Home Random Page


CATEGORIES:

BiologyChemistryConstructionCultureEcologyEconomyElectronicsFinanceGeographyHistoryInformaticsLawMathematicsMechanicsMedicineOtherPedagogyPhilosophyPhysicsPolicyPsychologySociologySportTourism






Getting Even

 

 

The Metterling Lists

 

 

Venal amp; Sons has at last published the long-awaited first volume of Metterling’s laundry lists (The Collected Laundry Lists of Hans Metterling, Vol. I, 437 pp., plus XXXII-page introduction; indexed; $18.75), with an erudite commentary by the noted Metterling scholar Gunther Eisenbud. The decision to publish this work separately, before the completion of the immense four-volume aeuvre, is both welcome and intelligent, for this obdurate and sparkling book will instantly lay to rest the unpleasant rumors that Venal amp; Sons, having reaped rich rewards from the Metterling novels, play, and notebooks, diaries, and letters, was merely in search of continued profits from the same lode. How wrong the whisperers have been! Indeed, the very first Metterling laundry list

 

 

List No. 1

6 prs. shorts

4 undershirts

6 prs. blue socks

4 blue shirts

2 white shirts

6 handkerchiefs

No Starch

 

 

serves as a perfect, near-total introduction to this troubled genius, known to his contemporaries as the “Prague Weirdo.” The list was dashed off while Metterling was writing Confessions of a Monstrous Cheese, that work of stunning philosophical import in which he proved not only that Kant was wrong about the universe but that he never picked up a check. Metterling’s dislike of starch is typical of the period, and when this particular bundle came back too stiff Metterling became moody and depressed. His landlady, Frau Weiser, reported to friends that “Herr Metterling keeps to his room for days, weeping over the fact that they have starched his shorts.” Of course, Breuer has already pointed out the relation between stiff underwear and Metterling’s constant feeling that he was being whispered about by men with jowls (Metterling: Paranoid-Depressive Psychosis and the Early Lists, Zeiss Press). This theme of a failure to follow instructions appears in Metterling’s only play, Asthma, when Needleman brings the cursed tennis ball to Valhalla by mistake.

The obvious enigma of the second list

 

 

List No. 2

7 prs. shorts

5 undershirts

7 prs. black socks

6 blue shirts

6 handkerchiefs

No Starch

 

 

is the seven pairs of black socks, since it has been long known that Metterling was deeply fond of blue. Indeed, for years the mention of any other color would send him into a rage, and he once pushed Rilke down into some honey because the poet said he preferred brown-eyed women. According to Anna Freud (“Metterling’s Socks as an Expression of the Phallic Mother,” Journal of Psychoanalysis, Nov., 1935), his sudden shift to the more sombre legwear is related to his unhappiness over the “Bayreuth Incident.” It was there, during the first act of Tristan, that he sneezed, blowing the toupee off one of the opera’s wealthiest patrons. The audience became convulsed, but Wagner defended him with his now classic remark “Everybody sneezes.” At this, Cosima Wagner burst into tears and accused Metterling of sabotaging her husband’s work.



That Metterling had designs on Cosima Wagner is undoubtedly true, and we know he took her hand once in Leipzig and again, four years later, in the Ruhr Valley. In Danzig, he referred to her tibia obliquely during a rainstorm, and she thought it best not to see him again. Returning to his home in a state of exhaustion, Metterling wrote Thoughts of a Chicken, and dedicated the original manuscript to the Wagners. When they used it to prop up the short leg of a kitchen table, Metterling became sullen and switched to dark socks. His housekeeper pleaded with him to retain his beloved blue or at least to try brown, but Metterling cursed her, saying, “Slut! And why not Argyles, eh?”

In the third list

 

 

List No. 3

6 handkerchiefs

5 undershirts

8 prs. socks

3 bedsheets

2 pillowcases

 

 

linens are mentioned for the first time: Metterling had a great fondness for linens, particularly pillowcases, which he and his sister, as children, used to put over their heads while playing ghosts, until one day he fell into a rock quarry. Metterling liked to sleep on fresh linen, and so do his fictional creations. Horst Wasserman, the impotent locksmith in Filet of Herring, kills for a change of sheets, and Jenny, in The Shepherd’s Finger, is willing to go to bed with Klineman (whom she hates for rubbing butter on her mother) “if it means lying between soft sheets.” It is a tragedy that the laundry never did the linens to Metterling’s satisfaction, but to contend, as Pfaltz has done, that his consternation over it prevented him from finishing Whither Thou Goest, Cretin is absurd. Metterling enjoyed the luxury of sending his sheets out, but he was not dependent on it.

What prevented Metterling from finishing his long-planned book of poetry was an abortive romance, which figures in the “Famous Fourth” list:

 

 

List No. 4

7 prs. shorts

6 handkerchiefs

6 undershirts

7 prs. black socks

No Starch

Special One-Day Service

 

 

In 1884, Metterling met Lou Andreas-Salome, and suddenly, we learn, he required that his laundry be done fresh daily. Actually, the two were introduced by Nietzsche, who told Lou that Metterling was either a genius or an idiot and to see if she could guess which. At that time, the special one-day service was becoming quite popular on the Continent, particularly with intellectuals, and the innovation was welcomed by Metterling. For one thing, it was prompt, and Metterling loved promptness. He was always showing up for appointments early-sometimes several days early, so that he would have to be put up in a guest room. Lou also loved fresh shipments of laundry every day. She was like a little child in her joy, often taking Metterling for walks in the woods and there unwrapping the latest bundle. She loved his undershirts and handkerchiefs, but most of all she worshipped his shorts. She wrote Nietzsche that Metterling’s shorts were the most sublime thing she had ever encountered, including Thus Spake Zarathustra. Nietzsche acted like a gentleman about it, but he was always jealous of Metterling’s underwear and told close friends he found it “Hegelian in the extreme.” Lou Salome and Metterling parted company after the Great Treacle Famine of 1886, and while Metterling forgave Lou, she always said of him that “his mind had hospital corners.”

The fifth list

 

 

List No. 5

6 undershirts

6 shorts

6 handkerchiefs

 

 

has always puzzled scholars, principally because of the total absence of socks. (Indeed, Thomas Mann, writing years later, became so engrossed with the problem he wrote an entire play about it, The Hosiery of Moses, which he accidentally dropped down a grating.) Why did this literary giant suddenly strike socks from his weekly list? Not, as some scholars say, as a sign of his oncoming madness, although Metterling had by now adopted certain odd behavior traits. For one thing, he believed that he was either being followed or was following somebody. He told close friends of a government plot to steal his chin, and once, on holiday in Jena, he could not say anything but the word “eggplant” for four straight days. Still, these seizures were sporadic and do not account for the missing socks. Nor does his emulation of Kafka, who for a brief period of his life stopped wearing socks, out of guilt. But Eisenbud assures us that Metterling continued to wear socks. He merely stopped sending them to the laundry! And why? Because at this time in his life he acquired a new housekeeper, Frau Milner, who consented to do his socks by hand-a gesture that so moved Metterling that he left the woman his entire fortune, which consisted of a black hat and some tobacco. She also appears as Hilda in his comic allegory, Mother Brandt’s Ichor.

