Fast Fiction: Words
Richard Mallinson’s briefly-worded story revolves around a paradox.
'I want to experience nature without words getting in the way.'
'What do you mean?'
'I mean . . . well, let me give you an example. I'm walking down a country lane, say, on a lovely June afternoon and I want to absorb the scene, including the flowers, the trees, the sunlight coming through the trees, the bushes, even the insects and, er, everything else.'
'So?'
'So I try to take it all in . . . to relish it but I can't - or not as directly and immediately as I would wish - because I'm thinking of the names of the trees and flowers etc. The bloody words, you see, are getting between me and, for want of a better term, nature. Do you understand?"
'Yes, of course. But why make such a fuss? After all, there's nothing you can do about it unless you go into a trance or something. There's simply no way that you can look at a tree and not think to yourself either it's a tree or it's an oak or both . . . Am I right?'
'Yes, you're always right - and you're always wrong.'
'That sounds like a paradox to me.'
'Well, yes and no to that . . . but if I were a painter I'd be thinking in terms of shapes, forms and colours, wouldn't I? Not words.'
'You, a painter!' he exclaimed. 'That's a laugh to begin with.'
