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"A Divine Avenue: A Mildly Metaphysical Fantasy": 1988: a short excerpt
“I know that God is around. Sometimes when I survey my speculations, I think I see occasional sparks of
divine interference, like points of light reflected by the sea on a moonlit night. These annoyingly ephemeral hints seem to form a ghostly pattern in my mind. Insubstantial, fluctuating between existence and non-existence, this pattern taunts me with it’s holiness· Wraith-like and tantalising, it flaunts it’s divinity, then disappears before it commits the error of divulging explicit evidence of a theistic presence.
Elusive God may be, but there is one conclusion I have been permitted to come to: God plays games and
has a sense of humour, sometimes.
NOSTALGIC TIME-SEQUENCES AND THE TEMPORAL TECHNICIAN
Reflections in time, back-and-forth they go, from one memory to another. This playing of mnemonic transactions, a ceaseless interchange of objectifying compulsions, all according to the metaphysics of that strange and unquestioned notion called ‘form’. It is under the spell of this notion, under its unquestioned assumption only, that one can talk about ‘repetition’. Without such an objectifying assumption, without these hypothetical ‘forms’ – at least one – there is nothing to ‘repeat’.
It’s not my intention here to outline the conditions of form or formal metaphysical assumption, but merely to suggest that beyond all the usual reflexive productions of insight attaching itself to this notion, mystery, or the mysterious, continues on its merry way, perhaps hinted at by this or that economy of ‘knowledge’ and its always not quite adequate ‘conclusions’, but never exhausted by these epistemological labours.
As is the case with economies of knowledge, so also with cultural economies of history and memory. It is quite possible for an entire culture to proceed in a particular ‘historical direction’, as it were, failing to adequately register the lessons of its development, and in such a way, that it proves impossible to simply follow along with such a culture, without provisioning radical explications apparently beyond that culture’s understanding. Not that there is necessarily any responsibility to do so, but refusing the task of giving explicatory contextualisations would be an unnecessary neglect.
If both Baudrillard and Fukuyama talked about the ‘end of history’, it is not so much that chronological developments have suddenly ceased to operate, but rather that the notion of ‘history’ in its conventional form; with its linear expectations and traditional narrative understandings; is no longer sufficient as an organisational mode. More is required. But the requirement of such an excess seems beyond the capacities of present cultural cognition. In the grip of this excess which it is no longer able to think, traditional cultural institutions continue on, incessantly repeating themselves and their procedures with ever-increasing uncertainty, as they slide into the unknown.
All that is left, for these alienated creatures, these ‘Occidental Androids’, who do not actually wish to think, is the contentment to merely and vicariously ‘operate’, sputtering positivist ‘memes’ to each other in vast, anxious, and swarming frenzies of ‘self’ and ‘world’ confirmation. As if repeating the exhausted terms of their Cartesian crisis with ever more fervent enthusiasm can somehow substitute for lack of greater understanding, in maintaining what seems to be mostly a dogmatic, miserable, and ignorant, charade. None of this is exactly new, but it is now globally instantaneous, and that is the key that has unlocked the first stages of a noospheric achievement, as it were, beyond conventional notions of both ‘knowledge’ and ‘history’. It is precisely those conventional notions which are in a crisis of inadequacy; their adherents, acolytes, and exploiters, in a crisis of promotion. What can be observed is merely the reflexive dissolution of those conventional dogmas, according to various arcs of nostalgic repetition.
I have, of course, referred to this before, at the outset of this blog: “Philosophy, in its institutional forms, has been busy archiving, classifying, and otherwise industrialising, the driven contemplations of various canonical traditions, as grist for the mill of future recombinant streams of commodified ‘wisdom’: a grist that will sustain the perennial tensions of these venerated traditions, with new brands of ‘logic’, intensified ‘epistemologies’, concentrated ‘ontologies’, nouveau-‘mysticisms’, etc.. All of this, circulating within the same circles of interpretation; playing the same topoi; in rhetorical oscillations, where the current jargons of reduction will scintillate with the shine of ‘progress’. A ‘progress’ in which the same, age-old platitudes can be uttered incessantly, as if they were unearthly revelations, never before thought or expressed.