Obviously, Metterling’s personality had begun to fragment by 1894, if we can deduce anything from the sixth list:

 

 

List No. 6

25 handkerchiefs

1 undershirt

5 shorts

1 sock

 

 

and it is not surprising to learn that it was at this time he entered analysis with Freud. He had met Freud years before in Vienna, when they both attended a production of Oedipus, from which Freud had to be carried out in a cold sweat. Their sessions were stormy, if we are to believe Freud’s notes, and Metterling was hostile. He once threatened to starch Freud’s beard and often said he reminded him of his laundryman. Gradually, Metterling’s unusual relationship with his father came out. (Students of Metterling are already familiar with his father, a petty official who would frequently ridicule Metterling by comparing him to a wurst.) Freud writes of a key dream Metterling described to him:

 

 

I am at a dinner party with some friends when suddenly a man walks in with a bowl of soup on a leash. He accuses my underwear of treason, and when a lady defends me her forehead falls off. I find this amusing in the dream, and laugh. Soon everyone is laughing except my laundryman, who seems stern and sits there putting porridge in his ears. My father enters, grabs the lady’s forehead, and runs away with it. He races to a public square, yelling, “At last! At last! A forehead of my own! Now I won’t have to rely on that stupid son of mine.” This depresses me in the dream, and I am seized with an urge to kiss the Burgomaster’s laundry. (Here the patient weeps and forgets the remainder of the dream.)

 

 

With insights gained from this dream, Freud was able to help Metterling, and the two became quite friendly outside of analysis, although Freud would never let Metterling get behind him.

In Volume II, it has been announced, Eisenbud will take up Lists 7-25, including the years of Metterling’s “private laundress” and the pathetic misunderstanding with the Chinese on the corner.

 

 

A Look at Organized Crime

 

 

It is no secret that organized crime in America takes in over forty billion dollars a year. This is quite a profitable sum, especially when one considers that the Mafia spends very little for office supplies. Reliable sources indicate that the Cosa Nostra laid out no more than six thousand dollars last year for personalized stationery, and even less for staples. Furthermore, they have one secretary who does all the typing, and only three small rooms for headquarters, which they share with the Fred Persky Dance Studio.

Last year, organized crime was directly responsible for more than one hundred murders, and mafiosi participated indirectly in several hundred more, either by lending the killers carfare or by holding their coats. Other illicit activities engaged in by Cosa Nostra members included gambling, narcotics, prostitution, hijacking, loansharking, and the transportation of a large whitefish across the state line for immoral purposes. The tentacles of this corrupt empire even reach into the government itself.

Only a few months ago, two gang lords under federal indictment spent the night at the White House, and the President slept on the sofa.

 

 

History of Organized Crime in the United States

 

 

In 1921, Thomas (The Butcher) Covello and Ciro (The Tailor) Santucci attempted to organize disparate ethnic groups of the underworld and thus take over Chicago. This was foiled when Albert (The Logical Positivist) Corillo assassinated Kid Lipsky by locking him in a closet and sucking all the air out through a straw. Lipsky’s brother Mendy (alias Mendy Lewis, alias Mendy Larsen, alias Mendy Alias) avenged Lipsky’s murder by abducting Santucci’s brother Gaetano (also known as Little Tony, or Rabbi Henry Sharpstein) and returning him several weeks later in twenty-seven separate mason jars. This signalled the beginning of a bloodbath.

Dominick (The Herpetologist) Mione shot Lucky Lorenzo (so nicknamed when a bomb that went off in his hat failed to kill him) outside a bar in Chicago. In return, Corillo and his men traced Mione to Newark and made his head into a wind instrument. At this point, the Vitale gang, run by Giuseppe Vitale (real name Quincy Baedeker), made their move to take over all bootlegging in Harlem from Irish Larry Doyle-a racketeer so suspicious that he refused to let anybody in New York ever get behind him, and walked down the street constantly pirouetting and spinning around. Doyle was killed when the Squillante Construction Company decided to erect their new offices on the bridge of his nose. Doyle’s lieutenant, Little Petey (Big Petey) Ross, now took command; he resisted the Vitale takeover and lured Vitale to an empty midtown garage on the pretext that a costume party was being held there. Unsuspecting, Vitale walked into the garage dressed as a giant mouse, and was instantly riddled with machine-gun bullets. Out of loyalty to their slain chief, Vitale’s men immediately defected to Ross. So did Vitale’s fiancee, Bea Moretti, a showgirl and star of the hit Broadway musical Say Kaddish, who wound up marrying Ross, although she later sued him for divorce, charging that he once spread an unpleasant ointment on her.

Fearing federal intervention, Vincent Columbraro, the Buttered Toast King, called for a truce. (Columbraro has such tight control over all buttered toast moving in and out of New Jersey that one word from him could ruin breakfast for two-thirds of the nation.) All members of the underworld were summoned to a diner in Perth Amboy, where Columbraro told them that internal warfare must stop and that from then on they had to dress decently and stop slinking around. Letters formerly signed with a black hand would in the future be signed “Best Wishes,” and all territory would be divided equally, with New Jersey going to Columbraro’s mother. Thus the Mafia, or Cosa Nostra (literally, “my toothpaste” or “our toothpaste”), was born. Two days later, Columbraro got into a nice hot tub to take a bath and has been missing for the past forty-six years.

 

 

Mob Structure

 

 

The Cosa Nostra is structured like any government or large corporation-or group of gangsters, for that matter. At the top is the capo di tutti capi, or boss of all bosses. Meetings are held at his house, and he is responsible for supplying cold cuts and ice cubes. Failure to do so means instant death. (Death, incidentally, is one of the worst things that can happen to a Cosa Nostra member, and many prefer simply to pay a fine.) Under the boss of bosses are his lieutenants, each of whom runs one section of town with his “family.” Mafia families do not consist of a wife and children who always go to places like the circus or on picnics. They are actually groups of rather serious men, whose main joy in life comes from seeing how long certain people can stay under the East River before they start gurgling.

Initiation into the Mafia is quite complicated. A proposed member is blindfolded and led into a dark room. Pieces of Cranshaw melon are placed in his pockets, and he is required to hop around on one foot and cry out, “Toodles! Toodles!” Next, his lower lip is pulled out and snapped back by all the members of the board, or commissione; some may even wish to do it twice. Following this, some oats are put on his head. If he complains, he is disqualified. If, however, he says “Good, I like oats on my head,” he is welcomed into the brotherhood. This is done by kissing him on the cheek and shaking his hand. From that moment on, he is not permitted to eat chutney, to amuse his friends by imitating a hen, or to kill anybody named Vito.

