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Istvan Orkeny - One Minute Stories PDF
Istvan Orkeny - One Minute Stories PDF
orkeny
one
minute
stories
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Contents
handling instructions
harem
an act of kindness
memoirs of a puddle
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incident
tulip in crisis
honeymooners on flypaper
budapest
folklore
our sons
gli ungheresi
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handling
instructions
Despite their brevity, the stories in this
book have a certain amount of literary merit.
They also have the added advantage of saving
us time, since they do not require our attention
for weeks on end. While the soft-boiled egg is
boiling or the number you are dialing answers
(provided it is not engaged, of course) you
have ample time to read one of these short
stories which, because of their brevity, I have
come to think of as one minute stories. You
can read them whatever your mood, whether
you are sitting down or standing up, in fine
weather or foul. They make good reading even
on a crowded bus. Most can even be enjoyed
on a walk.
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life should be so
simple
1. remove fire extinguisher from bracket
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2. open valve
3. approach source of fire
4. extinguish fire
5. close valve
6. replace extinguisher on bracket
harem
V.P. had eight wives, but because he
never got married in the same part of town
twice or made a big fuss about it, he avoided
calling attention to himself and the fact that in
his humble suburban abode he was in fact
keeping a harem.
The thing came to light by chance when
one of his wives tried to scratch out the eyes of
the local policeman, who attempted to
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an act of kindness
Across from the head nurse’s room
there are some plastic chairs and next to the
chairs a white hospital scale. This is where I
generally sit after I get my shot to relieve a
stubborn cough. It takes me ten minutes to
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public opinion
survey
The Hungarian Public Opinion Re-
search Office has just conducted its first sur-
vey, the results of which have recently been
made public. The question asked was: How do
people see the past, present, and future of the
nation? In order to insure credible results, the
bureau sent out questionnaires to 2,975 cit-
izens of various social standings, ranks, profes-
sions and religious persuations.
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a) Marxism
b) anti-Marxism
c) science fiction
d) alcoholism.
one minute
biography
When I was born, I was such a beautiful
baby the doctor swept me up in his arms and
going from room to room, showed me off to
the entire hospital. I even smiled, they say,
which made the mothers of the other babies
sigh with envy.
This happened in 1912, shortly before
the outbreak of the First World War, and it
was my only uncontested success, I think.
From then on my life has been one of continual
decline. Not only did I lose much of my ex-
treme good looks, but some of my hair and a
few of my teeth as well. What’s more, I haven't
been able to live up to what the world has ex-
pected of me.
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a number of
variations on the
theme of
self-realization
Why deny it. As a child I had the usual
foolish dreams. For instance, I wanted to be a
pilot, an engine driver, or failing that, an en-
gine. Sometimes I even fantasized that when I
grew up I’d become the Vienna Express.
A distant relative, the titular abbot Dr.
Kniza, a highly educated and sober-minded
gentleman, tried to talk me into becoming a
pebble. To tell the truth, the finality, the
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in memoriam dr.
H.G.K.
"Hölderlin ist ihnen unbekannt?" Dr. H.G.K.
asked as he dug the pit for the horse’s carcass.
"Who is that?" the German guard growled.
"The author of Hyperion," said Dr. H.G.K.,
who had a positive passion for explanations.
"The greatest figure of German Romanticism.
How about Heine?" he tried again.
"Who're them guys?" the guard growled,
louder than before.
"Poets," Dr. H.G.K. said. "But Schiller. Surely
you have heard of Schiller?"
"That goes without saying," the German guard
nodded.
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the grotesque (a
practical approach)
Stand with your legs apart. Bend for-
ward all the way. Look back between your legs.
Thank you.
Now look around you and take stock of
what you see. The world has been stood on its
head. The gentlemen's feet beat about in the
air while the ladies, she how they grab for their
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memoirs of a
puddle
On March 22, 1972, it rained all day,
and I found myself comfortably settled in front
of the house at Dráva utca 7, in Budapest’s
13th district, where there’s a dent in the side-
walk. People kept stepping in me, then cursing
and berating me over their shoulder, calling
me names I blush to repeat. I was a puddle for
two whole days, but never once did I bristle at
the insults.
Then as we know, on the 24th of the
month the sun came out from behind the
clouds. Oh, how paradoxical is life, to have to
dry up just as the weather brightens!
