Coincidance - Principia Discordia

32 COINCIDANCE
also knew how to do research; we signed a contract, and I went ahead
quickly producing a book of high erudition and (I think) some wit. It turned
out that this was not what was wanted. The erudition and the linguistic
history were exised, along with much of the wit, and in his hurry to turn my
work into a more commercial production, the editor in many sections
replaced correct grammar and syntax with the kind of pidgin English
generally encountered only in TV advertisements.
I was horrified, but 1 was also flat broke at the time, and Dell still had not
decided whether or not to publish llluminatus! Motivated entirely by
cowardice and panic, 1 allowed Forbidden Words to go out, under my name,
even though it was mostly at that point the editor's text, or the text he
thought a moron audience could understand. The book failed miserably,
and went out of print quickly. I have never mourned it, and I dread the day
when scholars rediscover it and begin blaming me for all that is wrong with it.
Meanwhile, somewhat reconstructed, here is a sample of what my very
first book contained. I have selected for republication my comments on the
most controversial endearment in the English language.
MOTHERFUCKER
Literally, a motherfucker is one who copulates with his mother, of course;
but the word is seldom intended literally. Being the most insulting obscenity
in American English, motherfucker has given birth to various timid,
euphemistic or quasi-humorous variations, such as motherjumper, motherferrier,
mo'fo', mammyjammer, futhermucker, the truncated adjective
mothering (as in "Where the hell is that mothering wrench?") and the
deaconic mother that has lately invaded middle-class speech—as when, in
the Billy Wilder film, The Apartment, jack Lemmon says to the bartender,
referring to a martini, "Give me another of those little mothers."
Motherfucker is usually thought to be of black origin, but some linguists
claim it appeared first among poor whites. It is used quite prominently in
many classic pieces of black folklore—for instance, the ballad of Stackerlee or
Stagolee, which has numerous variations and is known in almost every
black community. This epic contains the unforgettable boast:
I've got a tombstone disposition and a graveyard mind
I'm a bad motherfucker and 1 don't mind dyin
This is in the tradition of the boasts of the Homeric heroes, the Irish
orations of Finn Mac Cool, and the brags of Davy Crockett (who once