 

 

Conclusions

 

 

Organized crime is a blight on our nation. While many young Americans are lured into a career of crime by its promise of an easy life, most criminals actually must work long hours, frequently in buildings without air-conditioning. Identifying criminals is up to each of us. Usually they can be recognized by their large cufflinks and their failure to stop eating when the man sitting next to them is hit by a falling anvil. The best methods of combatting organized crime are:

1. Telling the criminals you are not at home.

2. Calling the police whenever an unusual number of men from the Sicilian Laundry Company begin singing in your foyer.

3. Wiretapping.

Wiretapping cannot be employed indiscriminately, but its effectiveness is illustrated by this transcript of a conversation between two gang bosses in the New York area whose phones had been tapped by the F.B.I.

 

 

Anthony: Hello? Rico?

Rico: Hello?

Anthony: Rico?

Rico: Hello.

Anthony: Rico?

Rico: I can’t hear you.

Anthony: Is that you, Rico? I can’t hear you.

Rico: What?

Anthony: Can you hear me?

Rico: Hello?

Anthony: Rico?

Rico: We have a bad connection.

Anthony: Can you hear me?

Rico: Hello?

Anthony: Rico?

Rico: Hello?

Anthony: Operator, we have a bad connection.

Operator: Hang up and dial again, sir.

Rico: Hello?

 

 

Because of this evidence, Anthony (The Fish) Rotunno and Rico Panzini were convicted and are currently serving fifteen years in Sing Sing for illegal possession of Bensonhurst.

 

 

The Schmeed Memoirs

 

 

The seemingly inexhaustible spate of literature on the Third Reich continues unabated with the soon to be published Memoirs of Friedrich Schmeed. Schmeed, the best-known barber in wartime Germany, provided tonsorial services for Hitler and many highly placed government and military officials. As was noted during the Nuremberg Trials, Schmeed not only seemed to be always at the right place at the right time but possessed “more than total recall,” and was thus uniquely qualified to write this incisive guide to innermost Nazi Germany. Following are a few brief excerpts:

 

 

In the spring of 1940, a large Mercedes pulled up in front of my barbershop at 127 Koenigstrasse, and Hitler walked in. “I just want a light trim,” he said, “and don’t take too much off the top.” I explained to him there would be a brief wait because von Ribbentrop was ahead of him. Hitler said he was in a rush and asked Ribbentrop if he could be taken next, but Ribbentrop insisted it would look bad for the Foreign Office if he were passed over. Hitler thereupon made a quick phone call, and Ribbentrop was immediately transferred to the Afrika Korps, and Hitler got his haircut. This sort of rivalry went on all the time. Once, Goring had Heydrich detained by the police on false pretenses, so that he could get the chair by the window. Goring was a dissolute and often wanted to sit on the hobbyhorse to get his haircuts. The Nazi high command was embarrassed by this but could do nothing. One day, Hess challenged him. “I want the hobbyhorse today, Herr Field Marshal,” he said.

“Impossible. I have it reserved,” Goring shot back.

“I have orders directly from the Fuhrer. They state that I am to be allowed to sit on the horse for my haircut.” And Hess produced a letter from Hitler to that effect. Goring was livid. He never forgave Hess, and said that in the future he would have his wife cut his hair at home with a bowl. Hitler laughed when he heard this, but Goring was serious and would have carried it out had not the Minister of Arms turned down his requisition for a thinning shears.

I have been asked if I was aware of the moral implications of what I was doing. As I told the tribunal at Nuremberg, I did not know that Hitler was a Nazi. The truth was that for years I thought he worked for the phone company. When I finally did find out what a monster he was, it was too late to do anything, as I had made a down payment on some furniture. Once, toward the end of the war, I did contemplate loosening the Fuhrer’s neck-napkin and allowing some tiny hairs to get down his back, but at the last minute my nerve failed me.

At Berchtesgaden one day, Hitler turned to me and said, “How would I look in sideburns?” Speer laughed, and Hitler became affronted. “I’m quite serious, Herr Speer,” he said. “I think I might look good in sideburns.” Goring, that obsequious clown, concurred instantly, saying, “The Fuhrer in sideburns-what an excellent idea!” Speer still disagreed. He was, in fact, the only one with enough integrity to tell the Fuhrer when he needed a haircut. “Too flashy,” Speer said now. “Sideburns are the kind of thing I’d associate with Churchill.” Hitler became incensed. Was Churchill contemplating sideburns, he wanted to know, and if so, how many and when? Himmler, supposedly in charge of Intelligence, was summoned immediately. Goring was annoyed by Speer’s attitude and whispered to him, “Why are you making waves, eh? If he wants sideburns, let him have sideburns.” Speer, usually tactful to a fault, called Goring a hypocrite and “an order of bean curd in a German uniform.” Goring swore he would get even, and it was rumored later that he had special S.S. guards french Speer’s bed.

Himmler arrived in a frenzy. He had been in the midst of a tap-dancing lesson when the phone rang, summoning him to Berchtesgaden. He was afraid it was about a misplaced carload of several thousand cone-shaped party hats that had been promised Rommel for his winter offensive. (Himmler was not accustomed to being invited to dinner at Berchtesgaden, because his eyesight was poor and Hitler could not bear to watch him bring the fork up to his face and then stick the food somewhere on his cheek.) Himmler knew something was wrong, because Hitler was calling him “Shorty,” which he only did when annoyed. Suddenly the Fuhrer turned on him, shouting, “Is Churchill going to grow sideburns?”

Himmler turned red.

“Well?”

Himmler said there had been word that Churchill contemplated sideburns but it was all unofficial. As to size and number, he explained, there would probably be two, of a medium length, but no one wanted to say before they could be sure. Hitler screamed and banged his fist on the table. (This was a triumph for Goring over Speer.) Hitler pulled out a map and showed us how he meant to cut off England’s supply of hot towels. By blockading the Dardanelles, Doenitz could keep the towels from being brought ashore and laid across anxiously awaiting British faces. But the basic question remained: Could Hitler beat Churchill to sideburns? Himmler said Churchill had a head start and that it might be impossible to catch him. Goring, that vacuous optimist, said the Fuhrer could probably grow sideburns quicker, particularly if we marshalled all of Germany’s might in a concentrated effort. Von Rundstedt, at a meeting of the General Staff, said it was a mistake to try to grow sideburns on two fronts at once and advised that it would be wiser to concentrate all efforts on one good sideburn. Hitler said he could do it on both cheeks simultaneously. Rommel agreed with von Rundstedt. “They will never come out even, mein Fuhrer,” he said. “Not if you rush them.” Hitler became enraged and said that it was a matter for him and his barber. Speer promised he could triple our output of shaving cream by the fall, and Hitler was euphoric. Then, in the winter of 1942, the Russians launched a counter-offensive and the sideburns came to a halt. Hitler grew despondent, fearing that soon Churchill would look wonderful while he still remained “ordinary,” but shortly thereafter we received news that Churchill had abandoned the idea of sideburns as too costly. Once again the Fuhrer had been proved right.

