Joseph Merrick was an exemplar of a man who encountered the meaning of suffering. He suffered the shock of growing from a tender-looking child into a monstrous-looking teenager. He suffered the betrayal of rejection by his mom who died too soon, his step-mom who treated him like vermin, and his dad who brushed him aside at a time of desperate need of assurance. He suffered the disappointment of discovering he could never earn his keep due to an abnormality that will not stop encroaching on his body; his will.
I have taken a big interest in reading biographies and seeing biopics. Well-plotted movies and fiction will often make blockbusters because imagination is let loose and permitted to run wild. This, of course, is where viewers get all the thrill and excitement. In my opinion though, as I once mentioned to a friend some years back, the most riveting, heart-stopping stories happen in the real world but only a few hit the mainstream media due to a number of factors, not least because of an inability to corroborate or furnish the story with overwhelming evidence, or the ineptness in the scripting and publicity of the story.
In the past few months, I’ve collected a number of high-ranking biopics like A Beautiful Mind, 12 Years A Slave, The Aviator, Catch Me If You Can, and Amadeus. The Elephant Man however is something devilishly different. I saw the movie recently. Not satisfied, I have had to read two books (The True History of The Elephant Man, The Elephant Man and Other Reminisces) to gather as much insight as I could possibly get.
Staggering will not do full justice in qualifying the true story of Joseph Merrick. I’ve seen some atrocious physical conditions of humans in Nigeria, and a couple of times, you can’t help but wonder what sort of crime these people must have committed to deserve the lifelong burden of a misshapen, deformed, impaired bodily constitution, in a world where all around appear perfect for others. This peculiarity of the human dilemma is precisely the plight of a picture reflected in Joseph Merrick’s brief and tortuous sojourn on earth, in England. This is not a review of his life (you’ll do well to watch the movie to get a comprehensive perception), but a contemplation of the Meaning of suffering, the Meaning in suffering, and the Meaning beyond suffering using Joseph Merrick, The Elephant Man, as a case in point. Follow along.
Meaning of suffering:
Suffering simply means being in pain. Pain comes in two ways: physiological and psychological. Physiological pain implies distress ailing the body or the internal organs. Psychological pain implies distress ailing the mind or the psyche. Naturally, pain in the body affects the mind, and pain in the mind affects the body; but one is always more evident than the other. For a fact, every human suffers individually, but not all humans suffer equally, nor similarly. Some individuals suffer more pain in their lifetime than a generation of family ever will.
Joseph Merrick was an exemplar of a man who encountered the meaning of suffering. He suffered the shock of growing from a tender-looking child into a monstrous-looking teenager. He suffered the betrayal of rejection by his mom who died too soon, his step-mom who treated him like vermin, and his dad who brushed him aside at a time of desperate need of assurance. He suffered the disappointment of discovering he could never earn his keep due to an abnormality that will not stop encroaching on his body; his will.
He suffered the wrath of a regimented workhouse that provided the basic human need, and a hell of an existence as the price to pay. He suffered the ignominy of being stripped and paraded by showmen as a horrific piece of spectacle to many an aghast audience. He suffered the horror of being chased by prying eyes that haunted him from his misadventure in Belgium all the way to a mobbed Liverpool street. He suffered the awful realisation as a romantic manque that will never find or get practical love in a lady.
Joseph Merrick suffered profound physiological and psychological pain every waking and sleeping hour of his day so that no one in his lifetime on earth could define the meaning of suffering more literally than The Elephant Man. His was the Via Crucis; the Way of the Cross. And ultimately, he suffered to death when the weight of his cross snapped off his shoulder in his noble attempt to, for once, sleep like other people.
Meaning in suffering:
Frederick Treves, a distinguished doctor of the highest royal éclat, but more importantly, a heaven-sent confidant in time of dire need, rescued The Elephant Man just in time from a frantic mob in Liverpool Street and helped secure him a permanent home in the London Hospital. This, for The Elephant Man, Frederick Treves, the London Hospital, and the entire country will prove a gateway into the fascinating inner world of Joseph Merrick.
