-Fyodor Dostoevsky
"Whoever has experienced the power and the unrestrained ability to humiliate another human being automatically loses his own sensations. Tyranny is a habit, it has its own organic life, it develops finally into a disease. The habit can kill and coarsen the very best man or woman to the level of a beast. Blood and power intoxicate... the return of the human dignity, repentance and regeneration becomes almost impossible."
-Fyodor Dostoevsky
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The Occasional Garden is a short story which was written by Saki (the pen name for H.H. Munro). It's found in a collection of his stories- The Toys of Peace and Other Papers- which was released in 1919, three years after his death in the trenches during World War I. Like most of his other works, The Occasional Garden is an impish send up of the pretentiousness of Edwardian society. In it, the main character Elinor Rapsley is bemoaning the fact that her garden is not a beautiful showpiece which would be the envy of the neighbourhood. She tells her friend- the Baroness- that it's impossible to keep her garden beautiful, because all the local cats have decided to use it for a meeting ground, ruining much of it. And, she says resentfully, the beasts don't even make themselves useful by ridding her of the flocks of sparrows which are currently decimating the parts of the garden left unspoiled by the recalcitrant cats. This wouldn't be any more than an embarrassing annoyance, except for the fact that the hated overachiever Gwenda Pottingdon has invited herself to tea the following week. Gwenda Pottingdon has the fanciest, most exotic garden in town and is always going on about it. Elinor knows that when Pottingdon sees the pitiful remains of her garden, the woman will be full of smug superiority and false sympathy. The Baroness says that she has the perfect solution for her: the O.O.S.A. (Occasional Oasis Supply Association) She herself has an annual subscription to the service. Rather than go to the bother and expense of employing a gardener to maintain her yard, whenever the Baroness has a luncheon or dinner party planned, she calls on the O.O.S.A. and they show up, roll out lush turf, and bring pots of flowers and trees with which to transform her barren garden into a veritable Eden. You can even order occasion-specific decor: when she was entertaining a bishop, the O.O.S.A. outfitted her garden with traditional English flora, such as yew hedges and hollyhocks, with an old world style sun dial and even a decorative beehive to complete the look. What Elinor needs to do is contact them and order the emergency E.O.N. package. This is an acronym, she explains, for 'Envy of the Neighbourhood' and is designed for just such an occasion; it costs a little more, but can one really put a price on squashing one's social enemies? Elinor decides to go for it. The O.O.S.A works out even better than she could have dreamed; the E.O.N. package transforms her dingy yard into an exotic landscape of verdant beauty which would awe the most exacting eye. Elinor's tea party goes off without a hitch, with Gwenda Pottingdon peevishly unable to boast about her own garden while viewing one which is so superior to hers. When it's all over, the O.O.S.A. returns, packs up the trees and flowers and rolls up the sod, leaving Elinor's garden in it's previously barren state. Afterwards, Elinor congratulates herself on her successful party, happy in the knowledge that she for once shut up that braggart Pottingdon. This feeling lasts for four days, at which time Gwenda Pottington - to her horror- drops by unannounced and uninvited, to brag to Elinor that her daughter has has a watercolour painting accepted by the Hackney Gallery. But what, she inquires, gazing out the window at the sad remains of Elinor's yard in bewilderment, happened to her beautiful garden? It is at this point that Elinor's emergency gardening is replaced with emergency thinking; she comes up with an explanation (lie) at lightening speed. Sorrowfully she tells Gwenda that a group of militant suffragettes broke into her yard and destroyed the garden in a ten minute rampage. She was, she confides, so distraught that she had all of the remaining debris cleared away and intends to start her garden from scratch, designing an even more elaborate one. The Occasional Garden is a quick, fun little story about the lengths people will go to, to keep up appearances and get one over on their social rivals. It's less biting than some of his works- like Tobermory for example, but still has a point to be made about self-absorption and hypocrisy. Saki was an inspiration for a number of British writers who followed in his footsteps- Noel Coward and PG Wodehouse among them. I haven't read a lot of Coward's works, but shades of Saki's characters can be seen in a number of Wodehouse's, though generally without the edge of worldly cynicism. I sometimes wonder what Saki would have made of todays society, with its own set of false pieties and hypocritical pretenses; it's too bad we'll never know. Related Posts:My eleven year old nephew is reading this in his home school curriculum: It's never too early to learn about the evils of communism. Sadly, you don't have to look very far to see examples of what Orwell was warning of in present day Canada, and many other western nations. Some quotes to ponder: "No one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal. He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?" “Several of them would have protested if they could have found the right arguments.” "They had come to a time when no one dared speak his mind, when fierce, growling dogs roamed everywhere, and when you had to watch your comrades torn to pieces after confessing to shocking crimes." "If liberty means anything at all it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear." “These people don’t see that if you encourage totalitarian methods, the time may come when they will be used against you instead of for you.”
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