The Tatiad

An epic poem by the amazingly gifted and seemingly omnipresent Oscar Wilde, The Tatiad deals with the struggles of a person down on their luck, specifically a person named Tate McMancooper.

The Acts

The Tatiad is split into a total of ten acts, all focusing upon separate but extremely true stories about Tate McMancooper. These stories are all biographical and contain truths about McMancooper. The Epilogue, located in the back of the book (as most epilogues are curiously scared of the front of the book) links all ten stories together.

Act One: The Coming of a McMancooper

Born into the lowest class possible, Tate is named after his sister's hedgehog. Interestingly enough, it is not said whether or not the hedgehog was the one who named him or not. The early life of Tate is hard and trivial, because like the Sacagawea dollar, it really didn't happen. Act One was mostly included for the coloring pages thrown in randomly, all of which were drawn by hand by the author, Wilde himself.

Act Two: Death Becomes Us All

After the tragic death of both of his parents, who were attacked by the Bermuda Triangle, Tate is taken into an orphanage, located at the bottom of Lake Klam, after his sister refuses to raise him. The orphanage is quite typical, with much singing and a horrible, money hording bitch. Speaking of bitch, have you visited one lately? I hear that they are quite lovely around this time of year...

Act Three: How Could This Happen To Me?

Deemed the first emo kid, and much like the generic emo kid, Tate is, like, so concerned about his social standing and his "deepness." He writes a poem that is so pitiful and self-loathing that it actually collapses in on itself, creating a black hole of lifelessness. This black hole is often referred to as Keanu Reeves.

Act Four: Tribulations of a Fallester

Reaching the ripe (and legal) age of eighteen, Tate is released from the orphanage, much to the dismay of many of the other orphans who enjoyed watching him try to tie his velcro shoes. Tate wanders the streets, looking for his purpose in life...what...oh, I guess not. He was actually looking for one of the contacts he dropped. Much to his luck, he is greeted by an old man, who he has never seen before, and is asked to step into his office. The old man, smelling of stale plastics, then makes Tate an offer. The old man would take Tate in as long as Tate would learn the ways of Fallestry. Because Tate was an orphan, he did not know much English, and therefore proceeds to nod his head until the old man finished talking. He becomes the local fallman, providing hours of entertainment for the masses. Unfortunately, fallestry takes its toll upon Tate and he feels obligated to pursue another career.

Act Five: The March of the Meapi

Tate begins to round up a large number of Meapi, a creature indigenous to the Klamath Basin. When he assembles the army, he begins to march north, to what he believes is the North Pole. Town by town goes up in flames, as Tate comes nearer and nearer to his desired destination. Unfortunately for him and and for Seattle, it dazzles Tate and he decides he will live there for all eternity.

Act Six: Intermission

Believed to be one of the most genius ideas ever, Oscar Wilde actually includes many of his shorter poems into the book during what he calls the "Intermission." Though this disrupts the tempo and loses the majority of the audience, the shear guts to include this section shows what type of man Wilde really is. Many of the poems are written in the traditional sonnets format, complete with the love songs written to gay men. A few poems are even written in the revered and rarely heard limerick format.

Act Seven: The Climax

Believed to be the climax of the play, The Climax focuses upon Tate's desire to take his army and attack Catipal Manor on Harbor Island. He succeeds in over-taking the million-dollar home owned by cats. This war takes place over ten years and ends when Tate's best Meapus friend, Garie, is killed by the Prince of Catipal Manor. Tate then damns all the cats to hell and dumps a bunch of water on the home, scaring all the cats away and seriously pissing them off.

Act Eight: The Aftermath

Taking over Capital Manor and moving in, Tate become restless and decides to paint the entire mansion orange in honor of his lost companion, Garie. The painting takes three years, but really only because Tate also has ADD and can't concentrate for that long. Finishing, Tate spends the night outside, basking in the glory and splendor of what should have been a day's work.

Act Nine: God, Why'd You Put That There?

Finding a sudden belief in the Church of the Sub Genius, Tate decides his time for a mission has come. He packs up and leaves Capital Manor and boards a vessel he himself built. Named "The Corgi," he brings along only one other person, his good friend Cooper, a delusional psychopath. Probably the worst decision in his life, Cooper attempts to steer the boat to the Bermuda Triangle, but misses extremely bad and instead runs into a large island, possibly Greenland, possibly Ireland.

Act Ten: OK

Screwed, Tate decides that his life is over, so he makes a raft and sails out to the middle of the ocean by himself. Suddenly attacked by an alien space ship, Tate's raft sinks. He makes it to Davy Jone's Locker where he is believed to reside today.

The Epilogue

The Epilogue attempts to wrap up the whole story, but instead drags on forever and ever and ever and ever and...well, you get the point. In fact, The Epilogue is twice the size of the rest of the book. Which, by the Laws of Obviousity, means it's two-thirds of the book. PERIOD!