other things racist rants and ranks of goose-stepping warriors. Americans are in love with spectacle, but in the wake of Nazism, spectacle in Europe can never be quite the same again. Instead, in Britain above all, there is ceremony, which is rather different.
The opposite of the angelic for Kundera, predictably enough, is the demonic, by which he means the language of the cynical and nihilistic, one with too little meaning rather than (like the angelic) one stuffed with sonorous clichés. There is enough demonic discourse in the States to suit anyone’s taste, but the fact remains that the official rhetoric of the country (which, one should stress, is far from the discourse of everyday life) is too pious, elevated, hand-on-heart and histrionic for us jaded Europeans. A dash of the demonic would do it no harm. The demonic can be found in the edgy, abrasive, sardonic speech of New York Jews, which is much closer to the Irish than it is to the Midwest. When they hear angelic American speech—“this great country of ours,” “let freedom ring forth,” and the like—most Europeans simply stare at their shoes and wait for it to stop, as some people do whenever Schoenberg comes on the radio. Many Americans, to be fair, find this kind of language just as excruciating.
European political discourse is much more downbeat. You might get away with a reference to freedom, but certainly not to God. Suggesting that the Almighty has a special affection for your nation would sound as absurd as claiming that he has a special affection for gummy bears. Phrases can be tested for their shitless or angelic quality by seeing whether the opposite would make any sense. The Republican politician Mitt Romney solemnly established a Committee for a Strong and Free America, as opposed to a Committee for an Enfeebled and Enslaved one. (“Strong,” incidentally, is a favourite American word.) Angelic discourse goes hand in hand with the high seriousness of the American public sphere. Political life in the States is colourful but earnest. It is hard to imagine a goat, nudist, flamboyant cross-dresser or can of baked beans being put up for political election, as they might be in the United Kingdom . Politics can be a circus, but not exactly a carnival. Michael Moore’s attempt to have a ficus plant elected to Congress is a magnificent exception.
Angelic language is too extravagant for British taste. Theatre is a venerable British art, but emotional theatricality is as un-British as sunshine. A British, French or German author might end the preface to his or her book with some rather tight-lipped acknowledgements to friends, colleagues and family. American authors, by contrast, have been known to write roughly as follows: “Finally, I should like to thank my incredible wife Marcia (remember that Caesar salad in Dayton, Ohio!), my three unbelievably beautiful children Dent, Tankard, and Placenta, our wonderful mongoose Brian J. Screwdriver who taught me wisdom, forbearance and compassion, and my totally extraordinary colleagues in the Department of Apocalyptic Studies at Christ Is Coming College . . . ” One might claim that where Americans and the British differ most is in sensibility. It is this divergence that their shared language tends to conceal. On one reckoning, however, Americans come out of the comparison rather better. They may overdo emotion, but they are not fearful of it. A surplus of feeling has rarely done as much damage as a deficiency of it.
The Kindness of Americans
There is, then, a positive side to the emotional lavishness of the States, as there is to many an American defect. In fact, de Tocqueville writes that what Europeans tend to see as American vices (restlessness of spirit, an immoderate desire for wealth, an excessive love of independence, and so on) are exactly what makes the nation so resplendently successful, and are thus every bit as serviceable to it as its virtues. Extravagant emotion may be mawkish, but it
The opposite of the angelic for Kundera, predictably enough, is the demonic, by which he means the language of the cynical and nihilistic, one with too little meaning rather than (like the angelic) one stuffed with sonorous clichés. There is enough demonic discourse in the States to suit anyone’s taste, but the fact remains that the official rhetoric of the country (which, one should stress, is far from the discourse of everyday life) is too pious, elevated, hand-on-heart and histrionic for us jaded Europeans. A dash of the demonic would do it no harm. The demonic can be found in the edgy, abrasive, sardonic speech of New York Jews, which is much closer to the Irish than it is to the Midwest. When they hear angelic American speech—“this great country of ours,” “let freedom ring forth,” and the like—most Europeans simply stare at their shoes and wait for it to stop, as some people do whenever Schoenberg comes on the radio. Many Americans, to be fair, find this kind of language just as excruciating.
European political discourse is much more downbeat. You might get away with a reference to freedom, but certainly not to God. Suggesting that the Almighty has a special affection for your nation would sound as absurd as claiming that he has a special affection for gummy bears. Phrases can be tested for their shitless or angelic quality by seeing whether the opposite would make any sense. The Republican politician Mitt Romney solemnly established a Committee for a Strong and Free America, as opposed to a Committee for an Enfeebled and Enslaved one. (“Strong,” incidentally, is a favourite American word.) Angelic discourse goes hand in hand with the high seriousness of the American public sphere. Political life in the States is colourful but earnest. It is hard to imagine a goat, nudist, flamboyant cross-dresser or can of baked beans being put up for political election, as they might be in the United Kingdom . Politics can be a circus, but not exactly a carnival. Michael Moore’s attempt to have a ficus plant elected to Congress is a magnificent exception.
Angelic language is too extravagant for British taste. Theatre is a venerable British art, but emotional theatricality is as un-British as sunshine. A British, French or German author might end the preface to his or her book with some rather tight-lipped acknowledgements to friends, colleagues and family. American authors, by contrast, have been known to write roughly as follows: “Finally, I should like to thank my incredible wife Marcia (remember that Caesar salad in Dayton, Ohio!), my three unbelievably beautiful children Dent, Tankard, and Placenta, our wonderful mongoose Brian J. Screwdriver who taught me wisdom, forbearance and compassion, and my totally extraordinary colleagues in the Department of Apocalyptic Studies at Christ Is Coming College . . . ” One might claim that where Americans and the British differ most is in sensibility. It is this divergence that their shared language tends to conceal. On one reckoning, however, Americans come out of the comparison rather better. They may overdo emotion, but they are not fearful of it. A surplus of feeling has rarely done as much damage as a deficiency of it.
The Kindness of Americans
There is, then, a positive side to the emotional lavishness of the States, as there is to many an American defect. In fact, de Tocqueville writes that what Europeans tend to see as American vices (restlessness of spirit, an immoderate desire for wealth, an excessive love of independence, and so on) are exactly what makes the nation so resplendently successful, and are thus every bit as serviceable to it as its virtues. Extravagant emotion may be mawkish, but it
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