gardner memory

[john wells]

MASCARO at humnet.ucla.edu wrote:
> 
> Back in 1979 or 80 I saw Gardner at a SUNY writer's conference in Buffalo.
> All decked out in the Marlon Brando look w/ the short studded leather jacket
>  and the Attitude a'plenty.  I remember him constantly attended by bevies of comely
>  babes all looking like English majors trying hard to look worldly and sophisticated.
>   He swaggered through the conference to all intents disgusted with everything
>  he saw.  A pretty insufferable little guy, all in all, from the public persona at least.
>  Then he stepped to the mike and blew away about 800 people by reading
>  a short piece of *metafiction* (I don't remember him using the word, but I remebr
>  someone using it) about a deer liking a salt block in which someone has
>  embedded a razor blade.  The deer licking, bleeding to death as it licks.
>  And the whole thing a parable of reading and writing.

It may've been a parable of reading and writing, but I heard long ago,
that was an Eskimo trick used to hunt wolves. The blades were frozen in
the ground or in ice, and then soaked with blood and meat scraps. The
wolf will not feel the razor very well, if it is shapened finely enough,
he'll also be licking over ice, and the fact that the cut is in his
mouth will make it almost impossible to heal, and the hunter will just
follow him until he's weakened enough to be safely taken.

Whether either of these stories are true, I don't think the razor blade
trick in the salt lick would work. While a very finely sharpened razor
blade might be difficult to feel, the salt in the wound would, without a
doubt, be intensely painful, and no animal with a tongue would continue
to lick salt with a cut tongue. Licking it imbedded in ice would be more
likely. 

>  A fantastic moment.  Earned my deep respect, despite the twitty
>  critical opinions (but clearly, if you can walk the walk you can talk
> the talk and I think this was his attitude).  Does anyone know if he
>  ever published this --I don't know what to call it--not really a
>  short story--vignette? Tableau?
> 
I too, would be interested in this story of Gardner's if it's ever been
published.

john