Holla! How in the foresooth have we been so misguided?

I just finished reading a mystery novel in which the protagonist's less suave, less attractive sidekick regularly (almost primarily in fact) quoted from Shakespeare's greater known plays. This incredibly distracting dialogue, however, wasn't even the worst of the literary degradation presented by the book's misguided author. Mais non, voici la piece de resistance: The book was actually entitled with a Shakespeare quote, which at the height of the climax, the protagonist shouted aloud, so as to remind the reader (had she forgotten the book's title) of what book she was reading. This is a shameless form of literary product placement. Not only is novelist incapable of crafting a story consisting of enough literary merit to deign an original title, but then out of fear of being forgotten, said novelist brandishes the unoriginal title in a move of unabashed product placement.
I would like to propose that this book is a manifestation the modern literary crisis. Authors of late have developed writing techniques that are as dastardly and disheartening as is their blatant accepted by the modern audience. Instead of embracing their inherently low position on the literary value scale, instead of thriving in their divine status on the entertainment value scale, authors unabashedly fling about the words of greater literati. This is a despicable appeal to postmodernity. It is the cry of "Help me, O Shakespeare, as I pilfer your words in an attempt to distract others from the shortcomings of my own linguistic prowess."
Second, I would like to critique scene endings. My critique is this: They are all identical. Every single scene cuts out upon a climactic moment. Every single scene. This lowers the act of reading a book to bear the same (lack of) intellectual caliber as watching reality television. Take for example, The Bachelor (ABC's Monday night 8 pm pride and joy). During the Bachelor, the TV network doesn't even try to disgusted the fact the they cut away to commercials on a heightened moments only because the show is so mediocre that this is the only way continued viewing can be ensured. Every singe scene will end on the reverberating note of drama, followed by an allergy medicine advertisement. The modern novel does the exact same thing, sans the interspersed medical advertisements. And for some sad reason, we accept mental abuse.
Were the scene endings not disheartening enough, add to them the exponential horror of sentences which predict the protagonist's future actions. The particular novel of which I write, is replete with lines like the following: "If only he knew how a few chilling hours later that evening he would come to regret those words." End scene. (This is created by me.It's not a direct quote). It's just despicable. That kind if line is an outright violation of the rights of the reader. How dare an author presume that we are such simpleminded readers that we aren't even capable of inferring and interpreting the future of the cookie cutter characters inside of a static plot.
Wurst of all wursts is the unbridled morality of the modern protagonist. In a Dumas novel, one expects and relishes in the moral greatness of D'Artagnan and Dantes. But today, this morality has been distorted and has gotten quite out of hand. The protagonist of whom I write, committed the following overstep of moral bounds. He paused, mid rescuing damsel from bandits, to ponder an unsubtly disguised version of the question of government subsidized housing. Outrageous! The Department of Housing has crept into my novel and stolen the value of a trustworthy hero right out from under my nose.

Me Miseram

Today echoes of high school biology in the same pungent kind of way that bad envelope glue stays on your tounge. Biology class provides various forms of entertainment: bits of formaldehyde pig skin which can be tossed at the kid sitting across your lab bench, the bladder out of the plastic human torso which can be stolen and planted in your friend's lunch bag, or the video "Birth: The Story of Human Gestation" which can be rewritten in whispered back-of-the-classroom tones. There prevails, however, one landmark of biology class which all students of the scientific journey will inevitably encounter: the Fruit Fly Lab.
Today is June 9th, 2011 and it is like the Fruit Fly Lab. If you remember, during these lab proceedings the masses of fruit flies are closely monitored while living inside of a behemoth contraption. Said contraption looks like an outdated form of refrigeration. However, instead of of chilling breezes, the behemoth emits tepid air which smells of London during the Bubonic Plague. Therein live the fruit flies, cramped by the hundreds into worn-out, damaged beakers. Several times during the lab hour, the wood grain facade door of this non-refrigerator is opened, so that the students may observe their specimens. The interior air of the chamber attacks in waves, each more ferocious than the last. One can see, with the naked eye, the mixing of these bombastically foul waves with the relatively untainted air supply of rest of the laboratory.
That is today: hot and unyielding. There is almost a moment of respite and then the next onslaught of waves comes, hotter and stickier than the former. I am a fruit fly, living a life of misery inside of a muggy inferno which reeks of rotting seaweed.

"There is a tremendous amount of hope, but not for us."
Franz Kafka

For several years now my unfortunately numerous encounters with the ill-literature of the big man Franz himself have been leading me to a suspicion which has been confirmed by the above statment: Kafka was a coffee drinker. All evidence, in fact, seems to point to the unwavering truth that he was quite an avid one.
I know this because I too, partake in the Water of Health and Beauty on a daily basis. Though I shudder to the umpteenth degree when I think upon the following proclamation (anyone who's read 'A Country Doctor' will understand. If anyone tries to foist it upon you, I suggest you do you best to injure them and then book it to the border as fast as you can), but I must admit it: We, Kafka and I, have got something in common and that something is called Black Gold. It is the liquid link, which breaches geography and history binding 20th century Czech Kafka to 21st century American me.
You see, coffee does something quite magical. It seeps into your morning-drowsy brain, an organ which quite understandably resists being dragged by a smelly fish net from the crystalline waters of paradisaical slumber, and gives your brain a much needed beam of hope. Hope then tells your brain, "Yes, you can ol' Brainy Boy. Together, you and coffee can make it thorough the next twelve hours."
So, what then, comes to pass on mornings when you awake only to realize that you've forgotten to go to the store and replenish the vital fortifications which only just ran dry on the previous day? On those mornings when there are absolutely no grounds shaking around the bottom of the coffee can? Well, on those mornings, you realize that there is a tremendous amount of hope out there in the cosmos. There is a tremendous amount of hope out there for all those other insouciant, coffee slurping individuals. But there is no hope at all for you.
And that moment you realize that you should never, never go coffeeless, lest you begin producing linguistic atrocities in the vein of Kafka, who appears to have suffered a great many years from a lack of coffee.

Comments? Questions? Are you a 30-something living in an inner city Prague basement with you parents and no coffee? We want to hear what you think. Share your thoughts with us at 1-800-GregorSamsaliveson or on the web @ www.gregorthebeetle.gov