Thursday, 21 July 2016

Mykalus Kane on Agathocles of Syracuse

Alright, I'm Mykalus Kane and I was down the Fountain of Arethusa battlecruiser a few weeks ago and I bumped into a geezer I know called Timaeus who wrote quite a lot about Callisthenes and Demosthenes and some other notable people. On this occasion he was fuming about something he'd read in the Syracuse Bee. A pony newspaper if there ever was one. I much prefer the Neapolitan Gnat. Some people ain't that keen on Timaeus, saying he has a sort of uneducated style and favours a sensationalist approach to history. He reckons Homer was a greedy basket because he always mentions banquets in his epic poems! Some say Timaeus is a bit of a cop out for spending bullseye years in a library in Athens and never experienced the school of hard knocks. They say he writes with his ray mears and not his mince pies! Whatever. It doesn't bother me as I think he's a good bloke to have a few sherbert dips with.

I said "what's got your goat Timmo?"
Timaeus, slightly red-faced, sipped on a pot of wine and then spat at the offending newspaper. "That fucking journo Polybius - the berk who thought the source of a fountain in Sicily originates in fucking Greece! He's really licking the Aristotle of King Agathocles in his obituary. Everyone including fucking Will's mother knows Agathocles left a good apprenticeship potter's job to become a prostitute on the streets of Syracuse. From potter to tart!"
I said "was it true he was doing striptease for the mayor of Syracuse?"
Timaeus said "Yeah, all part of his big game plan, mate. He was hung like a donkey. The proverb goes 'is that a new column on the Temple of Athena? No it's Agathocles' haha. Contrary to what Polybius says, he used his big knob to work his way up through the bedrooms of Syracusan society until he eventually became King and master of all Sicily."
I said "Masturbator of Sicily more like"
Timaeus said "Fuck me, haha, but Polybius has him down as some sort of straight-laced figure who never so much as had a quick hand-shandy round the haystack."
I said "Yeah I heard he shuffled over the Daily Spartan a lot when he was a potter! Got caught by the foreman on a few occasions. Hahaha"
Timaeus wasn't gonna relent "some of the stories that emanated from the back street brothels of Syracuse would make old Botrys the pornographer frown with disgust. There was a rumour about an ostrich involved on one occasion"
I said "Hahaha was he mates with Roddus Hullius? Agathocles scared the shit out of the Carthaginians though. I'll give him that. The slag kicked the fuckers out of Sicily"
Timaeus corrected "His army did. Not him! He was back home in Syracuse riding the Assistant Keeper of the Temple of Athena's daughter. Slag ain't the word, Mykalus. He was a jackdaw and a buzzard!"
"Cor, fuck me, that's bad!" I said
Timaeus said "He would face in any direction on request."
I said "a jack of all trades"
Timaeus said "master of none except whoring. I don't know how his trouble n' strife put up with it all the time"
I said "Yeah as Queen she must've been in two woodbines. I mean, he'd brought her amazing luxuries and god knows how many cassettes but she knew what he was up to behind the scenes. She probably had her lovers to compensate. Who knows"
Timaeus spat again "She obviously fell for him in the beginning - as we all know, he possessed some remarkable natural advantages."
"Biggest wanger in the land, haha" I said.
Timaeus said "Polybius ignores all the dirt and concentrates on his regal side and all the pomp and ceremony and all the virtues he possessed that enabled him to become king. He was a sly bastard with a big cock mate! Simple as that. Anyway fuck him, Mykalus, me old mucker, did I tell you some bloke had invented a mechanical snail? A mechanical snail that actually leaves a fake slime trail."

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