A Roman Spring, pt. 67: Dispatch V from Ravenna

Tiberius Claudius Pompeianus, Consul:
Greetings. This is missive number five, sent on the sixth day of our campaign, the eleventh after the Ides of the month of Junius. Assume you have held on this date the feast of Fors Fortuna. Naturally it didn’t occur to us to rebuild her altar on the Aventine Hill, but it is hoped that you have this day had the workers and plebs around the city go to the riverside, garland their boats and drink wine and sing on the Tiber's banks, after our fathers’ traditions. Oh, pardon, there are no plebs, are there…
Speaking of said traditions, our sacrifice of fifty-two goats at Memi did not yield any evidence of Artemis’ pleasure or displeasure, but we have done what we could do and no adverse signs have made themselves known. If the lack of a bad augur is all we have to proceed upon, we will simply have to make do with that. It would not be the first time! As we continue on, by the by, have yet encountered neither birds nor insects. There is an unreal feeling to the hills, towns and the odd empty domus we march past. It is not that we feel we are being watched, it is more that we are not. Not by anywhere near the usual number of animals, not even by rodents. No flies even over our latrines! There is wind, there are breezes, and the trees move to their meter, but something unseen hangs in the air that makes them ring false among us, something that refuses to allow us to glimpse it. Is this the expected evidence we’ve awaited of the gods holding off, waiting to see what further we will do to attract them? As one result, we have increased the size of town garrisons as we go. Recruits as yet are not keeping up with need for soldiers, but luckily so many of those few we encounter are starving that they see our simple rations and know their duty as new Roman citizens beats easily an empty belly. Assume you have dispatched tax collectors to Modena and Bologna. Ridiculous names for cities, but never mind it. That kicking ass Antoninus Bassianus Caracalla Imperator’s idea to make all who reside within the Empire Romans remains a good one. Let us use that to keep tax rates even across the board.
Please advise as to when the quarries we have retaken west-southwest of here will be in use again. The stones from the churches on your side of the river certainly will not last forever. Continue also to resist Cardinal Pacelli’s efforts to hold unauthorized services in them. As large amounts of stone have by now been removed from each to rebuild the Urbs, I insist that they are no longer safe to use for any other purpose. Should the Christiani continue their stubborn flouting of my and the praefectus urbanus’ decrees, do as you have done before; arrest all trespassers, detain one day and release them in the Trastevere. Let us not remake Nero’s mistakes!
On the subject of ‘panem e circenses,’ to paraphrase that Juvenal fellow– it is true that having a fully employed populace is an advantage to our economy, and one even the divine Augustus never achieved, but when one goes home after a full day’s slaving, visits the baths and cleans up, it would be proper for the Roman to have somewhere to go. The new taverns for which you are collecting license fees and so forth are all very well, but it is advisable that Romans do not all become tipplers. Thanks to Petrus Detritus, the Amphitheater will put a bad taste in anyone’s mouth for a while – until we return from campaign without him, I suspect – so therefore I will insist that the Circus be opened as soon as is humanly possible. Take men off any project which appears to be going ahead of schedule. Give it the highest priority. Begin now to re-establish the Green, Blue and Red teams our fathers knew, that they shall be ready. See and report back how early you can make the opening day. The Urban Prefect should officiate; as it is I and you who are making most of the decisions here, best we put up a different face for the people’s consumption. So to speak, in case the Circus works out no better than did the Amphitheatrum Flavianum. Incidentally, should that Juvenal fellow reappear from exile, dispose of him but not too quietly. Do as I did with my wife’s beau Paris. Set an example.
I will again pass over the condition of my family villa when we marched through it
yesterday. Who ever expected that the Bishop of Rome would have taken it over! We will have to tear down his Castel Gandolfo or whatever it is and rebuild my country home again, but as I will not be here to enjoy it for some time, it can certainly wait. At least Hadrianus Imperator’s was in no better condition! Before the gods decamped, at least they dealt the same miserable hand to all.
As for the angler who brought me a fish too large for any plate in the temporary Domus Flavia; no doubt you have made it known that the Tiber is not safe now, nor was it particularly so in our ‘other’ day, to catch fish in. Reward the man very modestly – the most effective sycophancy is the most imaginative, I think we agree - but suggest he eat poultry until we have the Ostian harbor going again if my health be such a concern to him! The same should be true of his own! This may arrive too late to act upon, but you might ‘stuff’ the fish and hang it in my entrance hall, if it is as large as you said.
Dispatches will continue to arrive in the pattern we have established; one a day as opposed to every other. You may take down from the gibbet the messenger who brought the letter with a broken seal. No doubt his lengthy thumbs will remind him and all others. Put him to work digging out the catacombs. Exercise will heal his hands, eventually.

