Bores must be banned – The Hindu

Bored by a bore,
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Frankly, few can stand a bore, especially the egotistical type who monopolises a conversation with little consideration for others. Blissfully unaware that his listeners are virtually squirming in discomfort (even as they tactfully try to mask it), he persists with his monologue usually on a topic no one cares about. In fact, he tries one’s patience until it all but snaps.

A wit once hit the nail on the head: a bore, he quipped, spends so much time talking about himself that you can’t talk about yourself. This indeed reflects the popular grouse against the bore. He thoughtlessly corners all the time and attention — even if many in his audience aren’t listening — depriving others of a chance to get in a word edgeways. Everyone knows how annoying this can be.

Of course, nothing is more irksome than to have to listen, willy-nilly, to a bore with no means of getting away — this sometimes occurs when the bore happens to be someone above you in rank. I once found myself in this unenviable situation with my loquacious department head holding forth long (and with gusto) on his cricketing prowess as a youngster. Out of deference, I stuck it out patiently, and thereafter I was extra careful to steer clear of him during my leisure hours.

People do get carried away by a passion or fixation that sometimes makes them unbearable bores. What they don’t realise is that their obsession with a particular sport, game or topic may not be shared by others. Thus society is generously (and unavoidably) scattered with bores and the bored. And, of course, the consensus would be that the latter far outnumber the former.

A bore is essentially a strategist. The bane of a conversation, at a get-together he patiently waits on the sidelines as it were, assessing the mood of those present. Then, seizing an opening, he slowly warms to his favourite subject, deftly veering the topic under discussion round to his speciality. And once he gets started, he goes ahead full steam under the delusion that his listeners are lapping up every word!

Yet it’s odd but true: forgiving those who bore us is easy enough but not those whom we bore. It wounds one’s pride or, worse, one takes it as a personal snub or insult that needs to be avenged! Often a speaker who talks at length will ask quite unselfconsciously, “Am I boring you?” Few ever answer in the affirmative though probably more than half the audience is bored beyond endurance! Our inherent tactfulness asserts itself here.

Of all the unflattering remarks I’ve heard about bores, perhaps the most scathing came from American writer W.D. Howells who insightfully observed: “Some people can stay longer in an hour than others can in a week.” Nothing could be truer.

All in all, the bore is a decided social nuisance that one has to learn to live with. Perhaps the best cure for an intolerable bore is to closet him with another for a day. The duo will probably ‘succumb’ to mutually inflicted boredom!

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