Passing through Exeter. Not too far to Plymouth.
How long is it since I wrote to our friend in Taiwan (W.’s friend in Taiwan)? W. asks me. W. hasn’t written to him in ages — years, he says. If you don’t contact a friend in five years, then he’s no longer a friend, that’s W.’s principle. And to lose our friend in Taiwan (W.’s friend in Taiwan) would be a terrible thing.
Ah, how can he forget the sight of him, when we met him at the station? His weightlifter’s vest … his Rupert the Bear scarf … Our hearts lifted! Our speaker had arrived, and all the way from Taiwan!
And what did we do with him? Where did we take him? W. shakes his head. To the worst Chinese restaurant in Newcastle. It was the only place open, I’d said. It’s actually pretty good, I’d said. Our friend (W.’s friend) had travelled halfway round the world, crossed whole continents, and we took him to the worst Chinese restaurant in Newcastle.
It was my fault, W. says. My Oriental food enthusiasm. My dim sum enthusiasm. Surely a better restaurant was open in Newcastle in the mid-afternoon! Surely we could have found somewhere else to eat!
Our friend (W.’s friend) had travelled all the way from Taipei, Taiwan, a centre of great Chinese-style food, to Newcastle, which is in no way renowned for Chinese-style food, W. says. Our friend (W.’s friend) had come the greatest distance possible, just to give a talk at my university, and we took him to a restaurant that would undoubtedly poison him and send him home in a body bag!
W. warned me, he remembers. What did he whisper to me on the way to Chinatown? We mustn’t poison our friend from Taiwan (his friend from Taiwan)! But how could he have known? W. says. How could he have known the hole into which I was leading him? The Oriental Buffet, W. says. All you can eat for £5, he says, shaking his head. The worst Chinese restaurant in Newcastle.
Our friend (W.’s friend) looked ill as we sipped our jasmine tea. I looked ill. W. felt ill, and that was before we began to eat. We hadn’t even seen the menu! Hospitality is a great art, W. says. It’s the art of arts. And here we were, as hosts, desecrating hospitality, spitting at it.
Still, he put a brave face on it, our friend from Taiwan (his friend from Taiwan), W. says. He took the reins of the conversation, as he always does. He was grace itself, as he always is. He tried to cover up the horror he must have felt at the dim sum, as it came glistening to our table. He didn’t retch as he nibbled on chicken feet. The potstickers didn’t seem to horrify him. He endured the steam buns and the spare ribs in hoisin sauce. And didn’t he even finish off his mango pudding?
He survived the afternoon. We survived it! And when we met up later that evening, we were determined to take our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan) for a night out in Newcastle.
There was a kind of distractedness to him, our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan), W. says. A vagueness, as though he wasn’t quite in tune with the world, wasn’t quite in focus. His outline seemed blurred, his replies hesitant, W. says — didn’t we notice that? When we asked him our questions, and we had many questions, there were long silences, great pauses and interregnums. And he replied, most often: I don’t know. Because he didn’t know, and he knew that he didn’t know. He rested in non-knowing.
Ah, how far away we must have seemed to him, our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan), with our inanities! W. says. With our chatter! But he confided in us, W. says. He spoke of the loneliness of thought. He said that he’d been out too far, out too long …
He could only guess at the inner states of our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan), W. says. He’d been out among the farthest stars, W. was sure of that. Out to the edge of the known universe, among the quasars …
Our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan) had roamed anti-stars and anti-galaxies, W. says. He’d wandered out among the anti-electrons and the anti-baryons. He’d met the anti-Lars (a towering genius), and the anti-W. (very much in the shadow of his friend). He’d wandered to the end of time, and his thought was at one with the end of things: that was clear from his pauses and silences, from the gaps between his words. Between his sentences!
And when we took him out to the nightclubs of Newcastle, our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan) seemed touched that we would think to look after him, W. says. He seemed genuinely moved when we showed him our primal scene dance.
We drank to his health. He drank to ours. We drank to his thought! He smiled at us. And when we took him to the airport the next morning, he embraced us both, looking each of us in the eye. — ‘Pengyou’, he said. ‘Friend’.
As friends of thought: that’s how we’ll be judged, W. says. As friends of those made solitary by thought.
We’ve sought to assist thought and its thinkers. Sought to lighten the solitude of thinking. We’ve written consolatory emails (W. more often than me). We’ve praised and encouraged (again, W. more than me). We’ve even discovered thinkers, picking them out from the crowd (W., not me).
We’re the encouragers of thought! Thought’s enthusiasts! What thinker, in our midst, have we failed to cheer on?
Weren’t we there, at our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan)’s presentation, in the front row with our notebooks, furiously writing? He spoke, and we wrote. And after, knowing the audience’s reaction could not fail to disappoint him, could not fail to leave our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan) feeling yet more isolated, yet more alone, we all but bore him upon our shoulders, cheering. We all but deafened him with our cries.
What did he mean by this point, or that one? we asked him. Stupid as we are, our interest flattered him. We were like a dry run, in our idiocy, for an encounter with a fellow thinker, an ally of thought, in conversation with whom our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan) could rise to his true vocation.
And what would we do, if, when in company with our friend from Taiwan (W.’s friend from Taiwan), another thinker came along? What, if a conversation between thinkers truly began, if idea met with idea, like eagles rising into the air? We wouldn’t get out our notebooks, W. made me promise that. I wouldn’t take out my camera, my infernal camera, W. made me promise that, too. And we wouldn’t chatter; we wouldn’t say a thing: W. doesn’t have to tell me that.
W.’s house, Plymouth. A pit stop for supplies, and to pick up books.
Why do I always take my trousers off in his living room? W. wonders. On one level, the answer is obvious: I am growing too fat for them; their waistband cuts uncomfortably into my swollen belly. But then I never take my trousers off elsewhere, W. has noticed. Only in his house, with him and Sal. Only in his front room, whether the shutters are open or closed.
Once, when a friend of theirs called round unexpectedly, I leaped up, frantically looking for my trousers. Too late! — ‘Lars always takes his trousers off when he visits’, W. had to explain. I feel some sense of shame, at least, W. says. He didn’t think I did, but there it was: shame over my trouserlessness. My public trouserlessness.
But why am I not ashamed of anything else? W. wonders. My ignorance, for example. My laziness. He thought he’d taught me, W. says. He thought I’d learnt something. But somewhere inside, I’m still an ape on the savannah. Somewhere, I’m still sitting back on my haunches and looking out over the expanse.