In 1926: living at the edge of time - Monoskop

TELEPHONES 227
Although in the United States, and among European teenagers who
adore whatever they imagine is the American way of life, the telephone
may be used for fun and games, elsewhere it is primarily a professional
tool for business and for the government. [see Employees] In a short
narrative by "Pedro" (Pierre) Girard entitled "Curiosa metamorfosis de
John" ("The Curious Metamorphosis of John"), translated from French
into Spanish for the Revista de o ccidente, the telephone figures as a
metonym for closed systems [see Elevators]-systems that never establish
contact with their natural environment, though their intrinsic structure
does not exclude this possibility: "In the oak-and-leather appointed
office of John S. S., the head of the bank John S. S. and Company, one
would never guess that it was autumn outside. Not a single elm leaf lay
on the carpet. No more was known of the season than what the newspapers
said. Doubtless it would have been possible to telephone someone
out in the country, to ask if the willows had turned yellow ... , but the
frosted windows prevented him from seeing the sky" (Revista de Occidente,
1). When John arrives at his Paris office early in the morning, he
immediately picks up the telephone in order to gather information about
recent developments on the international stock market from a number
of colleagues at foreign banks. His conversations take place in a world
lacking all trace of geographic distance, except perhaps for some strange
noises in the receiver which regularly accompany long-distance calls
(Kittler, 1986, 89): '''Get me Amsterdam,' he said, and a few minutes
later he heard the sounds being made in the home of the manager of the
Netherlands Bank, in Amsterdam. Inexplicable noises, the banging of a
Dutch oven, the rattle of a coffee mill" (2). Later the same day the
cold-hearted banker falls in love, and his emotions and behavior undergo
that remarkable metamorphosis to which the title of the story alludes:
he becomes just another young man full of romantic dreams, and he
finally learns to enjoy the beauty of Paris in the fall. Only in the final
scene does John revert to his old mind-set, when he begins to think of
his beloved Juliet in purely economic terms. His return to the closed
world of business and bureaucracy is marked by a telephone call: "A
wife! He was going to have a wife! A thousand duties imposed themselves
on him: ... to get together a sum as a wedding gift for her; to
invest it in shares of Credit Lyonnais. What was the current price of
Credit Lyonnais' stock? John ran to the telephone. 'Hello! It's me-yes,
me, the manager. Fine. And you? ... What's Credit Lyonnais trading at?