Southerners are not adept when it comes to speaking briefly
When it comes to saying a few words, Southerners are not very good at it. We find it difficult to limit our comments to several utterances. You say, “Good Morning” and we don’t seem to be able to say simply, “Yes, isn’t it.”
More times than not, we will add additional comments such as, “But not as good as the morning I got out of the hospital, which reminds me. Did I tell you about my gallbladder operation…, well, it was about two months ago… blah, blah, blah……etc. We are not adept at letting the conversation die down. We feel compelled to keep it going. Have you noticed? Southerners always seem to say “Blah, blah, blah” when “Blah” would do. In case you haven’t paid attention (a few letter-writers have), I am no exception.
In a word, you could say we Southerners are “verbose.”
Now this doesn’t always apply when we are speaking to strangers – especially anyone whose dialect does not match ours. We are not always comfortable in our conversation with folks we don’t know until we find out who this person is, where he/she is from and more than likely where they go to church.
Because of our tendency to speak on and on, we have, through the ages, been story-tellers. In fact, American literature was dominated during the first century of American history by Southern writers. They still hold their own with writers from other areas. Before radio and television, we entertained ourselves with sitting around the fire or on the front porch telling stories. Most Folks, it seems, from “up there” apparently were too busy complaining about the bread (or something else) to form a story-telling habit.
Southerners, perhaps because they couldn’t afford to do anything else, relished the telling of stories. We can be long-winded but not as bad as those Russian writers. Just take a look at their long, long novels. I once owned a Russian novel, “Quietly Flows the Don” that was six volumes long. It covered almost a foot of my bookshelves.
Southern novels were much shorter. I suppose those long winters on the frozen tundra of the Russian steppes offered nothing else but boredom — overtaken by long-windedness. Our Southern winters were mild; therefore, our novels are shorter.
Times, though, they are a’changing. Brevity can sometimes be less than forthcoming. We are bombarded hourly with television sound-bites and newspaper headlines that don’t usually tell the whole story. Many folks don’t look or read past headlines and/or sound-bites; therefore, they often get a distortion of the true picture.
TV stations can take a whole day’s political activity and reduce it into six words. I wonder what they would have done with the Abe Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address if it had been delivered yesterday. Would sound bits/headlines have been condensed into something like this?
Lincoln’s words, “…whether that nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure” would be reported: “Lincoln doubts future of America.” And, “…government of the people, by the people, for the people….” would likely be: “President promotes anarchy.” You get the idea.
Ernest Hemingway was once asked to tell a story in six words or less. His composition was sheer genius:
“For sale: baby shoes, never used.”
Wow! I wish I could write like that.
And excessively wordy graduation speeches are most times remembered about as long as it takes the procession to leave the auditorium but I doubt that anyone who heard Sir Winston Churchill’s famous baccalaureate ever forgot it. His address was the epitome of brevity:
“Never give up!”
On another occasion following several long-winded speakers, Churchill was called upon to give his “address;” whereupon he rose, paused a second or two and said, ”My address is 10 Downing Street and that’s where I am now going right now!.” He walked off the stage.
William Shakespeare understood the value of brevity when he put these words into the mouth of Hamlet: “…brevity is the soul of wit….”
Brevity is preferable in most cases and Thomas Jefferson (not always known for succinctness) probably had it about right when he said: “The most valuable of all talents is that of never using two words when one will do.”
I’ll take his advice, at least for now, by saying my two words:
“Bye, bye.”