'The Mousetrap’, a murder mystery play by Agatha Christie, has become famous for being the longest-running West End show, having reached its 30,000th performance on March 19, 2025, following its opening in 1952.
It follows a group of seven strangers in a remote countryside guesthouse, each with a murky past, who discover when a policeman arrives that one of them is the killer.
At such a time, they wish to be anonymous but fall into the ‘anonymous-e’ trap.
Many people like to be anonymous.
School heads may receive an anonymous letter from a parent or group of parents, giving no name or address, or, if written as an email, giving an anonymous email address.
It will be sent in this format as the anonymous parent is generally scared (like a mouse, perhaps) of victimisation for their child but the obvious problem is that the head cannot respond to the letter, explaining the situation, answering the charges.
So, what is actually gained by sending the letter, when no answer can be received?
At least by email, a response can be delivered, although many people will understandably and justifiably not bother to answer if the persons are not brave enough to identify themselves.
Anonymous in this instance has become annoying-mous.
Schools need to teach children to be brave enough to speak their mind as should governments allow their citizens.
That may appear blasphe-mous-e, veno-mous-e even, but definitely necessary.
However, though it may sound strange and contradictory, we need to teach our children to be anonymous, in the sense of not always wanting to receive attention, limelight or glory.
CS Lewis, the twentieth century philosopher described integrity as “doing the right thing right even when no-one is watching” which has shades of Christ’s injunction that when we help the poor, we should keep it a total secret, not trying to show off or get praise from people.
Humility is, after all, part of integrity.
That is hard, though, as people generally want others to know when they have done something well or big – look at soccer players pointing to their names (or the numerous other histrionics on display) when they score a goal.
Indeed, a few generations ago, when children were asked what they would like to be when they grew up, they tended to say things like a doctor or lawyer or sporting champion; now, if we ask a teenager the same question, their answer is often very different – “I want to be famous”.
That is all; they just want to be a fa-mous-e, somehow, even if they do not know how.
Neil Gaiman, in ‘The Sandman’, laments a number of things that children are not taught at school that are worth knowing, identifying, among other things, that “They don't teach you how to be famous.”
While not necessarily the case for the other things he mentions, there is good reason why we should not teach children how to be famous (though it is respected that we should teach them how to handle being famous, which is very different).
After all, as Fred Allen noted, "A celebrity is a person who works hard all his life to become well known, then wears dark glasses to avoid being recognised."
Ray Charles, the singer, once asserted that "I never wanted to be famous: I only wanted to be great" but as David Spade put it, "If you have to explain to someone you're famous, then you're technically not that famous." Those who ask, “Do you know who I am?” please note well.
Interestingly, before the internet, we may have been drawn to a Dictionary of Quotations with famous people like Winston Churchill, Mark Twain, Oscar Wilde being seen to have many memorable quotes but the biggest contributor of wise sayings just happened to be Anonymous! Anonymous, for example, on the internet now, is attributed with declaring that "Work hard in silence, let your success be your noise", as well as “You can feel sore tomorrow, or you can feel sorry tomorrow. You choose ”.
The key question in life may not be so much “Are you a man or a mouse?” but rather what sort of mouse are you?
Are you fa-mous-e or anony-mous-e? Wanting simply to be famous is a trap young people all too often fall into even if, as Willie Nelson noted, “The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.”
Rather, we need people to stand up for what they believe yet not seek credit – like the memorials ‘To an Unknown Soldier’. Walt Disney put a new light on it when he said of Disneyland that “I only hope that we don't lose sight of one thing - that it was all started by a mouse”.
Which mouse though?