 

 

After the Allied invasion, Hitler developed dry, unruly hair. This was due in part to the Allies’ success and in part to the advice of Goebbels, who told him to wash it every day. When General Guderian heard this, he immediately returned home from the Russian front and told the Fuhrer he must shampoo his hair no more than three times weekly. This was the procedure followed with great success by the General Staff in two previous wars. Hitler once again overruled his generals and continued washing daily. Bormann helped Hitler with the rinsing and always seemed to be there with a comb. Eventually, Hitler became dependent on Bormann, and before he looked in a mirror he would always have Bormann look in it first. As the Allied armies pushed east, Hitler’s hair grew worse. Dry and unkempt, he often raged for hours about how he would get a nice haircut and a shave when Germany won the war, and maybe even a shine. I realize now he never had any intention of doing those things.

One day, Hess took the Fuhrer’s bottle of Vitalis and set out in a plane for England. The German high command was furious. They felt Hess planned to give it to the Allies in return for amnesty for himself. Hitler was particularly enraged when he heard the news, as he had just stepped out of the shower and was about to do his hair. (Hess later explained at Nuremberg that his plan was to give Churchill a scalp treatment inan effort to end the war. He had got as far as bending Churchill over a basin when he was apprehended.)

Late in 1944, Goring grew a mustache, causing talk that he was soon to replace Hitler. Hitler was furious and accused Goring of disloyalty. “There must be only one mustache among the leaders of the Reich, and it shall be mine!” he cried. Goring argued that two mustaches might give the German people a greater sense of hope about the war, which was going poorly, but Hitler thought not. Then, in January of 1945, a plot by several generals to shave Hitler’s mustache in his sleep and proclaim Doenitz the new leader failed when von Stauffenberg, in the darkness of Hitler’s bedroom, shaved off one of the Fuhrer’s eyebrows instead. A state of emergency was proclaimed, and suddenly Goebbels appeared at my shop. “An attempt was just made on the Fuhrer’s mustache; but it was unsuccessful,” he said, trembling. Goebbels arranged for me to go on radio and address the German people, which I did, with a minimum of notes. “The Fuhrer is all right,” I assured them. “He still has his mustache. Repeat. The Fuhrer still has his mustache. A plot to shave it has failed.”

 

 

Near the end, I came to Hitler’s bunker. The Allied armies were closing in on Berlin, and Hitler felt that if the Russians got there first he would need a full haircut but if the Americans did he could get by with a light trim. Everyone quarrelled. In the midst of all this, Bormann wanted a shave, and I promised him I would get to work on some blueprints. Hitler grew morose and remote. He talked of parting his hair from ear to ear and then claimed that the development of the electric razor would turn the war for Germany. “We will be able to shave in seconds, eh, Schmeed?” he muttered. He mentioned other wild schemes and said that someday he would have his hair not just cut but shaped. Obsessed as usual by sheer size, he vowed he would eventually have a huge pompadour-“one that will make the world tremble and will require an honor guard to comb.” Finally, we shook hands and I gave him a last trim. He tipped me one pfennig. “I wish it could be more,” he said, “but ever since the Allies have overrun Europe I’ve been a little short.”

 

 

My Philosophy

 

 

The development of my philosophy came about as follows: My wife, inviting me to sample her very first souffle, accidentally dropped a spoonful of it on my foot, fracturing several small bones. Doctors were called in, X-rays taken and examined, and I was ordered to bed for a month. During this convalescence, I turned to the works of some of Western society’s most formidable thinkers-a stack of books I had laid aside for just such an eventuality. Scorning chronological order, I began with Kierkegaard and Sartre, then moved quickly to Spinoza, Hume, Kafka, and Camus. I was not bored, as I had feared I might be; rather, I found myself fascinated by the alacrity with which these great minds unflinchingly attacked morality, art, ethics, life, and death. I remember my reaction to a typically luminous observation of Kierkegaard’s: “Such a relation which relates itself to its own self (that is to say, a self) must either have constituted itself or have been constituted by another.” The concept brought tears to my eyes. My word, I thought, to be that clever! (I’m a man who has trouble writing two meaningful sentences on “My Day at the Zoo.”) True, the passage was totally incomprehensible to me, but what of it as long as Kierkegaard was having fun? Suddenly confident that metaphysics was the work I had always been meant to do, I took up my pen and began at once to jot down the first of my own musings. The work proceeded apace, and in a mere two afternoons-with time out for dozing and trying to get the two little BBs into the eyes of the bear-I had completed the philosophical work that I am hoping will not be uncovered until after my death, or until the year 3000 (whichever comes first), and which I modestly believe will assure me a place of reverence among history’s weightiest thinkers. Here is but a small sample of the main body of intellectual treasure that I leave for posterity, or until the cleaning woman comes.

 

 

I. Critique of Pure Dread

 

 

In formulating any philosophy, the first consideration must always be: What can we know? That is, what can we be sure we know, or sure that we know we knew it, if indeed it is at all knowable. Or have we simply forgotten it and are too embarrassed to say anything? Descartes hinted at the problem when he wrote, “My mind can never know my body, although it has become quite friendly with my legs.” By “knowable,” incidentally, I do not mean that which can be known by perception of the senses, or that which can be grasped by the mind, but more that which can be said to be Known or to possess a Knownness or Knowability, or at least something you can mention to a friend.

Can we actually “know” the universe? My God, it’s hard enough finding your way around in Chinatown. The point, however, is: Is there anything out there? And why? And must they be so noisy? Finally, there can be no doubt that the one characteristic of “reality” is that it lacks essence. That is not to say it has no essence, but merely lacks it. (The reality I speak of here is the same one Hobbes described, but a little smaller.) Therefore the Cartesian dictum “I think, therefore I am” might better be expressed “Hey, there goes Edna with a saxophone!” So, then, to know a substance or an idea we must doubt it, and thus, doubting it, come to perceive the qualities it possesses in its finite state, which are truly “in the thing itself,” or “of the thing itself,” or of something or nothing. If this is clear, we can leave epistemology for the moment.