Copyright 2008 by K. Griffiths. All rights reserved.

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A Roman Spring, pt. 66: The King of the Wood

"Very well, I’ll also need a young kid for the reconsecration, which shall begin as soon as the filth is out of the way. Have we roasted spelt and salt, et cetera?”
“Have we the what, sir?”
“The sack of grain that nobody is supposed to eat!”
“Oh, sure, right here—“
“RIGHT HERE, DOMINUS ET DEUS!”
“…yes, sir, dominus et deus…”
“Very good. PREFECT! See if your men can catch any of those goats, over on that hill. At least they’re all grass-fed…”
“For the sacrifice, Dominus—“
“NO, FOR THE HOLES IN MY TUNIC, I WANT THEM LARGER! Of course, for the sacrifice, what else do you think they’re doing over there! It’s a sign from Artemis herself, couldn’t be clearer.”
“Dominus et Deus, there’s always a herd of goats around here someplace—“
“Proof positive, then, of how long the goddess has waited! There must be no further delay or discussion. Oh, wait, better idea yet. FILTH! Catch us some goats! All of them! One at a time!”
-aaaahhhgghjj… -- P.
“Must say, I like you better with that rag where it is. GET!”
…
“Eusebio a King! Dominus, that would be a funny story for my Aunt Spezia, she never thought he’d amount to anything…”
“Well, his luck will hold for one calendar year, if not less. Or we may make him a modern Virbius, we’ll see if Diana has an opinion. You can’t know it from this, but it was a beautiful sanctuary in its former time. Which shall of course be again…”

Petey appears among them with a shrieking young goat/ bleating and kicking him new bruises

“Petrus Detritus! That was quick! Lost your rag, I see…”
-The last morning of what I’ll call our old life began. Here is the first of them, my lord. A spring leaps still from the rocks above the sanctuary. Pure and cold. We had slept again as a Triumvirate—OOOWWW! –P.
“You have not yet learned to edit yourself, it would appear. The Republic was a lost cause in my day and it still is, Detritus. You clearly did not bathe in the sacred waters, so you’ll fit right in with the goats, won’t you! Go catch the rest of them, one at a time, and stay downwind. Praetor, take this goat from him and knock it on the head, I’ll never recall the prayers with all this noise.”
“Yes, sir—“
“And once you have them all, get him out of here. Dump a few buckets of water on him from the lake and give him a scrub.”
“If I have to, Dominus et Deus.”
“You have to, summer cold or no. Ah, here’s our King now…”

Copyright 2008 by K. Griffiths.

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A Roman Spring, pt. 65: Outside the Sanctuary

The column having marched south/ late the second day, a familiar sole tree waves beside the road/ great hills rise to its left, a hint of marble on one slope/ Domitian steps out of line from behind his chariot

“We’ll look for signs of Artemis’ disgust, beginning now. The sanctuary’s to be found on that hill. Keep the horses where they are!”
“Will do, Dominus et Deus.”
-So. How shall we begin? All indoctrinations, whatever their purpose, must include the principle. We murdered the King. I saw us do it. To be more effective. The subject in this case. –P.
“Tell me what I don’t know, filth.”
“Then this is what, Dominus et Deus?”
“The Sanctuary of Artemis at Memi, Praetor!”
“Are you certain, Dominus, I had a cousin who had a souvenir booth here…”
“Souvenirs of what!?”
“Uh, among other stuff he had tiny statues of Roman Emperors—“
“Including myself?”
“Ah, not sure—“
“He’s out of business in any case… let’s try to find him…“
“Dominus et Deus! I have a dispatch from—aaahhhhh!”
“New Gerulus, I assume.”
“what… are you… doing…?”
“If you wish a long life, Gerulus Novus, do not step up behind the Emperor. All letters are to be handed to the Quaestor, who currently stands over there. Cloaculus, inform the legions that they may stand down. Hand out their pay for the week now. Get me ten soldiers to search the wood for the King and the Golden Bough.”
“Yes, Dominus et Deus.”
“I am very sorry, sir -- “
“QUIET. Munculus! How did this man approach me.”
-For whatever Jungian explanation may fit. And the result is far too. –P.
“Dominus, you mean myself—“
“Why do I have Praetors, when a man can leap out of nowhere! This is what hired killers do. Am I clear? And the rag for our secret weapon’s mouth, please!”
“You are clear, sir.”
-Ummppphhgg--- --P.
“Peace and quiet at last…”
“Please lower the knife, Dominus et Deus, this looks like the Consul’s seal.”
“You are new at this campaigning, you’ll learn. You’ll all learn.”
“Yes, sir—“
-- --- --P.