All this, we have seen, and it has not proved sufficient.”
(“Possibilities of Thought”, Saturday, July 21, 2012: http://visionfiction.theotechne.com/WordPress/?page_id=7)
It has become necessary to return to my earlier period of writings, 1987-1997, for a more suitable and fertile context in which to address these issues. This, of course, is natural for me due to the element of personal continuity, but might prove somewhat strange to readers of this blog, as for the most part, the majority of my Internet writings have been strategically limited to theoretically contained, critical responses and observations , with only a sprinkling of writings from the earlier period. That was sufficient, in terms of addressing the philosophy blogging scene on the Internet, which I’ve done for six years now, but that scene is not sufficient. More is required. If Baudrillard and Fukuyama right, about the ‘end of history’, this recollection of an unexpressed, earlier period is possibly more than mere nostalgia.
RADICAL INFORMATION
The ‘architext’ is just structured information, in any form, whatsoever. It can’t be ‘centred’, as such, because no metaphysical commitment is asserted with respect to informational differences. The only way to centralise it, would be through a ‘metaphysics of information’. One in which the concept of information itself, at its most radical level, and in all its anthropic receptions, shows itself as a limited case; a case of limited perspective; a particular and closured procedure. This is only possible, in an economics that exceeds the ‘localisation’ of radical information.
ANALECTA ALOGICA: FRAGMENTS WITHOUT ORDER (1989ish, not sure, though)
ANALECTA ALOGICA
A collection of rhetorical devices?
At present, Humanity seems to be composed of oppressive communities whose governing principles are derived from Man’s baser instincts. These coarse and cruel principles keep throwing us against the wall so that we are continually dashed into little pieces. Collected here, from the latest shatterings, are some of those pieces, just a few, forlorn fragments…
During these brief, eristical expeditions, it must be borne in mind that Reasoning is always in danger of being just so many genetic fallacies, but this is no demand for grief, for no matter where they go, the rhapsodies of Reason are always in time with the rhythms of reflection, and these rhythms invariably carry one away, to think, on some other day…
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“What was that rushing by?”
“Oh that! That was just a minute. We get millions of them in this neighbourhood.”
These writings are my scribal responses to the pressures of Life. Life pushes me, I push a pen. You may ask why I write, why do I respond this way? I could answer that by weaving these cocoons of connotations I protect myself from the harsh rigours of an anomie-filled existence. But I won’t, because I don’t. Protect myself from an anomie-filled existence, that is.
I write because… I like to write, because… I wish to keep some sort of account of some of the mental travels which my mind is continually embarking upon, I write out of desperation, out of joy, out of other emotional postures, too, each posture being a play, a strategic state of mind, a move in a game of emotional chess, again which never comes to rest…
I also write* because I feel that reading and writing is one of the most sublime species of social intercourse available to Humanity…
(*marginal note: *Writing is reading.)
“Having knowledge is having a ledge from which to know, a conceptual ledge, that is.” (Inline note: “All ledges are lost… in limbo, perhaps?… are lost!??” | The ‘are’ is underlined three times, pointing to: “Being! Misplaced?”)
Occasionally, my life seems to be dressed in dilemmas, but I won’t get overly dramatic about it, at least not yet, I’ll allow such dire dramas to develop naturally, at their own pace, perhaps…
“I seem to feel my mind reel as I ride upon life’s insanely spinning wheel.”
Reel, both verb and adjective,
Adjective – film reel,
Reality, Film, Image.
Shall I take this medicine of Enlightenment, this escapism that acts as an emetic, that causes one to vomit illusions. Shall I take this stuff before I’ve experienced the symptoms of Suffering, a Suffering caused by illusions.
Why not? Because, you know, I have suffered, I have experienced the symptoms of Suffering, I really have.
“I am a philosophic pétroleur, and I have planted an incendiary in your id. It’s guaranteed to blow your lid.”
” Oh, thank you. I could do with some excitement.”
