The Cream of the Jest · Chapter
XXX: Cross-Purposes in Spacious Times explained
Kennaston reflects on the futility of fleshly love and his eternal, unattainable longing for Ettarre.
What happens
Kennaston reflects on the futility of fleshly love and his eternal, unattainable longing for Ettarre. He recounts a dream in which he is a cardsharp named Lionel Branch who quarrels with a boy, Master Skirlaw, and flings wine in his face. As he reaches to touch the boy's signet ring, the dream ends and he awakens crying 'Valentia!', realizing the boy's face was Ettarre's. The dream remains an enigma, governed by the law that he can never touch Ettarre.
Themes in this chapter
Dream vs. Reality
Kennaston's dream is vivid and detailed, yet governed by a law that prevents him from touching Ettarre, blurring the line between waking and dreaming.
Love and Idealization
Kennaston's love for Ettarre is idealized and unattainable; even in dreams, he can only look upon her beauty, never possess it.
The Limitations of the Flesh
Fleshly passion is described as flickering out inevitably, while the dream's law enforces the impossibility of physical union with Ettarre.
Characters to notice
- Felix Kennaston
The dreamer, who experiences a puzzling dream as a cardsharp named Lionel Branch and awakens crying 'Valentia!'
- La Beale Ettarre
The unattainable ideal; appears disguised as the boy Master Skirlaw in Kennaston's dream, but vanishes when he tries to touch her.
- Muriel Allardyce
Mentioned as the person Kennaston talked with during the day before the dream.
Key passages
“For you loved and lost; or else you loved and won: there was quick ending either way.”
Whether love ends in loss or success, it is always brief and ultimately unsatisfying.
Kennaston's cynical reflection on the transience of fleshly love.
“Whatever happened, Ettarre stayed inaccessible, even in dreams: her beauty was his to look on only; and always when he came too near that radiant loveliness which was Ettarre’s... the dream would end, and the universe would seem to fold about him, just as a hand closes.”
No matter what, Kennaston could never reach Ettarre; whenever he approached her, the dream would end abruptly.
Describes the fundamental law governing Kennaston's dreams of Ettarre.
“It was simply a law that always when he was about to touch Ettarre—even unconsciously—everything must vanish; and through the workings of that law this dream, with many others, came to be just a treasured moment of unexplainable but poignant emotion.”
The dream's rule is that any attempt to touch Ettarre causes the dream to end, leaving only a mysterious, emotionally charged memory.
Kennaston's explanation of why the dream remains an enigma.