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Scott HawkinsSeveral years ago for Christmas I gave my pet monkey Wittgenstein a typewriter. I must confess that Wittgenstein did not seem particularly overjoyed with his present; but he has always been a stern and solemn ape, not given to frivolous displays of gaiety. He granted me a formal, curt nod of gratitude and dutifully set about putting this new device to good use.
A less resolute creature than Wittgenstein would surely have found the prospects daunting. After all, the classic paradigm for lower-primate text production postulates an infinite number of monkeys slaving away at an infinite number of typewriters, and here was Wittgenstein, a poor, solitary beast armed with nought but a single, battered Underwood. However, Wittgenstein reasoned that since he did not wish to reproduce the Works of Shakespeare, but merely concoct a brief treatment for a television series by the sale of which he hoped to rescue us from the state of poverty into which we were then just beginning to descend, a satisfactory text might very well be produced by aleatoric means within a period of time substantially shorter than the proverbial Infinity. Thus fortified with hope Wittgenstein went to work.
He was relentless in the pursuit of his goal. He sat before the keyboard day and night, tapping out letter after random letter in an unyielding, monotonous rhythm that I soon feared would drive me mad. "Give it up," I shouted at him in despair. "Can't you see it's hopeless?" Wittgenstein barely acknowledged my existence, granting me only a brief scowl before he continued on in the dogged furtherance of his task. Finally, miraculously, after seven weeks Wittgenstein emerged from his office bearing ten neatly stacked double-spaced pages that he had culled from the vast chaos of typescript that had inundated the room. These he placed in an envelope which he dispatched to Hollywood without delay, confident that our fortunes would soon see a turn for the better.
Alas, it was not to be. The flood-tide of residuals was never to come pouring in. The chauffeur-driven gods of the entertainment industry were never to bestow their blessings upon Wittgenstein. His follow-up letters and phone calls to studio and network executives were never returned. It was as if the fruits of his hard labor had been swallowed up without a trace. Wittgenstein bore the burden of this rejection with his customary grim stoicism. But imagine the dark despair he must have felt a little over a year later when, tuning in to the premiere episode of "Beverly Hills 90210," he immediately recognized characters, situations and indeed entire storylines that he himself had in grim struggle wrestled from the jaws of chaos. And it required a Herculean effort to contain his savage rage when he saw the credit-line--"Based upon characters created by Immanuel Kant," an Orangutan who was at that time employed by Aaron Spelling Productions.
Naturally I urged Wittgenstein to sue, but he would have none of it. Was he who had once braved the storm-tossed seas of randomness now to finish his days sucked down into the fetid swamp of the legal system? Since then Wittgenstein has chosen to affect a haughty disdain for the entire incident. He would have it be as if it had never happened. But I can see how it's changed him. He no longer seems to have any ambition. His typewriter sits gathering dust. He spends endless hours watching television and drinking beer, trying to drown his bleak fury--successfully, for the most part. But every so often I catch a glimpse of the depths of anger that lurk beneath the surface. The ghostly image of Shannen Doherty flickers across the TV screen and for an instant his eyes turn steely and cold. "Daruber muss man schweigen," Wittgenstein mutters grimly under his breath as he changes the channel.
Kant, in the meantime, has just signed a multi-program development deal with Fox. He sits on the patio of his Malibu beach house, sipping strawberry daiquiris and watching an endless parade of would-be starlets pass by. They bare their breasts for him, hoping to be discovered.
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One fine day in spring Bill Gates, having for a moment grown weary of the cruel and relentless struggle for Corporate Domination, went for a walk in the countryside. Confronted of a sudden with the joy and charm of Nature, his step grew uncommonly brisk. His lungs tingled with the rush of crisp, clear air. His ears greeted with delight the rustle of the wind in the trees, the busy thrum of insects. Coming upon an open field, overwhelmed by this sudden onrush of untoward exaltation, filled with mystic fear upon being faced with the Beauty and Wonder of it all, Bill Gates flung himself down amid the tall grass, cast aside his glasses, squinted upwards into bright sun and blue sky and soon allowed himself to drift off into his habitual nervous, twitchy slumber.
Soon, from all throughout the forest, birds began to gather about the prone body of Bill Gates. Gaily they cavorted in the air above him, counterposing their simple grace against the cramped and awkward twist of his limbs. They chattered and warbled to each other, easily drowning out the ruthless grinding of his teeth, his clenched, pathetic whimpers of dreamtime rage, in an ageless ocean of melody. They playfully spattered his sleeping form with their shit. Then a happy sparrow spotted a loose strand of yarn dangling from the sleeve of Bill Gates' sweater, swooped down and snatched it free. A sly finch spirited away a strand of his left sock. A pair mockingbirds pecked out tufts of his hair, and soon the general unravelment was under way. The birds of the forest flocked over his body, coming away with scraps of shredded flesh, splinters of soft bone, clumps of knotted nerves and long, tangled strings of code which they swiftly carried off to the furthest reaches of the forest and assembled into warm and spacious nests in which to cradle their offspring.
When Bill Gates awakened from his nap, when he put his glasses back on and again squinted into bright sun and blue sky he felt himself possessed by a Vision--a Vision of Corporate Domination more ruthless and all-encompassing than anything he had ever dared previously to conceive. So awe-struck was he by this new Vision, so eager was he to put this new plan into action that, as he strode vigorously back to his office, Bill Gates didn't even notice the fact that he no longer existed.
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