Modern Fable: Lions and gazelles (Dan Montano 1985 July 6)

[Garson O'Toole]

Dan Goncharoff wrote:
> Harking back to the joke about the bear -- "I don't have to outrun the
> bear, I just have to outrun YOU." --isn't it more important for the
> gazelle to outrun the slowest gazelle??

Right, the gazelle would be fine if it were faster than the slowest
gazelle in the subset of the herd that is being chased.

There is another defect in the formulation. The gazelle need not be
faster than the fastest lion because the fastest lion may not be the
one giving chase. The gazelle would be fine if it were faster than the
lion giving chase.

But incorporating these types of details would damage the archetypal
simplicity that the composer was probably striving to achieve.

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