Monday, August 31, 2015

test


by anonymous

illustrated by konrad kraus





ali took a test.

he was given 26 books to read. each book was accompanied by a brief description of the author.

it was explained that 13 of the books were written by a male and 13 by a female. 13 had been written by a straight person and 13 by a gay person, and 13 by a trans person and 13 by a cis person.

it was further stated that the racial and national identities of the 26 authors were in an approximately correct proportion to those of the world’s population.

the testees were instructed to give an analysis of each book. no suggestions were given, and no length was specified.

the books were:

the tiger’s yawn , by sara ming

thunder at sunset, by ah chang

no lotuses for mr y, by edwina lee

the finishing line grows more distant, by a survivor

bulletproof blossoms, by wang mei

courtesy and contempt, by badri chopra

every person their own apocalypse, by rachana desai

the colonel is indisposed, by gregory mahto

nothing and nowhere, by babar

i am me and also you, by bettina jamali

the monkey’s earlobe, by farida kusuma

the ocean, by lelei sanchez

fat girl with grasshopper legs, by akane aoki

the fourth secret , by anna komroff

don’t go there, by valentina ospanov

the nonentity, by paul bartko

the candy volcano, by elio crespo

you did this to me by q qasimi

the prophet weeps at burger king, by aludra abdullah

a program for mister p, by john nakadama

white people are funny, by abioye

blank space, by melody bangojena

hitting the spot, by bethany fanshawe-st john

the obliterated, by tomas peron

the dog, by clara martinez

i just want mine back, by adam grady


the 26 books had all been produced by a single software program. the real test was for the testees to unqualifiedly identify this fact. and to do so on their own, as there was nothing in the test instructions suggesting that this might be so.

those who passed the test were admitted into a training program for the elite (a rigorous program, with only 8% of the trainees passing).

those who failed the test were returned to the general population.



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