Waiting

Posted on March 23, 2023 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

It’s difficult to wait for something.

How many times in your life have you really had to wait? Usually if something you look forward to is happening in the future, you pass the time until then. The show is on the 12th of next month, today is the 23rd, so you’ve got about three weeks. You’ve got other things to do until then and little time to wait around. Occasionally you remember the event: two weeks, one week, three days to go. And for a moment out of time you stand in expectation, imagining the day of the event, seeing it as if you’re already there, before returning with a jolt to the present moment’s business. Apart from these moments where you stand in readiness, you’re not really waiting. You’re just passing the time as the day approaches.

But what if all you had to do was wait?

Perhaps you don’t know exactly when the day will arrive. And perhaps this thing is very important to you. An opportunity that will change your life forever. Like Christmas morning to a child, it’s all you can think about. Everything else in the world becomes jumbled and irrelevant, noise and chaos. The only thing that has meaning now is the awaited event. Do you count the hours, minutes, seconds to the end of each day?

But even this simple act of counting becomes a jumble. Your mind cannot focus on anything as immediate as seconds, or even on the present minute or hour. What day is it? All you can think about is the moment that is not here yet. It repeats and repeats, the toll of a bell from a too distant future: not yet, not yet.

What about the place where you wait? It is a dark hole in the ground, nothing more. It has no details that will register on your mind, your brain craning out too far into the void of the future for anything in the present to impact upon it.

“I can’t wait!” says the child. And what if you literally cannot? Perhaps waiting becomes impossible when all there is to do is wait, when there is nothing that can interest you in the present moment, nothing to latch onto. You have no clear idea of where you are, of time passing … And how can you be said to be waiting if time has ceased to pass? A paradoxical notion: to wait for eternity. And you start as if from a nightmare as the vertigo of that thought hits you. That here in the dark, waiting, is where it all ends.

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Monsters

Posted on March 16, 2023 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

I’ve been playing Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) quite regularly for five years or so now, and so I spend a lot of time thinking about monsters.

But what is a monster?

I’ve been looking through Medieval Monsters by Damien Kempf and Maria L. Gilbert, and at the beginning of the book there is a quote attributed to Alfred Jarry:

“It is common to call any unusual combination of dissonant elements a ‘monster’ … For me ‘monster’ signifies all original, infinite beauty.”

When we think about things we would call “monsters” we tend to imagine something we find horrible in some way. But Jarry seems to use “monstrosity” in a different way, to signify something interesting, exciting, and original. That’s what is truly shocking about a monster: it surprises us because it is unusual and different.

The best D&D players know that “monster” doesn’t necessarily mean “enemy”. They don’t just run in and slay every goblin they see. There are lots of different ways to interact with the strange creatures they meet on their journeys. Perhaps, instead of killing that troll, they might befriend it and persuade it to give them a vital clue that will help them on their quest.

In real life we encounter goblins and trolls all the time: “bugbears” we sometimes call them, those little things, and people, that irritate us. And wise people know that those minor irritations aren’t always the enemies they can seem to be, and you can learn a lot about yourself by paying attention to the things that bother you.

And the monsters of fiction: though the creatures in, say, H.P. Lovecraft’s stories might be far more terrible that those little daily annoyances of real life, if his dreams hadn’t been troubled by these terrifying cosmic visions then the world would never have had those stories to read.

So maybe this is what “monster” can often mean: something troubling and discomforting that an inquisitive and creative spirit will nevertheless always be happy to have encountered. Something that by its very strangeness stirs something new in us and changes the way we see the world forever.

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The Bag Thief

Posted on January 31, 2023 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

There’s a story in the Arabian Nights in which two men are being interrogated in the office of the police chief. One of the men had snatched the bag of the other but, when the victim called for help, the thief claimed the bag belonged to him. Both men claiming ownership of the bag, and calling the other man thief and liar, the police must determine the truth of the matter.

The Chief towers over the two men and says: “If the bag really belongs to you, you’ll be able to tell me what’s inside!” And he turns to the Thief and says: “You first! You tell me what’s inside the bag.”

