COMPETITION

Very small talk

Jaspistos

In Competition No. 1434 you were in- vited to supply a conversation involving two or more people on a social occasion and containing an awful lot of clichés. The first connoisseur of clichés (or 'cant' phrases, as he would have called them) was probably Swift, whose Complete Collection of Genteel and Ingenious Conversation, according to the Most Polite Mode and Method now used at Court, and in the Best Companies of England was published under the pseudonym Simon Wagstaff in 1737. Here is an intriguing extract from `The Third Dialogue':

Lady Answerall: I'm sure 'tis time for honest folks to be abed.

Miss Notable: Indeed, my eyes draw straw. Neverout: Why, Miss, if you fall asleep, some- body may get a pair of gloves.

Colonel: I'm going to the Land of Nod. Neverout: Faith, I'm for Bedfordshire.. .

Another fine student of the genre was Myles na Gopaleen (Flann O'Brien) with his Catechism of Cliché:

Of what was any deceased citizen you like to mention typical? Of all that is best in Irish life.. .

And of what nature is his loss?

Well-nigh irreparable.

You dutifully swamped me with very small talk, much of it in the setting of a wedding party or a wake, 'or whatever the word is for the apres-crem. shindig', to use John Digby's rather too original phrase. Through the mental hangover induced by taking in so much verbal 'plonk' I just managed to isolate five winners, who get £10 each, and Charles Mosley is awarded, through the kindness of the publishers, the bonus copy of the Longman Dictionary of the English Language (which, though otherwise admirable, fails to contain `angekkok', obscurely defined by my 1972 Chambers as 'an Eskimo conjurer').

`Mummy, this is Sarah. I'm proud to say she's agreed to be my wife.'

'I'm very pleased for you both. Today is the happiest day of your lives.'

`Thank you, Ma'am. . . . Please don't cry: you're not losing a son, you're gaining a daughter.'

'I can't help it. He was so sweet as a baby.' 'I know, They're tears of joy really, aren't they? The best kind.'

`Thank you, my dear. You have a way with words.'

'Perhaps I have. I'm in publishing, you see.' 'How fascinating! I expect they keep your nose to the grindstone?'

'Oh yes. But they're very real people. At the end of the day, though, when the chips are down, the job is what you make of it.'

`Very true. My own is no bed of roses.' 'Still, it must pay quite well.'

`Yes, one is able to put a little aside for a rainy day.' (Charles Mosley) 'Basil! Fancy seeing your

'Long time no see, Adam. How's tricks?' 'Not so dusty. How's life treating you?' 'Can't complain. Everything's great in our neck of the woods.'

'All right for some. You'll be in Surbiton till the cows come home.'

'Wouldn't live there myself for all the tea in China. How's Eunice?'

`Laughing all the way to the bank — over there in the little whiter-than-white Dior number.'

'You lucky devil! She's the picture of health.' `And Cicely?'

`Under the weather, I'm afraid. Keeping the home fires burning and in the club again.' `Good for you.'

`To be perfectly honest, I'm cheesed off. It's come as a blow. Enough is enough. Know what I mean? How's the garden?'

`Pretty as a picture, though I says it as shouldn't. Hard work is the name of the game. But it pays off.'

`Well, I must love you and leave you. . .

(Ba Miller) `My God, Tracey, Vera's excelled herelf. Clive's had a great send-off!'

`That's Vera. Nothing but the best. Keep up appearances! Though she's plumbing the depths.'

`Think so? She and Clive weren't exactly hitting it off.'

`No, but he was her bread and butter, dear. She's going to feel the pinch now.'

`Then she shouldn't have tempted fate. Ex- pecting him to fight that flab. Pigs might fly!'

`Couldn't agree more. That exercise bike was the last straw. Talk about killing the golden goose —' 'Vera's cooked hers, too!'

`She'll contest the will, of course, but Clive's kids'll get the lion's share. She hasn't a leg to stand on.'

'You can't win 'em all, Sis, and. . . oh, oh . . . time to make our escape. Our man of the cloth's bearing down on us with a few well chosen words, no doubt.' `Uh! A happy release, he calls it. Vera would beg to differ!'

(M. G. Mercer) `Hail and well met, old boy. Long time no see.'

`Er . . . tip of my tongue...'

`Rack your brains. Cast your mind back. Alma Mater.'

`Robinson! He of the leonine locks.'

`Alas! no more. Well, well, well, tempus fugit. Forty years on, eh? You're a sight for sore eyes.'

`How are you keeping? In good shape?'

`Not so young as I was. Old ticker plays me up. Waterworks a bit dodgy. Soldiering on, though. You?'

`Touch of the anno domini, y'know. Not so hot on the conjugal rites. Still, half a loaf...'. `You tied the knot, then?'

`Ah, the good lady, the better half? Yes, decent sort. Between you, me and the bedpost, I'm in flagrante here. No names, no packdrill, eh?'

`Mum's the word. Nod's as good as a wink.' `Well, time to climb the wooden hill. C'est la vie.'

`Che sera sera.'

`Chin-chin!'

`Cheers!' (Noel Petty) `Dead as a door-nail,' muttered the Mad Hatter, tweaking the left ear of the Dormouse.

`Pull the other one,' tittered the March Hare, `as the actress said to the bishop.'

`To get down' . . . began Alice.

`SILENCE IS GOLDEN!' shrieked the March Hare.

. . .to brass tacks,' continued Alice, cool as a cucumber, 'and to cut a long story short, I could eat a horse! Even common or garden cake would be welcome.'

`Can't have your cake and eat it, ducks,' sniggered the March Hare.

`I suppose the long and the short of it is,' sighed Alice deeply, 'that the cupboard is bare.'

`Tut! Don't wear your heart on your sleeve and never call a spade a spade,' snapped the Mad Hatter. 'And, last but not least, be thankful for small mercies like FOOD FOR THOUGHT.'

(L. L. Dean)