........................................................................................ - a weBlog by Snowy and me.

Tuesday 1 March 2016

Willie McGee and the Traveling Electric Chair

I first read the dystopian classic '1984'
when I was an uneducated teenager.
I have forgotten much of the book,
beyond how the prose style suggested
a life that was dusty, tired, and over-processed.

One scene that was not in the book
was the live broadcast of an execution,
the type of thing which inspires mass numbness
and a fearful and painful public indifference.
But inspired by the book such an event
became a powerful fantasy for me,
a fixation a could neither rid myself of
nor share which was part of me for years.

Now I know my fantasy actually happened
and not only was the execution broadcast live
on local radio 'because it is a news story',
but the method of the execution travelled
and was much used. Please listen about it here.  

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