Domitian resheaths his knife/ takes the dispatch/

“We’ll climb to the sanctuary first and see what’s become of it. Cloaculus, order all these ridiculous structures demolished. Leave the town alone.”
“These are private houses, Dominus—“
“They had no right to build them here, this ground is sacred! Is it not obvious by now that the modern age you were born in was an illusion!? And that idiotic ‘villa’ at the shore of Diana’s very mirror, where’s the other half of it?”
“Dominus et Deus, I’m certain I don’t know.”
“Was it really?”
“Was WHAT really!”
“An illusion? …Dominus et Deus?”
“It was. Once they’re torn down, their foundations are to be hidden! What did they think they were… well. Magnificent hill! Like the prow of a Greek trireme… Just as I recall. Praetor, there’s a lot to be done, go inform the legates that we will camp here until tomorrow afternoon. Come faster, all.”
“Phew!”
“Keep dragging it up, Praetor, if we have Artemis and her drawn bow awaiting us in the sanctuary I want Petrus Detritus through the doorway first. Let him catch her initial volley.”
-… -- P.
“Well unsaid, Filth. Seems that we’ll need Specious Pluris Subolis’ talents here as well.”
“Dominus et Deus, that I know of the roof’s been gone for centuries.”
“We’ve had this lecture, thanks again! Look at the Alban Mount, has that fallen in? Petrus -- oh, wait, take the rag out first.”
“Yes, sir.”
-…And you were there, David saw you. Shouldn’t you have done something?
Dominus, I will look for enemies? As Julius Caesar abandoned all resistance -- –P.
“Garrot that thing!”
--uuuuuuuuhhhhhggg-- --P.

Dispatch in hand, Domitian approaches Petey/ pulled to his knees by his handlers

“Listen closely, Fatuus. I don’t care what yammerings you drip on yourself and us. You won’t take the divine Julius’ name in that manner again. Or perhaps we’ll think of every conceivable way to not kill you convincingly. Now search the temple front to back, side to side. GO!”
-So may enough of humanity do likewise! Forgive me, my Dominus, it is my spew, it means nothing! It never did! Shall I also look for possible enemies? Witnessing one of their very own commit the. –P.
“I won’t ask. And yes, you will also look for enemies! Donkey’s ass... Praetor, let him loose at the arch and step back!”
“Yes, Dominus et Deus…”

As Petey fumbles about Diana’s sanctuary/ Domitian unsticks the message and reads

“Curious! More bodies dredged up from the catacombs. Little people with slanted eyes and yellowed skins! Dozens of them, so far... What’s that soldier’s signal, down there, mean?”
“No sign of this King yet, Dominus…”
“Keep looking! As Virgil states in book 13…

‘A common impulse, though, inspires them all, and a shared devotion to their fallen homeland drives them on.’

“’Fallen,’ all right! Italy’s had what, 98 governments since 1945?”
“The term ‘1945’ is meaningless, Praetor, I made that clear earlier. And this is ‘Latium.’ It always was. CLOACULUS!”
“Coming up, that I can see, Dominus.”
“Good. Gerulus Novus, I have a reply for the Consul. Have you paper and a stylus?”
“Yes, Dominus et Deus.”
“One day I shall have that word outlawed. Begin.

‘Tiberius Claudius Pompeianus, Consul:
Greetings. Upon this day, the seventh after the Ides of the month of Junius, I order that you alter the official Roman calendar to read today as the day of the reconsecration of the Memi Sanctuary of the goddess Artemis. All other mention of previously commemorated feasts for this day are naturally to be erased. We will begin reconstruction immediately. Send Specious Plubolis out with a cohort of one hundred men to begin designing a sanctuary after that previously approved by our fathers. I want rough drawings sent to me within two weeks without fail.’

“Have you got all that?”
“I do, Dominus et Deus.”
“You had best. Praetor, what is the pig doing up there! I have heard nothing from him!”
“Still snuffling about, sir, that I can tell.”
“Very funny! You have heard no sound of a drawn bow or loosed arrows?”
“No, Dominus et Deus.”
“A lucky hog indeed. Give him another few moments, then go in after him! DONOT ALLOW HIM TO ESCAPE! All right, Gerulus Novus, continuing the letter…

‘As for the foreign bodies of unknown origin that you are finding, take them all outside the city walls, half a day’s journey, and bury them in a mass pit. Any Romans you find in a similar condition, all attempts are to be made to determine their identity.
Whether you learn this information or not, they shall be cremated with all appropriate ceremony and their urns shall replace the now-removed statues in the exterior niches of the Amphitheatrum Flavianum until the proper statues can be found or sculpted to replace them.’

