Updates, Live: The Happy Few

(http://www.johndclare.net/wwii12.htm)
no copyright infringement intended

The Happy Few... splendid expression! I had my first encounter with it when reading Stendhal's Chartreuse de Parme. It was the ending line. The novel was dedicated TO THE HAPPY FEW. I thought about elite, the true one, differing to the rest by bravery, and by finesse. I understood later that Stendhal had dedicated all his writing to TO THE HAPPY FEW. The super-hero exalting the imagination of Stendhal, of Nietzsche, of Malraux. Were these happy few a distinct race, a Band of Brothers of their own?

The Happy Few were also to be found in a poem created by Lord Byron, in Don Juan (Canto the Eleventh):

LXVII
Then dress, then dinner, then awakes the world!
       Then glare the lamps, then whirl the wheels, then roar
Through street and square fast flashing chariots hurl'd
       Like harness'd meteors; then along the floor
Chalk mimics painting; then festoons are twirl'd;
       Then roll the brazen thunders of the door,
Which opens to the thousand happy few
An earthly Paradise of 'Or Molu.'

(http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/173089)

This expression, the Happy Few (followed by the Band of Brothers), comes from Shakespeare, from his Henry V: we are in 1415, on October 25, it is Saint Crispin's Day, and the English army has to face the French at Agincourt (Azincourt). The French seem to be much more powerful. And Shakespeare makes the English king keep a motivational speech to his troupes, the happy few, the band of brothers. And by the end of the day, they will overcome the French.

John Gilbert: King Henry V at the Battle of Agincourt
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:King_Henry_V_at_the_Battle_of_Agincourt,_1415.png)
no copyright infringement intended

This day is called the Feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day and comes safe home
Will stand a-tiptoe when this day is named
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall see this day and live t' old age
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours
And say, "Tomorrow is Saint Crispian."
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars
And say, "These wounds I had on Crispin's day."
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he'll remember, with advantages
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words —
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester —
Be in their flowing cups freshly remembered.
This story shall the good man teach his son,
And Crispin Crispian shall ne'er go by
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered,
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.
For he today that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne'er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition.
And gentlemen in England now abed
Shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin's Day.

(Shakespeare: Henry V)

St. Crispin's Day Speech: Kenneth Branagh
(video by conserv8)

And as the image on the top of this post reminded me of another famous one (though some would say infamous, it's up to every one) from Moscow's Sverdlov Square, I would add also another drawing from a comics, just for balance.