ANTONY BEEVOR
An I getting paranoid? During a bookshop talk in New York, I noticed a weaselfaced character in the front row taking notes of everything I said. His expression was conspicuously sardonic and his dresssense struck me as unmistakably Russian. But why the front row? Was he trying to spook me? The only alternative that I could think of was that he might be one of those crazy conspiracy theorists who are drawn to such events. Yet they always want to vent their wild suspicions. (The favourite at the moment is that 9/11 was really the work of the US government.) This character, however, did not open his mouth during questions at the end. He just slipped away. It seemed to confirm my hunch that I would not be receiving this year's Ferrero Rocher award for diplomacy from the Kremlin.
Author tours produce a number of unexpected encounters. One of the strangest occurred in England at a lecture organised by a local bookshop in Gloucestershire. During the questions afterwards, there was the sound of somebody vomiting, but nobody moved. The noise was repeated even more unmistakably. I was tempted to remark, 'I do hope it wasn't something I said.' From the platform I noticed a slight movement in the third row. A woman was being violently sick, yet those around her were trying their hardest not to notice. I was so amazed by this behaviour that I completely lost the thread of the question that I was supposed to be answering. I, too, tried to pretend that nothing out of the ordinary was happening, and brought the questions to an end as soon as decently possible. Afterwards, when I sat at a table signing books, a young woman came up. She leaned forward and murmured, 'I think that was the most thoroughly English experience I have ever witnessed.' I could not have agreed more.
National characteristics represent an inexhaustible source of potentially misleading insights, especially in the form of jokes. A favourite in the Russian army is about a soldier who, in the peasant-cunning tradition of the Good Soldier Schweik, asks his lieutenant, 'Does a crocodile crawl or fly, sir?' It crawls, you idiot,' the lieutenant replies. 'But the colonel says a crocodile flies, sir,' the soldier answers. 'Well, so it does,' the lieutenant replies hurriedly, `but very, very low.'
News of the recent death of General Aleksandr Lebed in a helicopter crash in Siberia reminded me of his favourite dinnerparty story. When Lebed arrived as governor of Krasnoyarsk, his first act was to invite round the local military commander. Lebed asked him what his problems were. 'Well,' this
general is supposed to have replied, 'it's the weather, of course. During last winter, about a dozen conscripts committed suicide and the ground was so frozen that we weren't able to bury their bodies. So, as soon as the thaw came. I had all the conscripts out digging graves so that we wouldn't be caught out that way again the next winter. And do you know what happened?' he demanded in outrage. 'No,' said Lebed. 'What did happen?' Eighteen of them deserted the next morning.' (This was no doubt followed by Lebed's uproarious laughter at his own anecdote.)
Unlike in Russia, where concern for human rights is developing rather slowly, the authorities in the United States bend over backwards to eliminate anything that might offend their own citizens. The New York State Education Board is in the forefront of the struggle for freedom from offence, but it has just suffered a severe rupture as a result of the necessary intellectual gymnastics. A very clued-up mother from Brooklyn noticed that her child's exam papers in English literature were presenting politically correct bowdlerised extracts. Any reference to race, sex, ageism, religion and even alcohol had been quietly eliminated from the original text. Among the words condemned to oblivion is 'fat'. So how is one supposed to describe those over-large young citizens, driven in automobiles through low-rise suburban sprawls, with neon signs offering obesity combos of every variety? The answer, it appears, is heavy. So now, presumably, it's not over until the heavy lady sings. T. its credit, the New York Times countered with a front-page article entitled 'The Elderly Man and the Sea'. The Education Board at first tried to defend its sensitivity review guidelines aimed at ensuring that no student will be uncomfortable, but then it had to cave in. Yet, despite this striking reverse inflicted on the forces of political correctness, I fear that the war for straightforward English is being lost. There seems to be no limit to the senseless rewriting — presumably one is supposed to say reconfiguration —V of the language. In hotel bathrooms, I discovered that soap is now called a cleansing bar: clearly a case of why go for one syllable when three can do nicely? Significantly, the field of education remains the worst. 'Exam' has now been dropped in favour of a 'testing situation'. It is almost as bad as the Kentucky State School Board, which a few years ago replaced the word 'evolution' in its biology curriculum with 'change over time'.
The price of good language is eternal vigilance, and I am afraid that we all slip up occasionally. Reviewers — and I, too, have been guilty in my time — sometimes suffer from motes, if not beams, in their own eyes when taking an author to task for lapses of judgment, taste or language. One of my favourite examples occurred the other day. I was gently chided by a reviewer in the Washington Post over a sentence in my book that the reviewer justifiably considered a trifle over-ripe. He then promptly described the picture that I had painted in the book as 'Brueghel multiplied by Munch, with background music by Shostakovich at his most agonised'. I felt that my ripeness had been crushingly trumped.
My visit to the States provided a sobering and educational experience. I should have understood long ago how different the American book market is, especially in non-fiction. Over there, your only real hope of bestsellerdom is an Arnericano-centric book that can be puffed as truly inspirational. Unfortunately, both Stalingrad and Berlin are also a little short on FGF, or feel-good factor. One cynical friend observed that I should write a Stalingrad cookbook. But that would provoke an instant court martial by a citizen-sensitivity board determined to defend the feelings of the overweight minority. Or have they already become a majority? Train seats in the United States now have to be truly thronelike in their width. Airlines are having to follow suit. Is this an example of power to the people or fear of litigation? If the latter, then we may be seeing a new stage of capitalist consumerism — victim gridlock. I wonder what those Soviet leaders are thinking in their Kremlin in the sky. How on earth did we manage to lose the Cold War?
Previous page
