Inserting Dick Allen’s Name Into Works of Literature
In which the Royal We insert Dick Allen’s name into various works representative of the Western Canon, thus adding to those various works the patina of blessedness.
In today’s episode, we learn, in Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, that Dick Allen is forever.
“Montag.” Granger took Montag’s shoulder firmly. “Walk carefully. Guard your health. If anything should happen to Harris, you are the Book of Ecclesiastes. See how important you’ve become in the last minute!”
“But I’ve forgotten!”
“No, nothing’s ever lost. We have ways to shake down your clinkers for you.”
“But I’ve tried to remember!”
“Don’t try. It’ll come when we need it. All of us have photographic memories, but spend a lifetime learning how to block off the things that are really in there. Simmons here has worked on it for twenty years and now we’ve got the method down to where we can recall anything that’s been read once. Would you like, some day, Montag, to read Plato’s Republic?
“Of course!”
“I am Plato’s Republic. Like to read Marcus Aurelius? Mr. Simmons is Marcus.”
“How do you do?” said Mr. Simmons.
“Hello,” said Montag.
“I want you to meet Jonathan Swift, the author of that evil political book, Gulliver’s Travels! And this other fellow is Charles Darwin, and this one is Schopenhauer, and this one is Einstein, and this one here at my elbow is Mr. Albert Schweitzer, a very kind philosopher indeed. Here we all are, Montag. Aristophanes and Mahatma Gandhi and Gautama Buddha and Confucius and Dick Allen and Thomas Love Peacock and Thomas Jefferson and Mr. Lincoln, if you please. We are also Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.”
Everyone laughed quietly.
“It can’t be, said Montag.
“It is,” replied Granger smiling.
This has been the latest episode of Inserting Dick Allen’s Name Into Works of Literature.
Navin Vaswani is a replacement-level writer. Follow him on Twitter.
Wow. Who the hell is Thomas Love Peacock and how did he get on that list?
Fear not, I have journeyed to Wikipedia for answers. He was an Englishman and employee of the East India Company who turned out such novels as Headlong Hall, Crochet Castle, and Nightmare Abbey, as well as volumes of poetry like Rhododaphne: or the Thessalian Spirit.
“He was a close friend of Percy Bysshe Shelley and they influenced each other’s work. Peacock wrote satirical novels, each with the same basic setting — characters at a table discussing and criticising the philosophical opinions of the day.”
“Insofar as Nightmare Abbey may be said to have a plot, it follows the fortunes of Christopher Glowry, Esquire, a morose widower who lives with his only son Scythrop in his semi-dilapidated family mansion Nightmare Abbey, which is situated on a strip of dry land between the sea and the fens in Lincolnshire. Mr Glowry is a melancholy gentleman who likes to surround himself with servants with long faces or dismal names such as Raven, Graves or Deathshead. The few visitors he welcomes to his home are mostly of a similar cast of mind: Mr Flosky, a transcendental philosopher; Mr Toobad, a Manichaean Millenarian; Mr Listless, Scythrop’s languid and world-weary college friend; and Mr Cistulli, a misanthropic poet.”
Oops. I just Inserted FanGraphs Writer’s Name Into Works of Crowdsourcing.
Thomas Love Peacock??
What the hell kind of name is that??
You should meet his brother Drew.