29 OCTOBER 2021
THREE SURGEONS
HALLOWEEN SPECIAL · PART I
Once, there were three surgeons who believed that had achieved perfect mastery of the surgical arts.
They travelled the world in the service of the army, for what other occupation or course of life could present them with greater challenges to their knowledge of the human body and the skill of their hands, than the most grim and desperate mutilations of the battlefield? And these three surgeons came one day to an inn where they wished to stay the night...
This episode tells the story of The Three Army Surgeons from the tales collected by the Brothers Grimm, a gruesome piece of fairytale body-horror which imagines what happens when three boastful surgeons demonstrate their skills by operating on themselves. It is one of those tales which some may be surprised to find in the Brother's Grimm if they are only familiar with the more sanitised stories which came to loom large in the public consciousness as examples of 'children's literature'.
The tale as it exists in Grimm is short and succint, but the vivid images it evokes offer a rich seam for the interpretive work of the storyteller. It was particularly satisfying to translate the surgical scene into sound, and populating the eerie soundtrack with the resonant scrapes, rattles and groans appropriate to the sparse and nervy atmosphere of this story.
This version adds a few additional elements to 'flesh out' the tale. In the original, the inn keeper pays off the Three Surgeons at the end: 'He gave them what he had, and whatever he could get together, and the three went away with it. It was enough for the rest of their lives, but they would rather have had their own proper organs.' Finding this ending somewhat anti-climactic for a horror story, I thought it would be much more effective if the surgeons took a more exacting repayment from the inn-keeper. They still miss their own proper organs, because as our version of the tale makes clear, the inn-keeper suffers an array of maladies that will detract from their surgical skills. This completes the moral arc of the tale about the price of hubris: for of course, the surgeons might always have bent their skills to helping the inn-keeper rather than impressing him with their great surgical feats.
Texts
"The Three Army Surgeons" from Brothers Grimm, on fairytalez.com
Research Sources
"Brothers Grimm." Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, 25 Sep. 2021. Web. 26 Oct. 2021.
"This Is How Cats See the World" by Nadia Drake on wired.com
"How cats see the world compared to humans" by Dina Spector for Business Insider, Mar 10, 2018, Web. 26 Oct. 2021.
EPISODE CREDITS
Story interpreted and performed by Rick Scott.
Sound editing, audio design and original illustrations by Rick Scott.
Lore & Legend Series Theme composed and performed by Robert Bentall.
Podcast hosting by Anchor. Video and audiogram creation using Headliner.
Incidental music, background ambience and sound effects by multiple authors sourced from Freesound.org. With particular thanks to users setuniman, toiletrolltube and PhonosUPF, whose sounds were instrumental in crafting the soundtrack for this episode.
See below for the full list of audio files and attribution credits for the 2021 Halloween Special Episodes:
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sypherzent
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domestophonics
4toiletrolltube
toiletrolltube
setuniman
erh
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soundholder
katfolker
helen-noir
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cueckermann
cueckermann
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toiletrolltube
toiletrolltube
johanwestling
be-a-hero-not-a-patriot
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craigsmith
phonosupf
phonosupf
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phonosupf
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phonosupf
phonosupf
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phonosupf
phonosupf
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soundflakes_
soundflakes_
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RICK SCOTT
STORYTELLER