I have decided to write a play entitled Twelve Chairs For Pirandello, which will be a modern and antithetical abstract re-enactment of the Last Supper, although in this case, Jesus, who is absent, will not die (and I intend no sacrilege) (although I do think this is the first time in my life I spelled sacrilege correctly the first time round). For the dinner portion of the play, I have already created my guest list (beside each name below, highlighting my reasons why):
[Chair 1]: Noam Chomsky
While I am averse to naming my children on this site, I suppose it is safe enough to say that Don and I and our youngest son had the privilege (why would sacrilege have been so hard to spell, given privilege?) of hearing Mr. Chomsky lecture on Foreign Policy in the amphitheatre at the University of Prince Edward Island about 17 years ago. Our son had recently broken his arm (in five, count them, places) and so was in a proper sling cum cast (or is that cast cum sling?), and at best was as shy as any young school-aged boy could be. We arrived early (we were, in fact, the first three arrivals), securing the best seats -- somewhat left of centre, on an aisle, not too high, not too low. On stage, Noam Chomsky chatted with a stagehand (or microphone expert or whatever the proper term is), then made an ambling move toward the door.
I whispered to my son, "You must go down and introduce yourself," a suggestion met with an astonished blotched face and even lower whispers of, "No, Mummy. I can't do that." Down he went and out the door (never trust a seven-year-old), and gone he was for ten or fifteen minutes. (Don and I thought perhaps he had drowned himself in the water fountain.) Returning to his seat he relayed the conversation he had had with Mr. Chomsky as best he could, which went something like (and he can correct me if I'm wrong)...
"Hello, Mr. Chomsky. I would like to introduce myself. My name is Noam, and I wanted to tell you that I was named for you." I am sure were it not for his cast/sling, Noam the younger would have held out his right hand, but I am almost certain I recall the other hand being used, which is neither here nor there except for the thrill I felt for my son who was shaking the hand of that man. And because I haven't an eidetic memory and instead a selective one (that's what hormones are for, correct?), the middle part of the story escapes me, but I do recall that the end of their conversation was, to my ears at least, spectacular:
Noam the senior leaned down to Noam the junior and smiled, looking Noam the junior square in the eye. "And do people call you Norm, too?" he asked. (Don and I found this especially funny because our Noam had had a recent prescription and, sure enough, typed onto the bottle's label was the name Norm.)
That night Noam Chomsky delivered a long lecture -- almost none of which I understood -- straight into the eyes of our mottled-faced son. The three of us couldn't have been more thrilled, for a whole host of reasons.
The other thing I remember vividly about that night is a professor (who I shall not here name) standing at the microphone for too many minutes during the question period and asking several combative questions, all of which Noam Chomsky answered quietly, politely, and, what seemed to me, comprehensively. That professor, in fact, allegedly spent several subsequent years jailed for sexual assault charges against young boys. Anyway, I am not sure I would seat Noam Chomsky next to anyone who might not quite understand or agree with him -- and never next to a pedophile (which is why Woody Allen was not invited) -- but he is certainly at the top of my play list.
[End of Part 1]
<:^)