The Thief is a small and thin man, and his eyes glisten and mouth waters as he stares at the bag, as if seeing through its material and eyeing the contents he hopes to make his own. He begins:

“Inside are many purses of gold, and gems scattered loosely about, and a suit of fine clothes for myself, and more clothes for my wife and children, and a chicken that will lay many eggs for us.”

The Merchant, his victim, snorts in disgust at the brazen lies of the Thief. “Such modesty!” he scoffs. “Why stop there? You know that the bag also contains a fine palace built of white stone, and many guards for the palace, a drinking fountain and a row of pleasant houses, and a wide valley that is pleasant to look down over as the sun sets.”

The Thief appears not to notice the sarcasm in the Merchant’s voice and is spurred on, speaking again as his hungry eyes once more seem to pierce the bag: “Inside this bag is a mountain, beneath which lies a secret treasure. And there are many servants, coming down the mountain in a great procession, who will attend to my wife and children’s every need. There are still more clothes, and a wide river in which to wash them. And there are many comfortable beds, so that my family and I will sleep peacefully every night, free from care.”

By now the Chief is twitching with rage. “Silence, both of you! What is this, some trick to make a fool of me? One of you must know what is inside this bag, unless you are both either thieves or comedians!”

“Oh yes!” shouts the Merchant, in a frenzy of his own. “I know what is inside the bag. It contains the sun and the moon, and all the seasons, a river of gold and a sky full of emeralds. It contains a vast city filled with people who never work, but sing and dance all day and hold me in high esteem as their blessed ruler. And I give it all to you, Thief!”

And so saying he leaps up, grabs the bag from the desk and hurls it down at the Thief’s feet. He turns and storms out of the room. The Chief hesitates a moment and then follows his suspect into the corridor, to urge him to return and remind him he’s in police custody. The contents of the bag have spilled out onto the ground. Three loaves of bread and a handful of olives.

It’s more than the Thief could have hoped for. He stuffs everything back into the bag and climbs quietly out of the window.

(I’ve been reading Malcolm C. Lyons’ translation of The Arabian Nights: Tales of 1001 Nights. The story I’ve told here is a retelling of the story told on Nights 295 and 296.)

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Kalganov and Karamazov (Notes on Book 9)

Posted on December 14, 2022 by Lee

Mitya says: I am guilty of murder. Not because I have killed; I have not. But because I am capable of killing. And we are all capable of cruelty. While there is any crime in the world, each and every one of us is guilty of it.

There’s no use squirming to avoid blame because we are all to blame.

Kalganov sees it differently. Convinced of Mitya’s guilt, he despairs. If one such as he could be guilty, what does that say of the rest of humanity?

Both Mitya and Kalganov believe in the universality of guilt. But while Mitya includes himself in this judgement, Kalganov excludes himself, believes himself the only innocent, and despairs.

(I’ve been reading Dostoevsky’s The Karamazov Brothers, translated by Constance Garnett.)

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Orchid

Posted on November 15, 2022 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

“The force that through the green fuse drives the flower / Drives my green age” writes Dylan Thomas. The same force that makes a plant grow flows within me and makes me alive. To be young is to feel close to creation, to nature, to the source. And “my youth is bent” by the same force. A poetic genius, as all young people are, Thomas can sense the force of nature move through him, and change him. He knows it’s not entirely him who acts when he writes, when he laughs and sings, but something that acts through him.

Getting older, such thoughts take a more macabre turn. I am here just for a moment, a single lifetime, as an individual, then the “clay” that I am made of returns to nature and I am again just part of that force. But this is a strange use of “just”, to say you are “just” a part of everything, once again at the centre of the creative force of the universe, as if that were something that would limit you. The macabre, looked at in the correct light, brings back those youthful vigorous sentiments again: it’s not that we’re going to die but that we’re already dead, because death is a part of life, and from the beginning it’s just a journey back to the creative centre. It’s just easier to remember this when you’re young, because you so recently came into the world as an individual that you can almost remember what you went through to get here, how you became limited to this single form, and what a varied and limitless expanse you left behind when you entered the world.

And “left behind” is misleading too, as if death were something to yearn to return to. No: remembering what it was not to be born, life itself can be opened up a crack to let in that dream of chaos and the void, that richness and boundlessness, to open up the real possibilities of life.

