HOW TO BE RUDE

it is easy to be rude on the Continent. You just shout and call people

names of a zoological character.

On a slightly higher level you may invent a few stories against your

opponents. In Budapest, for instance, when a rather unpleasant-looking

actress joined a nudist club, her younger and prettier colleagues spread the

story that she had been accepted only under the condition that she should

wear a fig-leaf on her face. Or in the same city there was a painter of

limited abilities who was a most successful card-player. A colleague of his

remarked once: 'What a spendthrift! All the money he makes on industrious

gambling at night, he spends on his painting during the day.'

In England rudeness has quite a different technique. If somebody tells

you an obviously untrue story, on the Continent you would remark 'You are a

liar, Sir, and a rather dirty one at that.' In England you just say 'Oh, is

that so?' Or 'That's rather an unusual story, isn't it?'

When some years ago, knowing ten words of English and using them all

wrong, I applied for a translator's job, my would-be employer (or

would-be-not-employer) softly remarked: 1 am afraid your English is somewhat

unorthodox.' This translated into any continental language would mean:

employer (to the commissionaire) : 'Jean, kick this gentleman down the steps

I '

In the last century, when a wicked and unworthy subject annoyed the

Sultan of Turkey or the Czar of Russia, he had his head cut of without much

ceremony; but when the same happened in England, the monarch declared: 'We

are not amused'; and the whole British nation even now, a century later, is

immensely proud of how rude their Queen was.

Terribly rude expressions (if pronounced grimly) are: 1 am afraid that

. . .' 'unless . ..' 'nevertheless . . .' 'How queer . . .' and 1 am sorry,

but . . .'

It is true that quite often you can hear remarks like: 'You'd better

see that you get out of here I ' Or 'Shut your big mouth I ' Or 'Dirty pig!

' etc. These remarks are very un-English and are the results of foreign

influence. (Dating back, however, to the era of the Danish invasion.)

HOW TO COMPROMISE

wise compromise is one of the basic principles and virtues of the

British.

If a continental greengrocer asks 14 schillings (or crowns, or francs,

or pengoes, or dinars or leis or

Date: 2015-02-16; view: 1785