Mark usually met his English Language teacher in school on Saturdays, to discuss and prepare for the National Speech contest. It was months away, but the teacher, a very conscientious and committed man who also happened to be very fond of Mark, felt that it was never too early to prepare for a competition that would receive extensive coverage in the press and on television and that would be graced by the presence of the Minister of Education himself. Mark was the star student, the school pinned its hopes on him, and he had never disappointed the school yet in the myriad inter-school oratorical and essay-writing competitions carried on throughout the year. The school grounds being used for the band practices that particular Saturday, Angela suggested that Mark invite his teacher home for the discussions, to be followed by lunch.
The boy did not object to the suggestion and Angela immediately flew into a whirl of activity, giving instructions to Mooi Lan to prepare something really good and to get a flask of hot coffee ready, while she herself would drive out to get some nonya kueh for tea, in case the discussions went on till tea-time. Mooi Lan suggested Hokkien mee; Angela thought it was a good idea as Mooi Lan made excellent Hokkien mee. She consulted Mark again, and again the boy made no objection. Mooi Lan was to prepare a lot of the good stuff for Angela wanted to take some for Old Mother and Mee Kin. She would deliver the food and still be in time to take Michelle for her practice at the Century Swimming Club.
“You wait for our new house to be ready, darling,” she told her daughter who had said she was feeling rather tired and didn’t want to go to the Century Swimming Club. “There’ll be the swimming pool, and then you can practise at home. Okay, darling?”
She peeped into Michael’s room; the boy was lying on his stomach on the bed and drawing something. He was less sullen of late, but he still refused to come out of his room to meet visitors. He had reluctantly shown his mother the monthly test-sheets for her to sign. The grades were disappointing, but not as bad as she had expected, and when she handed the sheets back to him, she had said, with a great effort at cheerfulness, “Mikey will try his best for the next month’s tests, won’t he? Then Daddy and Mummy will be so happy.” She had successfully kept the idiot one from coming to make a nuisance of himself with the boy; the further removed Michael was from the pernicious influence of the imbecile, the greater would be the boy’s chances of improvement.
The teacher came with armfuls of Shakespeare texts. While he sat with Mark in the sitting room, discussing the choice of a speech for the great event, Angela stayed in the piano room, wanting to listen in, but not wishing to displease her son by her presence. She was all excitement. She marvelled at the resourcefulness and imaginativeness of Mark’s teacher – how I wish Michael’s teacher could be like that, she said later to Mee Kin – for he was planning to tie the speech to the current campaign on ‘Filial Piety’ to make sure its delivery would have maximum impact upon the nationwide audience. He was also planning for Mark to read a poem in Chinese, on the same theme, following a speech from Shakespeare.
“Shakespeare,” he had said, “Shakespeare, because his works are the best. You will stand head and shoulders above the rest of the contestants with a speech from Shakespeare, for they will be mouthing silly little poems from Tennyson or some obscure poet. Shakespeare’s language is demanding – and that’s precisely the point. If you can recite a speech from Shakespeare, and do it well, you will make all those others with their silly little rhyming lines look childish and ludicrous.” The last argument had appealed very much to Mark.
They pored over possible speeches from Shakespeare, to reflect the spirit of the campaign. The teacher was for King Lear. “It’s a superb play,” he said enthusiastically, “one of Shakespeare’s best, if not the best, and my favourite. The theme is relevant. It’s about an old man driven out into the storm by his wicked daughters. The play condemns filial impiety. So it will be most relevant.”
Mark was glad. He had been afraid when the teacher spoke about doing Shakespeare, that Mark Antony’s ‘Friends, Romans, Countrymen’ speech would be chosen. It had been bludgeoned to death by schoolboy orators; Mark wanted something far more challenging. “Look,” said the teacher, opening the text. “Look at this speech. It’s my favourite, so powerful, charged with forceful imagery throughout. It may well be regarded as the climax of the play. King Lear cries out to the gods to punish his daughters for their wickedness. He curses them with barrenness, so that they will never have children to love them, since they have so shamefully treated him. But if they succeed in bearing children, these children will grow up to hurt them, in the same way as they have hurt their poor old father. Don’t you think the theme is just right? Listen, I’ll read the speech to you:
Hear, Nature, hear; dear goddess, hear;
Suspend thy purpose if thou didst intend
To make this creature fruitful.
