a cowardly feast

while visiting tony in oxford last week, i was invited to attend dinner at one of the colleges. i was warned in advance that it’s a traditional affair. “don’t laugh,” he said, “i have to wear a gown.”

we started by joining other diners for drinks at a lounge. tony tried to point out different college celebrities to me, but i was drifting after the third “famous economist”. i was also distracted by seeing my name on a formal seating chart, like you have at a wedding, and wondered if i should have taken the whole thing a bit more seriously.

a short man in a black and purple butler outfit answered with the ring of a small dinner gong. we followed him through a series of chambers, down some stairs, and arrived at a large hall from what appeared to be a kitchen entrance.

a big rectangular dinning table for the faculty sat on a raised platform - a stage, really – in the front of the cavernous hall, with smaller tables for the students arrayed below it. it was so harry potter, even the walls were lined with goth-looking paintings. i noticed the students seemed to be having a different dinner than ours. “they have their own kitchen,” tony said with a grin, “this is england after all.”

our multi-course meal was kickin’. i especially enjoyed the carpaccio salad, a buttery appetizer of dover sole with braised fennel, and strawberry soup with a dollop of coffee-flavored ice cream. at our corner of the table, there was a fellow who had been interviewing that day for a permanent spot at the college. he was working tony with all the brown-nosing skills expected from a proper british upper-class education. there was also and a mild-mannered man with ginormous glasses and an untamed einstein do, who sniffed when i asked him about his work, “ancient history, you know, greeks and romans.”

with another stroke of the gong, dinner abruptly ended and we were herded into a smaller but lavishly-appointed private room. spread in front of us were three kinds of dessert wine and various fresh berries, cheeses, and chocolate truffles. tony told me i would be seated with a different group and per custom was expected to be “clever and witty”.

to my left was this woman, who ignored me completely and seemed a little unhealthily obsessed with the guy to her left. whatever. on my right sat a thin but distinguished-looking man, kind of like a chilled version of christopher lloyd from “back to the future”. “hi, i’m robin,” he introduced himself, “would you like some port?”

robin told me he just came back from giving a lecture on arabic literature in d.c. “there were some government people there,“ he said, sounding both amused and a little sad. “there’s a lot of interest in arabic culture these days.”

i shot my “clever” wad in about 30 seconds by confessing to have only read one arabic novel of note, “palace walk” by egyptian nobelist naguib mahfouz. but frankly, i wasn’t even sure if dropping mahfouz qualified as “clever” since it’s about as obvious as checking twain on americana. anyhoo, i was definitely sweating a “witty” follow-up.

forutnately, robin got off on an isreali-palestinian conflict tangent and i was able to sound somewhat informed by biting a few newshour quips before we retired to yet another room for coffee and tea. i didn’t last even 5 minutes on this round and was out after a brief head-spinning chat with some guy about the population genetics of viral meningitis.

listening to my ipod on the train back to paddington, i found the cover of the platters’ doo-wop hit “the greater pretender” by lester bowie (the great pretender, ecm, 1981) an appropriate coda to the evening. the fact that earlier that day “crazy frog axel f”, a popular ringtone mashed with “beverly hills cop”’s “axel f theme” by the bass bumpers was poised to hit no. 1, possibly edging out coldplay, only added to my wonderment of the british culture, pop or otherwise. the ted currier (of boogie boys and slyfox fame) remixed, latin rascals edited “beverly hills version” (club, 1985) of the original faltermeyer track is included here to help wash the cheese out of your ears.

a few days ago, i came across an old noel coward recording of cole porter’s “let’s do it” on “noel coward at las vegas”(columbia masterworks, 1955). recorded live at wilbur clark’s desert inn, the album cover shows coward decked out in a tux, sipping tea in the middle of what appears to be the big nothing of the nevada desert. surely, i thought, here’s someone who would’ve appreciated the absurdity of my dinner with tony.

Posted by cellpharmer at May 30, 2005 08:16 PM