The Senior Common Room at St Anselm's: XXVI. The Memory

Mr Blottisham entered the Senior Common Room carrying a photograph.

Professor Quillibrace looked up.

"That expression suggests either discovery or mild confusion."

"Fortunately, in this case, they are the same thing."

"How encouraging."

"I have solved memory."

Quillibrace paused.

"That was quick."

"Yes."

"How long did humanity spend investigating it?"

"Thousands of years, presumably."

"And you?"

"About ten minutes."

"An impressive improvement."

Blottisham ignored this.

"Memory is a storage system."

Miss Elowen Stray looked up from her book.

"Is it?"

"Obviously."

"Obviously?"

"Certainly. We store photographs. We store letters. We store experiences. We store information."

Quillibrace nodded.

"You have listed several things associated with memory."

"Exactly."

"Not necessarily what memory is."

Blottisham looked surprised.

"I am not sure there is a distinction."

"There often is."

"For example?"

"A warehouse stores objects."

"Yes."

"Is a warehouse a memory?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because it merely keeps things."

"Precisely."

Blottisham looked at the photograph.

"That seems unnecessarily restrictive."

"Does it?"

"Perhaps a warehouse with better organisation."

"Ah."

"An emotional warehouse."

Quillibrace considered this.

"A phrase which manages to make both psychology and architecture uncomfortable."

Miss Stray smiled.

"Perhaps the difficulty is the word 'storage'."

"Why?"

"Because storage suggests that something remains unchanged in one place."

"Is that not what happens?"

"Does a memory?"

Blottisham looked at the photograph.

"It remains."

"Does it?"

"The photograph remains."

"Yes."

"The moment does not."

"No."

"The person looking at it has changed."

"Yes."

"The meaning of the moment may have changed."

"Exactly."

Blottisham frowned.

"So the storage system alters the contents?"

"Perhaps it was never simply storing contents."

"What was it doing?"

Miss Stray looked at the photograph.

"Maintaining a relationship."

Blottisham looked doubtful.

"With a photograph?"

"With what the photograph makes possible."

Quillibrace leaned back.

"Perhaps memory is not a cupboard."

"A bridge?"

"Possibly."

Blottisham examined the photograph.

"I do not see the crossing."

"That is because you are looking for movement."

"What else would a bridge involve?"

"Connection."

"Between places."

"Yes."

Miss Stray nodded.

"Memory connects the past and the present."

Blottisham considered this.

"But the past does not move."

"No."

"Then the bridge is unnecessary."

"Unless the purpose of a bridge is not always to move objects."

Blottisham looked at Quillibrace.

"That sounds suspiciously philosophical."

"It is unfortunate when philosophy begins making sense."

Blottisham sighed.

"The photograph is still only paper."

"Yes."

"A small rectangle of colour."

"Yes."

"The people in it may no longer look like that."

"Yes."

"The room behind them may no longer exist."

"Yes."

"And yet..."

"It does something remarkable."

"It allows the past to appear again."

"Not exactly."

"Not exactly?"

"It does not bring the past back."

"What then?"

"It allows the past to continue participating."

Blottisham was quiet.

"Participating in what?"

"The present."

A pause.

"That is inconveniently precise."

"Thank you."

"It was not a compliment."

"I accepted it anyway."

Blottisham placed the photograph on the table.

"So without memory..."

"Yes?"

"Everything would happen once."

"Go on."

"Every relationship would begin again."

"Yes."

"Every lesson would disappear after being learned."

"Yes."

"Every moment would be isolated."

"Exactly."

Miss Stray nodded.

"Memory creates continuity."

"It allows yesterday to have consequences today."

Blottisham looked around the room.

"Then memory is not only personal."

"No."

"Societies remember too."

"Exactly."

"Languages remember."

"Yes."

"Buildings remember."

"Yes."

"Libraries remember."

"Yes."

"Traditions remember."

"Yes."

Quillibrace smiled faintly.

"You appear to be collecting examples."

"I find lists comforting."

"Naturally."

Miss Stray said:

"A recipe remembers."

Blottisham looked puzzled.

"A recipe?"

"Yes."

"It remembers?"

"In a sense."

"Recipes cannot remember."

"People remember through them."

Blottisham considered this.

"So a recipe is a message."

"Yes."

"From someone before us."

"Exactly."

"And the message is?"

Miss Stray smiled.

"Someone found this worth preserving."

Blottisham nodded slowly.

"That is rather different from storage."

"Yes."

"Storage keeps something."

"And memory?"

"Decides that something should continue."

"Precisely."

Blottisham looked thoughtful.

"Then forgetting is not always failure."

"No."

"Some things should disappear."

"Yes."

"Some memories should become quieter."

"Yes."

"But losing something important..."

"Feels different."

"A forgotten name."

"A lost photograph."

"A vanished tradition."

"Because something has been disconnected."

Quillibrace nodded.

"That is the point."

Blottisham glanced at the photograph.

"Perhaps this explains why humans build memory outside themselves."

"Such as?"

"Letters."

"Yes."

"Diaries."

"Yes."

"Monuments."

"Yes."

"Libraries."

"Yes."

"Because the mind is unreliable."

"Because human beings understand that important things deserve assistance."

Blottisham looked pleased.

"External memory."

"Yes."

"Like a backup system."

Quillibrace closed his eyes briefly.

"Of course you would find a technological metaphor."

"It is accurate."

"It is incomplete."

Blottisham smiled.

"I was expecting that."

"Progress."

There was a pause.

Blottisham picked up the photograph again.

"There is one final difficulty."

"Which is?"

"Memory changes."

"Yes."

"So it is not like retrieving an object from storage."

"No."

"Every time we remember, we encounter the past from a different place."

"Exactly."

"So the event remains."

"Yes."

"But our relationship to it changes."

"Yes."

Miss Stray smiled.

"That is why memory is not a museum."

"A museum preserves."

"Memory continues."

Blottisham nodded.

"That explains gratitude."

"How?"

"To say thank you, we must remember something was given."

"Yes."

"To forgive, we must remember what happened."

"Yes."

"To love someone absent, we must remember who they are."

"Exactly."

"The invisible machine keeps those possibilities available."

"Yes."

The room became quiet.

Quillibrace looked around.

"The table gathers."

"The bridge connects."

"The letter carries conversation across distance."

"The library preserves inheritance."

"The compass creates orientation."

"The neighbour transforms proximity into responsibility."

"And memory?"

Blottisham looked at the photograph.

"I suppose it stores things."

Quillibrace raised an eyebrow.

Blottisham sighed.

"Yes, yes. I know."

"Do you?"

"Not entirely."

"Good."

He looked again at the photograph.

"Storage keeps something from disappearing."

"Yes."

"But memory allows it to continue mattering."

Miss Stray smiled.

"Exactly."

Blottisham placed the photograph carefully on the table.

"So memory does not let us return to the past."

"No."

"What does it do?"

Quillibrace looked at the photograph.

"It allows the past to continue walking with us."