A SHORT SHORT STORY
by Barry Gifford
Barry Gifford, author, poet, and screenwriter, has been called a master of the dark side of American reality. He is best known for a series of novels about two sex-driven, star-crossed protagonists on the road, and his Wild at Heart was adapted by director David Lynch for a movie of the same name. His most recent work includes The Cavalry Charges, a collection of essays, and a novel, Memories from a Sinking Ship. In 2006 Gifford was awarded the Christopher Isherwood Foundation Prize for Fiction.
ROY READ A STORY about a tribe of female warriors who interrupted the conflict between the Greeks and the Trojans in their quest for males to assist in the propagation of their race. These women called themselves Amazons and were led by Penthesilea, who, as had the rest of the tribe, severed her right breast in order to more swiftly and easily draw back her bow. The most exciting part of the story, Roy thought, was the Amazon queen’s confrontation with the champion of the Greeks, Achilles, whose ferocity in battle attracted Penthesilea as no man ever had. For the first time she encountered a man she could consider her equal.
The idea of a tribe of brave, vicious, single-breasted women was almost beyond the comprehension of Roy’s eleven-year-old mind. He drew pictures of the Amazons as he imagined them, naked, tall, and lean, their long hair tied back with leather thongs.
Roy asked his grandfather if he’d ever read this story.
“Sure,” said Pops, “it’s in The Iliad, by Homer.”
“That’s right,” Roy said. “I kind of found it by accident on a table at the library. Do you think there really ever was a tribe of savage women like that?”
“I don’t think savage is the correct word for them, Roy. They knew what they were doing. The Amazons wanted to be independent of men, the problem being that they needed men to impregnate them in order to keep their race from dying out.”
“But they only wanted girls, right?”
Pops nodded.
“Then what did they do with boy babies?”
“Killed at birth,” Pops said. “Drowned them or slit their throats.”
“It’s just a story, though, isn’t it?” Roy asked. “Homer made it all up.”
“Yes,” said Pops, “but there’s a lot of truth to it. Even today many Chinese drown their female babies because they think they’re worth less than men.”
“But they need girls to keep China going.”
“They don’t drown all of ’em.”
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