“Toothless sharks amuse me”
The Moon and the Sun“Toothless sharks amuse me” is Sherzad’s taunt against Louis XIV, delivered through Marie-Josèphe de la Croix during a negotiation over Sherzad’s life. The phrase makes a captive’s defiance audible at court; its later echo casts the King himself as the toothless shark, commanding a dangerous voyage that ends in a shipwreck.
The Insult as Defiance
Sherzad raises herself and sings, blood streaking her face, while Marie-Josèphe interprets for Louis XIV. Pressed to explain what Sherzad has said, Marie-Josèphe relays the insult and Sherzad’s accompanying question about whether a fleet of treasure ships could buy her life. When Louis XIV asks where the treasure is, Marie-Josèphe says Sherzad will tell her only after she is freed. The phrase is therefore part of a specific act of bargaining: Sherzad refuses to provide what the King wants without an assurance of release.
The Toothless Shark Reversed
Later, as the sun sets and the wind shifts, Sherzad listens for the shape of the seabed. The captain argues against sailing blind so close to shore, but the “toothless shark,” Louis XIV, orders him to obey. The ship plunges forward and strikes jagged stone, which grinds along its keel; timbers crash and splinter, and Sherzad is thrown against the net, whose rough cables cut her skin. The phrase’s recurrence is not simply a repeated joke: its earlier mockery returns as a name attached to royal command, while the wreck makes that command’s cost concrete.
