Analysis of Fifth Business

author: 
Robertson Davies, born 1913, Canadian


Setting:
A small town in Canada named Deptford. Very quiet, but yet very gossipy. Also many places in Europe.


Summary:
 In Fifth Business  by  Roberston Davies, Dunstable Ramsey retells his life story to the current headmaster at the college he works at. Throughout this novel, Ramsey interacts with many different people and tries to analyze the lives of many saints. Ramsey ends up discovering not only who he is, but what his purpose is in life. Ramsey ultimately learns that he is the fifth business and hasn't lived his own life, but rather simply played a role in the lives of others. 


Plot
1. Snowball thrown by Boy hits Mrs. Dempster: Paul is born. The Ramsey family starts to care for the Dempster family.
2. Mrs. Dempster is missing and is later found with a tramp. Mrs. Ramsey and the rest of the town turn their backs on the Dempster family. 
3. Ramseys older brother Willie is severely sick and dies for a brief period of time. Ramsey freaks out and gets Mrs. Dempster who then prays at Willie's side and Willie is miraculously alive again. This sparks the idea of saints in Ramsey's head.
4. Ramsey goes to war and is shortly injured. While he is about to lose consciousness, he thinks he sees the face of Mary Dempster on a statue of Mary and Jesus.
5. Ramsey is nursed back to health by Diana and receives the Victoria Cross for his heroic actions.He denies Diana's idea of marriage and changes his name from Dunstable to Dunstan. He shortly returns home to realize Boy and Leola are to be wed, Paul has run away, Mrs. Dempster is in the care of a relative because of her sanity, and Mr. Dempster died.
6. Ramsey returns to college and becomes a teacher and he visits Europe and begins to learn more about the saints.
7. Ramsey finds Mary Dempster and sees Paul on stage in Europe with the travelling circus.
8. Dunstan moves Mrs. Dempster to a hospital for the insane. 
9. HE goes to Europe and meets Padre Blazon and they discuss saints and Ramsay's life. 
10. Leola tries to kill herself on Christmas and Ramsay then helps her recover.
11. Leola dies and Ramsay is denied the spot of Headmaster, and travels to Mexico and sees Paul Dempster again, but this time as Magnus Eisengrim. 
12. Ramsay accepts the offer of writing a biography for Paul, and befriends Liesel and has her become one of his confidants. Liesel brings it to his attention that he is actually the fifth business and that he hasnt been living his own life. 
13. Mary Dempster dies and shortly afterwords Boy is found dead with suspicion of foul play. 
14. Dunstan Ramsay then dies at Paul's show of a heart attack. 


significant characters:

-Dunstable Ramsey: (name changed to Dunstan: nickname Dunny or Ramsey) Ramsey is the main character of this novel. He grew up as kind of an outcast from caring for Mrs. Dempster. He went to war, did a "heroic" action and received the Victoria Cross. He becomes a college professor and studies saints and writes many books about them.He is unsure about God, but he is very spiritual. He helps and occasionally cares for Mrs. Dempster, Leoyla, Boy, Paul, and Amassa Dempster, at the end of the novel we learn that Ramsey is the fifth business. 
-Mary Dempster: The mother of Paul and wife of Amassa. She is viewed by the town as very simple, and at sometimes the devil. By Ramsey, she is viewed as a saint. She is seen as the sacred feminine (she preforms three miracles), as the mother figure (she listens and is lauded by Ramsey), and as the fool saint (she does good but does not show prudence). She eventually goes crazy in a mental institute once she receives word about her son being alive. 
-Liesel: Liesel is a strong woman who helps Paul in his magic show. She is one of the only people in the novel to know about Ramsey's entire life and forces him to look inside himself and realize his role in life. She is also one of the few people to match Ramsey intellectually. In the jungian perspective she is seen as the high priestess. 
-Padre Blazon: He is another character that matches Ramsey on an intellectual level. He helps him deal with the quest to know about saints and what makes a saint. 
-Boy Staunton: He is the ultimate business man and what would be known as the golden boy. He is successful, dominant, masculine, and a long time friend to Ramsey. Boy (originally Percy Boyd Staunton) was the one whose rock-snowball hit Mrs. Dempster starting off the whole novel. 
-Leoyla: She was the first love of Ramsey, and later the wife to Boy Staunton. As she tries to keep up with her husbands upward climb socially, she realizes she can no longer satisfy him both publicly and sexually. She tries to kill herself, is unsuccessful, but later dies of pneumonia. 
-Paul Dempster: He is the premature son of Amassa and Mary Dempster. He grows up in an awkward situation by being seen as an outcast by the other townspeople. He idolizes Ramsey growing up and learns many magic tricks from him. He runs away to the circus at a young age and eventually becomes a successful traveling magician in Europe named Magnus Eisengrim. 
-Amassa Dempster: He is viewed as an outcast for having a simple and demonic wife, and a strange child. 
-Mrs. Ramsey: She is one of the only people to show love to Mrs. Dempster at the beginning of the novel which also influences Ramsey to show affection for her. 
-Diana: She is the woman that helps bring Ramsey back after his war injury. She teaches him how to walk again and is seen as a mother figure in Ramsey's eyes. She originally wants to be married to Ramsey, but after he rejects the idea, they become very close friends. 

Narative voice/style/point of view/tone/imagery/symbolism:
Narrative voice: very heavy, influential, opnionated
point of view: First person
tone: simple
Imagery:vivid actions, very detailed, describes when
Symbolism:  the stone = fate/start-stop button/karma, name changing = rebirth of a new self/different period in life, victoria cross = shows that Ramsay is the hero model and not just fifth business


Quotes:

- "We are public icons, we two: he an icon of kingship, and I an icon of heroism, unreal yet very necessarry..." (page 77)
    This shows Ramsay's sense of discovery throughout his life and shows that although we know of his life as a fifth business, this proves that he could have been the hero role, but we don't know of the story that goes along with it. 
-"No, Ramsay, I wont promise anything of the sort...You are too old a man to believe in secrets. There is really no such thinf as a secret; everybody likes to ell, and everybody does tell." -Liesel (page 204)
      This quote shows how Liesel is both a confidant and of an equal level intellectually. This quote shows how Liesel causes Ramsay to see the truth in his own life and in life in general. 


Theme & Support:


Humanity is the author of its own story.
Claim 1: God's actions are done by humans and they are simply being viewed as holy or spiritual over time due to their recreations and re-occurrences. 
Claim 2: the human story is all about perspective in deciding what character role you are playing and depending on  who is looking at your role and in what story.