Page 77 of Gifted & Talented

72

Arthur, oh, Arthur. The trouble with Arthur as a politician was that he was keenly aware of what other people wanted him to be or do or say, which made him very good but also optically terrible, because he could only really be what he was.

And so his politics read as inauthentic, as sycophantic or acolytic, because nobody really knew him, and none of them could read between the lines correctly. Arthur was saying I’ll be any shape you want if you’ll just love me, which on most politicians was probably superficial, but what everyone was missing was the tacit clause, the operative faith—the part where Arthur was so committed to the bit that he never questioned whether the love he so freely offered was what anyone really deserved.