Let us make speech.
I think I’ll say this phrase at various points in this ongoing monologue, albeit a monologue with apparent interruptions. I’ve borrowed the phrase from Abu Jabbar, The Possibility Merchant, who is a character in my book, “A Divine Avenue”. I guess you could say that as Abu Jabbar is my fictional construction, I’ve borrowed it from myself.
I find it pleasant that there is so much of me as I can lend and borrow within the circus of experiences that apparently constitute me.
It strangely comforting to think that the ‘human condition’can be complex and busy. There’s a persistent hope that among all this confusion, lying hidden, is something magical and wonderful, a private panacea. Perhaps this magical panacea lies in our perceptions, perhaps the magical quality is one way of seeing, a single selection from a variety of visions…
“The erection of an ‘I’ structure can prove somewhat difficult when the potential self, the soon-to-be-self, is immersed in pantheistic musings.
(Note at top of page: “*With what forms should I fumble?”)
What should I write about? What bits of information should I jungle? What do you want to read? What do you wish to know?
Should I be experimental, political, philosophical, emotional, urbane, charmingly rustic, sophisticated or cutely simple, specious and/or veracious.
Or should I try ineffable Wisdom!
Wisdom Lane: “I couldn’t put my finger on it. It was an old feeling, evasive but distinct. Continually elusive but ever present. I couldn’t define it, but I knew what it was. I KNOW what it is. It isn’t anywhere, in heaven or on earth, but it is always here, it is always there, it is everywhere…”
You get the picture. A few negativistic indications of the arcanum, a sort of indication by elimination, and also the revelation, by means of apparent contradiction, that the arcanum is the Reality behind all appearances.
Is that okay? Or do you want something different? Are you bored of my aphoristic, micro-philosophies, of my fast and trashy junk wisdom? Do you resent following this itinerary of improvisations?
“Sorry can’t stop! I’m on my way to help constitute a certain momentous event in history.”
Refinement will have to wait; nowadays I like to scream and shout. Occasionally, though, I leave some subtlety about.
I enjoy asking questions, going on a quest. Occasionally, though, this ‘Why Thing’of mine goes a little wild. Not that I mind. Because it is through this tendency to forever question, this ceaseless and untamed Criticality, that I achieve a lucid looseness, an arcane clarity, a kind of freedom that pulses through the complexities of Life, a kind of existential electron flow.
“Money makes the economy go round. Money is promises – ‘I Promise To Pay The Bearer On Demand The Sum Of…’.
And the essence of business is to promise more than is actually delivered. The concealment of this deficient delivery leads to a commerce of appearances. When appearances reign supreme, even the genuine loses its integrity and a sort of sugar flavoured sugar seems to sweeten our tea.”
“Well, man, well,” said the Styrofoam Queen, her legs all agleam and asheen. “Shing! Shing! Shing!” went the handmaidens, dressed in sequins, riding on dolphins.
Whatever!
“This is the News. Streams of Excluded Middles attacked Aristotle today, claiming that the philosopher had exploited them for years. We spoke to one of the Excluded Middles, A or B, and asked him to comment on today’s rebellion.”
“Well, the Greeks were bad enough, but the Scholastics were the last straw. Of course, Aristotle was, and continues to be, the main culprit. Anyhow, we’ve been gathering of forces and now we are abandoning your world. You can use other logics, we’re skedaddling down a side alley. Goodbye!”
“Reason, son of Rea Rhetorica the well known actress, collapse from nervous exhaustion today. He is reported to have said, just before his collapse: “Everyone seems to need me to live, and people keep coming to see me. I just can’t take anymore.”
“According to hospital doctors, Reason just needs a long holiday.”
“Abstracta, the world’s greatest hermit, forgotten until today, when he re-entered the Universe after being away for millions of years, spoke to our reporter, Geoff Humphries:
“Abstracta, what have you learned during your time of seclusion?”
” isolation is a form of relation, Mr. Media man. Isolation is just a relation. However, being a relation does not invalidate it. Isolation is still an option and I very much recommend it.”
