Miked

The Gordon Brown gaffe of a day or so back suggested a rather good wheeze to me. If we all went around wearing microphones that switched themselves on at arbitrary intervals, and broadcast our conversations to all and sundry, the world would be a more interesting place. I'm guessing the technology would be readily available in these digitally enhanced days.

I reckon I'd survive at least a couple of days before my reputation would be completely blown. At least that's a bit longer than poor Gordon managed.

On The Odiferous

Medicine doesn't smell like medicine anymore. At one time when you were ill you knew you were ill because of the lingering odours of all those unpleasantly thick liquids you were forced to ingest. Nowadays only the fact that you feel yucky is left as evidence of the state of being less than tickety-boo. All the pills and liquids these days taste either neutral or suspiciously pleasant and the lotions have the whiff of the mildly edifying.

I was reminded of this aspect of progress the other night when I put on one of those deep heat plaster whotsits on an uncomfortably aching lower back. Actually it was Noi who put it on after sensibly suggesting I wear one through the night. Now those things do smell, and you know you're getting your money's worth. Every time I turned over in bed I caught a noseful of my patch's richly pink heatiness and felt like a genuine invalid.

Come to think of it, hospitals don't smell much like hospitals. No wonder health tourism is catching on.

Surviving, Still

I used to regard birthdays with indifference. Nowadays I relish them. The older I get, the younger, and dafter, I feel. When I was a youngster of around forty I used to think folk of my age had achieved some small degree of wisdom. How wonderfully wrong I was, as the pictures above goofily testify.

Of course, getting lovely presents helps.

Cashing In

Trollope is excellent on money. He hasn't got Dickens's massive mythic power, but he knows how the stuff works, and to the degree to which we are all in thrall to its power.

Take this fine bit, from a uniformly fine much longer paragraph, on Mrs Greenow, one of the characters in the comic sub-plot of Can You Forgive Her?:

But she had already married for money once, as she told herself very plainly on this occasion, and she thought she might now venture on a little love. Her marriage for money had been altogether successful. The nursing of old Greenow had not been very disagreeable to her, nor had it taken longer than she had anticipated. She had now got all the reward that she had ever promised herself, and she really did feel grateful to his memory. I almost think that amongst those plentiful tears some few drops belonged to sincerity.

There's a refreshing, clubbable tolerance behind this clear-sighted analysis that you rarely find in the Victorian novel. Jane Austen has something of this, but her charity wouldn't extend to the Mrs Greenows of this world. Trollope's charity is central to his vision. I suppose that's why he tends to be regarded as a comfortable writer, peddling a kind of early version of the compassionate conservatism we've all come to roundly distrust. But I trust Trollope, because he doesn't hide from what money can and does do to people. Mrs Greenow is, in many ways, a dreadful woman, but she's also extremely likeable in her fashion.

By the way, the chap who wrote the rather snooty introduction to my edition of the novel (one Sir Edward Marsh, whoever he be, the edition being one of those natty little OUP World Classics in hardback that you don't see around anymore) thinks the entire Mrs Greenow plot is a waste of time and extraneous to the concerns of the novel. Never trust a Trollope fan, which is what he purports to be. Rarely has a major writer (and I think he is one, when on form) been so badly served by his 'supporters'. A bit like all those dreadful Jane-ites, I guess.

More Demands

It's incredibly difficult to deal with the work of students who struggle to express themselves with any degree of clarity. I've spent over thirty years trying to think myself into the position of kids who can't do what seems to come reasonably naturally to me. The problem is that if you can't figure out why what's going wrong is going wrong there's little you can do about it. Pointing out it is going wrong is important, but can only be a starting point. But I seem to spend a lot of time stuck at this level.

One thing that characterises the work of quite a few students is an apparent desire to make simple things more confusing than they are. I'm guessing that this is done in the vain hope that obfuscation will be mistaken for depth. Although, having said that, quite a few folk have built careers based on this strategy, so who am I to criticise?

Demands

After a demandingly enjoyable morning of drama and more drama I'm now waiting to get slapped around and pummeled by Noi's surpassingly excellent massage lady. Mind you, I'm in a queue comprising many of the Singaporean branch of Noi's family, so patience is called for. Worth the wait, though. A bit like the long wait for Scholsey's moment of genius against City last week.

And that's a reminder of another variety of drama - one sometimes so traumatic in its outcomes (the Bayern game!!!) that the pleasures of satisfied fulfilment are by no means guaranteed. At times I'm almost inclined to stick to massages.

Knowledge

When I consider how little I know about anything, it adds to that small but distinct sense of astonishment that I can manage to get to the end of each day if not exactly unscathed then not entirely scathed.

So Tired

Two great songs about being tired: I'm Only Sleeping and I'm So Tired - both by the late, great John Lennon, the laziest Beatle of them all, by repute. Oddly enough I can't think of a single other song on the subject - surely one of the most universal of human experiences. And ironically enough, I'm too tired to care.

Down To Earth

I was told this morning that today is Earth Day, though I'm not sure if the information was accurate. I remember a time when we didn't have an Earth Day because we didn't know we needed one. And I'm not sure we do now, insofar as I'm always dubious about any form of media-driven hoopla, and its costs.

But I do know that thinking seriously and carefully about how we treat our planet is an urgent necessity. Fortunately the young people with whom I have contact are more than prepared to do so - and. I think, they'll have the gumption to act on their thoughts. I just hope they have more sense than previous generations, especially mine.

The Real Thing

I've been reading Northrop Frye's Anatomy of Criticism in tandem with Trollope's Can You Forgive Her? They make an odd pair. But then anything by Frye makes an odd pair with whatever you put it up against. I suppose if you can have a favourite literary critic, a breed I generally detest, then Frye is it. You don't so much read Anatomy of Criticism as get lost in its goofy pattern-making and dazzling insights - I reckon at least three dazzlers, minimum, per page. Interestingly, I think I understand the overall thesis on this reading less than on my previous two. Always a good sign.

To some degree this is all preliminary to a reading of Fearful Symmetry, Frye's greatest book (I think) on Blake, I'm planning for later in the year - when I get a life again. I first read FS after innocently coming across it in the school library at Xaverian College, the scene of a good deal of my misspent youth. Talk about a window opening on the world: the realisation that things were a good deal more complex than I had hitherto suspected was welcome if somewhat intimidating for a kid who'd not that long since graduated from the Bunter books. (Does anyone still read Frank Richards?)

I hasten to add that the Frye itself is intended as preliminary to a big push on Blake's Prophetic Books and assorted goodies. And I'm planning a major Hughes festival of one. You've got to get beyond the critics, no matter how good they are, and Lear-like deal with the thing itself.