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Professor
Me and her (very brife)Literary
Career
Nabila
Idris
Professor
Me read somewhere that J K Rowling had been pondering about
the characters and plots of Harry Potter from her high school
days. The Prof (proud bearer of the Miss Lazy crown from
days of yore) didn't think highly of this unnecessary intellectual
exertion, until she chanced upon a report stating that Rowling
would be retiring with about 1 billion pounds. Aha! That
touched an artery somewhere in the Prof's cardiac organ.
Detailed discussion with her inner soul revealed that all
desires pointed to one direction and the Prof adopted the
Monetary Policy. The Policy revolved around the core theory
that exertion was permissible as long as it served some
pecuniary aims. The Prof therefore dared to indulge in a
feat of pondering. She thought that pondering about un-dreamt
of plots would not be difficult, if not outright easy which
goes to show just how weak her thinking prowess is, was
and will be.
Agatha
Christie had recommended for budding writers the excellent
practice of observing fellow human beings. The Prof tried
it. With dire results. Homo sapiens as a rule dislike being
stared at, and at times have been known to resort to violence
to discourage the rude habit. Though lucky enough to escape
without a physical black eye, both the mental ones assumed
the colour of a full-moon night, minus the moon. In spite
of this setback, the Prof had enough presence of mind to
categorise her victims, and put it all down in lucid terms,
in her highly scientific research paper titled Humans. An
extract from that informative thesis will no doubt interest
the readers.
1.
Baffled Beings: Majority of the population are classified
under this head. Upon noticing my eyes riveted on them,
they carefully scrutinised their attire, and patted their
hair to make sure it was in place harbouring the mistaken
notion that something was very wrong with them. Finding
nothing out of the ordinary, they glanced again at my gawking
self. They became totally convinced of the wrongness of
the elusive something and invariably departed for the washroom
to make use of mirrors.
2.
Indignant Individuals: Faced with my bulging eyes, they
did not spare their apparel even one furtive peek. On the
contrary, they tried to fob me off with contemptuous glances.
Seeing, that that tactic had no visible effect, they sniffed
and either went away or turned their backs to me. It should
be noted, that this is the group responsible for the mental
black eyes mentioned earlier.
3.
Equal Elites: This brave group would not be outdone by my
rudeness; they had their own adequate share of it. And we
spent many happy hours, staring straight at each other,
until one of us remembered a fictitious appointment.
4.
Flattered Few: Mainly composed of simpering Misses or (allegedly)
macho hunks, this group appeared to take my staring as a
form of compliment. They very carefully avoided looking
at me directly, and proceeded to observe me out of the corners
of their eyes. And in a trice, they had me fall victim to
the confusion displayed by Group 1, and thus hastened my
departure ...
Prof
Me gave up the observing habit. Well, duh! She now resorted
to imagination, a move criticised by many, since and I quote
a critic here “the lack of grey matter would undoubtedly
prove to be a substantial snag in the proper functioning
of imagination” . While acknowledging this as a speed-breaker,
the fearless Prof valiantly vowed to carry on nevertheless.
You see, the future financial gains were an incentive impossible
to ignore. But as we shall presently see, imagination was
also to no avail. Some examples of her plots, characters
and catches will clearly illustrate the difficulty.
However,
before proceeding further, it would be wise to clear up
a few points. The Prof is a staunch supporter of the proven
Theory of Plagiarism, which states: Given that plots are
a finite resource, and consumers needs infinite, it is an
accepted procedure to recycle them by taking the salient
features of an age old plot, and casting them in a slightly-similar/very-similar/identical
setting. Application of this is seen in Plot no. 1. The
other source Prof Me turns to for plots is the newspapers:
contemporary international politics (Plot no. 2).
Plot
no. 1. Romeo-Juliet & Leonardo-Kate scenario. In the
words of Jerome K. Jerome, “there was a lass, and there
came
a lad”. The girl came from a family who were die-hard Brazilian
fans, and the boy came from a family who were die-hard Argentina
fans. They met in a stadium, during half-time. Love at first
smell she used Elizabeth Arden, he used Ralph Lauren. Later
they met at the balcony of the hotel she was staying at. The
conversation contained sentences like:
“With love's light wings did I o'erperch these water pipes”,
says boy. “If they do see thee, they will make thee
worship Ronaldo”, says girl, referring to her kinsmen.
“Alack, there lies more peril in thine eyes
than twenty of their Ronaldinhos”, says boy, skilfully tackling
Ronaldo.
Faced with numerous perils, they both decided
to escape to the USA, and boarded the HMS Gigantic. Fate
intervened, and the ship struck the tip of an iceberg. And
they slowly sank to their watery graves, with a heart-touching
rendition of 'My heart will beat on'.
Plot no. 2. Oil, Bush & Saddam Triangle.
Far more notorious than the Bermuda Triangle, this triangle
caused one of the bloodiest chapters of human history. Miss
Oil lived in Iraq. A delicately nurtured female, her value
could not be measured in USD. Everyone was interested in
obtaining her, but the main rivalry existed between Mr Bush
(bullying hooligan + homicidal maniac) and Mr Saddam (brainless
moron + jealous boyfriend). After an intense propaganda
war, Mr Bush resorted to active combat. Assisting him were
his henchmen Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell, Blair, Howard, Sharon,
Jose Maria and the lot. They overruled popular opinion,
and the word of law delivered by the UN (United Ninnies).
Mr Saddam held his own, for a considerable time, but disappointingly
toppled, statue and all. And Miss Oil became Mr Bush's property.
Then came the problem of cleaning up the mess created during
the hostilities. Mr Bush refused to, and started to invite
innocent spectators to clean the mess up. The book ends
on a questioning note will the bystanders be as dumb as
to collapse in front of Bush pressure or not?
Prof Me heaved a sigh of relief. Two passable
plots done. As you may have guessed by now, this only heralded
further trouble. Upon publication of these two, there was
mixed reaction. Plot no. 1 earned her a reputation as a
copy-cat. However much she denied this baseless allegation,
and pointed out the excellent Theory of Plagiarism to the
public, it was useless. They were not to be moved. Plot
no. 2 earned her a term at the inhumane Guantanamo Bay.
She is at present pending court martial, with a confirmed
death sentence as the verdict, unless she can somehow become
a British citizen. Her fate may then very well be altered
in this highly democratic world.
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