A Room Called Earth by Madeleine Ryan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The Ethics of Conversation

Too girly for me to understand, at least initially. Is this young woman confident or just faking it, self-aware or self-obsessed, empowered or entitled? The first part of the book seems impenetrable without the secret code of the new young feminism. I have no doubt that such creatures exist but to me they are as incomprehensible as inter-stellar aliens.

She likes parties, and being seen, and one-night stands, and make-up, and her body, and her cat (because it stares at her), and her garden (largely because of the smells, including the plants that have the scent of sperm). But as far as I could tell, she has no taste, no criteria to distinguish between the good and less good, except her momentary whims.

She has opinions about everything - whiteness, colonialism, poverty, conformism, and competition, to name but several of her bugbears. But she has no suggestions - political, technological, or personal - for improving ‘social or environmental conditions. She seems resigned to her irrelevance: “All I have to offer Australian soil is the sound of my high heels slamming against the pavement…”

She doesn’t do drugs but takes her own vodka to parties. Apparently, for her, drugs interfere with one’s sovereign will; but alcohol of the right sort is merely a relaxant. Acutely aware of other people and their thoughts, she scores fairly high up the spectrum when it comes to casual interaction. At the party she so much wanted to join: “I’m weaving between them all and avoiding eye contact, because if I happened to lock eyes with somebody, they’d see that I had something to say, and that’d be embarrassing, because I wouldn’t say it.” Not that the self-absorbed folk in her social circle appear to notice. In the land of the blind… etc.

And then, incredibly, she starts to be something else: >I>“…it always seemed to me that if there’s an objective reality that we all share, it has to be wordless.” And she’s aware of the problematic implications of this: “Parting ways with someone or something doesn’t always make sense, so people often create reasons to be angry and resentful, because it weaves a stronger narrative around the process of letting go.” Suddenly she’s profound not silly: “I find that I have a much deeper appreciation for my fellow human beings when their mouths are shut.”

From that point onward it becomes clear that the young woman may be more thoughtful, more interesting, even more wise than the author has let on. Although I can’t agree with her radical existentialism and quasi-Zen philosophy, I recognise that her views are still advanced for her stage in life. She has something to say. She is articulate about saying it. And she knows that by saying it she’ll change nothing in the world but herself. Her every thought is ironic.

To reproach her youthful excesses would therefore be callous. Her central conclusions are sound: Most conversation is weaponised drivel. That of men is physically as well as linguistically dangerous. Women alienate themselves from each other in their conversations out of fear of men. Yet somehow human life persists.

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