Portable Curiosities Read Online Free PDF Page B

still, the world has gone beyond the Prophecy , to a point of no return. It’s a headless beast that keeps on charging. I’m to blame for a future I sought to prevent.’
    â€˜Speaking of guilt,’ says the interviewer, ‘you’ve been on wanted lists all over the world. Tell us about that.’
    â€˜In the early years, assassins hoarded copies of the book. Those who lost the wars wanted to lynch me. They saw my pen as a bloodied sword, not the scalpel of a surgeon.’
    â€˜How then were you able to travel here?’
    â€˜I’ve been in hiding for many years. But when there’s a need to travel, I do so under false identities. The instability of my appearance is helpful in this respect.’
    â€˜How have you felt about your exile from Australia, in particular?’
    The satirist shrugs.
    â€˜How does anyone feel in exile from their homeland? One never fully adjusts. One always yearns, forever adrift. I laugh at my country from afar so that I don’t have to weep for it.’
    â€˜If you could go back, would you?’
    â€˜Revisiting could be a mistake. I suspect that all that remains of the place is an intellectual black hole. Besides, as I grow older, I wonder if my exile isn’t merely geographical. When I think about it, I’ve been in exile my entire life. Always on the fringe, never at the centre.’
    â€˜Given the suffering that appears to be inherent in your line of work, why did you choose to fulfil that initial prediction at birth that you would become a satirist?’
    â€˜I wouldn’t say it was a choice.’
    â€˜Well then, when did you realise you were one?’
    The satirist falls silent. She looks out towards the back of the function room, searching the past.
    â€˜You know what?’ she says, finally. ‘The moment one stops crying and begins to laugh that hard, dark laugh is the moment a satirist is truly born. For some it takes an intimate betrayal, an unjust death, even a full-blown war. It’s always the idealist who falls furthest from the state of grace, the one whose pen turns from a long-stemmed rose into a polished blade.’
    The interviewer sighs. ‘And on that positive note,’ she says, ‘let me open the floor to questions.’
    The tweed man gets up from his seat.
    He strides over to a microphone in the aisle.
    He smiles.
    â€˜Your prophecy states that satire will end,’ he says. ‘That the last satirist, wanted by many, will surrender, marking the end of true civilisation. Do you consider yourself to be the last satirist?’
    â€˜I would hope not.’ The satirist’s cackle, low and hoarse, cuts through the room. ‘Although it’s quite possible that I no longer have a function in this society. That in a society beyond satire, my existence is entirely irrelevant. It’s possible I’m no longer considered such a threat.’
    â€˜To whom will the last satirist surrender?’ asks the interviewer. ‘The secret police?’
    â€˜It’s a puzzle yet to be solved. But if I were indeed the last satirist, and if an end really were approaching, wouldn’t it be curious if, out of the blue, after all these years in the wilderness, I received an anonymous invitation to a series called End Game, a private farce designed as a ruse to lure me out of hiding. Wouldn’t it be fascinating if someone with a unique sense of humour decided to arrange one last interview for me, to be given unwittingly to an audience of actors. Someone who enjoys elaborate schemes has brought me here. Someone who wants to tease me with the prospect of one last captive audience, who desperately needs to indulge in the thrill of the chase, to watch me wriggle in the trap. A hunter raising his rifle. A clear shot ringing through the air.’
    â€˜Why might one accept such an invitation? Could this be interpreted as surrender?’
    â€˜A satirist never surrenders: she only