Questions of mercy
Sir: Quoting Shakespeare is a dangerous game, and it appears that Mr Garton Ash (5 June) is as hazy about Portia as the i Pope. The celebrated 'quality of mercy' speech is more than a cleverly improvised get- out in the face of Shylock's response to her peremptory, 'Then must the Jew be merci- ' ,,ul• Shylock's telling rejoinder, 'On what e-,„°,_InPulsion must I?' is a question Mrs natcher might usefully put to those who °aY for magnanimity (and the even greater
humiliation that arguably imposes on the junta).
For all its fine phrase-making, Portia's speech is little more than an opportunist in- trusion in the midst of a painful confronta- tion; a piece of play-acting masquerading as compassionate advice. By quoting Portia's words, the Pope inadvertently revealed the weakness, not of Mrs Thatcher's position, but of his own; as does Mr Garton Ash when he accuses Mrs Thatcher of harbour- ing Churchillian fantasies whilst ending his own misguided polemic with the edict, 'In victory, magnanimity'.
Richard Osborne
The Old Rectory, Bradfield, Berkshire
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