Point Counter Point Character Analysis: Lord Edward Tantamount

Lord Edward Tantamount is a member of the royal Tantamount family. While growing up, he was always depressed and felt that he didn't have a purpose in the world. This changed when he discovered science and threw his life into research in the topics of biology and chemistry. His wife, Lady Tantamount, married him for his money and together they had a child, Lucy. The most prominent appearance of his in the book is during Lady Tantamount's party, during which he leaves his experiment on newts to listen to Bach being played downstairs.

A representative quote I found: "The only result of your progress...will be that in a few generations, there'll be a real revolution- a natural, cosmic revolution. You're upsetting the equilibrium. And in the end, nature will restore it." (58).

Lord Edward Tantamount's personal philosophy of life is revealed to be completely based in rational, scientific roots. In the quote, he is telling Webley that nature is much greater than all of society, and he argues that the draining of phosphorus in the soil will cause the downfall of our modern civilization. From this, it is clear that he doesn't care about politics and other "human" topics, but would rather concentrate on his academic pursuits. In fact, I chose to analyze him because out of all the characters in the book so far, I strongly identified solely with him and his beliefs on nature and balance being greater than us all.