Cosmopolitanism and Material Ethics 117of one tendency in human thought. Reason is the being of a cer-
tain spectrum of human thinking” (p. 67). Given that Costello nei-
ther places much emphasis on this distinction nor articulates herself
with the same degree of measured, rational professionalism as does
Mulhall, this portion of her argument can be easily overlooked.
Indeed, it is expressed in just a few rather vague lines that leave
the character exposed to misinterpretation. Therefore, the fact that
Norma (and, to a degree, John, who does not raise the point) over-
look s or misreads t his a spect of Costello’s a rg ument ca n be expla ined
at least partially by the character’s now-familiar rhetorical and ora-
tory “deficiencies.” However, Norma’s “misunderstanding” of this
part of the speech may not be entirely Costello’s fault. The acrid
nature of Norma’s criticism might also be partially attributed to the
fact that despite believing herself to be more of an authority on phi-
losophy than Costello, she is nonetheless unemployed and therefore
without the kind of academic platform that the latter enjoys. In this
reading, Norma’s own reasoning therefore appears to be guided or
“clouded” by her feelings toward the speaker, rather than by the
substance of her arguments—a notion that ironically consolidates
a broader point made by Costello about humanity’s erroneous faith
in reason.
Nonetheless, Costello apparently continues to undermine the
intellectual strength of her position when she makes a number of
seemingly contradictory and logically inconsistent utterances in
other parts of the narrative. During a dinner held in her honor at
Appleton College, Olivia Garrard, the president’s wife, attempts to
compliment Costello on her convictions, stating that she has “great
respect” for vegetarianism as “a way of life” (p. 89). Costello uncere-
moniously rejects this compliment through the cool admission that
she is wearing leather shoes and carrying a leather handbag (p. 89).
Such inconsistency is repeated more overtly in the final chapter—a
surreal Kafkaesque sequence that resembles The Trial. When asked
by one of the administrators (would-be “angels”) to state what she
believes, Costello responds with a vague and circuitous speech that
meditates upon the role of the writer as that which must reside out-
side the domain of belief. During one particularly problematic por-
tion of the statement, she announces: “I have beliefs but I do not