my nostrils” (Sartre, 279). Passing through the pages of Sartre’s play, one can get into account that what Fred is really doing is using Lizzie as a media to obtain his own benefit
“You dirty bitch! You are the Devil, and with the Devil you can’t win. He put his hand under your skirt, he shut down a dirty nigger; so what? You do things like that without thinking; they don’t count. Thomas is a leading citizen, that’s what counts” (Sartre, 259).
Nonetheless, even when it is true that both Sandy and Fred demonstrate their hedonism; there is a more concerning social criticism in both works: The authorities’ abuse.
Power and money have proved to boast the power of corrupting the human intellect and trigger the most egotistical hedonism. The government and the biggest enterprises can exploit recklessly their influence over the world’s decisions and this statement is deeply carved in Le Carré’s pages. Trying to multiply its incomes, ThreeBees uses its power to deceit Africa by testing a harmful medicine over the population in Nairobi
“KVH performed a similar public service in India, where two hundred children in the region of Madras allegedly died of related causes. The Indian court case court will be heard in about fifteen years, or longer if KVH continue to pay off the right people” (Le Carré, 252).
This egotistical enterprise do not seem to care about the humanistic damage it will cause; instead, it is shown in the novel how they just pursue the empty wish of getting more disgustingly rich “They’re also famous as front-runners in the pharmacy industry’s humanitarian campaign to prolong the life of their patents in the interest of suffering white billionaires” (Le Carré, 252). Similarly, the government can also “see not evil” at its own advantage, which is what the Senator does as the readers listen to his poisonous words of discrimination. Injected with a spice of racism, the Senator fools Lizzie to provide a fake testimony to the court, against the Negro who is completely innocent of the charges “Lizzie: The white man is guilty. Fred: He isn’t guilty. Lizzie: Since he killed, he’s guilty. Fred: Guilty of what? Lizzie: Of killing!” (Sartre, 255-256). The government achieves its goal and easily captures its light ideals as a leaf floating in the wind. Mostly, these two author attempt to point out how this injustices are made nowadays and to bring the spot lights to the constant and respectful quest for a humanistic solution against the big dogs’ hedonism.
Le Carré and Sartre use social criticism to expose nude the essence of social injustice and the menace of a light life. The Constant Gardener and The Respectful Prostitute believe in justice as they pound hedonism as the paradigm it is. In their original way and with a taste of a je ne sais quoi, both authors have achieved to make fun of the human shallowness and to propose a more complete and productive lifestyle; completely apart of the disadvantages and fake promises that the light life offers gently, as the sweet how of a hungry wolf. At the end, it is the public who decides who has the best option and as shown in both plays: unfortunately, when it comes to hedonism, majority rules.
[1] Extreme hedonism is the selfish seek of shallow pleasures like money, sex and drugs; each one without any spiritual value.
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December 20 2009 09:18 am | Hot post