Rilke has his own green fuse: he has our dreams drawing their force from the “giant stem” of the living human body, from the “sap” of the life we have been living in the daylight hours; and these dreams flower like orchids, and wither and fade the same way upon waking.

Dreams, ephemeral, are to the human body what those same bodies are to nature: flowers that spring up, bloom, fade, and die.

You are nature dreaming. When you remember this you recall that knowledge of youth, that life is eternal. You’re not going anywhere. The whole of nature is lived through you, immanently, and nothing can ever be lost.

(I’ve been reading “The Dreamer” in the Selected Poems of Rainer Maria Rilke, translated by Susan Ranson and Marielle Sutherland; and “The force that through the green fuse” in the Collected Poems: 1934-1953 of Dylan Thomas.)

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The Conduct of Life

Posted on November 14, 2022 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

“Kant’s philosophy represented an uncompromising philosophical criticism; and Spinoza’s philosophy stood for a radical scientific naturalism. But their philosophies also illustrated the dangerous consequences of rational enquiry and criticism. The consequence of Kant’s philosophy, if it were to drop its inconsistent postulate of the thing-in-itself, was solipsism; and the consequence of Spinoza’s philosophy, if it were to delete its superfluous religious language, was atheism and fatalism. Thus the two philosophies foremost in the public mind seemed to be destructive of morality, religion, and the state. But this naturally raised a very disturbing question in many minds: why should we listen to our reason if it undermines those beliefs necessary for the conduct of life?” (Frederick C. Beiser)

Assumption that morality, religion, and the state are necessary for life. No, life is more adaptable than that. After the apocalypse, humanity will live a roach-like existence until it finds new forms, new channels to pour its timeworn flesh into.

What if Kant’s mysterious “thing-in-itself” was just life, pure life, all along? A cipher, a place-holder, something to be filled in. Kant demonstrated the limits of reason, he said, in order to leave room for faith. What if this is the role of faith? To wrap a concept around your “thing-in-itself” and so create for yourself your very own form of life? Eight billion lives means eight billion forms of life, each with its own unique concept.

Henry Miller wrote that any form of life, even the life of a bed bug, is preferable to no life at all. A bed bug knows how to keep itself busy at least. The thing is to make sure you’re either working or creating. Despair and idleness are a kind of living death.

It’s not even that difficult. I’m not talking about getting a job or creating a masterpiece. There are as many ways to work and create as there are forms of life – which is to say, an infinite amount. There’s no need to “find yourself” to work out what you should be doing, because here you are already. If you go looking outside yourself for yourself, what you will bring back won’t be yourself at all, but some kind of strange fantasy. (By all means go looking. Only not looking for yourself but for the strange fantasy.)

The biggest mistake the critics of reason were making, in their rush to defend their way of life, was to think of life as something you conduct. No, life is lived, first and foremost. It’s whatever is left over, whatever would otherwise just get in the way, that you must conduct, this way and that, to make a space for yourself.

(I’ve been reading Frederick C. Besier’s The Fate of Reason: German Philosophy from Kant to Fichte.)

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Giant

Posted on October 27, 2022 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

Why are giants so cruel? Because they are made of ice and poison.

Before the earth was created there was Niflheim, a dark and cold place from which poisonous rivers flowed and which had existed forever.

Far to the south was Muspellsheim, a land of light and fire.

The cold rivers of Niflheim flowed slowly from their source, their noxious waters gradually hardening into frost as they entered a region even colder. This place of ice became known as “Ginnunga Gap” or “The Greatest of Voids”. It is difficult for the human mind to imagine a place emptier. It was utterly devoid of life.

Slowly the ice moved further south, and the fires that burned in Muspellsheim sometimes reached far north enough that they licked the ice in those regions, and melted it, and the cold poison from the ice rose up, and hardened again as the fires receded. And later the fires approached again, and the ice melted and rose before hardening again, and on it went. Hot battling cold for countless millennia. Until finally a great tower of poison ice stood just south of the centre of the void.

And more ages passed beyond counting, the ice dripping, then hardening, and dripping again, until the tower was shaped into something strange and complex and utterly unique.

So intricate the twists and runnels and flows of melting ice on this tower became that it was a whole world unto itself, of liquid flows and hard ice blockages and rising and falling – a system of pure primordial machinery and barren of life.

