A Curious Thing About Atrocity Stories Is

Breaking With Old Friends Is One Of The Most Painful Of The Changes In All That Piling Up Of A Multitude Of Small Distasteful Changes That Constitutes Growing Older.

When I Was A Kid I Used To Tell Myself The Moon Was A Silver Gong And If I Could Climb High Enough To Beat On It With Both Hands All My Wishes Would Come True.

Remember That It's Never A Crime In The Face Of Humanity And Enlightenment To Distribute The Works Of The Great Humanists Among The Merchants And Moneychangers Of This Godforsaken Country... You Better Slip Me The Dough.

It Has Been The Struggle Between Privileged Men Who Have Managed To Get Hold Of The Levers Of Power And The People In General Withtheir Vague And Changing Aspirations For Equality, For Justice, For Some Kind Of Gentler Brotherhood And Peace, Which Has Kept That Balance Of Forces We Call Our System Of Government In Equilibrium.

A Curious Thing About Atrocity Stories Is That They Mirror, Instead Of The Events They Purport To Describe, The Extent Of The Hatred Of The People That Tell Them. Still, You Can't Listen Unmoved To Tales Of Misery And Murder.