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... The Sirens of Titan ….
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‘That’s a funny name for a book,’ I said with a gulp. ‘Are those women going to get arrested?’
Mr Peterson didn’t know what the hell I was talking about.
‘They’re not wearing many clothes,’ I pointed out.
‘What’s your point?’ he asked.
‘So I thought maybe the sirens might be for them.’
Mr Peterson frowned.
‘ I think the police are allowed to arrest you for wearing too few clothes,’ I explained.
Comprehension dawned on Mr Peterson’s face. ‘No, kid. Not sirens as in police sirens. Sirens as in Homer.’
I frowned. ‘Simpson?’
‘The Odyssey!’
I looked at him blankly. At some point in the last thirty seconds, we’d stopped speaking the same language.
Mr Peterson sighed and rubbed his wrinkled forehead. ‘The Odyssey’s a very old Greek story by a very old Greek man called Homer. And in The Odyssey there are these very beautiful women called sirens ……
‘oh’, I said. ‘So the women are the sirens? And that’s why they’re not wearing very many clothes?”
‘Right. Except in Kurt Vonnegut’s book the Sirens don’t live in the Mediterranean. They live on Titan, which is one of Saturn’s moons.’
‘Yes, I know that,’ I said. (I didn’t want Mr Peterson to think I was an idiot). ‘It’s the second largest moon in the solar system, after Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon. It’s actually larger than Mercury, though not nearly so dense.’
Mr Peter frowned again and shook his head. ‘I guess these days school puts a big emphasis on sciences instead of the arts, huh?’
‘No, not really. School puts a big emphasis on exam questions. Do sirens breathe methane?
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