On Record
and are reacting like raw recruits called on to strip for medical examination. We dare not say No, but we linger as long as we can before we say Yes, and end by being half ashamed and half resentful. Man jis a shy animak naturally. Though he sometimes develops a ftont of brass, he is more likely to be blushing and inhibited outside a narrow range of experiences. Many of us start at the sound of our own names even in expected places-in school or army roll-calls, for example, or as litigants or witnesses in a court of law-and to hear them in unexpected. places takes our breath away. It is interesting at an auction sale to notice how many successful bidders resist calling out their names even when there is no business, social, or official reason for reticence. Not only do we withhold facts, but we make mysteries where none exist, and where publicity can have no serious consequences: about our addresses, for example, our occupations, and even our ages. Few men ever lost a job and few women a husband by being honest about their ages, yet many of them would sooner surrender a tooth than that secret. And records unfortunately mean nothing when we tear great gaps through them. If we don’t tell the whole truth we tell no statistical truth at all, and make it extremely difficult for anyone else to arrive at a useful approximation. Consider, for example, how successfully farmers and stock-breeders lie when they leave all the poor performers out of a registered family history. So if workers are accurate about their earnings but not accurate about their hours, or the other way round, the consequence may be a strike in which each side honestly and bitterly believes that the other is lying. It is to be hoped therefore that we have all had the courage this week to confess the whole truth about our wives, our wages, our homes, and our modern conveniences, and that we have not even concealed the peccadilloes of our hens. week we all go on record,
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19450928.2.12
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 13, Issue 327, 28 September 1945, Page 5
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351On Record New Zealand Listener, Volume 13, Issue 327, 28 September 1945, Page 5
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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