COPE OF M USIC •
I INVENTED A new musical instrument today, by one of those happy accidents so often recorded in the lives of great men. I sat down to play my piano, which gave out a loud, wiry whine whenever I touched B natural in the middle octave. Raised the lid and investigated and found that some careless child had left a glass alley on the strings. In fishing the alley out I dropped it onthe strings again, and it produced a succession of delicate, tinkling arpeggii, very pleasing to the ear. I repeated this a few times, and then got some more alleys and tried chucking them into the piano in handfuls; this was wonderful. Then I played a little piece on the keyboard, and threw alleys into the works at a musically appropriate moment. Superb! I shall patent this device of mine and market it as “Marchbanks’ Fairy Harp.” The soap operas will all snatch at it, I expect, and the electric organ will fall into disfavour.
• O F F EIGNED I NDUSTRY •
I SPENT A BUSY DAY today, but got little done. This is because I am at last becoming perfect in the art of seeming busy, even when very little is going on in my head or under my hands. This is an art which every man learns, if he does not intend to work himself to death. By shifting papers about my desk, writing my initials on things, talking to my colleagues about things which they already know, fumbling in books of reference, making notes about things which are already decided, and staring out of the window while tapping my teeth with a pencil, I can successfully counterfeit a man doing a heavy day’s work. Nobody who watched me would ever be able to guess what I was doing, and the secret of this is that I am not doing anything, or creating anything, and my brain is having a nice rest. I am, in short, an executive.
• H YMEN H ASTE ! T HY T ORCH P REPARE •
I PASSED A CAR which had a crude sign on the back reading “Just Married and Away to the West to Build a Nest.” The car was going east. I gaped at the occupants, a young couple who looked very serious, not to say worried. But as it can never be said that Marchbanksfailed to encourage the noble institution of marriage, I waved at them, and shook hands with myself like a Chinaman or a boxing champion, and leered and wagged my head in what I believed to be a benevolent manner. They caught sight of me, and their jaws dropped, and they hastily looked away. It is very difficult to be a ray of sunshine in this self-conscious world.
• O F H IS B ITE •
M Y DENTIST told me last week that modern man eats too much soft food, which weakens his bite and loosens his teeth. But this afternoon I bit my tongue with such vigour that I nearly bit it off. I do not understand how anyone could possibly have a stronger or more destructive bite than I have. Probably I am the only writer and critic in Canada of whom it can truthfully be said that his bite is worse than his bark.
• O F R ATIONALIZING A NGER •
T HE LADY ON my right passed the afternoon at the hairdresser’s. Such women are full of information, for they read old copies of digests and news magazines under the drier. She told me that a psychologist says that it is wrong to repress anger, as anger creates adrenalin and if this nasty stuff is not used up it poisons its owner, giving him indigestion, communism, rabies or ulcers. Anger, this fellow says, should be rationalized by violent physical action. It seems to me that the trouble with this idea is that the kind of violent physical action which follows anger is awfully hard to explain. If a man disagrees with me, and I become angry and pop him on the button and then say, “Nothing personal, you understand; I’m just rationalizing my anger and working off my excess adrenalin,” he will probably secrete a lot of adrenalin himself and pop me backagain. Then I shall fill up with adrenalin for a second time, and be compelled to re-pop him, and when the cops arrive it will look just like a low brawl, and not like a
I INVENTED A new musical instrument today, by one of those happy accidents so often recorded in the lives of great men. I sat down to play my piano, which gave out a loud, wiry whine whenever I touched B natural in the middle octave. Raised the lid and investigated and found that some careless child had left a glass alley on the strings. In fishing the alley out I dropped it onthe strings again, and it produced a succession of delicate, tinkling arpeggii, very pleasing to the ear. I repeated this a few times, and then got some more alleys and tried chucking them into the piano in handfuls; this was wonderful. Then I played a little piece on the keyboard, and threw alleys into the works at a musically appropriate moment. Superb! I shall patent this device of mine and market it as “Marchbanks’ Fairy Harp.” The soap operas will all snatch at it, I expect, and the electric organ will fall into disfavour.
• O F F EIGNED I NDUSTRY •
I SPENT A BUSY DAY today, but got little done. This is because I am at last becoming perfect in the art of seeming busy, even when very little is going on in my head or under my hands. This is an art which every man learns, if he does not intend to work himself to death. By shifting papers about my desk, writing my initials on things, talking to my colleagues about things which they already know, fumbling in books of reference, making notes about things which are already decided, and staring out of the window while tapping my teeth with a pencil, I can successfully counterfeit a man doing a heavy day’s work. Nobody who watched me would ever be able to guess what I was doing, and the secret of this is that I am not doing anything, or creating anything, and my brain is having a nice rest. I am, in short, an executive.
• H YMEN H ASTE ! T HY T ORCH P REPARE •
I PASSED A CAR which had a crude sign on the back reading “Just Married and Away to the West to Build a Nest.” The car was going east. I gaped at the occupants, a young couple who looked very serious, not to say worried. But as it can never be said that Marchbanksfailed to encourage the noble institution of marriage, I waved at them, and shook hands with myself like a Chinaman or a boxing champion, and leered and wagged my head in what I believed to be a benevolent manner. They caught sight of me, and their jaws dropped, and they hastily looked away. It is very difficult to be a ray of sunshine in this self-conscious world.
• O F H IS B ITE •
M Y DENTIST told me last week that modern man eats too much soft food, which weakens his bite and loosens his teeth. But this afternoon I bit my tongue with such vigour that I nearly bit it off. I do not understand how anyone could possibly have a stronger or more destructive bite than I have. Probably I am the only writer and critic in Canada of whom it can truthfully be said that his bite is worse than his bark.
• O F R ATIONALIZING A NGER •
T HE LADY ON my right passed the afternoon at the hairdresser’s. Such women are full of information, for they read old copies of digests and news magazines under the drier. She told me that a psychologist says that it is wrong to repress anger, as anger creates adrenalin and if this nasty stuff is not used up it poisons its owner, giving him indigestion, communism, rabies or ulcers. Anger, this fellow says, should be rationalized by violent physical action. It seems to me that the trouble with this idea is that the kind of violent physical action which follows anger is awfully hard to explain. If a man disagrees with me, and I become angry and pop him on the button and then say, “Nothing personal, you understand; I’m just rationalizing my anger and working off my excess adrenalin,” he will probably secrete a lot of adrenalin himself and pop me backagain. Then I shall fill up with adrenalin for a second time, and be compelled to re-pop him, and when the cops arrive it will look just like a low brawl, and not like a
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