 

 

II. Eschatological Dialectics As a Means of Coping

with Shingles

 

 

We can say that the universe consists of a substance, and this substance we will call “atoms,” or else we will call it “monads.” Democritus called it atoms. Leibnitz called it monads. Fortunately, the two men never met, or there would have been a very dull argument. These “particles” were set in motion by some cause or underlying principle, or perhaps something fell someplace. The point is that it’s too late to do anything about it now, except possibly to eat plenty of raw fish. This, of course, does not explain why the soul is immortal. Nor does it say anything about an afterlife, or about the feeling my Uncle Sender has that he is being followed by Albanians. The causal relationship between the first principle (i.e., God, or a strong wind) and any teleological concept of being (Being) is, according to Pascal, “so ludicrous that it’s not even funny (Funny).” Schopenhauer called this “will,” but his physician diagnosed it as hay fever. In his later years, he became embittered by it, or more likely because of his increasing suspicion that he was not Mozart.

 

 

III. The Cosmos on Five Dollars a Day

 

 

What, then, is “beautiful”? The merging of harmony with the just, or the merging of harmony with something that just sounds like “the just”? Possibly harmony should have been merged with “the crust” and this is what’s been giving us our trouble. Truth, to be sure, is beauty-or “the necessary.” That is, what is good or possessing the qualities of “the good” results in “truth.” If it doesn’t, you can bet the thing is not beautiful, although it may still be waterproof. I am beginning to think I was right in the first place and that everything should be merged with the crust. Oh, well.

 

 

Two Parables

 

 

A man approaches a palace. Its only entrance is guarded by some fierce Huns who will only let men named Julius enter. The man tries to bribe the guards by offering them a year’s supply of choice chicken parts. They neither scorn his offer nor accept it, but merely take, his nose and twist it till it looks like a Molly screw. The man says it is imperative that he enter the palace because he is bringing the emperor a change of underwear. When the guards still refuse, the man begins to Charleston. They seem to enjoy his dancing but soon become morose over the treatment of the Navajos by the federal government. Out of breath, the man collapses. He dies, never having seen the emperor and owing the Steinway people sixty dollars on a piano he had rented from them in August.

 

*

 

I am given a message to deliver to a general. I ride and ride, but the general’s headquarters seem to get farther and farther away. Finally, a giant black panther leaps upon me and devours my mind and heart. This puts a terrific crimp in my evening. No matter how hard I try, I cannot catch the general, whom I see running in the distance in his shorts and whispering the word “nutmeg” to his enemies.

 

 

Aphorisms

 

 

It is impossible to experience one’s own death objectively and still carry a tune.

 

*

 

The universe is merely a fleeting idea in God’s mind-a pretty uncomfortable thought, particularly if you’ve just made a down payment on a house.

 

*

 

Eternal nothingness is O.K. if you’re dressed for it.

 

*

 

If only Dionysus were alive! Where would he eat?

 

*

 

Not only is there no God, but try getting a plumber on weekends.

 

 

Yes, But Can the Steam Engine Do This?

 

 

I was leafing through a magazine while waiting for Joseph K., my beagle, to emerge from his regular Tuesday fifty-minute hour with a Park Avenue therapist-a Jungian veterinarian who, for fifty dollars per session, labors valiantly to convince him that jowls are not a social drawback -when I came across a sentence at the bottom of the page that caught my eye like an overdraft notice. It was just another item in one of those boiler-plate specials with a title like “Historagrams” or “Betcha Didn’t Know,” but its magnitude shook me with the power of the opening strains of Beethoven’s Ninth. “The sandwich,” it read, “was invented by the Earl of Sandwich.” Stunned by the news, I read it again and broke into an involuntary tremble. My mind whirled as it began to conjure with the immense dreams, the hopes and obstacles, that must have gone into the invention of the first sandwich. My eyes became moist as I looked out the window at the shimmering towers of the city, and I experienced a sense of eternity, marvelling at man’s ineradicable place in the universe. Man the inventor! Da Vinci’s notebooks loomed before me-brave blueprints for the highest aspirations of the human race. I thought of Aristotle, Dante, Shakespeare. The First Folio. Newton. Handel’s Messiah. Monet. Impressionism. Edison. Cubism. Stravinsky. E=mc2…

Holding firmly to a mental picture of the first sandwich lying encased at the British Museum, I spent the ensuing three months working up a brief biography of its great inventor, his nibs the Earl. Though my grasp of history is a bit shaky, and though my capacity for romanticizing easily dwarfs that of the average acidhead, I hope I have captured at least the essence of this unappreciated genius, and that these sparse notes will inspire a true historian to take it from here.

1718: Birth of the Earl of Sandwich to upper-class parents. Father is delighted at being appointed chief farrier to His Majesty the King-a position he will enjoy for several years, until he discovers he is a blacksmith and resigns embittered. Mother is a simple Hausfrau of German extraction, whose uneventful menu consists essentially of lard and gruel, although she does show some flair for culinary imagination in her ability to concoct a passable sillabub.

1725-35: Attends school, where he is taught horseback riding and Latin. At school he comes in contact with cold cuts for the first time and displays an unusual interest in thinly sliced strips of roast beef and ham. By graduation this has become an obsession, and although his paper on “The Analysis and Attendant Phenomena of Snacks” arouses interest among the faculty, his classmates regard him as odd.

1736: Enters Cambridge University, at his parents’ behest, to pursue studies in rhetoric and metaphysics, but displays little enthusiasm for either. In constant revolt against everything academic, he is charged with stealing loaves of bread and performing unnatural experiments with them. Accusations of heresy result in his expulsion.

1738: Disowned, he sets out for the Scandinavian countries, where he spends three years in intensive research on cheese. He is much taken with the many varieties of sardines he encounters and writes in his notebook, “I am convinced that there is an enduring reality, beyond anything man has yet attained, in the juxtaposition of foodstuffs. Simplify, simplify.” Upon his return to England, he meets Nell Smallbore, a greengrocer’s daughter, and they marry. She is to teach him all he will ever know about lettuce.

1741: Living in the country on a small inheritance, he works day and night, often skimping on meals to save money for food. His first completed work-a slice of bread, a slice of bread on top of that, and a slice of turkey on top of both-fails miserably. Bitterly disappointed, he returns to his studio and begins again.

1745: After four years of frenzied labor, he is convinced he is on the threshold of success. He exhibits before his peers two slices of turkey with a slice of bread in the middle. His work is rejected by all but David Hume, who senses the imminence of something great and encourages him. Heartened by the philosopher’s friendship, he returns to work with renewed vigor.

1747: Destitute, he can no longer afford to work in roast beef or turkey and switches to ham, which is cheaper.

1750: In the spring, he exhibits and demonstrates three consecutive slices of ham stacked on one another; this arouses some interest, mostly in intellectual circles, but the general public remains unmoved. Three slices of bread on top of one another add to his reputation, and while a mature style is not yet evident, he is sent for by Voltaire.

