Class conscious - Andrew Martin prefers middle-class noise
Published 14 June 2004
Tell me the noise you make and I'll tell you where you stand in society
I wrote an article about my dislike of, and neurosis about, noise - and received a bulging postbag. The precise meaning of "bulging postbag", incidentally, is a trade secret of journalism, but suffice to say that among the responses was an invitation to talk on the subject over the phone to a local radio station. I am always reluctant to do this without being paid, so I said that I was very busy. However, the researcher who called me was persistent, so I said: "OK, I'll speak on your programme, but only for five minutes." I was then introduced on the show as "Andrew Martin . . . He's a very busy man, and we only have him for five minutes." Reiteration of the fact that I was a very busy writer who could spare only five minutes took up about half of the five minutes that were supposed to be devoted to talking about noise nuisance, and when the interview was finished the DJ said: "OK, many thanks, Andrew. We won't keep you another minute from your work."
The result was that I spent the next half-hour staring out of the window and wondering whether I should have imposed the five-minute limit. Did it make me look pompous? And ought I to be complaining in public about noise nuisance anyway?
The leader of anti-noise campaigning in this country is a pleasant, down-to-earth woman called Val Weedon, who was originally galvanised into action by living in Thamesmead, south-east London, next to a woman who repeatedly played the Lisa Stansfield record "All Around the World". But to have a grievance against noise has usually been fairly snobbish.
Val Weedon sent me a photocopied chapter from a book called The Auditory Culture Reader edited by Michael Bull and Les Back, and from this I learned that a typical early complainant was Arthur Schopenhauer, who was fixated on the sound of cracking whips. In 1851, he wrote: "No one with anything like an idea in his head can avoid a feeling of actual pain at the sudden, sharp crack, which paralyses the brain, rends the thread of reflection, and murders thought." A decade later, Charles Babbage was campaigning against London street music, which he regarded as the tyranny of the lowest mob upon "intellectual workers".
One of the earliest anti-noise campaigns was founded in Germany in the 1930s, and its slogan - "Tranquillity is distinguished" - was apparently a hindrance in its attempts to gain support from trade unions. But tranquillity is distinguished . . .
If train conductors announced, at the start of journeys, "Carriage E has been designated a Middle-Class Carriage. Will any persons who are not middle class kindly refrain from using it?" and if that carriage were advertised with a depiction of a crop-haired man holding a can of lager, with a red line running through the image, there would be uproar. But this is what the quiet carriages are. Look at the occupants: they eat home-made sandwiches, read the broadsheets, keep their feet off the seats.
I must face up to the fact that when I object to hearing someone having a conversation on a mobile phone, it is always as much the downmarket tone of the conversation I object to as the actual noise. In fact, the last time I moved seats on a train was when I found myself sitting next to a television researcher who was using her mobile phone to interview people who'd been lined up to appear on a programme called something like It'll Be All Right With Wrighty, starring Ian Wright.
Occasionally - about once in every 18 months - you'll hear a mobile phone conversation that's inspiring or interesting, and then you don't mind. Similarly, there's a man down the road from me who often leaves his windows open while playing Debussy or Ravel. I have never objected, because I don't regard this as noise, which is, after all, nothing but unwanted sound.
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