Even good scholars and scientists shy away from publicly siding with truth when their intimate friendships are at stake. They lose their courage and independence in trying to keep intact the adulation of a few friends. Many heroes rust out by crawling to hero-worshippers.
All heroism that man seeks appears to have for its end the adulation of a few people who he feels are close to him. There is an interesting episode towards the end of Napoleon’s life that attests this truth.
Napoleon, who was one of the greatest military heroes in history, played a key role in the French Revolution and was the first emperor of France (1804-15). After a series of military defeats, he was forced to abdicate and exiled to the island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean where he spent the last six years of his life.
The living conditions at St. Helena were not particularly hard for the emperor. He had the company of loyal officers and was supplied with good food and allowed to move freely. St. Helena had a good climate too. But the emperor, a captive in exile, seemed to waste away day by day. There was a very private reason for the emperor’s pain.
Marie-Louise, who he had fondly loved and married, sent no word for him when he was in exile. Day after day, he waited for solace from her letter that would never come. Eventually, he received the news of her marriage with another man and this brought the final blow to the emperor’s already marooned life. Masti Venkatesh Iyengar, the master writer of Kannada, suggests in one of his best known stories that Marie-Louise’s departure from Napoleon’s life was a defeat more gruesome than all the military losses the great General had suffered.
All external losses can perhaps be made good if there are intimate friends who console and bring solace. But if such friends are lost, even victories appear barren. This fact of the human psyche perhaps explains why heroes die craving for the approval of their hero-worshipping friends. The problem has no easy solutions. As someone said, human beings are lovers first and heroes next.
krishnagl@iisc.ac.in
