MARGINAL COMMENT
By HAROLD NICOLSON
ON Friday evenings I have been listening to an item in the Home Service entitled " Twenty Questions." The Radio Times, with its accustomed gentility, defines this item as a "radio parlour game." Such a definition is untruthful ; no parlour that I have ever known contains a stage replete with actresses and journalists, or a numerous audience, who follow the proceedings with loud clappings and exhortations such as in the old days echoed across the circus at Byzantium. Upon the platform are seated men and women of alert erudition, such as Miss Winn, Mr. Dimbleby and Mr. Train. The chair is taken by Mr. Stewart Macpherson, who is not merely re- sourceful by nature, but has in front of him little cards bearing the detailed information which he requires. The producer, Mr. Finn, thinks of some object ; he communicates his thought to Mr. Macpherson ; the latter announces whether the object is animal, vegetable or mineral ; and the men and women on the platform are allowed twenty questions by which to discover what the object is. Increasing zest is given to the occasion by the presence of " an attendant," whose function, I gather, is to communicate to the
• audience (either by passing round slips or by holding up a notice which is invisible to the platform) the nature of the object of which Mr. Finn has thought. Nor is this all. We have a ghost-voice which communicates to those who are listening the word or object which those upon the platform have to guess. It is true that to the ghost- voice has been allotted a subordinate part in the proceedings. But his handling of his role is masterly. He manages, as he whispers to the world such thoughts as " The Forth Bridge " or " Castor oil," to throw into his voice a blend of the surreptitious and the trust- worthy, of the sinister and the confiding, of the mystic and the humane.
Having devoted much time to the study of the causes of human laughter, I follow this entertainment with interest and application. Why is it, I ask myself, that " Twenty Questions " should arouse sensations of amusement in people of every age and of every level of education? In the first place, I suppose, one approaches the com- petition in a mood of sympathetic attention ; it arouses within one soft nostalgic memories of one's own childhood. One of my own earliest memories is the effort that I made, as a child, to display prowess in this game in the presence of my elder brothers. " Animal, vegable or minerable? " I would shout, possessing even less know- ledge of the true properties of objects than that displayed by Mr. Macpherson. And thus as one listens again to this old game as played upon the ether one feels around one the firelight and the Turkey carpet of one's childhood years. In the second place, the fact that questions are limited to twenty, and that the moment arrives when the platform have almost guessed the answer, but have only two more questions in hand, accumulates expectation, which is either resolved, or dissolved, when the final question comes. We thus have two elements present which have been recognised as classic " occasions of laughter," namely, the reversion to childhood, and the accumula- tion and release of expectation. To this we may add a third element, that which derives from our sporting or playful instincts, and which is stimulated by the slight but painless excitement of wondering which side is going to win. It is curious also to observe that, on the whole, and in spite of Mr. Macpherson's compelling charm, we want the platform to win. And why is this? Because the platform represents for us the ordinary man, the ones who don't know, the under-dogs ; whereas Mr. Macpherson represents authority, the man with inside information, the bureaucrat. We want him to be scored off seven times in ten.
A fourth component in the amusement we derive from "Twenty Questions " is that provided by what Herbert Spencer called " a descending incongruity." He explained this difficult term by saying that when the expectedly small becomes the unexpectedly great; we
do not experience amusement, but wonder ; conversely, when the expectedly great becomes the unexpectedly small, sensations of amuse- ment are invariably aroused. Theodor Lipps defined this element with greater clarity. " Laughter," he writes, " arises when something significant or impressive suddenly loses its significance or impressive- ness." It is this special sequence of incongruities which provokes us to laughter when we listen to " Twenty Questions." We, and the audience in the studio, all know that the object which the platform is trying to guess is the Forth Bridge. Questions such as " Does it move? " " How many legs has it got? " or " Can you put it in your pocket? " suggest the exact descending incongruity of which Spencer wrote. Moreover, in our perceptions of the ludicrous there is often a moment of double vision, when we simultaneously see a thing as it is and as it is thought to be. This contrast between reality and unreality is much enhanced by the method employed by the producer, Mr. Finn. We have a simultaneous perception of the thing as we, being in the secret, know it to be, and of the successive unrealities in which the platform indulge ; and this makes us laugh. Thus when the object thought of is a prominent politician and the questioner asks, " Can one wear it? " a very strange simultaneity of perception is occasioned.
It would lead me into very deep water were I to apply to this item in the Home Service the definitions of the ludicrous which Bergson elaborated in his fascinating book on Laughter. One of the points which he makes is curiously applicable. He contended that society demanded two qualities of its members, namely, awareness and adaptability. When people become either unduly absent-minded or unduly rigid, we are apt to apply to their unsocial behaviour the sanction of ridicule. Seldom, in any experiment that Bergson con- ducted, can the contrast between awareness on one side and unaware- ness on the other have been so artificially emphasised as in this programme. Thus we laugh when we listen, since whereas we know the object which is being sought for, the platform do not. But there is more in it than that. Thomas Hobbes, in a famous passage, defied the occasion of laughter as heightened self-esteem. " I may therefore conclude," he wrote," that the passion of laughter is nothing else but sudden glory, arising from some sudden conception of some eminency in ourselves, by comparison with the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly." I do not agree that Hobbes's definition covers all forms of laughter, since obviously there are many forms which are sympathetic rather than complacent, affectionate rather than derisive. Nor do I suggest that those who listen to " Twenty Questions " are• conscious of any serious eminence in themselves or of any deep infirmity in the minds of souls of Miss Winn, Mr. Dimbleby or Mr. Train. But there certainly does exist an element of " sudden glory " in the amusement which we derive when we ourselves possess certainty, and observe others floundering in the marshes of conjecture. Nor do I see that this sense of eminence, provided it be quite superficial, is so very disreputable.
Such, I suggest, apart from the ordinary pleasure we derive from watching wits being nimbly exercised, are some of the reasons why we find " Twenty Questions " so entertaining. What puzzles me is why we should find the game more amusing on the ether than it seems when we play it at home. It is ably produced, of course ; it proceeds rapidly, and it possesses a time-limit ; most parlour games go too slowly and last too long. But that is not the only reason. Is it that the incongruities, the contrast between awareness and unaware- ness, even the sense of self-esteem, are enhanced when both the actors and the audience are unseen and unknown? In the home circle we are. aware of the extent of knowledge or of ignorance possessed by each individual ; when the game is played by strangers, the limits of expectation and surprise are much extended. It may be that. But I am not sure.
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