Characters:
Professor Quillibrace
Mr Blottisham
Miss Elowen Stray
Blottisham:
I’ve been thinking about our last conversation.
Quillibrace:
My condolences.
Blottisham:
Mock if you like, Professor, but something doesn’t add up. If meaning doesn’t persist, as you seem to suggest, then what exactly are we doing here?
Quillibrace:
Sitting.
Blottisham:
You know what I mean. Conversation presupposes continuity. Ideas carry over. Meanings build. Otherwise, every sentence would fall into the void.
Elowen Stray:
But sentences do fall into the void. Just not all at once.
Blottisham:
That’s poetic, Miss Stray, but it doesn’t solve the problem. Take a book. A book written centuries ago. Surely the meaning in it has persisted.
Quillibrace:
The book has persisted.
Blottisham:
You’re splitting hairs again.
Quillibrace:
Only because you keep trying to braid them.
Elowen Stray:
When I read something old, it often feels new. Or wrong. Or strangely off.
Blottisham:
Because you misunderstand it.
Elowen Stray:
Or because it’s happening now.
Blottisham:
Meaning doesn’t “happen now.” It was put there by the author.
Quillibrace:
Authors are remarkably overworked in your account.
Blottisham:
Someone has to be responsible.
Quillibrace:
There it is.
Blottisham:
There what is?
Quillibrace:
The need for a custodian.
Blottisham:
If no one keeps meaning intact, it degrades. That’s just common sense. Look at language. Words change. Meanings drift. Things get sloppy.
Elowen Stray:
Or lively.
Blottisham:
Sloppy.
Quillibrace:
You’re assuming meaning is a substance that can leak.
Blottisham:
If it isn’t, what are misunderstandings?
Quillibrace:
New events.
Blottisham:
That’s absurd. A misunderstanding is a failure to retrieve the original meaning.
Quillibrace:
Original according to whom?
Blottisham:
According to the system!
Quillibrace:
Ah. And now the system is doing the custodial work.
Blottisham:
That’s what systems are for.
Elowen Stray:
But systems don’t contain meaning either, do they?
Blottisham:
Then what good are they?
Quillibrace:
They make some meanings easier to have than others.
Blottisham:
That sounds like persistence with extra steps.
Quillibrace:
It sounds like possibility.
Blottisham:
Let me put it plainly. Yesterday I learned something. Today I still know it. Meaning persisted.
Quillibrace:
Your memory persisted.
Blottisham:
You keep saying that as if it explains everything.
Quillibrace:
It explains exactly what it explains.
Elowen Stray:
When I remember something, it doesn’t feel identical each time. Sometimes it surprises me.
Blottisham:
Then you’re remembering badly.
Quillibrace:
Or well.
Blottisham:
So now error is success?
Quillibrace:
No. Error is error. But it is still an occurrence.
Blottisham:
This is nihilism.
Quillibrace:
It’s meteorology again.
Blottisham:
You and your weather.
Quillibrace:
Yesterday it rained. Today it’s dry. You say the rain persisted in the ground. I say the conditions changed.
Blottisham:
Meaning isn’t rain.
Quillibrace:
No. Rain has better public relations.
Elowen Stray:
So when we say meaning “lasts,” what we really mean is that the conditions for it keep being rebuilt?
Quillibrace:
Yes. Sometimes carefully. Sometimes accidentally.
Blottisham:
That’s exhausting.
Quillibrace:
Only if you think it’s your job.
Blottisham:
If it isn’t, everything falls apart.
Quillibrace:
Has it?
(A pause.)
Elowen Stray:
So meaning doesn’t persist—but the world keeps offering chances for it to happen again?
Quillibrace:
With tireless generosity.
Blottisham:
And no guarantees.
Quillibrace:
At last.
Blottisham:
I don’t like a world with no guarantees.
Quillibrace:
Meaning seems quite fond of it.
End of Dialogue II
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