Anguish

                                                         "/that he did but see
                                                         The flatness of my misery, yet with eyes
                                                         Of pity, not revenge!"
                                                                                 -Hermione, The Winter's Tale



                                     "They would have been friends, but they saw each other only once
                                     face to face, on much-too-famous islands,
                                     and each of them was Cain, and also Abel.

                                     They were buried together.
                                     Snow and corruption know them.

                                     The event I refer to took place at a time we cannot understand"
                                                                        -Jorge L. Borges, "Juan Lopez and John Ward"

     (own tansl.)

Painfully, it seems, Hermione enumerates the things that matter most in her life: (1) the favor of her husband, (2) her first-born, and (3) the child Perdita that was taken away to be "murdered". Shakespeare presents the quintessential situation of agony when all of these are taken way-- and still Hermione maintains her character. She does not blame anyone; she feels overwhelmingly a deep sorrow simply for what is happening.

Borges, who was raised by his English grandmother and called his native Buenos Aires home, must have felt similar anguish when he witnessed the Falklands War (between England and Argentina), which resulted in deaths that to him were certainly not just one-sided.

When conflict arises, do we become angry? Or, as it seems Borges and Shakespeare are, are we genuinely pained by the debauchery inherent in man? I am impressed by the similarity of Shakespeare and Borges in their reactions and hope to internalize this message that they left behind.