Afterthought

By ALAN BRIEN

I TURNED to the index of The Faber Book of Aphor- isms (Faber, 30s.), edited by W. H. Auden and Louis Kronenberger, with the pessimism born of long experience. I did not know what I would find, but I knew what I would not

find. 'Bradley, Francis Herbert; Braun, Wernher

von; Brecht, Bertolt; Bright, John; Brillat-Savarin, Anthelme; Broad, C. D.; Browne, Sir Thomas; Bryce, James'; but no 'Brien, Alan.' I am now inured to such psychic shocks to my vanity. Time and again, I open magazines, vaguely hoping to come upon a brilliant piece under my name which has some- how transferred itself from my mind 'into print without having to be processed through a type- writer. Perhaps all ego-maniac scribblers are prey to the same mild form of hallucination—I remem- ber that the drama critic of the Daily Mail, in the days before he was doing five journalists' work for ten editors' pay, telling me that he regularly scanned the 'Appointments Vacant' column in The Times for the bold announce- ment, 'Kamm LEVIN WANTED: any price paid.' But professional writers soon learn the wisdom of the aphorism (not included in this book) by Rudolph Kommer—`the articles which have not been written stand little chance of being pub- lished.'

• Still, aphorisms cannot take long to chip out. You can use them again and again. And they are eatsily carried in the vest-pocket, to be polished up in odd moments between trains or before falling asleep. Somerset Maugham may not be right in thinking that every man has one novel in him, but surely we must all secrete one pearly aphorism for posterity in the course of the long disease we call our life. There are several easily-masterable techniques fdr aphor- ism-making—the proverbial saying given a kink in its tail; the cliché turned inside out; the truism expressed with a colourful metaphor; the dogmatic assertion of a popular, but usually un- spoken, prejudice; an extreme and gnomic opinion which is incontrovertible because mean- ingless; almost any comment which is so silly as to be unforgettable; somebody else's aphorism badly translated from the Yiddish or Greek, or simply rephrased with the help of Roget.

All journalism is a hunt for the aphorism. In the last ten years I must have launched at least a million words on to the conveyor-belt—I find it hard to believe that if Mr. Auden and Mr. Kronenberger had panned and sieved that output they could not have found at least a couple of nuggets. I could, of course, do the work for them now by getting down my collected cuttings. But, like most journalists, I would rather write a hundred inaccurate words than look up two facts. So I have now set myself the task, in the hour and a half remaining before the printer calls, of inventing a series of aphorisms which I ,shall interleave with a selection from the Faber Book. OK? Then here goes.

(I) The spectator may see most of the game, but he cannot score a goal.

(2) To have a good enemy, choose a friend; he knows where to strike.

(3) A secret does not exist until someone has betrayed it.

(4) He that giveth money giveth the least valu- able thing he owns.

(5) Many a man who thinks he could write a play cannot even invent a good name for his dog or his house.

(6) Children begin by loving their parents. After a time they judge them. Rarely, if ever, do they forgive them.

(7) There is only one place to bury the hatchet —in the body of your opponent.

(8) If the sexual act is sacred, why is it not performed in churches?

(9) Life is a maze in which we take the wrong turning before we have learned to walk.

(10) Life is a condemned cell with many reprieves but no pardon.

(11) The best contraceptive is—No.'

(12) In childhood we are treated like princes— in old age like beggars.

(13) Prayer is work.

(14) Theft is the principle of democracy applied to finance.

(15) If obscenity really were corrupting, then the Lord Chamberlain would be a sexual maniac.

(16) If the Prince of Monaco has a roulette table, surely convicts may play cards.

(17) Dogs have no religion, yet they quarrel over a bone.

(18) I hate unpunctual people, they always make me arrive early.

(19) One of the hostess's duties is to serve as a procuress. • (20) To get to know the truth properly, one must polemicise it.

(21) The meek shall inherit the earth—but only after their father is dead.

(22) Whoever takes up the sword shall perish by the sword. And whoever does not take • up the sword (or lets it go) shall perish on the cross. (23) Beauty is only skin deep, it is true: but an man has X-ray eyes.

(24) Politicians are never changed by success-- more's the pity.

(25) You could read Kant by yourself, if you wanted to; but you must share a joke with someone else.

(26) Men have always been sadists and women masochists. The modern woman still yearns to be beaten, but the modern man punishes her by refusing to do so.

(27) He is not loved whose lover deserveth tint love.

(28) He who desires but acts not, breeds pesti- lence.

(29) He who desires and acts, breeds posteritY.

(30) The night has no bedroom; it sleeps anY' where.

(31) Historians are most impressive when argir ing from the least evidence. None of then' can ever make sense of TODAY.

(32) Prophecy is the parent's promise to his children. History is the children's revenge on the parent.

(33) All politicians denounce immorality—but they never lock the door until the whores have gone.

(34) The embarrassment we feel in the presence of a ridiculous man is due to the fact that we cannot imagine him on his death-bed.

(35) Bores never bore themselves. We avoid then') because they make us bore ourselves.

(36) The thumb takes the responsibility, the hide% finger the initiative. •

(37) An aphorism is a witty, wise, and true re- mark which one can never remember at the moment when it would be most advarr tageous to repeat it. (38) If a rich man wants to feel poor, he has only to go out in the rain without an overcoat.

(39) Neurosis does not deny the existence of reality, it merely tries to ignore it; psychosis denies it and tries to substitute something else for it. A reaction which combines features of both these is the one we call normal or 'healthy'; it denies reality as little as neurosis, but then, like a psychosis, is concerned with effecting a change in it.

(40) Dramatic critics too often dramatise them selves and too rarely criticise the plays. (41) Some men have acted courage who had it not; but no man can act wit.

(The editor offers a copy of The Faber Book of Aphorisms to the senders of the first three lists correctly sorting Brien from the rest. Cony' pelitors are on their honour not to cheat by using the Faber Book.)

'Aren't you jumping the gun, Brian?'