Beyond Translation

The key to a successful career in any modern bureaucracy, it seems to me, is the mastery of and willingness to use a certain kind of language that is opaque and almost meaningless to an outsider. The mastery requires dedication, and the willingness a lack of scruple. It demands a certain intelligence, but not high intelligence. Mediocrities do it best because others are impatient of it.

The language is peculiar to itself and makes a speech by the late Leonid Brezhnev seem like a soliloquy by...