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Tallis in Wonderland

Just A Little Tune I Found In My Mouth

Raymond Tallis muses on music, memory and memes.

“What’s that you’re singing, darling?” a mother sitting opposite me on the train asks her little daughter. “Just a little tune I found in my mouth,” she replies. This charming answer reminds me of how often we discover ourselves humming, thinking, recollecting, picturing things that we had not exactly chosen to hum, think, recollect or picture. Here – in the full daylight of consciousness – we seem to be the site of events that happen without our permission.

Often this automaticity is to our benefit.

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