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(image: Florida swamp)
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Novelist Rescued From Becoming Genius
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He got lost in his plots. Ten drafts later,
his characters went looking for him, found
him in a Florida swamp, nursed him back
to writing. "Just tell our stories, will you?"
they asked. "But I'm a genius," he explained.
"I can't just be telling stories." The characters
looked embarrassed for him. "What is it"?
he asked. "What's the matter?"
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"Well," said one of them, "that genius-test
you took? --The result turned out to be
a false-positive." "You mean . . .?" he said.
A character picked up the novelist's crest,
which had fallen. The character explained,
"You're just a story-teller. Sentences and
paragraphs--that sort of thing." The former
genius said, "This reminds me of the time
one of you showed up at an anti-war rally
costumed as Napoleon because you'd just
come from a dress-rehearsal, and then . . . ."
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Copyright 2009 Hans Ostrom
