The Washington Spectator
Nathan, George Jean
Every now and then, during the Save Chile rally in Dupont Circle last month, one of the soft, pretty fellows who were anchoring the event would bring things to a froth and bellow into the...
...Here everybody can vote for who they want...
...This sort of "fim" appalls me: The guest list was littered with names Hke Dominique and Aniko, skinny women sashaying in slinky dresses, dripping South African diamonds amid a sea of shallow, tuxedoclad power boys nodding off to one another's banal chatter, stuffing their overfed faces with TUrbot a Sorrel Beurre Blanc and sloshing down magnums of Moet & Chandon—a herd of wild horses couldn't have dragged me to such an event...
...But the day was getting late...
...Let me explain," she said, then thought for a moment...
...I did do it with his tennis partner, for God's sake...
...I quickly shifted my attention to a table of gossiping college girls on my left...
...Moore himself, were precisely right: Washington Harbour is stupendously ugly, the kind of mess that only a Hegelian could contrive...
...This was a crowd that knew what it wanted...
...Reading his piece you could only feel sympathetic, and I began to think that up close his building couldn't be as bad as he was implying...
...Thkes the dative case...
...GJN...
...Whom they want," I said...
...And it knew how to get it, too...
...There has been some hubbub in Washington lately about Washington Harbour (that 'u' is always a bad sign), a new "multi-use city'^—in truth, a large building with condominiums, offices, a restaurant, and a taxi stand—recently constructed alongside a bend in the Potomac, at the edge of Georgetown...
...Now I grant that these are the words of a desperate man...
...So one evening I walked down to Wash\ T - ' 1 / ^^ml -x*^Sf>^ 1 7 ^ v i 4 ^ ^Viy^ ington Harbour and discovered to my horror that his critics, and by implication Mr...
...If the Harbour is a sort of architectural Elephant Man, the Potomac is his flouncy sister, a Vegas showgirl flashing lots of thigh...
...He won't pay any attention to me," she said thickly...
...Sing peace on earth and see and sigh," Pete was singing...
...Ariel Dorfman, prof at Duke and (as night follows day) fellow at IPS, took the stage and interjected a pragmatic note...
...One More Time Now, Everybody]" The poor old scarecrow was on his third chorus and leaping and waving with all his energy toward the crowd, slowly dispersing...
...There's something vertiginous to Mr...
...That was his namel" one girl said...
...No," her friend said...
...You see," she said finally, "in Chile, people are not allowed to vote...
...Moore's brainchild, with its countless chimneys and asymmetrical curves and bobbing turrets, and after a close examination I thought maybe I'd have a drink in the Potomac restaurant...
...I ordered a drink...
...Maybe time has passed Pete by...
...But the more he flapped his arms the farther the faithful fanned out from the Circle...
...Democracy Now...
...Prepositional object...
...Moore wrote that his "design attempts a sort of Hegelian synthesis out of antagonistic movements in architecture...
...Dorfman whipped out a paper from the overstuffed pocket of his short-sleeved shirt and read a poem, a vers libre effort—apparently Dr...
...The house Uquor is almost undrinkable, and the air conditioning is set on arctic freeze...
...The inaugural party sounded like the sort of dreadful affair that I would want to avoid at all costs—^'Washington's flashiest party in many a year put Hollywood on the Potomac with some of New York City tossed in," as the Washington Times put it...
...His name was Tom, but he wouldn't tell us what it was, so we just called him Rumpelstiltskin...
...For whom they want...
...Behind me, a sozzled woman was complaining to a friend...
...its vast carpet contains forty-nine colors weaved into an elaborate floral pattern...
...If they say a tree is a tree," he recited slowly, "don't believe them...
...Maybe the key's too low, I'll make it higher . . . Okay...
...Working from the premise that Washington was a "half-city, all Apollonian and no Dionysian," Mr...
...If they say a rock is a rock, don't believe them . . . " I knew there were more where those came from, so I struck up a conversation with a small lady who had shoved a petition at me "If they say a petition is a . . . " I started to warn, but she interrupted me...
...I first took note of the thing when the Potomac, its two-tiered, 1,000-seat restaurant, held a grand opening last month...
...As evidence...
...system: "What do we want in Chile...
...Come on everybody...
...With one failed verse behind him, he started up again, as the people wandered off...
...After Dr...
...His creaky voice bounced lightly from the buildings on the Circle, but down the street you could barely hear it...
...Arthur Cotton Moore, the Washington architect who designed the Harbour, took to the pages of the Post% Outlook section one Sunday to defend his creation...
...Dorfman had unloaded a couple more poems, Pete Seeger, billed as the star of the rally, took the stage and strapped on his banjo...
...But the inauguration achieved its goal and, commercially at least, the Harbour itself looks to be a success...
...the faithful would boom back...
...We are better than the others because we have better words and better souls...
...I figured I'd better go, too...
...which were surely the words that leapt to Mr...
...On my right was' a table of earnest young men discussing the tax bill over a round of Bud Lights...
...The waitresses—each one a beauty— are chipper in that tip-hungry, unbecoming manner of girls working their way through school...
...Dorfman's preferred form—called "Don't Believe Them...
...After that, maybe listening to Pete seemed supererogatory...
...From across the river Washington Harbour looks like a crumbling sandcastle, and the hubbub has arisen from the usual circumstance: The architect and his financifil backers think it is wonderful and the people who have looked at it think it's a monstrosity...
...Moore's mind when he first saw his completed building...
...It is not like here...
...twenty-four chandeliers of purple and green glass sway from its ceiling...
...I don't know...
...Also, I wasn't invited...
...there's a wait for tables at the Potomac every night, and the trade in condos and office space is brisk, even as the complaints about the Harbour's design grow almost as frenided and loud as the building itself...
...But they read far better than "My God, what have I done...
...She edged away from me...
...What can I do to get his attention...
...Like verbs, curvilinear dynamic elements impart a sense of movement from subject to object, both of which are modified by 'adjective' supportive elements...
...Every now and then, during the Save Chile rally in Dupont Circle last month, one of the soft, pretty fellows who were anchoring the event would bring things to a froth and bellow into the overworked pa...
...Maybe the Chile thing isn't his thing...
...Let's try it again," he exclaimed, joyously...
...My God, I can't believe anybody'd have such a stupid name...
...How about the tenors for this one . . . let's go, the high ones—make it so they can hear you at the White House...
...Cheerful as ever, he began reciting the words of what he called "one of his favorites," so we could all sing along...
...I loudly called for my check...
...Moore may not know what he's done, but he picked the right city to do it in...
...Do it with his tennis partner...
...We will triumph," he said, as his glasses slid down his nose, "because we are better than the others...
...Eight hundred thousand "glass jewels" speckle the ceiling...
...I took my drink out to the patio and settled in at a table close to the river, where passing motorboats released periodic bursts of diesel fumes into my Scotch...
...a toy train circumnavigates the room on a track built of brass...
...The would-be liberators of Chile had announced what they wanted (Democracy) and detailed when they wanted it (Now) and explained why they were entitled to it (the part about the souls...
Vol. 19 • November 1986 • No. 11
