heard of it. Pfefferkorn often wondered if he ought to go back to shepherding fragile young women.
The story under discussion that morning centered on an old man nearing the end of his life. He was tending his garden, oblivious to how its flourishing mocked his own senescence. The old man then watched a film in which the growth of flowers was shown, sped up, so that they went from seedling to full bloom to wilting to dead, all in a matter of seconds. This sequence was described in minute detail. The story ended with a cryptic fragment of dialogue.
The author was a twenty-year-old boy named Benjamin who came to class dressed in a homburg. His grasp of the aging process was limited to lurid descriptions of the male body in decay, although Pfefferkorn did acknowledge that the young man wrote with impressive confidence about urogenital problems and arthritis. Still, in Pfefferkorn’s opinion, the story lacked emotional insight. Indeed, it made no attempt
whatsoever to penetrate the old man’s psyche at all. It was as if the author had laid the character on a slab and left him there. When Pfefferkorn attempted to raise this critique he met a blistering counterattack, not only from Benjamin but from a host of like-minded supporters. They argued that Pfefferkorn’s understanding of character was antiquated. They abhorred writers who overexplained. Pfefferkorn defended himself by citing avant-garde and postmodern writers whom he enjoyed, stating that even these seemingly stone-faced works had at their center a moist, beating core of humanity. “That is total bullshit,” Benjamin said. “We’re all robots,” a hard young woman named Gretchen said. Pfefferkorn asked her to explain what she meant by that. “I mean we’re all robots,” she said. Heads nodded. Pfefferkorn was confused. “You can’t all be robots,” he said, not knowing what argument he was making or why he was making it. These students did not speak the same language as he did. He was tired, too, having slept badly for several months running. His doctor had prescribed him a sedative, but so far it had proved ineffective, lulling him to the cusp of sleep but not beyond, so that he spent his waking hours in a fog. He saw himself through his students’ eyes and he saw weakness. “I am not a robot,” he repeated firmly. “How do you know?” Gretchen said. “Because I’m not,” Pfefferkorn said. “Yes,” she said, “but how do you know?” “I’m human,” Pfefferkorn said. “If you cut me, I bleed.” “If you cut me,” she said, “I bleed motor oil.” This was agreed upon by several of the students to be very funny. Pfefferkorn, feeling the beginnings of a migraine, was glad when the hour was up.
That evening he sat at his desk with two large piles in front of him. One was a long-neglected stack of mail. The other was made up of hundreds of stories his students had written over the years. He had always kept copies on the off chance that one of them became famous and the story turned out to be valuable. That was not his present purpose in browsing. Rather, he was trying to find something he could use. A recent Herculean effort had pushed the word count to one hundred ninety-eight, but he still hadn’t gotten past the second page. Perhaps somewhere in this yellowing tower of mediocrity was the key to kickstarting his creativity. He told himself he wouldn’t steal anything word for word. That wasn’t his style. All he needed was to get the juices flowing.
Four hours and two hundred pages later, he put his head in his hands. He was headed for the rocks.
He turned his attention to the mail. Most of it was junk. There were bills, many of them overdue. His agent had sent royalty statements, along with a few medium-sized checks—nothing to sneeze at, but nothing that would cover a large suburban house, either. A padded envelope contained paperbacks of the Zlabian edition of
Blood Eyes
, all but one of which he planned to get rid of. Already
The story under discussion that morning centered on an old man nearing the end of his life. He was tending his garden, oblivious to how its flourishing mocked his own senescence. The old man then watched a film in which the growth of flowers was shown, sped up, so that they went from seedling to full bloom to wilting to dead, all in a matter of seconds. This sequence was described in minute detail. The story ended with a cryptic fragment of dialogue.
The author was a twenty-year-old boy named Benjamin who came to class dressed in a homburg. His grasp of the aging process was limited to lurid descriptions of the male body in decay, although Pfefferkorn did acknowledge that the young man wrote with impressive confidence about urogenital problems and arthritis. Still, in Pfefferkorn’s opinion, the story lacked emotional insight. Indeed, it made no attempt
whatsoever to penetrate the old man’s psyche at all. It was as if the author had laid the character on a slab and left him there. When Pfefferkorn attempted to raise this critique he met a blistering counterattack, not only from Benjamin but from a host of like-minded supporters. They argued that Pfefferkorn’s understanding of character was antiquated. They abhorred writers who overexplained. Pfefferkorn defended himself by citing avant-garde and postmodern writers whom he enjoyed, stating that even these seemingly stone-faced works had at their center a moist, beating core of humanity. “That is total bullshit,” Benjamin said. “We’re all robots,” a hard young woman named Gretchen said. Pfefferkorn asked her to explain what she meant by that. “I mean we’re all robots,” she said. Heads nodded. Pfefferkorn was confused. “You can’t all be robots,” he said, not knowing what argument he was making or why he was making it. These students did not speak the same language as he did. He was tired, too, having slept badly for several months running. His doctor had prescribed him a sedative, but so far it had proved ineffective, lulling him to the cusp of sleep but not beyond, so that he spent his waking hours in a fog. He saw himself through his students’ eyes and he saw weakness. “I am not a robot,” he repeated firmly. “How do you know?” Gretchen said. “Because I’m not,” Pfefferkorn said. “Yes,” she said, “but how do you know?” “I’m human,” Pfefferkorn said. “If you cut me, I bleed.” “If you cut me,” she said, “I bleed motor oil.” This was agreed upon by several of the students to be very funny. Pfefferkorn, feeling the beginnings of a migraine, was glad when the hour was up.
That evening he sat at his desk with two large piles in front of him. One was a long-neglected stack of mail. The other was made up of hundreds of stories his students had written over the years. He had always kept copies on the off chance that one of them became famous and the story turned out to be valuable. That was not his present purpose in browsing. Rather, he was trying to find something he could use. A recent Herculean effort had pushed the word count to one hundred ninety-eight, but he still hadn’t gotten past the second page. Perhaps somewhere in this yellowing tower of mediocrity was the key to kickstarting his creativity. He told himself he wouldn’t steal anything word for word. That wasn’t his style. All he needed was to get the juices flowing.
Four hours and two hundred pages later, he put his head in his hands. He was headed for the rocks.
He turned his attention to the mail. Most of it was junk. There were bills, many of them overdue. His agent had sent royalty statements, along with a few medium-sized checks—nothing to sneeze at, but nothing that would cover a large suburban house, either. A padded envelope contained paperbacks of the Zlabian edition of
Blood Eyes
, all but one of which he planned to get rid of. Already
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