"Raymond F. Nelson - Then Beggar's Could Ride" - читать интересную книгу автора (Nelson Raymond F)

the groaning smorgasbord of leftovers habitually discarded by the
American restaurant goer, as I sunned myself on the campus of the
University of California and discussed philosophy with students and an
occasional professor, was I a beggar? No. I never asked for money. Indeed,
that summer (for this life lasted only a few months) I neither accepted nor
spent one single penny. Was I a bum? Was I a hobo, a beatnik, a hippie?
(This was before Herb Caen coined the word "beatnik," back when a
"hippie" was a sharp-dressing Black.)

I was none of these things.

Thanks to my omnipotent imagination, I was on Monday a monk, on
Tuesday a troubadour, on Wednesday (having found the stump of a pencil
and some discarded leaflets) a great artist, on Thursday a secret agent, on
Friday a Zen Master, on Saturday a peripatetic philosopher, and on
Sunday the Emperor of the World traveling incognito. Or I could be an
explorerтАж I did indeed explore the East Bay on foot, from East Oakland to
the wilds of darkest Richmond. A composer, a dancer, a poet, a
psychoanalyst, a naturalist, a swimmer, a runner, a clown; all these things
I could be. I had but to imagine it, and it was so. And, as the occasion
demanded, I was also a free babysitter, a free furniture mover, interior
decorator, dishwasher, house-husband (briefly), cook.

I knew a girl at that time, a student at Cal. She was

(A) in love with me,

(B) trying to reform me,

(C) both of the above
 (D) or none of the above.

One day she asked me, "What if everyone acted like you?"

That is the seed of this book!

What if we lived in a world of make-believe, designed to the
specifications of our fantasy, planned in our daydreams, molded to our
heart's desire? What if we designed this world so you could live in any
historical era, in any known place, or in times and places that never were,
but only were imagined?

Could such a world be made possible? Could it be practical, stable,
functional? Of courseтАж in the imagination.

But let's make the question harder.

Could it be possible on a budget? In reality'?

Could it be possible with no technological breakthroughs, with no