Silent Quest

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Have you ever wondered about the sound of silence?  Or why some people shrink from its presence whilst others absorb its embrace?  Often we do things, like cultural habits passed down from generation to generation, and over time its meaning has got lost along the way.  Why for example, do we put our index finger over our mouth before we whisper shhh? 

 

The ancient Greeks had a God, his name was Harpokrates.  He was a derivative of Horus the Egyptian God.  Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris, was often portrayed as a small boy with his finger held to his lips.  According to Egyptian history the gesture was a symbol of childhood but the Greeks mistook the gesture for a hush of silence.  Harpokrates became known as the God of silence and secrets.  Small bronze or terracotta statues are often found with him wearing the crowns of Egypt, riding on the backs of animals or sat on a lotus flower.  It’s ironic that the Greeks, most noted for their famous philosophers, Socrates, Plato and Aristotle would honour a God of silence considering their philosopher’s voices still echo in our culture today.  As for the Harpokrates he has been silent for centuries.  Maybe the Greeks realised their embarrassing error and hoped in silence that the shhh would go away.  It does make you wonder though if the Greeks hadn’t misunderstood Egyptian symbolism what silent gesture could we be using now. 

 

Harpokrates is not the only God associated with silence.  Christian cultures believe that in the beginning God spoke the world into existence.  In the beginning there was nothing, not even a sound.  The earth was formless, void, and in darkness.  Then God said,

‘Let there be light and there was light.’  Through the act of speaking, hence sound, our world came into existence.  Take note, if you ever hear Church bells calling and wooing its congregation, watch them as they greet each other on the sacred path.  In their sunny clothes, a shroud of stillness announces their arrival at that holy place.  As a child I used to wonder what secrets did they know as they passed through the arched wooden entrance?  Maybe it was back then that the seeds were sown for my unrealised quest for silence. 

 

It was 1981, the year Lady Diana stepped out of the royal carriage and thirty million Brits and seven hundred and fifty million non Brits, glued to boxed TV sets, drew a simultaneous intake of breath.  That dress!  It looked like something a primary school pupil had created out of ivory white crepe paper.  Little did we know then that years later her death would silence the globe.  1981 wasn’t all a disaster though.  We celebrated the first London Marathon and Bucks Fizz won Eurovision.  The song was terrible, it got in your head.  If you hadn’t made your mind up, on first hearing, by the trillionth time, you certainly wanted to run to the land of make believe and never return.  We won though and that’s what counts, or so they said. 

 

The Sinclair ZX81 home computer had been released earlier that year.  Those lucky enough to own one spent their entire summer watching ‘tape loading’ errors flicker on their TV screens.  After a proper summer, when summers used to last more than a few days, eager junior school children prepared to cross the threshold into secondary school.  This secondary school never had a ZX81 or any other computer for that matter.  There were no PC’s with desktop publishing, one click and your done.  Back then it was technical drawing desks.  They were large and could be flipped and rotated into different angles.  The room was filled with them, all laid out in neat rows.  Twenty or so excited eleven year olds were too busy evaluating these strange beasts as though they were the latest puzzle from the Krypton Factor.  No one noticed Mr Edwards the Technical Drawing Teacher enter the room.  No one saw him leap onto the desk, but everyone heard him shriek, ooh, ooh, aah, aah.  He then proceeded to vault from one desk to another screeching, ooh, ooh, aah, aah, over and over whilst twisting his curved hands into his armpits like a decrepit monkey.  His varied shades of brown tartan tie contrasted against his cream shirt and tweed trousers.  He looked like a seventies hippie that had tried to dress formal.  Backwards and forwards he leaped and pale classroom faces were stunned into silent submission.

‘If you want to act like monkeys, then I’ll treat you like monkeys,’ he yelled.  His face now as red as blistered tomatoes popping in the frying pan.

 

We soon learnt to adjust with precision our technical drawing desks so they rested in perfect symmetry with our technical rulers and HB pencils.  The room was still.  Even the breeze tried to escape Mr Edwards as he paced in-between the rows of desks.  In forced silence with only the melodic symphony of pencil nibs scratching across white paper, we drew one perfect line after another.  If anyone speculated as to what was the point of this pedantic task, no one dared to ask.  Some of the braver pupils offered a suppressed snigger now and then and everyone raised their eyes under eighties hair sprayed fringes, half expecting Mr Edwards, to leap up to the light fittings and swing like Tarzan crying arghargh.  Philosophers of sound would call it polite silence.  A hush generated by the reluctance to speak for fear of offending someone.  For a culture who has been brought up on the mantra of ‘silence is golden’ and ‘children should be seen and not heard’ it was normal to fall in line.

But were we afraid of offending him?  Or had Mr Edwards conjured up an ancient survival instinct in this troop of monkeys that understood the nature of predator and prey? 