It is amusing to note that ‘chain’ is synonymous with ‘sequence’ and ‘shackle’ and ‘bond’. Is a sequence a trap?
Chain: (nouns) coupling: fetter: link: manacle: progression: restraint: train: sequence: series: shackle: succession: union
(verbs) bind: confine: enslave: restrain: train: sequence: shackle
To indulge in sequential thought patterns is to be bound! Is that so? Is life a train of thought?
I want to create works of unparalleled beauty, of unsurpassed insight. For I want to create a suddenly pellucid profundity, to surprise Sofia in her most secret activities. I want, I want, I want. I am, I am, I am. Desire and Being, Yearning and Feeling. A moment in Time and the Moment of Time.
“Like Hegel, Nagarjuna also rejects the temporal causal view, but, unlike him, does not substitute any rational pattern for it. Instead of grasping separatedness in terms of unity, as Hegel advocates, Nagarjuna refers, perhaps, to a meditative state, or to the effect of such a state, in which, paradoxically, separatedness may exist as before, but is not taken as such: one seems to have lost, or, rather, overcome the awareness of events in time. Not that one ceases to react to phenomena, but that one acts as though the moment of action is eternity.
Nagaruna’s insight, I think, should have been clarified in less intuitive terms. But I must admit that I do not find the right words to define it. But perhaps finding them is missing it. What Nagarjuna helps us to do, and Kant and Hegel do not, is to forget about philosophy and still rest satisfied.”
“Philosophy East/Philosophy West: A Critical Comparison Of Indian, Chinese, Islamic, And European Philosophy” Edited by Ben-Ami Sharfstein
Etc. Can’t be bothered to put the other pictures in, yet.
Time Flies: from, Self, World, and Writing
INTRODUCTORY NOTES
“Time flies: from, Self, World, and Writing” was written some time between 1989-1992. As can be seen, my advanced hermeneutical technique of non-reading, though nascent, was obviously in its early development, here, lol. The references to “weak thought”, are not to be confused with Gianni Vattimo’s idea, though I was aware of his work, he’d been on television, with John Searle & David Farrell Krell.
This was based on an actual experience.
Time Flies: from, Self, World, and Writing
This writing is an anticipation of, but not an encounter with,Thomas Nagel’s text, “The View From Nowhere”, unless one counts anticipation as a form of encounter. This writing veers away from the text of TN.
I lack the force, the power, perhaps even the inclination, to knock my philosophcal head on walls made of Nagelian bricks. However, this is no celebration of weakness, of a “weak thought”. Nor is it the claim of some reflexive logic that weakness is actually a form of strength. It is, rather, a reminder that weakness as weakness is an indispensable perspective, that a cursory reading is perhaps philosophically valuable in itself, and that haste and superficiality in interpretation can be useful strategies in avoiding the hypnotic images of of metaphysics (“In skating over thin ice, our safety is our speed.” Emerson)
Consciousness as conceived is a simple and accountable fact, but the ultimate provenance of consciousness may well lie beyond all conception. The events of consciousness are significant vibrations, trembling meanings, and what occurs in the space of consciousness is a complex resonance of events, a resonance whose source transcends all realities within the hearing of consciousness, a source external to every phonic fact. A source of courage, perhaps, exterior to the phobic phonations that serve the closed economies of consciousness and knowledge?
A bench, trees, and birds suggest an avine metaphorics: the being and wing-buzz of these birds requires translation into conceptual spaces. An avine metaphysics? Why not? Why should “consciousness”, “intellect”, “reason” – the metaphors of “Man” – take precedence over the avine in populating conceptual space?
WANTED: an avine and arboreal logic require a consciousness, with incorporated perceptual faculties, to act as an interpreting nexus for the buzz of perceptual information (the “information atmosphere”) generated by our avine-arboreal cosmologic, so as to create an ecstatic ecology. An ecology that, through the agency of its interpreting consciousness, and powered by circadian and seasonal rhythms, projects flight into new spaces, and analogises birdsong beyond the audible.
