The Truth by Stanislaw Lem
You can read the newly translated story here. The very fifth post of this blog, made in 2009 was about the death of Stanislaw Lem, my favorite science fiction author.
I've always felt bitter more people didn't recognize his work. I'm not sure why he's suddenly getting all this publicity. I've seen three articles discussing his legacy the last several weeks and now we're getting a newly translated short story.
This story is a standard trope in Lem's fiction but I think the punchline is spoiled by the synopsis found at the top of the page. If you trust me when I say its good and have the patience to read a 9000 word short story, skip over the synopsis, scroll past the picture, and just read it from the beginning (starting with "Here I sit").
American police
Minnesota police want people to carry their cards in a special bag so officers won't get scared and shoot them when they ask for their license. Wow, police work must be a pretty dangerous and violent job. Let's see some death statistics.
The grapes of wrath
Still upset that school ruined so many works of literature for me.
The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth.
There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate- died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.
John Steinbeck 1939
Ice cream recipe
I found the most delicious no-churn ice cream recipe. It's better than store bought ice cream. Just watch this video - he covers everything and has a recipe in the description.
My first batch, I just dumped in a small bag of peanut m&ms. I then tried peanut butter and pretzels, and just chocolate chunks. I've been using Kahlua as my liqueur. I've been thinking about trying pomegranate syrup or fruit.
The infrequently updated blog.