Story-Ventures into Unknown Terrirtory 52:70

Enchanted Typewriter Chapter Ten: Golf in Hades by John Kendrick Bangs (published in 1899).

Summary: Non Spoiler

• This is the Last Story in Ventures into Unknown Territory for 2012
  (God Willing We will Have more from this theme in 2013).
• Genre: Comic Fantasy
• Length: Six Pages
• Summary: Boswell tells the author about the game of golf in hell.  The story is a comic fantasy, that is sure to bring a smile to any cantankerous face.

What I learned about Writing

If you want to do a big concept keep it simple. Don't get bogged down in all of the details, which this author could have done, but just tell simple anecdotes that create the whole thing. Its almost like hearing a visitor at a club house talking to the regulars about what it is like at his home course.
Also think about what makes an event/sport good, and what makes it bad. What are the questions that people have that play this sport? How does one win this sport? Then have famous characters or people participate in the sport. What are the people/characters good and bad qualities? What would they do if they were playing the sport? This story was dated but could easily be updated by using recent personalities.

Characters in the Story

1. The Narrator
2. Jim Boswell
3. Apollyon
4. Medussa
5. Napolean
6. Deliliah
7. Napoleon Bonaparte
8. Diogenes
9. Solomon
10. Motaigne
11. Simple Simon
12. Mc Guffin
13. Stygians
14. Old Peter Stuyvesant
15. Colonel Bogey
16. Munchhausen
17. Xanthippe
18. Queen Elizabeth

    First Words

    
    "Jim," said I to Boswell one morning as the type-writer began to work, "perhaps you can enlighten me on a point concerning which a great many people have questioned me recently. Has golf taken hold of Hades yet? You referred to it some time ago, and I've been wondering ever since if it had become a fad with you."
    
    

    Favorite Quote

    
    Munchhausen, having received an imaginary challenge from an imaginary opponent accepted.  He went out to the links with an imaginary ball, an imaginary bagful of fanciful clubs, and licked the imaginary life out of the colonel.
    
    

    Last Words

    
    I can only hope that for one and all the future may hold as much of pleasure as the place of departed spirits has held for me.
    
    
    

    Where to Find this Story

    
    One can find this story online at the Classic Reader.
    
    

    How I Discoverd or Acquired this Story

    
    I was looking up information on Philip Jose Farmer and found the book The Enchanted Typewriter  mentioned on the Wikipedia page for Farmer.  I looked to see if the Enchanted Typewriter was public domain, and it was.  Then I looked at the titles of the individual stories, and Golf in Hades seemed like a good story to read, and that is how I found this story.