1751: Journeys to France, where the dramatist-philosopher has achieved some interesting results with bread and mayonnaise. The two men become friendly and begin a correspondence that is to end abruptly when Voltaire runs out of stamps.

1758: His growing acceptance by opinion-makers wins him a commission by the Queen to fix “something special” for a luncheon with the Spanish ambassador. He works day and night, tearing up hundreds of blueprints, but finally-at 4:17 A.M., April 27, 1758-he creates a work consisting of several strips of ham enclosed, top and bottom, by two slices of rye bread. In a burst of inspiration, he garnishes the work with mustard. It is an immediate sensation, and he is commissioned to prepare all Saturday luncheons for the remainder of the year.

1760: He follows one success with another, creating “sandwiches,” as they are called In his honor, out of roast beef, chicken, tongue, and nearly every conceivable cold cut. Not content to repeat tried formulas, he seeks out new ideas and devises the combination sandwich, for which he receives the Order of the Garter.

1769: Living on a country estate, he is visited by the greatest men of his century; Haydn, Kant, Rousseau, and Ben Franklin stop at his home, some enjoying his remarkable creations at table, others ordering to go.

1778: Though aging physically he still strives for new forms and writes in his diary, “I work long into the cold nights and am toasting everything now in an effort to keep warm.” Later that year, his open hot roast-beef sandwich creates a scandal with its frankness.

1783: To celebrate his sixty-fifth birthday, he invents the hamburger and tours the great capitals of the world personally, making burgers at concert halls before large and appreciative audiences. In Germany, Goethe suggests serving them on buns-an idea that delights the Earl, and of the author of Faust he says, “This Goethe, he is some fellow.” The remark delights Goethe, although the following year they break intellectually over the concept of rare, medium, and well done.

1790: At a retrospective exhibition of his works in London, he is suddenly taken ill with chest pains and is thought to be dying, but recovers sufficiently to supervise the construction of a hero sandwich by a group of talented followers. Its unveiling in Italy causes a riot, and it remains misunderstood by all but a few critics.

1792: He develops a genu varum, which he fails to treat in time, and succumbs in his sleep. He is laid to rest in Westminster Abbey, and thousands mourn his passing.

At his funeral, the great German poet Holderlin sums up his achievements with undisguised reverence: “He freed mankind from the hot lunch. We owe him so much.”

 

 

Death Knocks

 

 

(The play takes place in the bedroom of the Nat Ackermans’ two-story house, somewhere in Kew Gardens. The carpeting is wall-to-wall. There is a big double bed and a large vanity. The room is elaborately furnished and curtained, and on the walls there are several paintings and a not really attractive barometer. Soft theme music as the curtain rises. Nat Ackerman, a bald, paunchy fifty-seven-year-old dress manufacturer is lying on the bed finishing off tomorrow’s Daily News. He wears a bathrobe and slippers, and reads by a bed light clipped to the white headboard of the bed. The time is near midnight. Suddenly we hear a noise, and Nat sits up and looks at the window.)

Nat: What the hell is that?

(Climbing awkwardly through the window is a sombre, caped figure. The intruder wears a black hood and skintight black clothes. The hood covers his head but not his face, which is middle-aged and stark white. He is something like Nat in appearance. He huffs audibly and then trips over the windowsill and falls into the room.)

Death (for it is no one else): Jesus Christ. I nearly broke my neck.

Nat (watching with bewilderment): Who are you?

Death: Death.

Nat: Who?

Death: Death. Listen-can I sit down? I nearly broke my neck. I’m shaking like a leaf.

Nat: Who are you?

Death: Death. You got a glass of water?

Nat: Death? What do you mean, Death?

Death: What is wrong with you? You see the black costume and the whitened face?

Nat: Yeah.

Death: Is it Halloween?

Nat: No.

Death: Then I’m Death. Now can I get a glass of water-or a Fresca?

Nat: If this is some joke -

Death: What kind of joke? You’re fifty-seven? Nat Ackerman? One eighteen Pacific Street? Unless I blew it -where’s that call sheet? (He jumbles through pocket, finally producing a card with an address on it. It seems to check.)

Nat: What do you want with me?

Death: What do I want? What do you think I want?

Nat: You must be kidding. I’m in perfect health.

Death (unimpressed): Uh-huh. (Looking around) This is a nice place. You do it yourself?

Nat: We had a decorator, but we worked with her.

Death (looking at picture on the wall): I love those kids with the big eyes.

Nat: I don’t want to go yet.

Death: You don’t want to go? Please don’t start in. As it is, I’m nauseous from the climb.

Nat: What climb?

Death: I climbed up the drainpipe. I was trying to make a dramatic entrance. I see the big windows and you’re awake reading. I figure it’s worth a shot. I’ll climb up and enter with a little-you know… (Snaps fingers)

Meanwhile, I get my heel caught on some vines, the drainpipe breaks, and I’m hanging by a thread. Then my cape begins to tear. Look, let’s just go. It’s been a rough night.

Nat: You broke my drainpipe?

Death: Broke. It didn’t break. It’s a little bent. Didn’t you hear anything? I slammed into the ground.

Nat: I was reading.

Death: You must have really been engrossed. (Lifting newspaper Nat was reading) “NAB COEDS IN POT ORGY.” Can I borrow this?

Nat: I’m not finished.

Death: Er-I don’t know how to put this to you, pal…

Nat: Why didn’t you just ring downstairs?

Death: I’m telling you, I could have, but how does it look? This way I get a little drama going. Something. Did you read Faust?

Nat: What?

Death: And what if you had company? You’re sitting there with important people. I’m Death-I should ring the bell and traipse right in the front? Where’s your thinking?

Nat: Listen, Mister, it’s very late.

Death: Yeah. Well, you want to go?

Nat: Go where?

Death: Death. It. The Thing. The Happy Hunting Grounds. (Looking at his own knee) Y’know, that’s a pretty bad cut. My first job, I’m liable to get gangrene yet.

Nat: Now, wait a minute. I need time. I’m not ready to go.

Death: I’m sorry. I can’t help you. I’d like to, but it’s the moment.

Nat: How can it be the moment? I just merged with Modiste Originals.

Death: What’s the difference, a couple of bucks more or less.

Nat: Sure, what do you care? You guys probably have all your expenses paid.

Death: You want to come along now?

Nat (studying him): I’m sorry, but I cannot believe you’re Death.

Death: Why? What’d you expect-Rock Hudson?

Nat: No, it’s not that.

Death: I’m sorry if I disappointed you.

Nat: Don’t get upset. I don’t know, I always thought you’d be… uh… taller.

Death: I’m five seven. It’s average for my weight.

Nat: You look a little like me.

Death: Who should I look like? I’m your death.

Nat: Give me some time. Another day.

Death: I can’t. What do you want me to say?

Nat: One more day. Twenty-four hours.

Death: What do you need it for? The radio said rain tomorrow.

