#MajorsCorner The playing fields of life.

I was walking by a private school in Victoria a few months ago when I came upon a small boy sitting all by himself on the edge of a playing field. In a rush of memory I recalled my own time at those schools, not always a happy event. Like the poor little chap near me, I too spent much of my time on my own, hiding either from school bullies or maddened masters, as our teachers were referred to then.
I was 10 years old when an English literature master said I reminded him of a fragment from an Italian farce. At such an age I could not make out what he could possibly mean by that, but I understood it was not a compliment. Then the class bully pushed me up against a wall during the recess break, saying I was just a farce and punching me in the short ribs. I ran across the fields and hid behind the hockey rink in terror and was of course severely punished when I failed to return to the class. I was alone, afraid and forlorn.
I stopped and said hello to my little once-self. He simply sniffed sadly. I asked if I could help in any way as I had once been in his place, if he could believe it. He wiped his nose with the loosely knotted school tie that was almost outside of his collar.
“I hate it here,” he said. “They won’t let me be”
“Have you told your parents?” I enquired.
“No, I am a boarder and they are way up north. I am here because my dad went to this school and I don’t want to let him down. But I can’t play sports the way he did. I am too small for everything.”
“Well,” I said, “you must make yourself interesting then.” I asked him what his next class was and was delighted when I found it was English literature, especially as he had been selected to speak on Shakespeare. He felt that it was a boring subject and that he would get a low mark through disinterest.
“Nonsense!” I said. “You must astound and amaze your fellow inmates, that is the way to get respect at these sorts of places.”
I managed to sit down near the sad boy by the tree, although my 80-year-old knees shouted objections. I started by saying that Shakespeare was one of the fastest writers in literature, only matched by perhaps Dickens. He wrote thousands of words at one sitting, barely pausing for food and drink before doing it again and again.
And what he used to write with, the quill pen, is also interesting. People carried little knives to sharpen the points of their quill pens, hence the name, penknife. But it is the longevity of the quill itself that proves its power, for it ruled the world of writing for well over a thousand years until the metal nib pen.
From the middle of the 7th century until the middle of the 19th, the quill was the instrument that one used with ink. Of course it was the vast copying of the monks of the so-called dark ages that forced cursive onto the stage as the copyists did not want to waste time lifting their pens after every letter and so designed a type of continuous writing. This is what Mr. Shakespeare used to go so fast and so long.
The boy had stopped snivelling and seemed absorbed, which pleases an old man such as myself. I finished off with, “Of course our friend Shakespeare had to write so prodigiously as the unwashed public of his time expected new plays every few months or so, as did his investors. He also was a partner in a theatre that required him to write or not to eat as it were. There is nothing like the need to survive to overcome the vaunted writer’s block.”
I then asked Featherstone, for that was the name tag sewn on the inside of his wet tie, to digest what I had told him and if he required more, he should attend the school library before the next class. He thanked me heartily and shot off towards what I assume was the library.
As I made my way to the club that day, I tried to remember who had tipped me off to the idea of being interesting when I was little Featherstone’s age, but I am not sure, maybe an uncle of mine. Oh well, lost in the fog of time, I suppose.
I hope young Featherstone succeeds in scoring a blow for freedom and relief from his tormentors. It helped in my case, and has since. Good luck, my small friend.
Copyright Christopher Dalton 2016