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Authors: Geoff Dyer
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out with clichés. And you’re being rude . . .’
‘No I’m not.’
‘Anyway I’m bored with this conversation. Let’s talk about something else.’ For the next couple of minutes we weaned ourselves off rhetoric and back on to pleasantries.
We talked about what we’d been doing and stuff like that and then Mary went off to get another drink.
I crossed the room to where Freddie was talking energetically to someone about writing. You had to hand it to him: he really looked the part. He was wearing a corduroy jacket, suede shoes and a
tie. Every now and then he took his glasses out of his jacket pocket, put them on and took them off again. (‘My new affectation,’ he’d once described it as, ‘one part
Morrissey to one part George Steiner.’)
‘
I always wanted to be a writer
,’ he was saying. ‘Now that is the tense of great fiction. Only really great writers get a chance to come out with that kind of
thing.’
‘Did you always want to be a writer?’ said the woman he was talking to.
‘I got forced into it. I mean I got fed up doing nothing. Now most days I still do nothing but at least I feel I’m meant to be doing something. As an incentive I pay myself
psychological overtime: time-and-a-half after seven o’clock, double-time after midnight, triple-time at weekends. So if I put in a good four or five hours on a Sunday I can take the rest of
the week off,’ said Freddie, pausing to swallow a mouthful of beer and then tossing away the empty can. ‘And that’s the really great thing about writing: you can take a whole week
off and nobody is going to give a shit: that’s the kind of powers writers wield. They can withdraw their labour at any moment – no need to ballot – and that’s fine by
everybody. Nobody’s going to dock your wages, nobody’s going to get shit-face if you turn up at your desk hungover or late and knock off at four o’clock after a two-hour
lunch-break. A toss is exactly what no one will give about anything you do.’
At the end of this little speech – I’d heard earlier drafts at other parties – Freddie looked as if he would have appreciated a round of applause. I handed him a can of lager
instead.
‘You ought to read the book he’s writing,’ said Steranko to the woman they were talking to. ‘It’s a work of Tolstoyan banality. One of the few truly dispensable
works of our time.’
‘What’s it about, your book?’ the woman asked.
‘It’s a memoir of life at the eastern end of the Central line. I’m calling it “Look Back in Ongar”.’ At the very least I had heard Freddie make this joke ten
times in the last two years. It was what he called one of his ‘Classic Standards’ and he showed no signs of ever getting fed up hearing himself say it.
‘And what do you do?’ the woman asked Steranko.
‘I’m an artist,’ he said.
‘The only thing he’s got in common with an artist,’ said Freddie, ‘is he gets cramp in the same wrist.’
Foomie came over, smiling, pouring wine and putting her arm around the woman Freddie and Steranko were speaking to.
‘So you’ve met the beer boys Caroline?’ she said, much less formal with us once she could mediate her comments through a friend. Steranko, Freddie and I stumbled over each
other trying to make jokes.
‘D’you three live together?’ Caroline asked during a pause in all this verbal jockeying for position.
‘We ride together,’ said Freddie before going off to get some food.
Foomie talked to Steranko and me but however hard she tried to share what she said evenly between us it was obvious that the conversation was taking place on a slope, tilting away from me
towards Steranko. If Steranko was talking to Caroline I could tell that Foomie was half listening to what they were saying. Her eyes lingered on Steranko when he spoke.
Someone tapped Caroline on the shoulder. I moved over to the drinks table where someone handed me another joint. The centipede rhythms of salsa
‘No I’m not.’
‘Anyway I’m bored with this conversation. Let’s talk about something else.’ For the next couple of minutes we weaned ourselves off rhetoric and back on to pleasantries.
We talked about what we’d been doing and stuff like that and then Mary went off to get another drink.
I crossed the room to where Freddie was talking energetically to someone about writing. You had to hand it to him: he really looked the part. He was wearing a corduroy jacket, suede shoes and a
tie. Every now and then he took his glasses out of his jacket pocket, put them on and took them off again. (‘My new affectation,’ he’d once described it as, ‘one part
Morrissey to one part George Steiner.’)
‘
I always wanted to be a writer
,’ he was saying. ‘Now that is the tense of great fiction. Only really great writers get a chance to come out with that kind of
thing.’
‘Did you always want to be a writer?’ said the woman he was talking to.
‘I got forced into it. I mean I got fed up doing nothing. Now most days I still do nothing but at least I feel I’m meant to be doing something. As an incentive I pay myself
psychological overtime: time-and-a-half after seven o’clock, double-time after midnight, triple-time at weekends. So if I put in a good four or five hours on a Sunday I can take the rest of
the week off,’ said Freddie, pausing to swallow a mouthful of beer and then tossing away the empty can. ‘And that’s the really great thing about writing: you can take a whole week
off and nobody is going to give a shit: that’s the kind of powers writers wield. They can withdraw their labour at any moment – no need to ballot – and that’s fine by
everybody. Nobody’s going to dock your wages, nobody’s going to get shit-face if you turn up at your desk hungover or late and knock off at four o’clock after a two-hour
lunch-break. A toss is exactly what no one will give about anything you do.’
At the end of this little speech – I’d heard earlier drafts at other parties – Freddie looked as if he would have appreciated a round of applause. I handed him a can of lager
instead.
‘You ought to read the book he’s writing,’ said Steranko to the woman they were talking to. ‘It’s a work of Tolstoyan banality. One of the few truly dispensable
works of our time.’
‘What’s it about, your book?’ the woman asked.
‘It’s a memoir of life at the eastern end of the Central line. I’m calling it “Look Back in Ongar”.’ At the very least I had heard Freddie make this joke ten
times in the last two years. It was what he called one of his ‘Classic Standards’ and he showed no signs of ever getting fed up hearing himself say it.
‘And what do you do?’ the woman asked Steranko.
‘I’m an artist,’ he said.
‘The only thing he’s got in common with an artist,’ said Freddie, ‘is he gets cramp in the same wrist.’
Foomie came over, smiling, pouring wine and putting her arm around the woman Freddie and Steranko were speaking to.
‘So you’ve met the beer boys Caroline?’ she said, much less formal with us once she could mediate her comments through a friend. Steranko, Freddie and I stumbled over each
other trying to make jokes.
‘D’you three live together?’ Caroline asked during a pause in all this verbal jockeying for position.
‘We ride together,’ said Freddie before going off to get some food.
Foomie talked to Steranko and me but however hard she tried to share what she said evenly between us it was obvious that the conversation was taking place on a slope, tilting away from me
towards Steranko. If Steranko was talking to Caroline I could tell that Foomie was half listening to what they were saying. Her eyes lingered on Steranko when he spoke.
Someone tapped Caroline on the shoulder. I moved over to the drinks table where someone handed me another joint. The centipede rhythms of salsa
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