What else can I say? Did I live up to ex-
pectations? Did I fail to do so? Should I have
behaved differently in the dent in front of
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message found
afloat in a bottle
(fished out of the pacific ocean)
“Here, at latitude 17 south, longitude
151 west, from approximately the height of the
Otahiti Islands, amidst highly unfavorable
weather conditions, in the thick of night, in
whipping winds, torrential rain, tossed about
by horrendous waves, after the other Hungari-
ans, noble sailors to the last man, have gone
under, I realized quite by accident that if I
thrust my two arms forward and then pulled
them back as if I were rowing while I kick my
legs apart like leaping frogs, then, instead of
going under like the others and drowning, I
can keep myself afloat. My fellow countrymen
from Felsőpáhok! Could this be possible? Did
you know? And if you did, why didn’t you say
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so much to keep in
mind
Valid for travel within two prepaid
zones within one hour of initial embarkation
with a maximum of four transfers on the
shortest route between your starting point and
final destination. Transfer is permitted only at
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incident
A paraffin cork that was just like any
other paraffin cork (he said his name was Alex-
ander G. Hirr, Jr., but what’s in a name?) fell
into the water. For some time it just bopped up
and down on the surface. But then a strange
thing happened. Gradually, almost impercept-
ibly, it began to sink until it reached the bot-
tom and was never heard from again. No ex-
planation for the baffling incident has ever
been offered.
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tulip in crisis
It came as quite a shock. It never com-
plained. It was in the best of health. Its bulb
had just yielded flowers for the seventh year in
a row. It stood in full bloom on the windowsill
of an elderly couple, both of whom were re-
tired teachers. The night before it had thor-
oughly fertilized its pistils, after which it had a
good night’s sleep. But at five in the morning –
flowers are notoriously early risers – it flung
itself down into the street from the fourth story
window.
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honeymooners on
flypaper
They made up their minds to stay home.
Why leave Budapest, the brand new husband
reasoned, when it’s such a spectacular city?
There’s the theater, the movies, concerts.
There’s so much to see. And so, they stayed,
and their honeymoon was spent in love and
contentment. Then around five-thirty one af-
ternoon, they got stuck on the flypaper
hanging from the ceiling lamp. What silly
nonsense!
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*
The husband: Do you love me, kitten?
The wife: What a question.
The husband: Well, then, come on.
The wife: Again?
The husband: Come-come-come-come-
come.
The wife: Oh, you little devil!
The husband: Come on, munchkins!
The wife: In a moment. My heel. I think it’s
stuck.
The husband: Well, kick off your shoes,
bunny. Just don’t keep me waiting.
The wife: You want to stay in again to-
night? They’re playing Tchaikovsky at the
Academy.
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Punch
Háború
Chocolate.
This is what our lives will be like. All we
have to do now is survive the next hundred-
and-fifty years as best we can.
budapest
A bus crashed into a tree on Calvin
Square, and soon after, every tram in the city
came to a stop. Everything stopped, even the
toy train in the window of the toy shop. Silence
everywhere. A little later there was a rasping
sound, but it was just a page from a newspaper
being swept along by a gust of wind. Then it
was flung against a wall, and the silence grew
profounder still.
Eight minutes after the atomic bomb
exploded the electricity failed and immediately
afterwards, the last gramophone recording
wound down over the radio. An hour later the
water taps gave off a slurping sound, and then
there was no more water. The boughs, too, be-
came as dry as a hot tin roof. The semaphore
gave the go-ahead, but the last express from
Vienna never made it to the station. By
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in memoriam dr.
h.g.k.
"Hölderlin ist ihnen unbekannt?"' Dr.
H.G.K. asked as he dug the pit for the horse’s
carcass.
"Who is that?" the German guard
growled.
"The author of Hyperion," said Dr.
H.G.K., who had a positive passion for explan-
ations. "The greatest figure of German Roman-
ticism. How about Heine?" he tried again.
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folklore
1. banter
A black limousine approaches from the direc-
tion of county headquarters. It comes to a halt.
A man in black gets out and walks over to the
pea fields.
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our sons
Many years ago there lived a poor old
widow, and this poor old widow had two hand-
some sons. One of them, the first-born,
entered service on a ship that headed straight
for the Pacific, but nobody knows what became
of him, because there’s no one left to tell us,
they all disappeared without a trace.
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gli ungheresi
Ice cream was originally invented by
Ugo Riccardo Salvatore Giulio Girolamo B., a
baker from Catania. The precise date is still an
object of debate, so let’s not worry about it; it
was more or less at the same time as the inven-
tion of the printing press.
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