Pad Tannhauser

Pad Tannhauser
or, why Wagner killed nihilism in food...
by Richard Bryant

Some might argue that no true art existed before Wagner. Like wandering shepherds in search of Jackson Pollack’s pasture of splattered dreams among the hillsides of Napoleon’s crumbling Europe; composers tried to re-tell the tales of love and death of pre-revolutionary Europe. The resulting unfinished nothingness, lingered in the broken syllables of hobbled oboes in the salons of Vienna and Berlin. While for measure after measure violas asked interminable questions of longing, love, and loss; never waiting for answers to be given. The sacrifice paid by so many and now shared by so few; what was it for? The evil wrought by the French hordes, for what manipulative purpose did it serve? Would Franz Schubert force sacrifice to dance with evil in the pursuit of unrequited love? No. Who then?

In the endless melody of time, I have found few restaurants whose cuisine moves me to tears. By this I mean the food’s taste, texture, and dining experience is such that I am emotionally moved from where I am to a place better than I could have planned to be. As there are certain melodies in which I believe, melodies which confirm existential realities beyond space and time, there are certain dishes at certain restaurants which do the same.

Notes, like those which open Richard Wagner’s opera Tannhauser, do not wander across my brain. Far from the distant and drunken ramblings of Schubert’s sonatas, Wagner’s notes form a simple progression of melodic ideas. Once heard, it is impossible to un-hear them and remove them from the seat they have found in your psyche. The notes are indisputable in their origin. They will tell you a story and take you to a definitive place and time. Your only choice is to go along for the ride.

I pick up the phone. Seven numbers, as familiar as those seven opening notes, separate me from hearing these words, “Thai Moon.” Once that connection is made, it is impossible to put down the phone. I am unable to remove myself from the world I have entered. Speak and I will be answered, hope and it will be fulfilled. The orchestra is waiting for the baton to drop. Joy, tears, and peace are only three words away, “pad Thai chicken.” It seems to do no justice to the dish I’m about to eat to describe the flavors as harmonious. Does one describe lime and garlic as the 3rd and 5th chords of redemption and salvation? Does the irreducible experience of human compassion find itself in noodle after noodle? Am I now, as the great French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan would argue, in a place of genuine otherness moved to see what I have never seen and hear what I’ve never heard? Yes. Is my world more authentic and a better place because I’ve eaten this meal? Yes.

Richard Bryant is the pastor at the Ocracoke United Methodist Church. This piece was originally posted on his blog

 

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