Until the tower of ice began to move of its own accord, moving the strange and many legs that had formed, and shaping the ice around it with its many arms, and the poison water moved around its great many frozen brains, carrying its dreams and plans around its body as it began to think its own thoughts.

The first giant, Ymir, had come into being.

(I’ve been reading The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson and John Lindow’s Norse Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs.)

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Ragnarok

Posted on October 24, 2022 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

The final judgement of the gods. All their deeds – and crimes – rewarded and punished here. Most are guilty, and so almost all perish, but few without some deserved glory.

Thor is permitted to die with a smile on his lips, having finally been allowed to prove his strength against the Midgard Serpent.

Baldr and Hod, the truest and purest of the gods, go in the other direction, from death to life, as a reward for their good hearts and endurance of suffering. They will emerge from the underworld once the battle is over. In the unjust world in which they first lived, Hod was seen as the murderer of Baldr and was punished. Now the judgement is reversed and Loki, the one who tricked Hod into causing Baldr’s death, is killed in his place.

Loki dies also with a smile on his lips, believing he has brought about the end of everything, but he is mistaken in this. He cannot even comprehend the rebirth of the world which is to come, in which he will have no place. He believes the final darkness that swallows him engulfs the whole world forever too, and he is satisfied.

Perhaps Loki hated Baldr because he simply couldn’t understand him or anything he stood for. Can a being really be so good and pure? What’s his angle? And the world that Baldr will inherit will struggle to understand what place such a vicious god as Loki could have in any world, and why such evil was ever tolerated.

The story of Ragnarok is the tale of a world saying goodbye to a force that it has undoubtedly required since the beginning of time: the chaotic evil of a trickster god. But great changes must be made, great upheaval endured, before the elimination of “necessary evil” is made possible. What is a world without chaos? Without suffering? And who in the world of the present – gods help us! – could even bear to live in such a world?

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Salt

Posted on October 19, 2022 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

Why is the sea salty?

In Denmark there were two millstones that could grind out anything. King Frodi used two strong slave women, called Fenja and Menja, to grind out gold, peace, and prosperity for him. They turned the heavy stones and out those things came, and Frodi ruled over a wealthy and peaceful land.

The women toiled year after year. And over the years the slave women hated King Frodi more and more for making them slaves, especially in a land where everyone else was enjoying freedom and wealth. And so they decided to use the magic millstones for something else. They ground out an army to oppose the king.

Fighting began, and for the first time in an age there was violence and desolation in the land.

The sea king Mysing heard rumours of the civil war and sailed out in his ship, famous for its power and size, and landed in Denmark. Once ashore, he and his warriors carved their way through the armies on both sides until they reached Frodi’s halls, killed the king, and carried off the millstones and the slave women. Fenja and Menja were now no better off than they had been before, and they cursed Mysing even as he put them aboard his ship.

Sailing away from Denmark with his spoils, Mysing told the women to grind out salt.

“Is that all you want?” they asked.

“I really like salt,” he replied.

The women had been grinding out salt for a long time before their prayers were finally answered and a storm came and sank the ship along with the king, the women, the stones, and a ship-load of salt.

And Mysing’s ship was so big that the salt it held was enough to fill the whole sea, and make its waters salty forever.

(I’ve been reading The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson.)

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Idea

Posted on October 17, 2022 by Lee
Image is from Pixabay

Loki’s cleverness was his own undoing.

He was trying to figure out how his enemies might catch him, now that he spent most of his days as a salmon, hidden deep in the water near a great waterfall. He wanted to make sure he’d considered every possibility, so he’d have a plan for every eventuality.

He invented the first fishing net. “Yes, that’s how they might catch me, if they’re clever enough to think of this too.” Then he shook his head and smiled. “I don’t think I have anything to worry about.”

From this vantage point, camped on the hill above the water, he could see his enemies approaching. Quickly he threw the net into the fire, turned into a fish, and leapt into the water.

By the time the gods arrived on the hilltop, the net was mostly burned away, but they could just see its outline in the fire as it burned, and it was enough to give them the idea to make their own. And so they did, and fished for Loki in the water.

(I’ve been reading The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson.)

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