The Princess Bride

Look, it has been hundreds of years since Florin was a European power. But it mattered once, as all truth matters. If you read books on their history, as I have, you know that yes, there was a Vizzini, though it has never been proved to most academicians' satisfaction that he was a hunchback. One leg shorter, yes, that we know. Sicilian, yes, that we know.

And yes, he hired Fezzik and Inigo. And Fezzik set records, some of them still remarkable, in the world of Turkish wrestling. And Inigo Montoya is still thought of as being the greatest fencer in history. Read any book on the art of the steel.

OK. Vizzini hired them, you know why, they didn't succeed, the man in black stopped them, Buttercup lived. Now to the crucial point—Inigo killed Count Rugen. That is Florinese history. I was in the room where the evil noble died. (There is, again, dispute among experts, on just where in the room the death took place. I don't care personally if he was near the billiard table in a distant corner.)

But you cannot reverse history for the sake of your story and have Inigo die like that, die a failure, after all he had gone through to revenge his father.

'Skip around,' I said to my companion. 'What's the next main thing he talks about?'

Willy went on another couple of pages, stopped, groaned. 'Shakespeare,' he said. 'Do I have to?'

I gestured for him to continue with Morgenstern.

''I was pacing most of the night. Thinking of when I was a child and my father took me to Denmark, to Elsinore Castle. And told me that right here, within these walls, was where the greatest drama of all took place. Hamlet. (In the Icelandic saga, his name was Amleth.) And went on to explain how his uncle murdered his father by poison, later married his mother, and how I would love to read that when I was a bit more wise.

'And Shakespeare used that bit of history, made it great, but he did not basically alter it for his needs. He did not, for example, have Hamlet die a failure.

'As I almost did having Inigo lose to the evil Rugen.

''Shame on me for almost doing that. Inigo deserves his place in our history. Westley is the greatest hero we have. I must not cheapen his triumphs.

''I pledge to take greater care in the future.''

YOU WILL NEVER know how much better I felt at that moment.

THEN SUDDENLY, AMAZINGLY, it was lunchtime. We'd been sitting there for over two hours, slowly turning the pages of the journal, didn't get even a tenth of the way through.

'I wish we could take it to the hotel,' Willy said. But he knew that was impossible—there were signs on the walls saying sternly in any number of languages that nothing could be removed from the room, and there were no exceptions.

'You didn't see a Buttercup's Baby journal?' I asked. 'I didn't.'

He shook his head. 'There weren't that many journals. Maybe he didn't write one.' He went to the Journal shelf, put The Princess Bride back.

'Maybe I'll ask Vonya, he could have it in his desk or something.'

'Grandpa, I don't think that's very smart.'

'One little question, how can that hurt?'

Now he gave me a look, Willy the Kid did.

'What?'

'Don't talk to that guy, don't give him a chance to say anything else to you.'

He was right. We left the Sanctuary, left the Museum, started to find a place to eat but it was chilly and Willy had worn a jacket, but he'd left his heaviest coat back in the room and he wanted to go there, so we did.

I lay down on my bed while Willy, still with his jacket on, went to the bathroom, came out after a long while, went into the living room part of the suite, puttered around a minute, then called out to me.

'Grandpa?'

'Whoever could you be referring to?' He never liked it when I was childish.

'Hyuk hyuk hyuk.'

'Grandpa what?'

'What would you think of a giant bird?' Then he was in the doorway. 'Remember at the end of that chapter in Buttercup's Baby when Fezzik is falling to his doom holding Waverly? Well, what would you think if a giant talking bird flew underneath and saved them?'

'A talking bird? Oh please. Maybe historians aren't sure how Fezzik survived, but I know Morgenstern would never stoop to something that idiotic. I mean, why don't the rocks at the bottom turn out to be rubber so Fezzik could just bounce around awhile and save them that way? That would make just as much sense.'

'Yeah, Mister Smart Guy?' He darted out of sight for a moment, then was back, reading. ''I wish I had thought about how I was going to save Fezzik before he dove off the cliff. He could have just reached out and grabbed Waverly at the last minute. Why do I get myself in these situations? It's my Hamlet problem all over again. How much can the truth be manipulated in the name of art?'' Now Willy turned the page. ''I think my basic problem with Fezzik's rescue is I personally have trouble dealing with the existence of the giant bird. Even though I have seen the skeleton, even though our greatest scientists assure me that it did patrol our skies, still I feel the legendary rescue smacks of coincidence. Who knows how I will eventually solve the problem.''

I was out of bed before he finished, stared at what he was reading from. I knew at that moment what he had done, tucked it inside his jacket, and I knew why he had done it, so I could have this gift and not get insulted again, and I knew we would return it in a few hours and no one would know it had been gone.

I carefully took it from him, glanced through, saw I would learn about Westley's childhood before he became the Farm Boy, and Fezzik's great love affair, and Inigo's heartbreak and Buttercup's nightmares that started coming true and Miracle Max's memory problems, and the hungriest monster in the sea who discovers that humans, tasty humans are living on One Tree Island.

I held Buttercup's Journal in my hands. What a thing.

Now all I had to do was turn the page....

***

AND IF YOU, dear reader, as we used to say, turn the page, what befalls you?

Only the introduction to the 25 th Anniversary edition, which you've hopefully glanced at already. Followed by my 'good parts' version of The Princess Bride and the one and only finished, abridged chapter of Buttercup's Baby. But do not, please, despair.

I have never worked harder than I have these past days, sometimes alone, sometimes with the wonder child who is nuttier for me to complete my research and finish the book than you are.

I don't make promises anymore. But I make this promise to you (the same one I made to Willy when I took him to Fezzik's grave. Andre had gone years before. More work on his char, he told me): before the (ugh) 50th Anniversary edition comes into existence, Buttercup's Baby will be yours.

Hoping, in advance, that you like it ... and if you don't, don't tell me....

Introduction to the 25th Anniversary Edition

IT'S STILL MY favorite book in all the world.

And more than ever, I wish I had written it. Sometimes I like to fantasize that I did, that I came up with Fezzik (my favorite character), that my imagination summoned the iocane sequence, the ensuing battle of wits to the death.

Alas, Morgenstern invented it all, and I must be contented with the fact that my abridgement (though killed by all Florinese experts back in '73—the reviews in the learned journals brutalized me; in my book-writing career, only Boys and Girls Together got a worse savaging) at least brought Morgenstern to a wider American audience.