An elderly Massachusetts resident has broken the world record for continuous speaking, according to officials at the Guinness Book of World Records.
Avram Chomsky, 86, affectionately called “Noam” by his friends, is known by residents of the quiet town of Lexington as the “Real-Life Rain Man” due to his formidable memory and tendency to launch into long monologues. It wasn’t until recently, however, that they realized just how accomplished at talking Chomsky really was.
In June of last year, Guinness officials were informed of Chomsky’s ability, and a team of judges was sent from Dublin to record the octogenarian at work. More than half a year and dozens of terabytes of video footage later, the judges announced that they had sufficient proof that Chomsky had rambled non-stop for a total of seven months, six days, four hours and 53 minutes — easily beating the previous record of 57 hours and 16 minutes set in 1997 by Boston-area meth addict Becky Flaherty.
“We’re absolutely delighted with Mr. Chomsky, and we hope that he will inspire a whole new generation of monologists,” said Guinness judge Michael Gibbons, who lived with Chomsky for several months during the execution of the feat. “In all my time recording people speaking, I’d never seen someone who could so seamlessly move from one topic to the next, from the disappearance of black rhinos, to the increase of tooth decay in Cambodian village children, to the rate of suicide among aboriginal populations in Australia — and in every instance link these atrocities to U.S. foreign policy.”
“He’s amazing, a true natural wonder who should be cherished by the whole world,” Gibbons added. “And he drives people around him absolutely bonkers.”
Chomsky’s longtime friends say that they are not surprised by his accomplishment.
“I don’t think Noam has really stopped talking since college,” said Bernard Ackerman, a former classmate who says Chomsky was often told by instructors to sit alone in the corner and talk to the wall so as not to disrupt lectures. “That was 68 years ago.”
Attempts by the Dandy Goat to secure an interview with Chomsky were unsuccessful after our reporter found that he was unable to interrupt the professor’s days-long monologue detailing the CIA’s responsibility for Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro’s recent bout with crippling hemorrhoids.