Frederick soon discovered that this lump of a being was not illiterate, unintelligible, or unintelligent as misrepresented. Joseph Merrick, as it well turned out, was well-read, highly imaginative, and a loving, lovable individual to keep company with. I had wondered how embittered Joseph must have become owing to the myriad of blows life dealt him. This was Frederick’s report of his personality:
Those who are interested in the evolution of character might speculate as to the effect of this brutish life upon a sensitive and intelligent man. It would be reasonable to surmise that he would become a spiteful and malignant misanthrope, swollen with venom and filled with hatred of his fellow-men, or, on the other hand, that he would degenerate into a despairing melancholic on the verge of idiocy. Merrick, however, was no such being. He had passed through the fire and had come out unscathed. His troubles had ennobled him. He showed himself to be a gentle, affectionate, and lovable creature, as amiable as a happy woman, free from any trace of cynicism or resentment, without a grievance and without an unkind word for anyone. I have never heard him complain. I have never heard him deplore his ruined life or resent the treatment he had received at the hands of callous keepers through life had been indeed along a Via Dolorosa, the road had been uphill all the way, and now, when the night was at its blackest and the way most steep, he had suddenly found himself, as it were, in a friendly inn, bright with light and warm with welcome. His gratitude to those about him was pathetic in its sincerity and eloquent in the childlike simplicity with which it was expressed.
Joseph Merrick embraced meaning in suffering. In his brief time at the London Hospital, he accomplished far more in 27 years than some normal humans accomplish in a century. Joseph Merrick welcomed the duchesses and countesses and dignitaries in his humble abode and received gifts in bounteous supply. Joseph Merrick was given the rare privilege of visiting the Theatre to see his first pantomime, and was enclosed in a private box given he was a VIP!
Joseph Merrick handcrafted a majestic cardboard model of a church which remains a relic in the Royal London Hospital Museum. The highlight of his accomplishments was establishing a correspondence and friendship with Queen Alexandra of Wales who gifted him, amongst many others, a signed portrait of herself. Joseph, who had suffered all his life that his very humanness personified suffering, found something meaningful, something joyous, something ennobling to hang on to even while he journeyed through the Slough of Despond.
Meaning beyond suffering:
Joseph Merrick, the so-called Elephant Man, encountered the meaning of suffering, embraced the meaning in suffering, but above all, enrobed his meaningless life to a meaning beyond suffering. Frederick commented that even as a voracious reader, “the Bible and the Prayer Book he knew intimately.” In the movie, Frederick needed to convince Carr Gomm (Chairman of the Royal London Hospital Committee) that Joseph was intelligent, and therefore, deserved a chance to be kept.
Joseph was made to say something intelligent as proof, but due to timidity and incoherence of speech, his recital of Psalms 23 could not be comprehended quickly enough. Carr Gomm was on his way down the stairs when Frederick picked up an audible sound of Joseph’s continual reading of the Psalms. He bid Carr quickly to listen in too, and before them stood a man who had such total faith in God that even when the world had given up on him, shut the door on him as done for, his faith in God will not waiver until the last drop of a syllable in the reading.
Actual or not, one thing is dead certain: Joseph, The Elephant Man, reposed his faith in God to the uttermost application. Could Joseph not have cursed God for the unfair dealing he had received as his portion? Could he not have stood as the perfect proponent of the idea of atheism, agnosticism? Could he not have chosen to become a terror to mankind, as a show of enmity towards God? I bet he could have, and we may well have justified his grievance if he had so acted. But no, Joseph was wiser than his appearance.
He knew that he was not an Elephant Man and that there was an essence of truth to his being, far more glorious than the undignifying garment laden on him. He surrendered to the will of the Grandweaver, who was the Author and Finisher of his faith. And yet, those who know little pain ask God, “Why create so much pain?” God is not human. Joseph Merrick served a purpose. A Godly purpose. He’s crowned in glory and seated in heavenly places above all principalities and powers.
__________________________________
PS: Frederick Treves: As a specimen of humanity, Merrick was ignoble and repulsive; but the spirit of Merrick, if it could be seen in the form of the living, would assume the figure of an upstanding and heroic man, smooth browed and clean of limb, and with eyes that flashed undaunted courage.
__________________________________
PSS: Joseph Merrick: “Tis true my form is something odd,
But blaming me is blaming God;
Could I create myself anew
I would not fail in pleasing you.
‘“If I could reach from pole to pole
Or grasp the ocean with a span,
I would be measured by the soul;
The mind’s the standard of the man.”
__________________________________
Excerpt From
Thoughts In Traffic
Aramide Salako
This material may be protected by copyright.
