All the World’s A Stage

Why was this book focused around characters who have “old-fashioned jobs,” that are reminiscent of another time? A con-man, three magicians…

Jar of Fools seems to be about the truth and deception, it seems to be about the show of life. And con-men and magicians make their living based on deception and tricks. Everyone in the book is putting on a show, from Lender’s many different guises he assumes to con people, to the show that Al and Ernie have to put on as magicians in order to make a living.

Al’s brother, Howard, even had to put on a show in order to end his own life without making it seem like he purposefully took his own life; it was an accident, that was the scene he had set up.

Everyone in the book is being fooled, the people Lender cons, the people who enjoy Al and Ernie’s magic tricks, the workers from the home who are constantly being fooled by Al, the workers at the cafe where Lender and his daughter steal a cash register, etc.

But the presentation is always good, so people are fooled. What makes people want to go see magic tricks if they know it is a trick? Because they want to be tricked, they want to believe in it for a little. Ernie explains to Claire  the importance of the presentation of a trick. He says what’s actually magical is not the trick, “but what it makes possible in people” (73).

Obviously, loads of people are being deceived by the main characters in the book, but as Lender says to Al in a fight they have, “[people] sometimes don’t want to know the truth”(84). They want an easier story to swallow, whether it’s the story of a card trick that lets them believe in magic for a while, or the story of a heart broken man who needs a cup of coffee. Those stories are easier to understand than the inner workings of a card trick or the fact that a man and his daughter are living under a bridge and need food. Deception is a big part of life.

But other people aren’t the only ones being deceived. Often times the deceiver’s are being deceived as well. Lender is tricking himself into thinking that he is providing a good life for his daughter.  As he says himself, “I do have some dignity” (85). Dignity enough to lie to himself because he himself doesn’t want to hear the truth; that he isn’t providing the kind of life his daughter needs.

Al provides Lender with a way out, though, when he says referring to Lender’s skill as a con-man, “I guess maybe that’s what you were dealt. But sometimes cards can be traded in and an Ace, y’know, an Ace is the bridge between a deuce and a king” (85).

From that one speech, we suddenly see Lender come up with a plan, a plan that seems to be his last deception. Lender sets up the scheme to steal the cash register, but seems to set himself up, “forgetting” it was the day the cops checked for homeless people under the bridge,  so that Claire could go to her mother and maybe live a better life. He finally stopped deceiving himself. It seems clear that it was his last con because on pg. 126 his face looks rather sad and depressed despite his words, “Things’re lookin’ up pumpkin.”

This book speaks to the heart of Shakespeare’s quote, “All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”