The Duelists

More than 40 years ago, back when Ridley Scott had access to its unfettered faculties, he directed a great flick: The Duelists (1977).

It featured two great actors of our age, Harvey Keitel and Keith Carradine.

The movie is about a real feud between two French officers from the Napoleonic Wars. Meet François Fournier-Sarlovèze and Pierre Dupont de l’Étang, who engaged in numerous duels over a prolonged period spanning over 16 years.

These were flesh and bone French officers whose names Joseph Conrad changed in his 1908 The Duel novel to François Louis Fournier and Pierre Dupont.

Then again when Ridley Scott’s movie came out, the two protagonists assumed new identities, to further confuse the living daylights out of anyone crazy enough to follow this story. They became aristocratic Armand d’Hubert (Keith Carradine) and Bonapartist Gabriel Feraud (played by Harvey Keitel).

Fournier was an ultra-Bonapartist, devoted heart and soul to the Emperor, whose heavy handed tactics in Spain during the Peninsular Campaigns as well as his reputation as a guy with a short fuse and an affinity for going out (i.e., challenging people to duel), earned him the moniker el demonio.

The Aristocratic but relatively more down to earth de l’Étang, had the misfortune to be ordered by his superiors to arrest Fournier one morning in 1800 in Strasbourg. You see, and I really don’t want to spoil it for you, but the movie opens with obsessive-compulsive duellist Fournier having just nearly killed the nephew of the mayor in a duel. And de l’Étang is sent to place him under house arrest. Fournier is offended (no big surprise there) and challenges his fellow officer to a duel.

Some of you will perhaps say “Testosterone” and perhaps you are right to say so.

I will say “Bring back duels” but in moderation. After all, too much of anything is bad.

I believe that because Honor is Everything. I also believe that one’s Name is the only thing worth something in this shabby, deluded world of ours. I consider it a black mark over our day and age the fact that one has no such recourse in the face of libel, ignominy, and calumny.

I also think a man like Fournier has no place in civilized society because I detest all excessive behaviour. Having been an excessive person with eccentric views, I do attest to the truth that Moderation is a Virtue and Excess is Detrimental to the Soul.

But obviously and for that very reason, Fournier would have challenged me to a duel if he was alive today. Now, even though I used to be passable with a blade, it’s been near 30 years since I dabbled. If a challenge happened today, I’d probably end up skewered like a shish-taouk. But as the Code Duello rules allow the challenged to select the weapon, I fear that Fournier would have a challenging time with pistols.

But why am I telling you all this? Well, easy. My daughter decided to wear her bangs today. So, when I saw her lounging this morning, I instantly remembered the faces and hair styles of the Duellists. Incidentally she has their Spirit, their Courage, and their Noblesse.

What she lacks however, is a working knowledge of fencing, or pistol shooting. Perhaps, it is time to initiate her in these admirable sports, since they can only enrich her life and add to her skill sets.

Not only that…such martial skills could one day save her life. Women, and my daughter is quite representative for the female species, are risk averse and natural born smart survivors. My daughter is very intelligent in her life and death decision making. Unlike men, women won’t risk their life or limb unless they really had to.

Unlike men, there’s no genetic or natural predisposition or inclination for chivalrous behaviour in women. But it’s not encoded into their genes. Society doesn’t expect them to do violence. Nature doesn’t expect them to risk their skins either.

Men, however, are expected to both protect the weak, and constantly prove their worth in competition against other men. Society and nature expect them to do their duty. But there is a fine line between 1800’ societal expectations and gender roles and the brand of craziness displayed by Fournier.

Some men, like Fournier, just didn’t know how to navigate that line.

The man would rather die than accept defeat. Two short centuries ago, Honour used to be the common currency. Nowadays, the word is gone from our vocabulary.

What happened to us that we went from a Just society where one could find redress by exceeding his station and moving up while protecting one’s Honour, to our gentrified, ossified, and putrid society of dishonourable individuals, who engage in Self-Delusion on a daily basis?