Into her womb convey sterility,
Dry up in her the organs of increase,
And from her derogate body never spring
A babe to honor her. If she must teem,
Create her child of spleen, that it may live
And be a thwart disnatured torment to her.
Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth,
With cadent tears fret channels in her cheeks,
Turn all her mother’s pains and benefits
To laughter and contempt, that she may feel
How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is
To have a thankless child. Away, away!
Mark was impressed. He was visibly excited by the challenge of the speech, especially when his teacher had told him, “Even Pre-University students will not be able to manage a speech like that. But you can, Mark. With a little bit of coaching, you can manage. Remember, the judges include University professors who are probably going to yawn at the namby-pamby that I know some of the contestants have chosen – snowy clouds and daffodils and waves breaking over rocks, and all that stuff. I know Miss de Silva from the Convent has chosen a silly poem from Tennyson for one of her students. We go along with something sophisticated, something that gives you scope for real expression, something that is at the same time, related to social issues in Singapore!” Moreover his father had told him, Minister had once again spoken of him, called him the budding orator. The teacher’s enthusiasm was infectious. Mark looked very happy.
“I’m making arrangements for Mark to listen to a tape recording of King Lear,” he told Angela at lunch. “The actor taking the part is no other than Richard Burton. And there’s a certain expatriate teacher in the Premier Junior College, a Mr Roy Nicholls, who’s an expert in correct pronunciation and intonation. He’s a good friend of mine, and I’m getting him to coach Mark in these aspects. I’m not very good in these,” in a tone of humility.
Angela helped him to another bowl of Hokkien mee, very pleased with this committed and inspiring teacher. She did not say very much to him, apart from the niceties of polite conversation, in case she said something that might embarrass Mark who was a very sensitive boy. But later she told Mee Kin, with an enthusiasm bordering on elation, that it was a good thing that there was such a teacher in Mark’s school to develop his potential to the fullest.
“If only we had more teachers like that in Singapore,” she said, taking out a tier of the Hokkien mee soup, and then another tier of the boiled pork, prawns and vegetables.
“How thoughtful of you,” said Mee Kin. “Just when I was longing for some Hokkien mee! Wait, I have something to show you.”
Mee Kin led her to the guest bedroom where stood a large antique bed with a carved top and posts, resplendent with new oriental silk bed-curtains. Angela gasped.
“It’s beautiful,” she said. “Where did you get it? You never told me!”
“I meant it as a surprise,” replied the amiable Mee Kin. “Dorothy had the same reaction. I picked it up at the old junk-shop in Irrawaddy Road. There was only one left and I grabbed it. Then I had it done up by the man who’s been doing up Dorothy’s antiques.”
“It looks as if I’m the only one without an antique bed!” cried Angela laughing. “But listen, Mee Kin, I’ve no time to talk now, I must fly. Mark’s tutor is still in the house. If he stays till three, I must get some tea and kueh ready for him!”
She bought a new cassette recorder for Mark to practise his speech, as the old one was not functioning properly. The teacher appeared to have some difficulty obtaining the King Lear tape recording. Angela made inquiries at the British Council and was overjoyed to find the tape available, and that it could be rented out. She brought the tape back breathlessly to her son, her joy, and was rewarded by an appreciative smile and a “Thanks, Mum.”
“You can practise with me as your audience,” she teased her son. “I’ll listen. It sounds a very good speech indeed.” But Mark preferred to practise in the privacy of his room.
Angela’s heart glowed with pride as, passing her son’s room, she heard his voice, loud and steady and strong. The boy was a natural orator; Angela paused outside the door and heard the young, firm voice rise in a crescendo of feeling at the end of the speech.
“How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child!”