Thursday, June 08, 2006

Closing the book on the lousiest story ever sold : Mail & Guardian Online

This is hilarious!Closing the book on the lousiest story ever sold : Mail & Guardian Online (South Africa)
A gentle stroll among the seed of his seed was just what he needed. He called out for Jesus, and the Bolivian manservant appeared at his elbow.

“Take me to the little ones,” croaked the old man. Young children always lifted his spirits. He adored them. They read whatever you put in front of them, and they hadn’t yet discovered ugly, degrading phrases such as “half-arsed research” and “pseudo-literary quasi-historical pigswill”. With any luck one could steer them clear of nasty influences such as school and atlases and the History Channel until they were 14 or 15, and by then they were too old to be reading in any case.

They had reached the long corridor, flanked by the great bookcases that contained his entire oeuvre, and he let his fingers brush over the leather spines. Somewhere here was The Devil’s Inquest, a critical triumph. “Brown at his space bar hammering best,” the Times had said. “Banality never looked this voluminous.” His son Golgotha had been less charitable, declaring it “total crap, like all the others”, but of course Golgotha had been older than 15 when he’d read it, so one couldn’t really trust his opinion.

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