SEVERAL TYPES OF TYPES

New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 814, 4 March 1955, Page 15

SEVERAL TYPES OF TYPES

HES an army type. He sticks his hands into his pockets as if they contained Mills bombs, and his belly looks like a landmine, short-fused to his face. E’S an air-force type. There’s no grey in the slipstream of his hair, and he strokes his moustaches as if they were butterfly wings, or some rare orchid. E’S a navy type. When he laughs it is very loud, and he talks endlessly. Oh, that windy emotion they call the Silent Service! E'S a civilian type. You can tell he’s never been in the services: he doesn't walk, he shambles. His anecdotes are pointless and his arms wave about like aimless cranes. He has no particular occupation, and no mannerisms. Therefore a dull fellow. E’S a lawyer type. Delightful, socially, with never an opinion to express. His jokes about the law have age-old precedents. He cocks his head sideways, purses his lips, and considers your idle remark as if it were a Supreme Court judgment in writing.

He's a sheep-farmer type. Shoulders as broad as tractor wheels, and large, clumsy, sensitive hands. He looks unnaturally healthy. His language to his dogs is impéccably fluent standard English, even if the words are not in the dictionary. He's a life-insurance type. You know that at once because when introduced to a roomful of people he never misses a name. And his conversational questions are always so flatteringly personal, E’S a doctor type. "Ah!" he says, and looks incredibly profound. In private he complains about his indigestion, and prophesies his weak heart will finish him off. But he won’t see a doctor. E’S a schoolmaster type. A mass of noble, vague ideals and a fund of irrelevant facts. He believes in impartial justice, with himself. as prosecutor and judge. Roman in his virtues, he draws inexhaustibly on six Latin tags. E’S a journalist type. He looks on tragedies, detached, cool, unmoved: a poor little doggie without a home makes him burst into two-column tears. .