PR-217 Song of Alexander
Song of Alexander
Pleasure Readers
PR-217
Chris Davidson
$1.25
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Prologue
Once upon a time there lived a man; a man filled with such dreams and hopes that they inflamed him and drove him like the blacksmith’s bellows drive the flames before them and turn the metal bright, white-hot.
If you so wish, it is now possible to go to the great libraries and there, among the thousands of dusty scrolls, you may find many volumes dealing with this man.
These volumes tell of his great battles, and the tributes he exacted from his great empire.
In these volumes you may find the names and numbers of his countless captives, and the names of those he appointed as governors of his empire.
If you search long enough, peering relentlessly, you may also find records describing the number of breastplates and spears; the numbers of the arrows and extra bow-strings that his army carried into battle with them.
All of these things can be found by he who delves deeply enough, but—these things are only important to the historians and the professional soldiers. These things would interest only the most insidious statistician. What about the man?
What was this man made of?
What drove him?
Why did he succeed where every other man had failed?
What was the message given to him by the gods in The Oracle of Delphi?
What was the strange relationship between this man and Peter, the priest of the oracle, the poet of Thebes?
Why, when he burned the city of Thebes as he swept on to conquer the world, did he save only Peter’s villa?
There are many questions that have been asked, and many that have never been answered.
Who was this man?
Was he mortal or god?
How is it that he was allowed to speak against the gods and still live while all others had died at the very least blasphemy?
Who was this man?
He was Alexander, called the Great One. And he conquered the world in just a few, short years, and left behind his name and his greatness for all generations of man as a symbol of what utter devotion to a dream can achieve and what utter hopeless love cannot accomplish.
* * *
In the book, Sex and Society, Kenneth Walker and Peter Fletcher state: “In another human being, man or woman, we see our own living image; another person who possesses an equal right to life, who claims the freedom we claim to make choices and decisions and to take action. For this reason, we cannot without betraying ourselves treat other people as things existing for the satisfaction of our appetites, or to be used as instruments of our private purposes. By doing so we should deny the validity of our own claim to human consideration.” But Alexander the Great was not the type to settle for anything less than his goal—the world. And until this need was met, anything and anyone in his way was doomed… except Peter, his beloved Peter, whom all the world’s riches could not buy.
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