Nat: Can’t we work out something?

Death: Like what?

Nat: You play chess?

Death: No, I don’t.

Nat: I once saw a picture of you playing chess.

Death: Couldn’t be me, because I don’t play chess. Gin rummy, maybe.

Nat: You play gin rummy?

Death: Do I play gin rummy? Is Paris a city?

Nat: You’re good, huh?

Death: Very good.

Nat: I’ll tell you what I’ll do-

Death: Don’t make any deals with me.

Nat: I’ll play you gin rummy. If you win, I’ll go immediately. If I win, give me some more time. A little bit -one more day.

Death: Who’s got time to play gin rummy?

Nat: Come on. If you’re so good.

Death: Although I feel like a game…

Nat: Come on. Be a sport. We’ll shoot for a half hour.

Death: I really shouldn’t.

Nat: I got the cards right here. Don’t make a production.

Death: All right, come on. We’ll play a little. It’ll relax me.

Nat (getting cards, pad, and pencil): You won’t regret this.

Death: Don’t give me a sales talk. Get the cards and give me a Fresca and put out something. For God’s sake, a stranger drops in, you don’t have potato chips or pretzels.

Nat: There’s M amp;M’s downstairs in a dish.

Death: M amp;M’s. What if the President came? He’d get M amp;M’s too?

Nat: You’re not the President.

Death: Deal.

(Nat deals, turns up a five.)

Nat: You want to play a tenth of a cent a point to make it interesting?

Death: It’s not interesting enough for you?

Nat: I play better when money’s at stake.

Death: Whatever you say, Newt.

Nat: Nat. Nat Ackerman. You don’t know my name?

Death: Newt, Nat-I got such a headache.

Nat: You want that five?

Death: No.

Nat: So pick.

Death (surveying his hand as he picks): Jesus, I got nothing here.

Nat: What’s it like?

Death: What’s what like?

(Throughout the following, they pick and discard.)

Nat: Death.

Death: What should it be like? You lay there.

Nat: Is there anything after?

Death: Aha, you’re saving twos.

Nat: I’m asking. Is there anything after?

Death (absently): You’ll see.

Nat: Oh, then I will actually see something?

Death: Well, maybe I shouldn’t have put it that way. Throw.

Nat: To get an answer from you is a big deal.

Death: I’m playing cards.

Nat: All right, play, play.

Death: Meanwhile, I’m giving you one card after another.

Nat: Don’t look through the discards.

Death: I’m not looking. I’m straightening them up. What was the knock card?

Nat: Four. You ready to knock already?

Death: Who said I’m ready to knock? All I asked was what was the knock card.

Nat: And all I asked was is there anything for me to look forward to.

Death: Play.

Nat: Can’t you tell me anything? Where do we go?

Death: We? To tell you the truth, you fall in a crumpled heap on the floor.

Nat: Oh, I can’t wait for that! Is it going to hurt?

Death: Be over in a second.

Nat: Terrific. (Sighs) I needed this. A man merges with Modiste Originals…

Death: How’s four points?

Nat: You’re knocking?

Death: Four points is good?

Nat: No, I got two.

Death: You’re kidding.

Nat: No, you lose.

Death: Holy Christ, and I thought you were saving sixes.

Nat: No. Your deal. Twenty points and two boxes. Shoot. (Death deals.) I must fall on the floor, eh? I can’t be standing over the sofa when it happens?

Death: No. Play.

Nat: Why not?

Death: Because you fall on the floor! Leave me alone. I’m trying to concentrate.

Nat: Why must it be on the floor? That’s all I’m saying!

Why can’t the whole thing happen and I’ll stand next to the sofa?

Death: I’ll try my best. Now can we play?

Nat: That’s all I’m saying. You remind me of Moe Lefkowitz. He’s also stubborn.

Death: I remind him of Moe Lefkowitz. I’m one of the most terrifying figures you could possibly imagine, and him I remind of Moe Lefkowitz. What is he, a furrier?

Nat: You should be such a furrier. He’s good for eighty thousand a year. Passementeries. He’s got his own factory. Two points.

Death: What?

Nat: Two points. I’m knocking. What have you got?

Death: My hand is like a basketball score.

Nat: And it’s spades.

Death: If you didn’t talk so much.

(They redeal and play on.)

Nat: What’d you mean before when you said this was your first job?

Death: What does it sound like?

Nat: What are you telling me-that nobody ever went before?

Death: Sure they went. But I didn’t take them.

Nat: So who did?

Death: Others.

Nat: There’s others?

Death: Sure. Each one has his own personal way of going.

Nat: I never knew that.

Death: Why should you know? Who are you?

Nat: What do you mean who am I? Why-I’m nothing?

Death: Not nothing. You’re a dress manufacturer. Where do you come to knowledge of the eternal mysteries?

Nat: What are you talking about? I make a beautiful dollar. I sent two kids through college. One is in advertising, the other’s married. I got my own home. I drive a Chrysler. My wife has whatever she wants. Maids, mink coat, vacations. Right now she’s at the Eden Roc. Fifty dollars a day because she wants to be near her sister. I’m supposed to join her next week, so what do you think I am -some guy off the street?

Death: All right. Don’t be so touchy.

Nat: Who’s touchy?

Death: How would you like it if I got insulted quickly?

Nat: Did I insult you?

Death: You didn’t say you were disappointed in me?

Nat: What do you expect? You want me to throw you a block party?

Death: I’m not talking about that. I mean me personally. I’m too short, I’m this, I’m that.

Nat: I said you looked like me. It’s like a reflection.

Death: All right, deal, deal.

(They continue to play as music steals in and the lights dim until all is in total darkness. The lights slowly come up again, and now it is later and their game is over. Nat tallies.)

Nat: Sixty-eight… one-fifty… Well, you lose.

Death (dejectedly looking through the deck): I knew I shouldn’t have thrown that nine. Damn it.

Nat: So I’ll see you tomorrow.

Death: What do you mean you’ll see me tomorrow?

Nat: I won the extra day. Leave me alone.

Death: You were serious?

Nat: We made a deal.

Death: Yeah, but-

Nat: Don’t “but” me. I won twenty-four hours. Come back tomorrow.

Death: I didn’t know we were actually playing for time.

Nat: That’s too bad about you. You should pay attention.

Death: Where am I going to go for twenty-four hours?

Nat: What’s the difference? The main thing is I won an extra day.

Death: What do you want me to do-walk the streets?

Nat: Check into a hotel and go to a movie. Take a schvitz. Don’t make a federal case.

Death: Add the score again.

Nat: Plus you owe me twenty-eight dollars.

Death: What?

Nat: That’s right, Buster. Here it is-read it.

Death (going through pockets): I have a few singles- not twenty-eight dollars.

Nat: I’ll take a check.

