WEBVTT

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Let me read you another
short prose piece then.

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This is called Barabbas.

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It has nothing to do with
the biblical Barabbas.

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I don't know why I chose
that to be the character.

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I like the name.

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Anyway, it's about him.

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There was a man
named Barabbas, who

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had lived all his life
in one small village.

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And so he did not
amount to much.

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When the mayor's wife,
who affected an accent,

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spoke of traveling
beyond the mountains,

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Barabbas shrugged
politely and turned away.

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When the minister of education
passed around his latest

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postcard, Barabbas admired
the cobblestones at his feet

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and said he was late for supper.

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When the merchant's
secretary dreamily

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murmured the names
of distant cities,

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Barabbas looked into
his hat and fell asleep.

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Well, there are some people,
said the mayor's wife.

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Hopeless, said the
minister of education.

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Who, said the
merchant's secretary.

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So life in the village
went on, day after day.

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And at night, when darkness
lay upon the village,

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the mayor's wife loosened
her tongue upon the mayor

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and let her tears fall into
the valleys of her pillow.

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The minister of education
unbuttoned his vest and pasted

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stamps into a book that
grew heavier and heavier

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with the years.

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The merchant's secretary
came home from the cinema

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and entered the bitter
geography of her room.

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And Barabbas, after his
supper, would stroll out

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under the stars.

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Now, he would say, when I
was the king of Poland--

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that's an avant garde novel.

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