…as the birds fly around him, forming a halo of sharp, tumbling melodies and pulsing winged rhythms mind, world, and self are lost: the emphases of epistemology fade and give way to an ecstatic ecology…
…we must fly away from the realm of epistêmê, and practise ornithomancy on each other…
Time has flown—
Asymptotic Aim of the Name
The asymptotic “aim of increasing financial capital (Franco ‘Bifo’ Berardi: here)”?
“The goal of the capitalist isn’t to accumulate capital but to accumulate capital in order that he may feel inoculated against ontological insecurity and existential vulnerability.” Arran James (here)
“immortality, or an effective illusion of immortality” Arran James (here)
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All of this follows an oneiric logic of the Name; the Hellenic obsession with nominal glory, or glorious nominalisations, as it were. It’s a perpetually repetitive mechanics of mnemonic recognition, technologised; merging with that which formerly memorialised, inscribing the ephemerality of anthropic bios onto the enduring lithic media of monument; a monu(mentality) where nominal sign & its medium are unified in the enduring ecstasy of lithic legend – the spectral stone*, of the West.
*3D screen consciousness
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: algorithms of immortality
Note (“algorithms of immortality”27-09-2011)
“algorithms of immortality
Eurocentric obsession with delimited objectivities, suppression of ambiguity, of the unmanipulable?
Greek & Eurocentric obsession with names
the identifiable, identities susceptible to perpetual recall by the mechanised algorithms of enduring techno-immortality device, the regime of such an arrangement
nostalgic desire to conform to ancient mechanisms of salvation?”
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: On the Naming thing, & the Oneiric
The Hellenic ‘naming perspective’ occurred to me in the early 1990s. There was a conjunction of ideas; Saul Kripke’s, “Naming & Necessity”, suggested the conjunction of the two concepts in its title; Cioran’s “To bear a name, is to claim an exact mode of collapse” was in there, linking the two concepts more explicitly. My notion of ‘Oneiric economy’ was there, too, as well as others.
Not sure if I’d already read Sol Yurick’s virtuosic “Metatron”, wherein, he pretty much does everything, in one way or another, that was occurring in the intuition I was having through the conjunction of concepts mentioned. But then, in the 1980s, I wrote: “We all live in Aristotle’s mind,” which kind of encapsulates one of the logics at play. Sol Yurick, of course, wrote his stuff back in the early 1980s, & he’s the only theorist I can think of, who has the powers of ‘idea compression’, as it were; of analogy, extrapolation, & metaphoric leaping, all without losing critical intuition or precision; & sheer speed (best read fast); of the better SF writers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargazer_%28Rainbow_song%29
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: Meillassoux as Symptom?
Meillassoux’s diatribe against so called “correlationism”, is a symptom of the Occidental desperation to fixate itself as a determinate, perpetually repeatable, sign. Hence, the need to locate the ‘Real’ as absolute other, the Occident as exception to this ‘Real’ & its own cyclical modes.
Meillassoux’s characterises his ‘Absolute’ as not merely indifferent, but in terms of his own ‘realist hysteria’. It’s the purchasing of understanding; through the logic of sado-masochistic self-sacrifice, hence the need for ‘Universalism’, to offload that sacrifice onto ‘universally appropriated’, empirical Others; & through harsh disciplines of ‘working & tested truth’; all of it is configured by historical trauma, of which, it is the configured, dogmatic expression.
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: Addenda 1 – Rainbow: Stargazer
Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow: Stargazer (Legendado PT-BR) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGsfugB8LPQ
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: Addenda 1a – Lyrics
Rainbow – Stargazer Lyrics
High noon, oh I’d sell my soul for water
Nine years worth of breakin’ my back
There’s no sun in the shadow of the wizard
See how he glides, why he’s lighter than air
Oh I see his face!
Where is your star?
Is it far, is it far, is it far?
When do we leave?
I believe, yes, I believe
In the heat and the rain
With whips and chains
To see him fly
So many die
We build a tower of stone
With our flesh and bone
Just to see him fly
But don’t know why
Now where do we go?
