EPISODE 92: "Ghosts" (866 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.86 on 20 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by The Chronicles of College-Guy (View user info) at 2005-03-02 19:29:56 EST
*THE CHRONICLES OF COLLEGE-GUY*
EPISODE 92: "Ghosts"
March 2, 2005
While I'm thinking about tying up the Asian girl in the corner, my teacher breaks my concentration.
"Today," he says, "We'll be reading more of Byron's Manfred. I want to try and finish the second act today."
This is British Literature. It sucks.
"I think that Mary can play the part of the witch--"
"Please," I laugh. "Give her something more challenging."
The class chuckles a little. That one would have killed in eighth grade.
"And I think that Sam can play the part of Manfred," the teacher smiles.
Just like this jerkoff to assign me the hardest part. It's not that I don't want to read the play--fuck, I love attention. It's just that I'm stoned and don't want to have to focus on this gay-ass shit.
"I ain't readin'," I say to my teacher.
"You are if you want to pass," he responds, showing his grading sheet to me.
Left with few options, I begin reading.
"Oh," I read in a monotone. "I but thus prolonged my words, boasting these idle attributes, because as I approach the core of my heart's grief--but to my task..."
God damn, I think to myself. This shit really sucks.
"...I have not named to thee father or mother, mistress, friend, or being, with whom I wore the chain of human ties; if I had such, they seem'd not such to me--yet there was one--"
"Spare not thyself!" Mary reads in an annoying Fran Drescher voice.
"You're not gonna read it like that, are you?" I interrupt.
The class laughs. "Sam," the teacher says. "Stay in character."
"Spare not thyself!" Mary reads over again. "Proceed."
I take a deep breath and begin making my way through the next line, which looks like a big one.
"She was like me in lineaments--her eyes, her hair, her features, all, to the very tone even of her voice, they said were like...mine..."
Something snaps in my head. My face reddens.
"Continue," says the teacher after a short pause.
"Like mine," I say in a gruffer voice. "But soften'd all, and temper'd into beauty; she had the same lone thoughts and wanderings, the quest of hidden knowledge, and a mind to comprehend the universe: nor these alone, but with them gentler powers than mine, pity, and smiles, and tears..."
This shit is way too real. My voice is flemmy.
"...Which I had not; and tenderness--but that I had for her; humility--and that I never had. Her faults were mine--her virtues were her own..."
The next line eats into me.
"...I loved her...and destroy'd her."
I try to regain my composure as Mary reads as the witch, but her line is short.
"With thy hand?" she asks me.
"Not with my hand, but heart--which broke her heart--It gazed into mine...and withered. I have shed blood, but not hers--and yet her blood was shed--I saw--and could not staunch it."
Mary reads, "And for this--a being of the race thou dost despise, the order which thine own would rise above, mingling with us and ours, thou dost forego the gifts of our great knowledge, and shrink'st back to recreant mortality--Away!"
"Daughter of Air," I respond. "I tell thee, since that hour--but words are breath--look on me in my sleep, or watch my watchings--Come and sit by me! My solitude is solitude no more, but peopled with the Furies;--I have gnashed my teeth in darkness until returning morn, then cursed myself till sunset;--I have pray'd for madness as a blessing--'tis denied me. I have affronted death--but in war of elements the waters shrunk from me, and fatal things pass'd harmless..."
I force myself through, trying to remember that this is two-hundred-year-old fiction. It's not about me, damn it.
"The cold hand of all-pitiless demon held me back, back by a single hair, which would not break. In phantasy, imagination, all the affluence of my soul--which one day was a Croesus in creation--I plunged deep, but like an ebbing wave, it dash'd me back into the gulf of unfathom'd thought. I plunged amidst mankind--forgetfulness I sought in all, save where 'tis found and that I have to learn--my sciences, my long-pursued super-human art, is mortal here--I dwell in despair...And live--and...live for ever."
With that, I storm out of the classroom. I hear a few applause, but most people see the tears in my eyes.
That's how I know there's a God; I feel Him spitting on me.
User Reviews
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2007-04-12 15:47:38 EDT (#)
Ranking: -2
Submitted by mybrainisawaffle (user info) at 2005-04-11 19:30:20 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Sam is back.
Submitted by Divinity (user info) at 2005-03-12 20:41:07 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by c1ndy (user info) at 2005-03-04 04:54:55 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
fantastic!
Submitted by dudaculb (user info) at 2005-03-03 22:23:53 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Man, really good
Submitted by NoahsArk (user info) at 2005-03-03 19:51:25 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
nice
Submitted by boneface (user info) at 2005-03-03 19:07:40 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by zakalwe (user info) at 2005-03-03 18:49:02 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
but this was brilliant. times like these i love your characterisation. sam is like a person now.
Submitted by zakalwe (user info) at 2005-03-03 18:44:47 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
phlegmy
Submitted by JonnyX (user info) at 2005-03-03 18:32:37 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This is actually pretty good...are you feeling okay?
Submitted by Holz (user info) at 2005-03-03 09:38:11 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
better
Submitted by Jeanneee (user info) at 2005-03-03 08:29:34 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Ed_0150 (user info) at 2005-03-03 05:58:51 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Falconer (user info) at 2005-03-03 02:43:07 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by MrWillard (user info) at 2005-03-03 02:14:26 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
That is the expected level of writing. Good show.
Submitted by JohosaPhaTZ (user info) at 2005-03-02 22:00:27 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
You should have tied that Asian bitch up. Good reading that'd have been.
Submitted by Chinaski (user info) at 2005-03-02 19:56:20 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
Pretty tame.
Submitted by olivia_tremor_control (user info) at 2005-03-02 19:50:34 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Kazzerax (user info) at 2005-03-02 19:35:48 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
This is for the post.
Submitted by Kazzerax (user info) at 2005-03-02 19:33:23 EST (#)
Ranking: 2
1ST AGAIN