I Was a Teenage Were-Woolf
Published January 29, 2008
One Comment (at bottom of article)
By Alex Townsend
I write these words with shaking hands. I don’t know what has happened to me or what is going to happen next, but I thought that someone should know my story. Have you ever had reason to fear a syllabus? To look at what’s coming and feel shivers? It can come from a term paper, or finding out that a huge project is due soon, or even (if there are ladies present it might be a good time for them to leave the room) reading an author who’s known for being really, well, tough.
We’ve all had to deal with them, with mixed levels of frustrating authors: Melville, Chaucer, Seuss. Recently though, I have had to deal with a new horror: Virginia Woolf. Many of my friends had warned me about the Woolf, but there she lay upon the accursed syllabus. My doom was sealed. One dark night I picked up A Room of One’s Own and it was then that the Woolf struck, tearing into me like so many really annoying paper cuts.
Ever since then I haven’t been the same. I’m changing somehow, becoming more…like a heron dancing upon a still lake surface. I feel ripples coursing through me. Perhaps one day I shall be contented enough to lie upon the sand…No! Stop it! I just mean that I feel weird, alright? Maybe I just need some rest…but how can a mind rest that has been so twisted by the sinister sinews of the world? If only one could see the ocean, with the salt riding openly, no longer part of a never-ending lie…
It’s happening again! I’ve been infected! I’m starting to become her!
Who could have known that a book could be so destructive? I’m sending this out now as a warning to you all. Beware! The Woolf is among us! But don’t think that she’s the only one you have to worry about. After a bit of totally legitimate research on the internet (that great consortium of tubes, made for living lives or creating those that never were) I saw that there are numerous English class-induced curses waiting to plague you.
The Faulkner Pestilence: Suddenly you feel the need to describe everything in disturbing, obscure ways. So obscure in fact that it’s like you’re describing something completely different. That’s okay though. It’s symbolic.
Affliction of the Shakespeare: Watch out for spontaneous “thous” and “verilys” and the occasional soliloquy, but it’s even more important that you learn patience. Trust me, your wife will wake up if you just give her a few more minutes.
Austen’s Decorum-less Disorder: You will be dull, very, very dull. Also, you will have an incredible urge to meddle in everyone’s love lives, but at least it will all be done with extreme respect for propriety.
Tolstoy Terror: One day you will start talking and you will never ever stop.
As I sit here at my desk, in a room that is barely furnished (as indeed few rooms are these days) I can’t help but wonder what effect my words will have on those who read them. Perhaps they will simply go unremarked upon, forgotten as swiftly as yesterday’s breakfast. Or maybe my warning shall be justly heeded marking a new, though doubtful, hope for…
Oh, dear God.
Run! It’s too late for me. Save yourselves!
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One Response to “I Was a Teenage Were-Woolf”
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I wonder if you’ll get this. I wonder if you’ll like it… Well either way I’m writing this because I thoroughly enjoyed reading this woefully tragic essay. I’m sorry that the Woolf has gotten to you. I regretfully inform you that I, too, have taken ill before. However, my illness is now an obsession. I can’t help but read every book I come in contact with. Thank you for your words of hope though they are wasted on one such as myself.
Loved it,
Sarah
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