and dormice" and using drugs such as "dwarf elder, knotgrass, and daisy juice". The conception was known to Shakespeare, as Beatrice K. Otto pointed out, quoting A Midsummer Night's Dream:Get you gone, dwarf;You minimus, of hindering knot-grass made; Other means of creating this result were conjectured to include physical stunting by breaking or dislocating bones, and forcible constraint, whereby growth was inhibited for a long enough period to create permanent deformation. Modern references The term comprachico is very uncommonly used in modern English except in reference or allusion to the antiquated folklore, but similar stories do exist in the English speaking world. For instance, a tale circulating since at least the 1980s tells of a Japanese bride who disappears during her honeymoon in Europe; years later her husband discovers she has been abducted, mutilated, and forced to work in a freak show. The shock documentary Mondo Cane (1962) shows apparently actual criminals arrested for crippling children to be used as beggars. The novel Q & A (2005) and its film adaptation Slumdog Millionaire (2008) portrays a gang that blinds children to create beggars. "Comprachico" has been adopted as a pejorative term used for individuals and entities who manipulate the minds and attitudes of children in a way that will permanently distort their beliefs or worldview. Twentieth-century philosopher Ayn Rand referred to educators of the time as "the Comprachicos of the mind" in her article "The Comprachicos". Her criticism was targeted especially toward educational progressivists, but also grade-school and high-school educators who, in her view, used psychologically harmful methods of education. James Ellroy refers to them and Victor Hugo's novel in The Black Dahlia, where the concept is a major motivation for the murder of Elizabeth Short. In the 2010 album Immersion by Australian Drum and Bass band Pendulum, one of the songs was named "Comprachicos", where the lyrics had references to manipulation and restraint. The 2011 DC comic Batman and Robin #26 contained a villain whose father disfigured him after reading about the "Comprachicos" in Hugo's novel. SCP-2912 refers to the Comprachicos' work (also called "child breaking") as being an outdated form of "clown breeding", used to create freaks for anomalous freak shows. See also Imbunche Artificial cranial deformation Foot binding Castrati References Body modification Folklore