Hiro Protagonist

The Burning of the Books

When the Regime commanded that books with harmful
            knowledge
Should be publicly burned on all sides
Oxen were forced to drag cart loads of books
To the bonfires, a banished
Writer, one of the best, scanning the list of the
Burned, as shocked to find that his
Books had been passed over. He rushed to his desk
On wings of wrath, and wrote a letter to those in power.
Burn me! He wrote with flying pen, burn me. Haven't my
            books
Always reported the truth? And here you are
Treating me like a liar! I command you:
Burn me!

                        Bertolt Brecht
                        (Translated by John Willet)

From part of an email from my friend, Mvirion :

Well, it's hard to believe that it's possible, but I now have even more respect for H.P. Lovecraft. I found a bookstore in Tampa that specializes in rare Sci-Fi/Horror. I found a collection of Lovecraft's nonfiction writing amongst his other works. One of the items in this book is a letter to the editor which was published in Scientific American in approximately 1906. In this letter. Lovecraft lays out some valid arguments as to why he believes another planet exists beyond the orbit of Neptune. He proceeds to chide the scientific establishment of the day for not devoting more resources to searching for this planet. Of course, Pluto wasn't discovered until 1930. The book was $40. I will undoubtedly go back and buy it. The only reason I didn't purchase it was that I was already spending $40 to buy a book containing all of Lovecraft's poetry. The book contains many different kinds of poetry. I found the following poem to be very witty. I thought I would share it with you.


"The Decline and Fall of a Man of the World"

Young Damon was a model son,
With wit and art aglow
Till he partook in curious fun
of C₂ H_{6 O}

His active senses, quickly pleas'd,
As speedily were cloy'd;
And soon, that they might more be eas'd,
He try'd an alkaloid.

C₁₀ H₁₄ and N₂
The stripling first inhal'd,
But outrag'd Natures takes her due,
and worse desires prevail'd.

C₁₇ H₁₉ N
O₃ + H₂ O
The hapless youth took now and then,
And knew De Quincey's woe.

But still his tortur'd brain-cells whirl'd
With cosmic retribution,
So one dark night he quit this world
With KCN solution!

--H.P. Lovecraft

The identities of the compounds, in the order in which they were mentioned,
in the poem are as follows:

Alcohol (Ethanol)
Nicotine
Morphine
Cyanide