Bug Farm

(originally posted 1/24/2021)

What if George Orwell had written Bug Farm?

“Six legs good, two legs bad” the insects would have said.

“Eight legs good, two legs bad” the arachnids would have said.

“Ten legs good, two legs bad” the solifugids would have said.

“Twenty four legs good, two legs bad” the centipedes would have said.

Which goes a long way in explaining why George wrote Animal Farm instead. Change something as simple as the number of legs on the characters and a beloved allegorical novella can quickly become an incoherent six/eight/ten/twenty four car pile up of a novel. There are hard and fast rules to follow when writing and if you stray from them even a little bad things are sure to follow for the reader.

So say the men who would have featured in both books anyway.

The same men who tell us that writers should avoid using the word suddenly and limit the number of exclamation points used.

(Did you know that an overwhelming majority of the major players in the publishing industry all graduated from the same half-dozen schools?)

But what if I want to live in a world filled with suddenly and exclamation points?

If I were a DJ at a radio station I would never play a Beatles song. Not under any circumstance. It’s not that I don’t think that they recorded some good songs, I will acknowledge they did, but there are just too many other stations playing them. You can hear a Beatles song any time you want.

There has to be outlets that play They Might Be Giants.

Songs bursting with suddenly and exclamation points.

Truth is, I enjoyed Animal Farm but I would have rather read Bug Farm. If you’re reading this now, perhaps you feel the same way.

Passion is all suddenly and exclamation points!!! ! !  !    !               ?

“Two legs good, four hundred legs better” the millipede would have said.