An Overheard Dialogue: Language sans Verb
Overheard conversation from a gastropub in Cambridge, England. In honor of my pen and notepad, always carried in my back pocket, in wait of remarkable transactions like the one transcribed below.
“You familiar with Michel Thaler?”
“Michel Thaler? Yes, that eccentric French author, the novelist, right? A charlatan, maybe, but an entire novel without a single verb — legendary! Truly, how? And after the initial publication, a brilliant marketing ploy: a ‘funeral for the verb,’ hosted by Thaler himself! In attendance: about 300 publishers and academics, dressed as mourners, in black wool. A tearful cacophony, an ululation, elegies, or even a modest whimper? Probably not, but oh boy, those intellectuals and their drinking habits! Another ransacked venue and a tarnished lawn of a cemetery for the authorities and their battalion of cleanup mercenaries. But the attempted organization of a modest procession behind the solemn horse-drawn hearse? A ‘threat to public order,’ according to the police. Ah France, this country of incomprehensible lunatics! — Another round please, bartender. Yes, Pimm’s №1. — ….So what of Thaler? On your mind for what?”
“Your familiarity, my relief! Oh you — knowledgeable of the latest developments as always, my beloved friend, a gentleman and a scholar! But Thaler, a mere novelist? No, surely more! His book: a pleasure indeed. But his movement, his following — and me, a proud member of his clique — , his revolutionary fervor, his ruthless, implacable desire for the death of that pesky encumbrance to language: my life’s beginning. Not the random happening of biological birth (alas, only an unimportant prequel to my life), but an authentic genesis, and the genesis of my authenticity.”
“Finally, clarity for me! Cajolery all, you swine! A few compliments and straight to the point — as usual. Not another Cause, please! Every week, a different ‘passion’ with you. And I, a humble admirer of literature, the latest convert in your eyes. Enough!”
“The difference this time: an undying hatred, my favorite emotion. A hatred born of my love of language! A contempt for the enemy of beautiful prose, a vitriolic disdain for all the utterances making this world of simplistic Newspeak so rotten. That a glimmer in your eye? This hatred, boiling inside of you too — but a denial on your part! Why? You, one single person — so arrogant! A lone defender of these weeds of language, these despoilers of a garden of yellow carnations! You, supposedly a libertarian, a revolutionary, now reduced to a lackey of the imperative!”
“The bathroom. Quick! Where? This overwhelming sense of nausea — with your ceaseless pontificating as the culprit and malefactor! The end of one or the other: this conversation, or you. Your choice. …. — Bartender! Another!”
