{"id":2076,"date":"2010-12-15T09:38:27","date_gmt":"2010-12-15T14:38:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.chesterton.org\/?page_id=1941"},"modified":"2018-12-07T09:19:45","modified_gmt":"2018-12-07T15:19:45","slug":"lecture-74","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chesterton.org\/store\/lecture-74\/","title":{"rendered":"Lecture 74: The Paradoxes of Mr. Pond"},"content":{"rendered":"

It is well known that Father John O\u2019Connor was the inspiration for the character of Father Brown, and it is generally conceded that Maurice Baring was in some way the model for Horne Fisher of\u00a0The Man Who Knew Too Much<\/em>. But who served as the basis for Mr. Pond? I have never heard of anyone being offered up as the real life counterpart for G.K. Chesterton\u2019s last detective. I think it may be because there was no such person. However, I think there was a real basis for the character. Just outside the window of his study. The inspiration for Chesterton\u2019s Mr. Pond was Chesterton\u2019s pond.<\/p>\n

In the introductory story, the narrator makes the connection with Mr. Pond\u2019s obvious namesake:<\/p>\n

\u2026he was curiously like the pond in the garden. He was so quiet at all normal times, so neat in shape and so shiny, so to speak, in his ordinary reflections of earth and sky and the common daylight. And yet I knew there were some queer things in the pond in the garden. Once in a hundred times, on one or two days during the whole year, the pond would look oddly different; or there would come a flitting shadow or a flash in its flat serenity; and a fish or a frog or some more grotesque creature would show itself to the sky. And I knew there were monsters in Mr. Pond also: monsters in his mind which rose only for a moment to the surface and sank again. They took the form of monstrous remarks, in the middle of all his mild and rational remarks. Some people thought he had suddenly gone mad in the midst of his sanest conversation. But even they had to admit that he must have suddenly gone sane again.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Thus Chesterton set the stage for eight adventures featuring a quiet government clerk whose first name we never learn, who is perfectly ordinary but for his strange and sudden pronouncements that knock everyone ajar. Pond\u2019s associates, Wotton and Gahagan, puzzle over his paradoxical statements: \u201cThe only part of his conversation they could understand was the part they could not understand.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFunny things, agreements,\u201d said Pond. \u201cFortunately people generally go on disagreeing, till they die peacefully in their beds. Men very seldom do fully and finally agree. I did know two men who came to agree so completely that one of them naturally murdered the other; but as a rule\u2026\u201d
\n\u201c\u2018Agreed so completely,\u2019\u201d said Wotton thoughtfully. \u201cDon\u2019t you – are you quite sure you don\u2019t mean: \u2018Disagreed so completely\u2019?\u201d
\nGahagan uttered a sort of low whoop of laughter. \u201cOh, no,\u201d he said, \u201che doesn\u2019t mean that. I don\u2019t know what the devil he does mean; but he doesn\u2019t mean anything so sensible as that.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It is fitting that his final work of fiction is devoted to his most distinctive literary device. It is as if Chesterton wants to insist one last time that his paradoxes are simply obvious truths, only compressed into a small space that only makes them seem contradictory. \u201cYou simply have to know the story to see how simple it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

He offers a thorough examination of the nature of paradox in the story, \u201cWhen Doctors Agree,\u201d which may include the only instance of Chesterton deliberately quoting himself (though unattributed): \u201cA thing worth doing is worth doing badly.\u201d The wonderfully twisted aphorism first appeared over a quarter of a century earlier in\u00a0What\u2019s Wrong with the World<\/em>, and was no doubt widely acknowledged as one of Chesterton\u2019s most striking – and most quoted – lines. (Pity we never catch him quoting that\u00a0other<\/em> famous line of his: \u201cWhen a man stops believing in God\u2026\u201d).<\/p>\n

A reviewer of this posthumous collection of detective stories noted that no actual blood is ever spilled in these tales of crimes; it is only fallacies that are slain. A fine insight, but it overlooks the fact that these tales are also great yarns, and the otherwise tepid reviews also reveal the sad fact that Chesterton\u2019s own generation did not understand what it had just lost. There would be no more detective stories spun from Chesterton\u2019s mighty pen. This was the last batch. It should have been a cause for rejoicing that there was one final collection, offered, as it were, from beyond the grave.\u00a0The Paradoxes of Mr. Pond<\/em> remains the most overlooked collection of Chesterton\u2019s mysteries, since it appeared after Chesterton himself left the stage. Most of his biographers tend to end Chesterton\u2019s story with his life, not with his stories.<\/p>\n

But this book is not without its admirers. \u201cI think of Chesterton first as a poet,\u201d said Jorge Luis Borges. \u201cBut he was a poet all the time. Especially when he wrote detective stories.\u201d Borges believed that Chesterton\u2019s stories would always be read, \u201csince a mystery that so imaginatively suggests an impossible, fantastic occurrence is interesting for more than the logical explanation contained in the last few lines.\u201d Of the many Chesterton stories that Borges translated into Spanish, his favorite was one from this collection: \u201cThe Three Horseman of the Apocalypse.\u201d The images he found unforgettable: \u201cthe long white road, white hussars and white horses, and a fascinating struggle of the wills.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, there is something far-reaching about this tale. The very title suggests something both monumental and prophetic. There is an important character, central to the story, but whom we never meet. His name is Paul Petrowski, \u201cthe poet from Cracow, \u201d who combines \u201cbeing a poet with being a patriot.\u201d He is \u201ca torch and trumpet of revolutionary hopes,\u201d who is suddenly thrust upon the international stage. His enemies worry about his influence because they know \u201cthat a poet or a prophet could be as dangerous as an army.\u201d And they resolve to kill him. But they fail.<\/p>\n

A generation after this story was written, there would arise a poet from Cracow, who would become an international figure and \u201ca torch and trumpet of revolutionary hopes.\u201d He, too, would occupy the chair of Petrow, or Peter. And his enemies would try to kill him. And they would fail.<\/p>\n

What did Chesterton see with his bright dying eyes?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Detective Stories Featuring Mr. Pond<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[138],"tags":[1099,1098,1023],"class_list":["post-2076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-chesterton-101","tag-maurice-baring","tag-mr-pond","tag-msgr-john-oconnor"],"yoast_head":"\nLecture 74-The Paradoxes of Mr. Pond<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I have never heard of anyone being offered up as the real life counterpart for G.K. 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