My China University Thesaurus Talk

by Clair Lasater

My favorite tool for writing is not the dictionary, a word processing system, Google, or a grammar text. It's the reference book of synonyms, the thesaurus.

Before I got even my first two-year sheepskin, I had sold a number of articles to magazines found on every newsstand in America. I credit educated use of the thesaurus, for these
early successes. (If I weren't a bit slow upstairs, I'd easily make it big, hack-freelancing, through use of this com-pendium.)

Universities in China often enough assign writing classes for foreign experts to teach. I've drawn a few. I always make sure to talk thesaurus use, at least one full class period.
(Approximately one hour.)

At one university in the South of China, one class session, I had observers -- the Dean of English, and some woman I suspect he picked up, in a teachers' lounge, on his way to the classroom. They weren't smiling. They were not allowing me to catch their collective eye, to say, "Hello."

I was in an okay mood, however. Even though one of the front-row students, a teacher herself -- back in university to add a year to her credentials -- was flagging me.

She kept saying aloud, "The class has begun!" She meant it. I kept answering, "The class hasn't begun." (I had a watch, that because of her, I was checking quite often.) I
would walk out onto the truly outside, open-view-of-the-campus passageway, stroll around several seconds, lean on the waist-high bulwark directly across from the door,
then stroll back through the front of the classroom, all the way to the opposite wall, then back to the lectern.

Whereupon, she would pronounce loudly again, "The class has begun!"

I would look at my watch, then take another stroll, make a fresh lean, gaze into space momentarily, outside again, then return to the front of the class. All this time, (and it was
a bit of time -- I had arrived particularly early), the dean and his observer helper were watching and hearing this queer spectacle.

Following two or three more "The class has begun!" ad-monishments, the bell rang. I felt vindicated, probably said so, then began my lecture. I did an hour on why and how to
use the thesaurus.

If the dean, and his female colleague, and the crab in the front expected calamity, they all received a jolt. Of all the talks I've given in nine years in the P. R. C., that
specific discourse probably rates first-best. I know, by faith, the two observers exited the room stupefied. I, myself, am still not over that thesaurus talk.

Later that week, I "ran into" the dean's unintroduced female friend. She had an entirely different look on her face, as she gifted me with a genuinely respectful greeting and
smile.

[The End.]

Biography: Clair Lasater has taught Spoken English as a professor at Hainan University, Ling Ling University (now the Hunan University of Science and Engineering), Maoming University, and Shunde Polytechnic.

He is published in the Guardian, and in China Daily.