Potential

Mulla Nasrudin was carrying home some liver which he had just bought. In the other hand he had a recipe for liver pie which a friend had given him.

Suddenly a buzzard swooped down and carried off the liver.

“You fool!” shouted Nasrudin, “the meat is all very well — but I still have the recipe!”

From “The Exploits of the Incomparable Mulla Nasrudin”, by Idries Shah

6 Comments

  1. I wonder if “buzzard” should be “hawk.” The latter swoop down, not the former, in American English, anyway.

    Jeffery Hodges

    * * *

    Posted December 6, 2011 at 2:39 pm | Permalink
  2. Malcolm says

    Well, it’s far too late to do anything about it now — so you’ll just have to try to imagine a swooping buzzard.

    Posted December 6, 2011 at 2:53 pm | Permalink
  3. JK says

    No Jeff. It was simply the lack of a hyphen.

    “Swooped-down and carried off the liver…”

    The hawk dives, being relatively small, especially targeting. The buzzard on the other hand, relatively large, would naturally go for the scrap.

    Posted December 7, 2011 at 1:54 am | Permalink
  4. swooped (verb): (esp. of a bird) Moved rapidly downward through the air.”

    “Swooped down” is redundant. The hyphen is a red herring.

    Posted December 7, 2011 at 12:25 pm | Permalink
  5. Malcolm says

    Poor Idries Shah… dead these 15 years and all of you piling on…

    Posted December 7, 2011 at 2:59 pm | Permalink
  6. Not me; I didn’t even know the guy. I was merely pointing out that “swooped” implies downward, and a hyphen has nothing to do with anything being discussed.

    Posted December 7, 2011 at 3:05 pm | Permalink

Post a Comment

Your email is never shared. Required fields are marked *

*
*