The Master of Boxes
By Mark Barkley
()
About this ebook
"Are All Managers Born Useless? Or are they crafted thus? In Management School, you are taught to be as listening and as flexible as a laminate bench top. To steer your staff to misery, burn them over, turn them over, watch them slink out the door broken and busted. Then you can push the knife into allergy-free cake on Mental Health Day."
Not my words. A transcript was passed to me from a harried reporter wishing anonymity. He'd interviewed an enigmatic figure known as the Master of Boxes, a significant figure in business and government circles of higher management.
Contained in this document are the thoughts and insights, in as true and accurate a transcript as possible, of the Master of Boxes.
In the words of the reporter passing the papers over to me. "May God help us all!"
Read more from Mark Barkley
Sylvia Terry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSpades: Short Film Script + Movie Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGoodbye Melaleuca Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Master of Boxes: A Dark Lord’s Guide to Modern Management Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Captains and The Kings Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Captains and the Kings: A Play in Two Acts Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGuess What The Fish Sings To The Hook, Book Five: The Sabienn Feel Adventures Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLove, Life and The Old Stench of Luck Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Two Men Who Kill To Be Carbon, Book Four: The Sabienn Feel Adventures Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Kind of Belgium Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhere The Black and Grey Wolves Kiss, Book Two: The Sabienn Feel Adventures Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhen The Stone Shepherds Awaken, Book One: The Sabienn Feel Adventures Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWhy The Sister Moons Swallowed Rage, Book Three: The Sabienn Feel Adventures Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Big Sugar Election Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to The Master of Boxes
Related ebooks
Read With Me Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsToo Bad: Sketches Toward a Self-Portrait Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNarrator Magazine Blue Mountains Spring 2010 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsMy Max Score AP Essentials English Literature and Composition Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCitizen Reporters: S.S. McClure, Ida Tarbell, and the Magazine That Rewrote America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Birth of Science Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Study Guide for Judith Ortiz Cofer's "American History" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsResisting Trump: Teaching English Language Arts in the Age of the Demagogue Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOutta My Mind: Poems from the Other Side of Sanity Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBut Old Mr. Darwin Wasn't to Blame: The Little Book of Evolutionary "Quotes" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Brink: a memoir Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Altruistic Imagination: A History of Social Work and Social Policy in the United States Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsStudy Guide to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsStories I Tell My High School English Students: (For Encouraging a New Generation of Writers and Poets) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Oaths, Signs, Ceremonies and Objects of the Ku-Klux-Klan. A Full Expose. By A Late Member Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSeven Years a Teacher: An Engineer’s Perspective On Public Schools Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA SOLDIER'S QUARTET Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Matter of Words: 21 Short Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Flower Lost - the Ruby Jewel Story: A Priscila House Story Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAsking Animals: An Introduction to Animal Behaviour Testing Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsShort Stories: Five Decades Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Study Guide for Katherine Anne Porter's Ship of Fools Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPassed On: Public School Children in Failing American Schools Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTeachers with the Courage to Give: Everyday Heroes Making a Difference in Our Classrooms Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsUprooted: Second Edition Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Study Guide for Anthony Dey Hoagland's "Social Life" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Last Dog: The Last Dog, #1 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVincent Ventura and the Mystery of the Chupacabras / Vincent Ventura y el misterio del chupacabras Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Study Guide for Katherine Anne Porter's "He" Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNicaragua Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Satire For You
The Robot Who Looked Like Me: Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Sisters Brothers Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Master & Margarita Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Shriver: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As I Lay Dying Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mash: A Novel About Three Army Doctors Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bonfire of the Vanities: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Clown Brigade Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Kill for Love Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Candy Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Yellowface: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Little Old Lady Who Broke All the Rules: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Going Postal Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Utterly Uninteresting and Unadventurous Tales of Fred, the Vampire Accountant Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/51900: Or; The Last President Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5It Was Just Another Day in America Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Only Living Girl on Earth Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5House of Cards Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Five People You Meet in Hell: An Unauthorized Parody Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Dice Man: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Friday Black Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Out of Oz: The Final Volume in the Wicked Years Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Third Policeman: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Crimson Petal and the White: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Utopia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Between the Bridge and the River: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Wonder Boys Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Dog's Heart Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Faggots Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No One Left to Come Looking for You: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5
Related categories
Reviews for The Master of Boxes
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
The Master of Boxes - Mark Barkley
1. Author’s Note: A Transcript Passed On To Me by a Reporter Unknown. Published In Full, As Received
I write to you, dear reader, to say that as a slave of the internet, I will never win.
