My Tailor

(8)

Stephen Leacock

My Tailor

Q No. 1:          What were the ways of the tailor?

        This essay is taken from a collection of humorous pieces called “Further Foolishness”. In this essay Leacock mingles humour with pathos and leaves a lasting impression on the reader’s mind. Here, he masterfully delineates an unforgettable character.   He presents his tailor before us to entertain as well as educate us.  Writer’s tailor was every special person with some specific ways and habits.

            Writer's relation with him was thirty years old and in these thirty years, his style never changed.  He remained standing in the back part of his shop with his inches tape round his snack.  He used to greet the writer with a warm smile and asked him what he wanted.  Then, the tailor himself made the choice of cloth for him as "serge" and then himself chose the colour as dark blue.

            His way of displaying the cloth was quite amusing.  He lifted one knee and draped the cloth over it, standing upon one leg.  The tailor could stand in this posture for an indefinite time.  It was very difficult for the writer to resist him. So, he readily agreed with his choice.  They had a strange way of obliging each other. The writer always asked him if his dress would be cool and decent.  This question pleased the tailor a lot and he told the writer that it would be so.

            Then he took measurements of the writer, only round the chest.  He tried to flatter him by telling that the writer was growing round the chest. It was like a psychological trick.  Then there was the matter of billing.  The tailor never talked about the bill rather he turned to other things.  This matter was only dealt with by correspondence.   The tailor wrote him a letter in such a tone that suggested that he would never have written to him if he were himself not under the pressure of paying for his consignments from Europe.  The writer noticed that these consignments generally arrived when he had passed the limit of owing for two suits and had ordered a third one. Then the tailors talked about weather.  He always finished his conversation with weather and that only after the order of the suit.  He offered the writer to buy some shirts or collaring but the write never did.  They walked to the door in a friendly way.  After bidding each other "Good afternoon" they parted.

 This was the description of writer’s tailor that had some specific details and with the help of these details he has successfully established the salient features of his tailor's personality.

Q No. 2:          How did the deal with the problem of billing?

            The writer and his tailor had a strong relation of courtesy.  The tailor never talked about the bill.  Whenever the writer tried to talk about this matter, he waved it aside and started to discuss something else.  This was the matter they never spoke of.  They dealt it through correspondence.  The tailor wrote him a letter in a fine, decorous and courteous way.  His manner of asking for the bill was quite apologetic.  He would give reasons for his demand of bill like arrival of heavy consignments from Europe for which he needed money.  Writer noticed that these consignments usually arrived when he had to pay for two suits and had ordered a third one.  But it might be a coincidence.

             It was their unique style of dealing with the matter of bill.

Q No 3:           Why did Leacock regard his tailor to be "Immortal"?

            The writer had been visiting a very nice tailor for last thirty years.  They had very courteous and warm relationship.  The writer was extremely shocked when one day he heard the news of his tailor's sudden death.  He never thought it possible.  He had been meeting the tailor for last thirty years and had expected to see him forever.  He regarded him as being immortal.  This event carries a criticism on our ways and behaviors in this world.  In fact the writer wants to make us realize the importance of “man”.  Today people are so busy in their own lives that they cannot see and understand the problems of people living around them. The modern race of collecting more and more money has blinded the human race and people care for nothing except their own lust, selfishness and competition.  The modern man regards people around him as machines and never tries to recognize their personal problems and worries. 

            It was the same case with the writer; he never took his tailor to be a human being. He thought him only to be a machine that provided him a service and that would never break down.  Leacock never tried to know about his personal life and worries.  His relation with him was only superficial and business like.  That's why the news of the tailor’s death struck him with wonder.  The writer was equally shocked by the existence of his wife and a daughter.  The financial problems and the religious interests of the tailor also seemed strange and unreal to him.

            The motive of Stephen Leacock is only to make us realize this great reality that humanity will never flourish or be preserved unless the individual man is given importance.  The relation ship, the understanding and helpfulness is very important in the society and it is the lack of all these things that has made the modern man lonely and helpless.  This situation should be rectified and people should come closer to understand and help each other.

Q No. 4:          What was other side of the tailor's personality?

            The writer describes his intercourse with his tailor in a very effective and amusing way.  He tries to invoke us to think deeply about the human beings and different aspects of their lives.

            Every man has a three dimensional life and character but our rushed life does not give us enough time to look beyond life’s apparent or obvious facet.  The writer too did same in the case of his tailor.  He took his tailor as a worker or “hand” but never thought about his inner life.  The tailor, besides being a skilled professional, was a religious person.  He was interested in music and played the flute.  He had a daughter who was also learning music.  His business was not going on well.  In spite of his smooth and calm ways, his business worry was mounting up with every passing year and now it had finally killed him.  It was quite unbelievable for the writer that even the business worries can help to kill a person.  He was told that the tailor's wife would have to face grave financial problems.  It was quite strange for the writer who never thought about other aspects of the tailor's life.  The smiling face and amusing manners of the tailor were hiding a deeply tragic life and a helpless death behind them. This is the moral of this essay that pleads us to look through the veil or mask of human face and discover the troubled and agonized soul of a man behind it.  Today’s man needs some companion or helper who can at least listen to his problems sympathetically.

Q No.5:           What is the moral of this essay?

            In this essay, Stephen Leacock presents a finely knit character of his tailor.  Through this character and the circumstances of his life, he tries to give us a message.  Today the life has become so busy that human beings have taken the shape of isolated Islands that lie scattered in the deep and wide ocean of the world completely oblivious of each other.

            Today nobody cares for others.  Everyone tries to pursue his own motives and objectives.  The sense of friendship, co-operation and sympathy has been finished and human beings take no interest in anybody else's life.  Modern man never comes to know that how many people suffer silently and never share their troubles with anyone like Stephen Leacock's tailor.

            The thesis of the writer is the need to cultivate love and courtesy in the world so that man can live a humane life.  Today we all are running a race with machines and technology.  The urge to become rich has killed the soul of humanity and compassion.  But we should halt for a moment to take a breath and think who we are and what are we doing.  We are human beings but we live an artificial life like machines and this is leading us to the tragedies of the tailor's type.  Today a man dies even without expressing his agonies because nobody can spare a moment to talk about his life and its troubles. We should try to improve the situation and live like a man and also consider other people as a “man”.