Fifth Business
ESSAY OUTLINE
With reference to fifth business, show that the author develops a central theme through a character who is unable to change his/her course of action
Paragraph One
Our childhood plays a significant role in defining the kind of person that we become and the type of life that we live.
In “Fifth Business”, Robertson Davies displays how the main character, Dunstan Ramsay’s, childhood friends and family influence him to be incapable of changing the course of action of his life.
By his senior years, Dunstan had undergone limited progression in his life as he experienced the resurfacing of his childhood persona, the haunting reminder of his family’s relationships in his own affairs, and the persistent burden of guilt and responsibility from inflicting insanity upon a childhood friend.
Paragraph Two
Dunstan Ramsay’s boyish traits made reappearance in his elderly years.
Despite Dunstan’s efforts to suppress his talkative nature, he was aware that he was unable to stop himself from speaking indiscreetly – even as an old man.
“I babbled like a fool” (60)
“I was going to be a sharp-tongued old man as I had been a sharp-tongued boy” (242)
“You are too old a man to believe in secrets. There is really no such thing as a secret; everybody likes to tell, and everybody does tell” (217)
“Babble it to everybody you know because that is your professed way of dealing with confidences” (222)
Dunstan developed a boyish crush at an old age, falling head over heels for a younger woman named Faustina, and was unable to explain his obsession for her.
“Two things that were wrong I could easily identify: I had become a dangerously indiscreet talker, and I was in love with the beautiful Faustina”
“If the breakdown of character that made me a chatterbox was hard to bear, it was a triviality beside the tortures of my love for the beautiful Faustina” (218)
Even in his senior years Dunstan would go alone to a circus or to magic shows
With reference to fifth business, show that the author develops a central theme through a character who is unable to change his/her course of action
Paragraph One
Our childhood plays a significant role in defining the kind of person that we become and the type of life that we live.
In “Fifth Business”, Robertson Davies displays how the main character, Dunstan Ramsay’s, childhood friends and family influence him to be incapable of changing the course of action of his life.
By his senior years, Dunstan had undergone limited progression in his life as he experienced the resurfacing of his childhood persona, the haunting reminder of his family’s relationships in his own affairs, and the persistent burden of guilt and responsibility from inflicting insanity upon a childhood friend.
Paragraph Two
Dunstan Ramsay’s boyish traits made reappearance in his elderly years.
Despite Dunstan’s efforts to suppress his talkative nature, he was aware that he was unable to stop himself from speaking indiscreetly – even as an old man.
“I babbled like a fool” (60)
“I was going to be a sharp-tongued old man as I had been a sharp-tongued boy” (242)
“You are too old a man to believe in secrets. There is really no such thing as a secret; everybody likes to tell, and everybody does tell” (217)
“Babble it to everybody you know because that is your professed way of dealing with confidences” (222)
Dunstan developed a boyish crush at an old age, falling head over heels for a younger woman named Faustina, and was unable to explain his obsession for her.
“Two things that were wrong I could easily identify: I had become a dangerously indiscreet talker, and I was in love with the beautiful Faustina”
“If the breakdown of character that made me a chatterbox was hard to bear, it was a triviality beside the tortures of my love for the beautiful Faustina” (218)
Even in his senior years Dunstan would go alone to a circus or to magic shows