This short story is an entry in the 2001 Soc.Sexuality.Spanking Summer Short Story Contest and is copyright by the author and commercial use is prohibited without permission. Personal/private copies are permitted only if complete including the copyright notice. The author would appreciate your comments
Category:
The Deeper Meaning
By
Dr. Simpson <dr_simpson@ix.netcom.com>
Tim Farquart
English 201
2nd Period Book Report on Summer Reading
September 10, 2051
My favorite book that I read this summer was Caught Smoking by Michael J. Simpson, which was written 50 years ago, in 2001. I chose this story for my report because in my opinion it is the best example in English literature of allegory and symbolism.
Caught Smoking is superficially about Jennifer and Chris, two 13-year old kids who are caught smoking in the woods behind their middle school. The kids' parents and teachers are shocked because Jenny and Chris have always been model students. In spite of their unblemished records, Parkland Heights Middle School has a "zero-tolerance" policy about smoking, so the kids have to be punished anyway. They are given a choice: suspension or a public, bare bottom spanking during an assembly. Jenny and Chris choose suspension, but their parents insist on the spanking because unlike suspensions, spankings don't go down on their permanent records. So a spanking is what Jenny and Chris get.
The spanking, which is administered by the principal using birch switches cut from trees in the woods, is described in great detail by the author, and consumes one hundred and forty pages. Not only are they spanked, but Jenny and Chris also have to perform community service on the weekends by picking up cigarette butts from the side of the highway. If they don't work fast enough, the guard makes them bend over and whips them on their bare bottoms with a switch in front of all the passing motorists.
Literary critics dismissed this story as "preposterous"1, "patently offensive,"2, "overly graphic,"3, and "obscene."4 The author was arrested in Ohio for pandering, and spent the rest of his life in jail where he was not allowed to write anything anymore.
But in my opinion the critics missed the point.
I think there is little doubt that the story has a deeper meaning. (Otherwise I would not have read it.) The woods are symbolic of the Garden of Eden, and the kids are like Adam and Eve, two innocent people who lived an ideal existence in Paradise until things went wrong. Jennifer's ugly and wicked stepsister Karla is the one who got Jenny hooked on cigarettes, hoping that she would get caught. So cigarettes are like the apple and Karla is like the snake.
The principal is symbolic of God. He casts the kids out of the Garden and sees to it that they know shame for the first time by spanking them in front of the whole school. Doing hard labor by picking up cigarette butts from the highway is symbolic of the miserable life of toil Adam and Eve had to live after they were expelled.
In conclusion, I think this is a great book. The only better allegory, maybe, is Moby Dick, but I didn't have time to finish that one before school started.
The End
© Copyright Summer, 2001
Reviews
Pam <PamiMac(at)aol(dot)com>
An interesting story. Dr Simpson had a unique way of writing a story this time. I find that the author of the book report is a bit pompas as is the way with many HS students who think they are smarter and more worldly than they are. I loved that. Good one.
Michele <mcasson(at)telus(dot)com>
What a wicked, funny satire. It so aptly captures the voice of a student writing a paper for an English literature class, and the ways in which students are taught to analyze stories.
But, closer to home, Dr. Simpson proves himself willing to make gentle fun of his own (very very minor, indeed) interest in spanking. Lines like this had me giggling: «The spanking, which is administered by the principal using birch switches cut from trees in the woods, is described in great detail by the author, and consumes one hundred and forty pages.»
And the fun doesn't end there. The author also skewers attitudes toward pornography. There's lots of good stuff going on in this story.
Proof-reading this review, I realize that it sounds a lot like the very writing style that the good doctor is parodying. He'll probably get a good laugh out of that <g>.