If name tags are being distributed at a reception, lecture or other event I happen to be attending with my husband or daughter, one of us is very likely to say to the others: "Name tags at the Anarchists' Convention."
I'm sure anyone who's overheard us has been baffled. The explanation: "At the Anarchists' Convention", a short story by writer and film director John Sayles, has supplied much of our family’s love language.
I first heard the story read on the radio in 1988 by comedian Jerry Stiller. His performance was part of Selected Shorts, a series at New York's Symphony Space theater featuring actors reading short fiction that was broadcast by NPR affiliate WNYC. I loved "At the Anarchists' Convention" so much I hunted down a copy of the then out-of-print 1979 collection in which it was included -- and that wasn't easy in the days before Amazon. I also bought a recording of Stiller's performance on a Selected Shorts cassette tape.
I'm not sure whether I first gave the man who would become my husband the recording to listen to or the book to read. I'm not saying it would have been a deal-breaker if he had not embraced the story. What's important here is that he did. He once loaned the cassette and a boom box to an ailing friend, sure that listening to "At the Anarchists' Convention" would cheer her better than flowers.
We introduced our daughter to the story when she was in elementary school, before she knew anything about determinism or syndicalism, among the big words the characters in Sayles's story manage to use conversationally. I'm sure she understood the story's big ideas: that idealism is good, and a sense of humor essential; that you're never too old to have an adventure; that we should stand by and with our friends, even those who can be annoying; that love takes many forms.
Leo Gold, the hero and narrator of "At the Anarchists' Convention", introduces us to his fellow old lefties as they gather for a reunion in a New York hotel. As the story opens, Leo observes, "some woman I don't know is pinning everyone with name tags. Immediately the ashtrays are full of them, pins bent by palsied fingers. Name tags at the Anarchists' Convention."
Stiller gave that last phrase a Brooklyn-accented note of incredulity that I, my husband and daughter try to mimic. We work other phrases from the story into conversation more often than you would think possible. I sometimes call the 3,300-word story our Bible, because we quote it chapter and verse.
"It's a matter of seconds."
"We're trying to preserve it." "What, Yiddish? I don't speak." "No. Anarchism. The memories of anarchism. Now that it's served its dialectical purpose."
"If Brickman had a heart, it was a well-kept secret."
"Nobody trusts to hear it secondhand."
"Who better to be a treasurer than a man who thinks gold is filth?"
And my personal favorite: "Grapes are fine. In fact grapes were always fine -- it was the labor situation that was no good, not the fruit."
My daughter is now a teen-ager. We've upgraded the Selected Shorts tape to a CD. "The Anarchists' Convention and Other Stories" has been reissued, so now we have two copies of the text, one a lovingly worn hardback, the other a glossy-covered paperback.
As we were making Thanksgiving plans this year, my daughter half-jokingly suggested we play the CD for our guests. In lieu of a prayer, I suppose. I could almost see everyone else sitting in silence as the story unfurled, while their hosts chime in from memory. I liked the image. But Stiller's performance is a half hour, long even for those among our guests trained by Passover to incorporate storytelling into a holiday meal. My daughter conceded the length was a problem. She suggested we instead send our guests the story ahead of Thanksgiving to listen to or read before arriving.
"Then when they come," she said, "we can present them with name tags."