As a reporter of no note and no consequence in the digital space, it is my lot to have my correspondence plundered, copied and pasted, reused, re-owned, spat upon and sat upon at the joys of some other person’s life. And yet I must turn up each day.
Debt and mouths to feed are a constant in my maths. And if you think Necessity is a bad Mother, no amount of seed I can throw at her will penetrate her completely to create Invention enough to keep me employed.
Therefore, I come to this assignment that I must speak to you on.
It was a rare commission that I undertook where I was ordered to meet this man on his sick bed. By torchlight I read the name and address on the envelope stuffed with a denomination of unknown deflation. I was marked to meet a man called ‘The Master of Boxes’.
It was in an undisclosed place in a wealthy suburb and his castle was furnished with numb butlers and attentive gargoyles. It had rained incessantly and the fog lay on the ground with its dark and mysterious vines and high pines. Several times I missed the place completely because of the mist. It made me thankful I was in a profession as uniquely respected as journalism, and not something important like pizza delivery. Then I saw the house number on the front gate wall in its black metal numbers. 666.
After gaining access to the house, I was informed that it was his wish that the interview take place in his bedroom. Our contract did stipulate that I offer no physical description of him. But for the sake of the truthful mistress of journalism that I offer allegiance to, imagine a youthful, athletic man of taut physique and a full head of hair and dreams; this man was the opposite. His pyjamas were silk and red and he opted to don a trench coat of war rather than a more comfortable dressing gown.
The chairs that we sat at near his desk were comfortable, antique and wooden and marked with cat claws. Or, I assumed were cat claws. A table nearby was scattered with bottles of good wine, plates of cheese and an intriguing chessboard with gothic pieces, sitting in tense readiness for a game to commence.
His disease was an ailment unknown, though he did regularly imbibe orally the red liquid of the vine on offer, like blood. He drank like it was the only thing keeping him alive, though I wasn’t there to offer a medical opinion. Nor would I say, by the feeling I was getting, I was there to offer a speedy recovery. After the initial greetings were made without any warmth, my credentials and passport were offered for his perusal and approval. It was then the nature of my visit was revealed.
The man before me, whom I was later to refer to in private correspondence to loved ones and family as the Dark Lord, had felt that he had been wronged.
The nature of my commission was to be the conduit for this man. He was slandered in the press by someone that he constantly referred to as ‘the Idiot’, and the purpose of this discussion was for me to organize the Dark Lord’s thoughts into a fierce rebuttal for the damage that this said Idiot had caused him.
Having no idea who this Idiot was placed me at a severe disadvantage. The Dark Lord offered no insight as to the nature of the slander. Although throughout our interview he did refer to texts. They had been copied from articles which he showed to me. But my subsequent investigations couldn’t shine any further light.
There was no appraisal of the Idiot’s character. Or whether that said Idiot had any legitimate claim in mental state, as to be correctly classified as an Idiot. No research that I was able to undertake made me wiser.
The matter was then raised of how I should be able to deal with this material. It was tactfully suggested that I could create a publication for my own financial gain. Surely it would be worth something to read the thoughts of a man who had spent so much time in private and government circles. His assessment was blunt.
Why bother? You write for the attention of the modern manager. No profession is more committed to the bringing of darkness to the world. Your work will be bought, then they will turn around and get a complete electronic refund. And then they’ll leave zero stars. Such is the nature of this unforgiving life you investigate. Grift and thrift.
I thought this an unfair appraisal of any person breathing. But strapped for cash, I was in no position to be fashionably resistant.
It was then left to me as to how to deal with this.
As all vocal recording of our interview were required