"R. A. Lafferty - Stories 1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lafferty R A)

rolling on wheels. He put frogs in water glasses and left lighted
firecrackers on bridge tables. He reset wristwatches on wrists; and played
cruel tricks in mens' rooms, causing honest gentleman to wet themselves.
"I was always a boy at heart," said Charles Vincent.

Also during those first few days of the controlled new state, he
established himself materially, acquiring wealth by devious ways, and
opening bank accounts in various cities uuder various names, against a time
of possible need.
Nor did he ever feel any shame for the tricks that he played on
unaccelerated humanity. For the people, when he was in the state, were as
statues to him, hardly living, barely moving, unseeing, unhearing. And it is
no shame to show disrespect to such comical statues.
And also, and again because he was a boy at heart, he had fun with
the girls.
"I am one mass of black and blue marks," said Jenny one day. "My
lips are sore and my front teeth are loosened. I don't know what in the
world is the matter with me."
Yet he had not meant to bruise or harm her. He was rather fond of
her and he resolved to be much more careful. Yet it was fun, when he was in
the state and so invisible to her because of his speed, to kiss her here and
there in out-of-the-way places and show her other hallmarks of affection.
She made a nice statue and it was good sport. And there were others.

"You look suddenly older," said one of his co-workers one day. "Are
you taking care of yourself? Are you worried?"
"I am not," said Vincent. "I was never happier in my life."
But now there was time for so many things, in fact, everything.
There was no reason why he could not master anything in the world, when he
could take off for fifteen minutes and gain fifteen hours. Vincent was a
rapid but careful reader. He could now read from a hundred and twenty to two
hundred books in an evening and night; and he slept in an accelerated state
and could get a full night's sleep in eight minutes.
He first acquired a knowledge of the languages. A quite extensive
reading knowledge of a language can be acquired in three hundred hours of
world time, or three hundred minutes (five hours) of accelerated time. And
if one takes the tongues in order, from the most familiar to the most
remote, there is no real difficulty. He acquired fifty for a starter, and
could always add another any evening that he found he had a need for it.
And at the same time he began to assemble and consolidate knowledge.
Of literature, properly speaking, there are no more than ten thousand books
that are really worth reading and falling in love with. These were gone
through with high pleasure, and two or three thousand of them were important
enough to be reserved for future rereading.
History, however, is very uneven. It is necessary to read texts and
sources that for form are not worth reading. And the same with philosophy.
Mathematics and science, pure or physical, could not, of course, be covered
with the same speed. Yet, with time available, all could be mastered. There
is no concept ever expressed by any human mind that cannot be comprehended
by any other normal human mind, if time is available, and if it is taken in