 

Of course with all unrealised quests for silence, there are failed attempts.  One epic failure occurred through a chance meeting with a nameless boy.  It must have been around the late 70’s, when children still went out to play at dawn and came home at dusk.  This particular day the goal was to climb all the trees in Victoria Park.  As we were debating the next tree to climb a friend appeared with an unknown boy.  He had a small frame and a peculiar manner.  His khaki trousers and white button downed shirt were immaculate, compared to our grass stained play clothes.  He looked like he had come from a birthday party or a wedding.  His blonde hair was swept over to the side of his head, the way only mothers know how to do.  Sealed into place by the lick of two wet fingers and a look that says don’t you dare even think about it.  My friend explained that this boy never talked – ever.  No one knew why.  It wasn’t that he couldn’t talk, it’s just that he chose not to.  According to my friend he had been mute now for a couple of years.  He looked to be around eight just a couple years younger than me.  He was mysterious, fascinating and a problem to be solved. It became a quest to try and break his silence.  To cure him from this irrational illness.  It was tactical warfare, the brutal kind.  The challenge began with various questions,

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‘What’s your name?’

                                   Silence—

‘Where do you live?

                                                   Silence—

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Then came the reasoning with his intellect,

‘Of course, I know you can speak really, just say one word.’

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                                                                  Silence—

‘We won’t tell anyone.’

                                                                                   Silence—

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So when that didn’t work it became outright verbal attack.

‘You think you’re clever, don’t you?’

                                                                                                 Silence—

 

His eyes betrayed him.  He understood every word.  He didn’t stare off into a blank abyss.  His blue steal eyes reflected back an unfathomable mystery.  They weren’t harsh or cold.  They were just vacant as if he had somehow left his exterior frame.

‘Come on,’ my friend said to him, ‘we have to go now.’  My friend kicked his trainers into the gravel and they walked off and with that the boy who didn’t talk was gone.

 

So fascinated was I to learn of what I now understand to be selective mutism I endeavoured to give it a try.  No one seemed to notice my attempt at first.  This gave me my first conundrum.  How do you tell people you’re being silent without breaking the silence?  Clearly I hadn’t thought this through.  It wasn’t long before my stifled voice was breached due to sibling rivalry and the need to defend my corner.  Siblings have an uncanny way of knowing your weakness and sliding under your skin, pushing you to break that which is promised.  This silent quest was doomed to fail.  Annual school reports had predicted my dilemma.  Would do well if she focussed more and stopped chatting, one teacher said, and another in blatant red ink, talks to much!  The brief experiment wasn’t a total failure.  It revealed an omnipotent power that draws its breadth in silence.  It’s hard to analyse exactly what it is but it often stands around us like an unconscious ghost.  It’s like the absence of sound, shapes its frame, but has anyone ever seen its face?  We sense its presence in those silent moments but few truly embrace it.

 

My unrealised silent quest was put on hold when MTV hit the TV stations that year.  For the first time we had non stop twenty-four seven music videos.  The first music video MTV played was ‘Video Killed the Radio Star’ by The Buggles.  How’s that for an in your face salute to the radio?  For many years life just became noise.  Music, dancing, parties and beach barbeques were later replaced by the roaring of rush hour traffic, whaling babies in the dead calm of night, toddler tantrums, dogs barking, children laughing, bosses moaning, teenagers arguing.  Then silence.  It crept in unnoticed.  You don’t realise at first that you haven’t switched the television on.  Then someone turns up, switches it on and you can’t wait for them to go so you can switch it off.  Then before long you can’t wait for them to go as well.  Your inner sanctum has been penetrated.  Yap, yap yap, like a little terrier snapping at your heels and everything within you cries,

‘for God’s sake put a muzzle on it.’  But you don’t say, instead you stay – silent. 

 

Silence is selfish like that.  Once you’ve stepped into its embrace and been caressed by its soothing balm it becomes addictive.  I never went in search of silence.  My unrealised quest found me.  It became an escape.  A place where the mind can explore realities that this mundane world can never offer.  As tempting as it can be to sit in the stillness and listen to silence’s voice, it’s just as important to connect with those around you.  To live, love, laugh and cry.  To dip your toe in the hustle and bustle if only so you can appreciate your next silent adventure.

 

What was it that made the unnamed boy decide to give up on language?  In many ways he was similar to Harpokrates.  In his silence he held onto secrets we still don’t have the answer to.  For many like the sniggering children in the technical drawing class, when silence creeps into our reality we sense its expansion growing into an uncontrollable omniscient being.  What I misread as their bravery was nothing more than their need to extinguish silence before they succumbed to its presence.  If only they had realised that silence is not a phantom ghost.

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