| Wooden Circus Lindsay Kaplan |
| There was a time when the great novel of the 21st century had not yet been written. Before such a novel even existed, the literary world was in a complete and utter downhill spiral. This was before a book was printed in 37 languages and sold world wide in only a thick hardcover edition with tall green letters on it, before it became required reading for post-pubescent philosophers and before the author himself would become a historical hero. Wallace Pikul refers to the novel as, "The finest piece of art a pathological madman could create." In regards to its author, he says "Killbride is part genius, part god." This was a blatant lie. Pikul had, after all, delivered his eulogy and had paid careful attention to and duly noted his friend's mortality. It began with a child being born and ended with an old man dying. In between was a war, a wedding and the fall of western civilization. You, however, are not beginning the great novel of the 21st century, you are reading about a genius. No, no. Forgive me. You are beginning the truth behind a big, fat man who thinks he is a failure; a man who sits down one fateful night and has a spectacular episode of genius. He is not a loving character. Readers prefer a flawless Tom Cruise, a George Clooney, not an overweight, pock marked, greasy haired slob. But his work was the product of perfection. His work was manufactured by the coming together of the forces in his head, a magnification of something spectacular caused by a sudden increase of a certain hormone in his pituitary gland. People called him crazy, maniacal and distraught. And maybe he was. Somehow, somewhere in a recessed alcove of his brain, the trapeze artists was king, socks were considered heresy and... Look: He was not a stupid man, but he was certainly not a genius. = Genius doesn't occur often anymore. The more mankind tickles the threads of time and space, the less freak ripples of the bizarre come to surface. Henry Killbride was certainly the last of the bizarre. The book was called "Wooden Circus." Henry Killbride didn't know this yet. He sat in a folding chair next to his desk in his studio apartment in Poughkeepsie, idly drawing pictures of light bulbs that were reminiscent of women's breasts. It was his thirtieth birthday. Poughkeepsie was the closest city outside of New York City he could afford to live in. It was just two hours away by train. Outside, a black and blue storm was stirring the winds that made the trees flop awkwardly beside his window. His hand was covered in smudged ink and he cursed the gods that he, like roughly twelve percent of the population, was born left handed. Lewis Carroll was a natural lefty, but Lewis Carroll was also a natural pedophile. Actually, Henry was born right handed, but converted at four when he broke his right hand in a freak elephant accident. This was all unbeknownst to him, of course, who had only marked the occasion in his memory with images of a cast scrawled over with an aquamarine felt tip pen. His mother, Angela, had weaned him off his endless crying with ice cream. Henry weighed 65 pounds at the age of five and would remain just under what Angela called "husky" for another forty years after. Angela had been a good mother to Henry, though most Killbride biographers would blame his mental instability on the fact that she was certifiably insane. The few who had known Angela before her son's descent into the public eye referred to her as a bit of a loon. And so what if she had gone off the deep end? She was a sweet, soft-spoken woman with heavily rouged cheeks and unnaturally thin lips that curled into a dimwitted smile. She never worked a day in her life, rather, spent her time painting sloppy water colors on the kitchen table with a child�s paint set. Angela painted the same scene over and over, hanging picture after picture of a blurry beach around the tiny house, though she had never been farther South than Delaware. Her hands were permanantly stained pale blue, her finger nails navy. She had married young and given birth to Henry on her twenty-third birthday. She became a drunk by twenty-seven and was dead at forty-one. Henry rose to go wash his hands and bumped his head on the light bulb above him. An idea flashed through his him so quickly he got winded and had to sit back down, dirty hands and all. Outside, the wind howled like a wounded animal. Henry grabbed his pen and filled seventeen unruled marble composition books with the scribble that would later be called the great American novel of the 21st century. Genius flashed through him for three hours. He was slapped, backhanded, across the cheek by it. The brilliance magnified his pores and cause his pupils to dilate. His mind quivered and quaked in its gray matter while folds of brain tissue spooned. Currents of genius pulsed under his skin, forcing the loose flesh on his forehead to twitch. When he was finished, he clutched a roll of duct tape that served as a paperweight and stared passively out his window. There was a sudden calm in the storm as the wind�s moans began to fade. Outside, a tree collapsed hastily. = Literary scholars have always enjoyed the historical context of Henry's name. King Henry VIII was a famous Brit who selfishly divided the Church of England from the Roman Catholic Church for the sake of his own libido. He also had a habit of offing his unfortunate brides. He annulled his first marriage to his brother�s widow, Catherine of Aragon, after a few spotty years and six children, only one whom made it past childhood still kicking. He then turned his attention to the stunning, six-fingered maid of honor at court, Anne Boleyn. She bore him a daughter before he ordered her to be beheaded for sleeping around with members of the royal court. His third wife, Jane Seymour, died shortly after a messy childbirth. As soon as grass sprouted upon Jane�s grave, he married Anne of Cleves, a German princess, upon the urging of his well esteemed prime minister. His trusty prime minister was later executed and Anne was quickly divorced. Catherine Howard was soon wedded, bedded and beheaded after a shoddy conviction of adultery. Although Henry's sixth and last wife, Catherine Parr, outlived him, King Henry VIII had driven most of his wives to death before he himself succumbed to his own deep sleep. Henry Killbride would later confess to killing his bride too, but not until after his break down. |
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