The comic rendering of a thirty year old dilettante’s kinky, criminal, scientific, and philosophic quest for the Name of God in the Twentieth Century.
Angry and disappointed because he has no job, he-who-will-be-E leaves his Ph.D. defense-of-thesis. A protest rally offers distraction. But when Aunt Hager interrupts and accuses Fyodor Leonovich Maslenikoff of stealing beets from her garden, the amusement ends.
As Fyodor collapses into a fit, he dares he-who-will-be-E to get arrested. He does and soon he meets Maslenikoff in jail.
Later that evening at his girl friend Poly’s, inspiration strikes: he’ll earn the tuition for Maslenikoff’s course in God’s name by turning two pounds of good Mexican into super grass.
Two months later, during a grueling forty eight hour workshop, Poly, guided by her mentor Phyllis, chastises the impatient, careless, and inconsiderate, egoist for tramping through her life to do his alchemy. Chains, electric shock, and the five basic exercises, re-educate E to a proper appreciation of the feminine.
As the workshop proceeds, E and Poly remember the week during which he was an alchemist.
As the ordeal winds down, she has E tell his adventures with Fyodor and recount Maslenikoff’s ‘ridiculous’ good news.
But his success making super grass has gotten him a job offer, and E must choose between his new appreciation of the feminine and masculine egoism.