Hot wind, moving fast across the desert
We feel that our time has arrived
The world spins, while we put his dream together
A tower of stone to take him straight to the sky
Oh I see his face!
Where is your star?
Is it far, is it far, far?
When do we leave?
Hey, I believe, I believe
In the heat and the rain
With whips and chains
Just to see him fly
Too many die
We build a tower of stone
With our flesh and bone
To see him fly
But we don’t know why
Ooh, now where do we go
All eyes see the figure of the wizard
As he climbs to the top of the world
No sound, as he falls instead of rising
Time standing still, then there’s blood on the sand
Oh I see his face!
Where was your star?
Was it far, was it far
When did we leave?
We believed, we believed, we believed
In heat and rain
With whips and chains
To see him fly
So many died
We built a tower of stone
With our flesh and bone
To see him fly
But why
In all the rain
With all the chains
Did so many die
Just to see him fly
Look at my flesh and bone
Now, look, look, look, look,
Look at his tower of stone
I see a rainbow rising
Look there, on the horizon
And I’m coming home, I’m coming home, I’m coming home
Time is standing still
He gave back my will
Ooh ooh ooh ooh
Going home
I’m going home
My eyes are bleeding
And my heart is leaving here
A place I’ve known
But it’s not home, ooh
Take me back
He gave me back my will
Ooh ooh ooh ooh
Going home
I’m going home
My eyes are bleeding
And my heart is leaving here
The place I’ve known
But it’s not home ooh
Take me back, he gave me back my will
Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh
Going home, I’m going home
My eyes are bleeding
And my heart is leaving here
The place I’ve known
But it’s not home, ooh
Take me back, take me back
Back to my home oh oh ooh
Time standing still
Songwriters: WOLF, LENNY / STAG, DANNY / FRANK, JOHN BURT / STEIER, RICK J.
Stargazer lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: Addenda 1b Meanings
“The song has been called a “morality tale”,[6] and its lyrics are written from the standpoint of a “slave in Egyptian times”, according to lyricist Ronnie James Dio. They relate the story of the Wizard, an astronomer who becomes “obsessed with the idea of flying” and enslaves a vast army of people to build him a tower from which he can take off and fly.[4] The people hope for the day when their misery comes to an end, building the tower in harsh conditions (“In the heat and rain, with whips and chains; / to see him fly, so many died”). In the end, the wizard climbs to the top of the tower but, instead of flying, falls down and dies: “no sound as he falls instead of rising. / Time standing still, then there’s blood on the sand”. The next song, “A Light in the Black”, continues the story of the people who have lost all purpose after the Wizard’s death “until they see the Light in the Dark”, according to Dio.[4]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stargazer_%28Rainbow_song%29#Description
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: Addenda 1c – Discussions
Good discussion of the song, here, http://lyraka.com/ourfatherofmetal/rainbowsstargazer.htm .
Lays out the mass psychology of ‘belief’; the Wagnerian (arguably fascist or proto-Nazi) techniques of “enchantment”, for transitioning into the Oneiric; in short, the mass hallucinatory construction of the Cult of the Real.
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Asymptotic Aim of the Name: Addenda 2 – Rainbow – Lost In Hollywood
This song’s title evokes being lost in the Oneiric TechnoSensorium.
Rainbow – Lost In Hollywood – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYVqpauiq8E
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Arguably, better guitar solo on this version. Malmsteen does his thing.
Alcatrazz アルカトラス – Lost In Hollywood [Live in Tokyo, 1984] – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=870H3mggCdw
A Divine Avenue (1988) – AUTHOR’S INTRODUCTION
A deliberately mannered introduction.
AUTHOR’S INTRODUCTION
If some readers regard this bag of fictions to be nothing more than a sack of speeches blended with conceptual com, or a hold-all of harangues mixed with metaphysical trinkets, they would not be suffering from misconceptions, for this book is all of those things. But it is also a heap of hints, or, to extend the above metaphor, a carrier of allusions and implicatives; seen in this light, it should, I hope, provide more than a modicum of inspiration for the reader. If it manages to make such provision, I will consider it a success.
