Unintended outcomes, again

Number one. The Jewel in the Crown. One of the best film series of a book. Have seen the whole thing several times since its appearance in '84 and my views about it have changed a lot. But it remains a really fine piece of dramatic storytelling.

Yet.

I notice that it is only because of the do-gooding of the Mother Theresa character --Sister Ludmilla-- that policeman Ronald Merrick and tragic lover Harry Kumar meet, conflict and begin their gruesome relationship. Without her charity, they might never have crossed paths.

A side note on the crucial importance of group status in human life. I don't think anyone could make the case that the British Raj was anything at all like the earlier Mughal invasions, which Will Durant considered some of the bloodiest in history. The drive to make the British "quit India" must really have been driven by status resentment rather than real oppression. But it was powerful enough to make the British leave.

Number two. The most brilliant fictional incident of unintended outcomes is in the book which also contains perhaps the most famous opening sentence in modern English literature. In Earthly Powers, --this is a spoiler-- a pious priest, who later becomes a Pope on the verge of being canonized, performs a healing miracle and saves the life of a young baby in the hospital. Later in the story we discover that the boy grows up to be Jim Jones, of Jonestown.

No good deed...