Cussedness
The natural cussedness of things in general.
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Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne
I know, I can’t believe I’d never read it before now either. It’s great stuff, although the descriptive travelogue sections are a little eye-glazing. Overall I think I prefer 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, but the ending of Around the World in 80 Days is supremely well crafted.
You don’t look for complex characterisation in adventure stories like this, so I was unsurprised by the numerous similarities between Captain Nemo and Phileas Fogg, who are both of a rather fantastic type: silent, stong, deeply rational, and almost superhuman in their abilities. They both sprang to mind when I was, quite coincidentally, reading this article about psychopaths, found floating around on Reddit this morning. I couldn’t help thinking that Phileas Fogg has quite a few psychopathic character traits, so I decided to do an evaluation of his personality using a completely unscientific method based very loosely on the PCL-R checklist lifted from the Wikipedia page on psychopathy.
The PCL-R (Psychopathy Check List - Revised) test is a rating system based on twenty items which are scored 0, 1, or 2 depending on how strongly the subject displays each tendency. The higher the score, the more likely the subject is to be a psychopath. Before I proceed to score Mr Fogg, I would just like to point out that as I’m not a professional psychologist I have no idea what I’m doing, and that analysing a fictional character’s psychological profile is a pretty daft activity in the first place.Characteristic Score Superficial charm and above average intelligence - undoubtedly, although Fogg’s charm is hardly superficial. 2 Absence of delusions and other signs of irrational thinking - if we assume that our protagonist isn’t delusional in thinking he can make it round the world in the allotted time, we have to award full marks here. 2 Absence of nervousness or neurotic manifestations - Fogg is a picture of serenity even when confronted with the most trying of eventualities. 2 Unreliability - Passepartout specifically seeks out employment with his master because of his reputation for predictability. 0 Untruthfulness and insincerity - apart from a lie of omission which enables him to cross the Atlantic to Ireland, our hero is a picture of integrity. 0 Lack of remorse or shame - there’s not much data here because Fogg never really messes up. He does exhibit some remorse at the end, when all appears to be lost. 0 Antisocial behaviour without apparent compunction - highly reclusive and rather demanding, many would see this as antisocial. 1 Poor judgement and failure to learn from experience - risking your entire fortune for such a mad reason is pretty poor judgement. 1 Pathological egocentricity and incapacity to love - we might have to score at least 1 here were it not for Fogg’s actions at the end of the story. 0 General poverty in major affective reactions - I think this means the subject is undemonstrative and reserved, as Fogg undoubtedly is. 1 Specific loss of insight - we can’t accuse him of lacking empathy after seeing his gallant rescue of Aouda. 0 Unresponsiveness in general interpersonal relations - strong tendencies in this category. 1 Fantastic and uninviting behavior with drink, and sometimes without - the entire book is based on a highly fantastic action, completely unfuelled by alcohol. 1 Suicide threats rarely carried out - not as far as we know. 0 Sex life impersonal, trivial, and poorly integrated - no data: the book was written in the 19th century after all. 0 Failure to follow any life plan - Fogg seems pretty aimless, although that may be a result of having succeeded in his life plan already. 1 Grand total 12/40 So much for that theory. You have to score over 30 to qualify as a fully fledged psychopath; I therefore have to conclude that Fogg isn’t a psychopath, he’s just terribly terribly English.
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It’s a relief to know that Fogg isn’t a psychopath. Thanks for the investigation. I think you should try investigating Sherlock Holmes. Now he is a very shifty character.
2007-05-29 11:41