Taran, a regular 3CT commenter, has brought to my attention how similar the previous post ("Apocry-phun!") is to an old Woody Allen bit of prose called "The Scrolls" which originally appeared in The New Republic in 1975, then in his compilation book "Without Feathers" a few years later. I wasn't able to admit this to myself until I re-read it tonight. It is still extremely funny. Taran and I were college friends, so he knew me when I was reading all that stuff, soaking it in, and in no small way trying to incorporate it into the stuff
I was writing. Well, I guess some habits die hard. Without even realizing it, I have once again co-opted the patented Woody inflection, then shamelessly accepted the praise as my own.
I couldn't find the original article online, so here, today, I will reprint (without permission) excerpts. In this way you can judge for yourself the extent to which I have nothing to call my own.
"Scholars will recall that several years ago a shepherd, wandering the Gulf of Aqaba, stumbled upon a cave containing several large clay jars and also two tickets to the ice show. Inside the jars were discovered six parchment scrolls with ancient incomprehensible writing which the shepherd, in his ignorance, sold to the museum for $750,000 apiece.
"Archeologists originally set the date of the scrolls at 4000 B.C., or just after the massacre of the Israelites by their benefactors. The writing is a mixture of Sumerian, Aramaic, and Babylonian and seems to have been done by either one man over a long period of time, or several men who shared the same suit. The authenticity of the scrolls is currently in great doubt, particularly since the word 'Oldsmobile' appears several times in the text. Still excavationist A.H. Bauer has noted that even though the fragments seem totally fraudulent, this is probably the greatest archeological find in history with the exception of the recovery of his cuff links from a tomb in Jerusalem. The following are the translated fragments.
"ONE... And the Lord made an bet with Satan to test Job's loyalty and the Lord, for no apparent reason to Job, smote him on the head and again on the ear and pushed him into an thick sauce so as to make Job sitcky and vile and then He slew a tenth part of Job's kine and Job calleth out: 'Why doth thou slay my kine? Kine are hard to come by. Now I am short kine and I'm not even sure what kine are.' And the Lord produced two stone tablets and snapped them closed on Job's nose. And when Job's wife saw this she wept and the Lord sent an angel of mercy who anointed her head with a polo mallet and of the ten plagues, the Lord sent one through six, inclusive, and Job was sore and his wife angry and she rent her garment and then raised the rent but refused to paint. and soon Job's pastures dried up and his tongue cleaved to the roof of his mouth so he could not pronounce the word frankincense without getting big laughs."
"TWO... And Abraham awoke in the middle of the night and said to his only son, Isaac, 'I have had an dream where the voice of the Lord sayeth that I must sacrifice my only son, so put your pants on.' And Isaac trembled and said, 'So what did you say? I mean when He brought this whole thing up?' 'What am I going to say? I'm standing there at two a.m. in my underwear with the Creator of the Universe. Should I argue?' 'Well, did he say why he wants me sacrificed?' Isaac asked his father. 'The faithful do not question. Now let's go because I have a heavy day tomorrow.'"
And there's lots more after that, but you can clearly see my sin. I can only say in my defense that at least I've stolen from a master, whose writing I greatly admire -- and who himself stole from his own hero, S. J. Perelman. The difference is, Woody never apologized, whereas I am begging your forgiveness for my transgression.
Taran, a regular 3CT commenter, has brought to my attention how similar the previous post ("Apocry-phun!") is to an old Woody Allen bit of prose called "The Scrolls" which originally appeared in The New Republic in 1975, then in his compilation book "Without Feathers" a few years later. I wasn't able to admit this to myself until I re-read it tonight. It is still extremely funny. Taran and I were college friends, so he knew me when I was reading all that stuff, soaking it in, and in no small way trying to incorporate it into the stuff
I was writing. Well, I guess some habits die hard. Without even realizing it, I have once again co-opted the patented Woody inflection, then shamelessly accepted the praise as my own.
I couldn't find the original article online, so here, today, I will reprint (without permission) excerpts. In this way you can judge for yourself the extent to which I have nothing to call my own.
"Scholars will recall that several years ago a shepherd, wandering the Gulf of Aqaba, stumbled upon a cave containing several large clay jars and also two tickets to the ice show. Inside the jars were discovered six parchment scrolls with ancient incomprehensible writing which the shepherd, in his ignorance, sold to the museum for $750,000 apiece.
"Archeologists originally set the date of the scrolls at 4000 B.C., or just after the massacre of the Israelites by their benefactors. The writing is a mixture of Sumerian, Aramaic, and Babylonian and seems to have been done by either one man over a long period of time, or several men who shared the same suit. The authenticity of the scrolls is currently in great doubt, particularly since the word 'Oldsmobile' appears several times in the text. Still excavationist A.H. Bauer has noted that even though the fragments seem totally fraudulent, this is probably the greatest archeological find in history with the exception of the recovery of his cuff links from a tomb in Jerusalem. The following are the translated fragments.
"ONE... And the Lord made an bet with Satan to test Job's loyalty and the Lord, for no apparent reason to Job, smote him on the head and again on the ear and pushed him into an thick sauce so as to make Job sitcky and vile and then He slew a tenth part of Job's kine and Job calleth out: 'Why doth thou slay my kine? Kine are hard to come by. Now I am short kine and I'm not even sure what kine are.' And the Lord produced two stone tablets and snapped them closed on Job's nose. And when Job's wife saw this she wept and the Lord sent an angel of mercy who anointed her head with a polo mallet and of the ten plagues, the Lord sent one through six, inclusive, and Job was sore and his wife angry and she rent her garment and then raised the rent but refused to paint. and soon Job's pastures dried up and his tongue cleaved to the roof of his mouth so he could not pronounce the word frankincense without getting big laughs."
"TWO... And Abraham awoke in the middle of the night and said to his only son, Isaac, 'I have had an dream where the voice of the Lord sayeth that I must sacrifice my only son, so put your pants on.' And Isaac trembled and said, 'So what did you say? I mean when He brought this whole thing up?' 'What am I going to say? I'm standing there at two a.m. in my underwear with the Creator of the Universe. Should I argue?' 'Well, did he say why he wants me sacrificed?' Isaac asked his father. 'The faithful do not question. Now let's go because I have a heavy day tomorrow.'"
And there's lots more after that, but you can clearly see my sin. I can only say in my defense that at least I've stolen from a master, whose writing I greatly admire -- and who himself stole from his own hero, S. J. Perelman. The difference is, Woody never apologized, whereas I am begging your forgiveness for my transgression.
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