No doubt this book suffers from many defects, much as I would like to claim that it is flawless, such a claim would veer away from the realms of veracity. Nevertheless, I shall continue to hope that its readers derive something from it, I’m not sure what exactly, but something which enhances Life in an enchanting manner, and also attempts to bring Existence and Intelligence together.
However, that slippery character Life, whose allonym is Existence, remains highly refractory when any attempts are made to bring it into an ultimately intimate correspondence with human understanding. It is an elusive thing; evading epistemology with eel-like undulations.
Perhaps that is its nature. Perhaps Life is inherently problematic; an obscure phenomenon that teasiingly reveals to our thoughts only riddles, dilemmas, and paradoxes. Some say it is these very clashes of contradictories and the tensions between them, that constitute Existence. If such a notion is accepted, then paradox may be regarded as the fuel of Life. Be that as it may, for my own part, I suspect that Life will prove intransigent even when asked to conform to its own inconsistencies.
Whether or not paradox is the fuel of Life is contestable, but it is certain that paradox is the fuel of LIFE! “What is this LIFE ?” you ask. Because I’m kind, I’ll tell you. LIFE is acronymous for the Literature of Infinite Fictions Engine. Stokcd with paradox, this engine will transport you across the spaces of fiction. So reader, ride this engine, this mechanism of language, this train of’ letters and words, ride it to wherever uou want to go. LIFE, like Life, goes everywhere.
Gcd bless this contrivance cf communications and all its readers.
Off we go!
A Divine Avenue (1988) – AUTHOR’S COMMENTS
Actual quote, & fictive quotes.
AUTHOR’S COMMENTS
I’ll use this page as a device to insert some quotes. I have included the Sextus Empiricus quotation as it voices my own personal views on certain matters.
“I have a thousand tongues and a tongue, but only one mouth to put them in.”
Abu Jabbar
“I Know ‘Athene’s Avenue’ wouId’ve sounded better, but I decided to avoid the excruciatingly obvious.
Author of A ‘Divine Avenue’
“We do not positively affirm that the fact is as we state it, but simply record each fact like a chronicler. as it appears to us at the moment.”
Sextus Empiricus (I think)
“When we were doing the rounds with our “Snow White And The Seven Dwarves” show, we did a gig in the collective consciousness of the Milky Way galaxy, but we didn’t go down too well. Some dumpy planet near the rim – I think it was called Earth or Dirt or Dearth or something – anyway, this Dirty Earth planet was the only place that liked us. Especially the children, their minds were all over us.”
“So yeah, Life has its good points.”
Mizz Snow White
A Divine Avenue (1988) – CONTENTS
Architectonic – sections & chapters
Here are the sections & chapters of the novella.
CONTENTS
Title Page…………………………………………………………………………………………….. 0
Contents………………………………………………………………………………………………. 1
Author’s Comments…………………………………………………………………………..…. 2
Author’s Introduction………………………………………………………………………..…. 3
Prologue “The Abstraction”………………………………………………………………….. 4
1/ “4040 Saint Sophia Avenue”………………………………………………………….….. 6
2/ “The Universe At The Edge Of Creation”……………………………………………. 19
3/ “A Procession Of Processes”………………………………………………………….…. 27
4/ “Temporal Investiture”……………………………………………………………………. 33
5/ “Cranthimus Jaxley, Temporal Technician At Your Service”……………….. 42
6/ “Constructing Reality”………………………………………………………………….…. 48
7/ “Richard Merriman’s Elusive Merchant”…………………………………………… 51
8/ “The Pursuit Of Unhappiness”…………………………………………………………. 63
9/ “Logovia And Graphico”………………………………………………………………….. 65
10/ “At The Thought Port”…………………………………………………………………….. 71
11/ “Fountain Of Creation”………………………………………………………………….… 81
12/ “The Divine Cinema”…………………………………………………………………….… 83
Epilogue “The Various Voices Of Jabbar”……………………………………………. 84
Author’s Afterword………………………………………………………………………….… 88
