"Robert Rankin - Waiting for Godalming" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robert Rankin)

that is to meet the hero for our tale.
For the present, he is unaware that he is the hero. Indeed, by the
looks of him, he seems hardly cut from that cloth of which heroes
are tailored. He is slender, slightly stooped and sits with
downcast eyes, patiently awaiting his turn for a trim. He speaks
to no-one and no-one speaks to him. He is eighteen years of age
and his name is Icarus Smith.
It's a good name for a hero, Icarus Smith. Encompassing, as it
does, both the mythic and the mundane. But other than his
having a good name for a hero, what can there be said about the
man who bears this name?
Well.
If you were to approach young Mr Smith and ask that he
recommend himself, he would like as not ignore you. But if the
mood to communicate was upon him, as seldom it was without a
good cause, for he rarely spoke to anyone other than himself, he
would probably say that he considered himself to be an honest
God-fearing fellow, who meant harm to no man and called each
man his brother.
His brother by birth, however, might well choose to take issue
with this particular statement, letting it be known that in his
opinion, Icarus was nothing more than a thieving godless ne'er
do well.
But then that's brothers for you, isn't it? And Icarus, for his part,
considered his brother to be barking mad.
So can any man be truly judged by the opinions of others, no
matter how close to the man himself those others might be?
Surely not. By a man's deeds shall you know him, said the sage,
and by his deeds was Icarus known.
To most of the local constabulary.
He did not consider himself to be a thief. Anything but. Icarus
considered himself to be a "relocator". One who practised the
arts and sciences of relocation. And to him this was no
euphemism. This was a way of life and a mighty quest to boot.
To Icarus, the concept of "ownership" was mere illusion. How, he
argued, could any man truly "own" anything except the body that
clothed his consciousness?
Certainly you could acquire things and hold on to them for a
while and you could call this "ownership". But whatever you had,
you would ultimately lose. Things break. Things wear out. Things
go missing. You die and leave the things that you "owned" to
others, who in turn will "own" them for a while.
You could try like the very bejasus to "own" things, but you
never really truly would. And if you didn't hang on like the very
bejasus to the things that you thought you owned, then like as
not you wouldn't "own" them for very long.
For they would be relocated by Icarus Smith. Or if not relocated
by Icarus Smith, then simply stolen by some thieving godless
ne'er do well.
Now for the cynics out there, who might still be labouring under