“They actually believe in this shit.”
When John goes to Vietnam to fight in the war, he continues to perform magic tricks to pass the time and to make the others like him. In time, he begins to be known as the sorcerer and his tricks bring comfort even to those who are dying. When John remains among the only ones not to be injured, the other soldiers look up to him and believe that he has magic powers. In a letter he sent back home, John expresses his amazement regarding the other people’s trust in him. John is unable to understand how the others trust him so much but at the same time is the first time he realizes how easily he can manipulate those around him.
He talked about leading a good life, doing good things telling the full truth. Politics was manipulation. Like a magic show: invisible wires and secret trapdoors.
John manifested an interest for deception from his childhood. From an early age, he was fascinated with magic tricks and occult practices and he maintained his interest for magic tricks in his adulthood. Even when John was in the army, he entertained his peers with magic tricks and he even received the nickname The Magician. When he returned home, John decided to enter politics because he still longed to manipulate those around him and politics offered him the means to do it.
“I wish he was my father..’’
John has mixed feeling about his father and when he mentions him he either worships him or loathes him for what he has done. John mentions how his father would be one person in public and another person in private. The children adored John’s father and they even expressed their wish to have John’s father as their own. The quote thus proves that John was not the only one in the family who was a skilled manipulator but that his father was one as well.
