The young man who could not laugh in English

He was too original a teacher for his students to understand. We received his “simple” words of wisdom with immediate joy, and immediately did we forget them as plain jokes for the moment. Yet, with the passage of time, and on leisurely reflection, those words begin to shine like the proverbial “apples of gold in settings of silver”.

We were 10-year-olds then in the fifth standard. He taught us English. His jokes ranged from the trivial to the serious. One of his most memorable jokes was about the “folly” of a rich countryman who sent his son for higher studies at Oxford, but was disappointed because the son returned without learning how to laugh in English!

This was the storyline. The rich, rustic man’s son made him proud by graduating in English literature from Madras University in first class. And he sent him for higher studies at Oxford. The young man eventually returned as a Barrister-at-Law. To celebrate the occasion, the proud father arranged a feast for his countrymen and an exclusive dinner for his son’s friends. The dinner guests included some of his white friends from England. The old man was gratified with the confidence and ease with which his son conversed with his friends in English. All of a sudden, however, his face fell, as if from some private disappointment or pain.    

When the guests departed, the old man’s trusted friends gathered around him and discreetly enquired about his abrupt mood shift. With disappointment marking his voice, he said, his son had failed to meet with his expectations. How? He had not yet learnt to laugh in English! No one understood. Now enter the son in high spirits. He was dismayed to see his moody father in the midst of his silent friends. The youngster suppressed his laughter when the reason was revealed. Soon every one in the room, other than the father, was laughing uncontrollably. The son tried to reason out. The old man peremptorily commanded every one to leave the room.

The father explained the next day, within the limitation of his vernacular vocabulary, that his son was behaving in the manner of an uneducated country kid. His white guests moved, gestured and laughed differently, while his own gestures and laughter matched neither with his English education nor with the lounge suit that he was wearing at the dinner. The contrast between the disciplined smile of his English friends and the apparently meaningless, irrelevant laughter of the young man was conspicuous. The youngster gradually saw wisdom in his father’s observations. Today, in modern idiom, we would say, the young man’s general demeanour and body language remained that of a rustic youth of early twentieth century, despite his exposure to higher education.

Obviously, we, ten-year-old lads were not ready to grasp the essence of the story. What remained in our minds was the old man’s “foolish” complaint about his son’s inability to laugh in English. How could any one laugh differently in English!

I recalled my teacher’s wisdom on seeing a minister from the South on TV a few years ago. He was in a lounge suit with a beautiful necktie and a matching pocket kerchief addressing a group of businessmen at Dubai. Seated at the head table, he was addressing them with the body language of one who was relaxing on a kitchen chair at home with one arm hanging behind him over the backrest, and his head tilted awkwardly!   

K X M John

02/04/10