The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman · Chapter
Chapter IV explained
Tristram addresses readers who demand full disclosure, defends his method of beginning his story ab ovo, and reveals the circumstances of his conception, including his father's clock-winding habit and its association with his mother's thoug
What happens
Tristram addresses readers who demand full disclosure, defends his method of beginning his story ab ovo, and reveals the circumstances of his conception, including his father's clock-winding habit and its association with his mother's thoughts, which Locke's theory of association explains.
Themes in this chapter
Digression and Narrative Form
Tristram defends his digressive, ab ovo method and rejects adherence to any rules, including Horace's.
Obsession and Hobbyhorses
Walter Shandy's extreme regularity in winding the clock and scheduling family matters illustrates his hobbyhorse.
Knowledge and Philosophy
Tristram invokes Locke's theory of the association of ideas to explain his mother's mental connection between the clock and other thoughts.
Characters to notice
- Tristram Shandy
Narrator who defends his digressive method and recounts the story of his own conception.
- Walter Shandy
Tristram's father, a former Turkey merchant, who winds the house-clock on the first Sunday night of each month and has a regular schedule.
- Uncle Toby
Mentioned as the recipient of Walter's remarks about his monthly routine.
- Mrs. Shandy
Tristram's mother, who associates the clock-winding with other thoughts due to an unhappy association of ideas.
- Bobby
Tristram's eldest brother, who is taken to London to be placed at Westminster School.
Key passages
“I find it necessary to consult every one a little in his turn; and therefore must beg pardon for going on a little farther in the same way: For which cause, right glad I am, that I have begun the history of myself in the way I have done; and that I am able to go on, tracing everything in it, as Horace says, ab Ovo.”
Tristram acknowledges that he must humor his readers by continuing his detailed approach, and he is pleased to have started his story from the very beginning, as Horace advises for epics.
Tristram justifies his narrative method by appealing to Horace's principle of beginning ab ovo, while also asserting his independence from any rules.
“My father, you must know, who was originally a Turkey merchant, but had left off business for some years, in order to retire to, and die upon, his paternal estate in the county of ‚łĽ, was, I believe, one of the most regular men in everything he did, whether ‚Äôtwas matter of business, or matter of amusement, that ever lived.”
Tristram describes his father Walter as an extremely methodical man, a former Turkey merchant who retired to his estate and applied the same regularity to all his activities.
This introduces Walter Shandy's character trait of extreme orderliness, which leads to the clock-winding habit.
“It was attended but with one misfortune, which, in a great measure, fell upon myself, and the effects of which I fear I shall carry with me to my grave; namely, that from an unhappy association of ideas, which have no connection in nature, it so fell out at length, that my poor mother could never hear the said clock wound up,‚Ā†‚łļ‚Ā†but the thoughts of some other things unavoidably popped into her head‚Ā†‚ÄĒand vice versa:‚Ā†‚łļ‚Ā†Which strange combination of ideas, the sagacious Locke, who certainly understood the nature of these things better than most men, affirms to have produced more wry actions than all other sources of prejudice whatsoever.”
Tristram explains that his mother's association of the clock with other thoughts, a concept from Locke, is the origin of a misfortune that affects him personally.
This passage introduces the theme of the association of ideas and sets up the circumstances of Tristram's conception.
