The Knave of Hearts
“The Knave of Hearts is a character from the book ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland’ by Lewis Carroll. He’s first mentioned at his trial for a tart robbery over which the King of Hearts presides as judge. Alice eventually defends the Knave after the evidence becomes increasingly absurd and she is called as a witness. The White Rabbit announces the charges as:
The Queen of Hearts, she made some tarts,
All on a summer day:
The Knave of Hearts, he stole those tarts,
And took them quite away!
The Knave rarely speaks during the trial. The Mad Hatter is called to give evidence but spends his entire time being nervous in front of the King and Queen of Hearts The Duchess’ cook is summoned to tell the court what tarts are made of, neither is a convincing witness, and the Knave does not offer a very good defense. He denies he wrote a letter that mysteriously appears in the court, but that he already knows isn’t signed.
Fortunately for him, Alice diverts the attention of the court by growing ever and ever larger and arguing more and more, lastly with the Queen over the concept of “sentence first—verdict afterwards”. Before a verdict can be reached for the Knave’s innocence or guilt, Alice reaches full size and forcefulness, and then calls them “nothing but a pack of cards”. They attack her, ending the trial.
The Ultimate Nonsense
The ultimate nonsense is that the King and the Queen don’t even have the right person standing trial. It isn’t even the Knave of Hearts, and whoever it is, is unwilling to clarify the matter. However, this would also suppose Alice, the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter and everyone else missed it as well, and that Carroll inserted an unintroduced character.
In the history of playing cards, the Jack has its own special history. This card was known as ‘the knave’ in the mid-1500s, when ‘knave’ meant ‘male servant of royalty’. The Knave became the Jack in 1864, thanks to an English card maker called Samuel Hart.
The Jack has never been thought to represent anyone in particular, though in the French tradition they knew the Jack of Spades as the legendary hero Ogier the Dane, the Jack of Hearts as the French warrior, the Jack of Diamonds Hector of Troy, and the Jack of Clubs was Lancelot.”
Odysseus
Myself, I’d add Odysseus to this list of jacks of all trades. This man of twists and turns. He was one of the most influential Greek champions during the Trojan War, frequently viewed as a man of the mean, renowned for his self-restraint and diplomatic skills.
He was not only ingenious as evidenced by his idea for the Trojan Horse, but also an eloquent speaker, a skill perhaps best demonstrated in the embassy to Achilles in Book Nine of the Iliad.” I think of those traits as the redeeming turns in his character.
In these modern times, among modern Odysseus types, I wonder if it’s become nothing more than an excuse for uncaring, unthinking behaviour, these twists and turns in his character. Twists and turns that some might allow since they believe them endearing. These mists over the awa (river), they’ll clear soon.
It was Bloom who observed Odysseus as one of the great wandering womanisers. I call that, the less redeeming twists in Odysseus’ judgment. Sometimes the modern day Knave of Hearts does more than steal tarts, yes? Absurd, no!