Death: From what account?

Nat: Look who I’m dealing with.

Death: Sue me. Where do I keep my checking account?

Nat: All right, gimme what you got and we’ll call it square.

Death: Listen, I need that money.

Nat: Why should you need money?

Death: What are you talking about? You’re going to the Beyond.

Nat: So?

Death: So-you know how far that is?

Nat: So?

Death: So where’s gas? Where’s tolls?

Nat: We’re going by car!

Death: You’ll find out. (Agitatedly) Look-I’ll be back tomorrow, and you’ll give me a chance to win the money back. Otherwise I’m in definite trouble.

Nat: Anything you want. Double or nothing we’ll play. I’m liable to win an extra week or a month. The way you play, maybe years.

Death: Meantime I’m stranded.

Nat: See you tomorrow.

Death (being edged to the doorway): Where’s a good hotel? What am I talking about hotel, I got no money. I’ll go sit in Bickford’s. (He picks up the News.)

Nat: Out. Out. That’s my paper. (He takes it back.)

Death (exiting): I couldn’t just take him and go. I had to get involved in rummy.

Nat (calling after him): And be careful going downstairs. On one of the steps the rug is loose.

(And, on cue, we hear a terrific crash. Nat sighs, then crosses to the bedside table and makes a phone call.)

Nat: Hello, Moe? Me. Listen, I don’t know if somebody’s playing a joke, or what, but Death was just here. We played a little gin… No, Death. In person. Or somebody who claims to be Death. But, Moe, he’s such a schlep!

 

 

CURTAIN

 

 

Spring Bulletin

 

 

The number of college bulletins and adult-education come-ons that keep turning up in my mailbox convinces me that I must be on a special mailing list for dropouts. Not that I’m complaining; there is something about a list of extension courses that piques my interest with a fascination hitherto reserved for a catalogue of Hong Kong honeymoon accessories, sent to me once by mistake. Each time I read through the latest bulletin of extension courses, I make immediate plans to drop everything and return to school. (I was ejected from college many years ago, the victim of unproved accusations not unlike those once attached to Yellow Kid Weil.) So far, however, I am still an uneducated, unextended adult, and I have fallen into the habit of browsing through an imaginary, handsomely printed course bulletin that is more or less typical of them all:

 

 

Summer Session

 

 

Economic Theory: A systematic application and critical evaluation of the basic analytic concepts of economic theory, with an emphasis on money and why it’s good. Fixed coefficient production functions, cost and supply curves, and nonconvexity comprise the first semester, with the second semester concentrating on spending, making change, and keeping a neat wallet. The Federal Reserve System is analyzed, and advanced students are coached in the proper method of filling out a deposit slip. Other topics include: Inflation and Depression-how to dress for each. Loans, interest, welching.

 

 

History of European Civilization: Ever since the discovery of a fossilized eohippus in the men’s washroom at Siddon’s Cafeteria in East Rutherford, New Jersey, it has been suspected that at one time Europe and America were connected by a strip of land that later sank or became East Rutherford, New Jersey, or both. This throws a new perspective on the formation of European society and enables historians to conjecture about why it sprang up in an area that would have made a much better Asia. Also studied in the course is the decision to hold the Renaissance in Italy.

 

 

Introduction to Psychology: The theory of human behavior. Why some men are called “lovely individuals” and why there are others you just want to pinch. Is there a split between mind and body, and, if so, which is better to have? Aggression and rebellion are discussed. (Students particularly interested in these aspects of psychology are advised to take one of these Winter Term courses: Introduction to Hostility; Intermediate Hostility; Advanced Hatred; Theoretical Foundations of Loathing.) Special consideration is given to a study of consciousness as opposed to unconsciousness, with many helpful hints on how to remain conscious.

 

 

Psychopathology: Aimed at understanding obsessions and phobias, including the fear of being suddenly captured and stuffed with crabmeat, reluctance to return a volleyball serve, and the inability to say the word “mackinaw” in the presence of women. The compulsion to seek out the company of beavers is analyzed.

 

 

Philosophy I: Everyone from Plato to Camus is read, and the following topics are covered:

Ethics: The categorical imperative, and six ways to make it work for you.

Aesthetics: Is art the mirror of life, or what?

Metaphysics: What happens to the soul after death? How does it manage?

Epistemology: Is knowledge knowable? If not, how do we know this?

The Absurd: Why existence is often considered silly, particularly for men who wear brown-and-white shoes. Manyness and oneness are studied as they relate to otherness. (Students achieving oneness will move ahead to twoness.)

 

 

Philosophy XXIX-B: Introduction to God. Confrontation with the Creator of the universe through informal lectures and field trips.

 

 

The New Mathematics: Standard mathematics has recently been rendered obsolete by the discovery that for years we have been writing the numeral five backward. This has led to a reevaluation of counting as a method of getting from one to ten. Students are taught advanced concepts of Boolean Algebra, and formerly unsolvable equations are dealt with by threats of reprisals.

 

 

Fundamental Astronomy: A detailed study of the universe and its care and cleaning. The sun, which is made of gas, can explode at any moment, sending our entire planetary system hurtling to destruction; students are advised what the average citizen can do in such a case. They are also taught to identify various constellations, such as the Big Dipper, Cygnus the Swan, Sagittarius the Archer, and the twelve stars that form Lumides the Pants Salesman.

 

 

Modern Biology: How the body functions, and where it can usually be found. Blood is analyzed, and it is learned why it is the best possible thing to have coursing through one’s veins. A frog is dissected by students and its digestive tract is compared with man’s, with the frog giving a good account of itself except on curries.

 

 

Rapid Reading: This course will increase reading speed a little each day until the end of the term, by which time the student will be required to read The Brothers Karamazov in fifteen minutes. The method is to scan the page and eliminate everything except pronouns from one’s field of vision. Soon the pronouns are eliminated. Gradually the student is encouraged to nap. A frog is dissected. Spring comes. People marry and die. Pinkerton does not return.

 

 

Musicology III: The Recorder. The student is taught how to play “Yankee Doodle” on this end-blown wooden flute, and progresses rapidly to the Brandenburg Concertos. Then slowly back to “Yankee Doodle.”

 

 

Music Appreciation: In order to “hear” a great piece of music correctly, one must: (1) know the birthplace of the composer, (2) be able to tell a rondo from a scherzo, and back it up with action. Attitude is important. Smiling is bad form unless the composer has intended the music to be funny, as in Till Eulenspiegel, which abounds in musical jokes (although the trombone has the best lines). The ear, too, must be trained, for it is our most easily deceived organ


Date: 2015-04-20; view: 1173


<== previous page | next page ==>
Will you be my daddy | PERSONAL IDENTIFICATION
doclecture.net - lectures - 2014-2024 year. Copyright infringement or personal data (0.098 sec.)