“Dear gods all, the rules I’m breaking… Have you got that?”
“I do, Dominus et Deus.”
“Hand it here.”
“What would a load of Chinese be doing—“
“You’ll ask the questions I tell you to ask and no more, Praetor... Impressive, Gerulus Novus. A scribe who writes as fast as I speak. Reasonably legible.”
“I’ll have to rewrite it—“
“Understood. One more paragraph, then you may do so. I get the original for my records, of course.”
“Yes, sir, I’m ready.”

“‘Regarding our discussions, sacrifices at the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus should now be taking place each morning since the army’s departure, to say nothing of those at the Temple of Mars Ultor, and the rites of Vesta should begin as soon as possible. Assume the flame remains relit as it was on the day before we left. Please advise and confirm. Titus Flavius Domitianus Imperator,’ space for my mark. Are we done?”
“Yes, sir, I’ll copy that out and bring you them shortly.”
“Very shortly. WHAT NEWS, PRAETOR! Ah, Cloaculus. What took you so long?”
“Pardon, Dominus, I was—“
“One moment. GO AHEAD, PRAETOR! WHAT’S THE HOG HAVE TO REVEAL!”
“Says it’s picked clean, as I’d said it would be!”
“Should have listened to you, then! Rehook the Detritus and bring him down the hill!
Yes, Prefect.”
“Troops have started, knocking down walls, in the villa. Whoo! Nobody lives there, right now, that we can see… phew…”
“Don’t overheat yourself, go on…”
“Arrested one man, with a souvenir stand. Phew…”
“Dominus, that might be my cousin!”
“And if we can’t find the King of the Wood, it may well be he. Are they bringing him up?”
“Momentarily, Dominus et Deus.”
“I expect faster than that! Get him here!”
“Yes, Dominus et Deus.”
"For the benefit of one word, an entire civilization halts and waits..."

Copyright 2008 by K. Griffiths. All rights reserved.

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A Roman Spring, pt. 64: Ave atque valle...

-Wow! I saw that when I found the Rabbi. I thought that building looked familiar! –P.

Pompeianus signals the first legate in line/ a shout goes back, repeated from commander to commander/ the men come into formation and begin to divide up/

“You’ll let me know how accurate these ‘future historians’ were as you go.”
“Ha! A future as dead as the past, and good riddance! Did the flamen go outside the city gates to say the prayers of war?”
“Before sunrise, Caesar.”
“Then we’re ready. Oh, yes. As soon as Janus’ corridor is rebuilt, open the gates at both ends and leave them that way.”
“Yes, Caesar. I am writing it down now.”
“Another reason I hate ‘Italian.’ Peace is an Empire’s worst enemy. Papa Hadrian, fancy boy Antoninus and their Pax Romana! Slackers and lazybones all! One thing more…”
“I’m ready...”
“What do you hear Detritus saying in your reveries?”
“Not a lot I can understand fully.”
“We never looked into our dreams, you know. Our fathers would disown us if their shades knew!”
“Caesar, they would see that we have done all we could.”
“Would they?”
“Yes, Caesar.”
“That word again… I’ll believe you for now. That aside, I want you to go over your memory with a woman’s finest comb, do you hear? And every morning, write down what you recall him saying from now on. Send it to me, double sealed. Whatever it is.”
“At your command, Caesar.”
“He is clearly fire within, who knows what else he is that cannot be seen. Do not dictate those dispatches, and make no copies. Scribes have tongues, unless you tear them out—“
“And even then, they still have their fingers! I recall, Caesar, I will not.”
“You have been my right hand, and now you shall be both of them. Again, I am grateful.”
“Even Jove had his Hercules.”
“You flatter yourself, but so he did! Odd you should mention Jove, we’re paying a call on his daughter first.”
“May she be there to receive you -- ”
“Possibly I’ll challenge her to an archery contest.”
“ -- Caesar! I just thought… I would tread lightly in Memi. Diana is a protectress of women, and after that ‘exhibition’ in your assembly hall last week—“
“You did not approve, did you.”
“Caesar, if I may exhibit that backbone of mine again…”
“Speak as you would.”
“It was an absolute horror. I never even saw Commodus… well...”
“You are not exaggerating.”
“I am not, Caesar.”
“Hmm. Did it seem improper to sharpen our secret weapon? Excise as much of his heart as he could do without?”
“Yes, but any palace under Apollo’s chariot has ears. And before all your new tribunes and magistrates!”
“Most of which were dead drunk at the time and probably remember nothing, and the remainder of which may never dare voice it loud…”
“I guarantee you the entire city knows of what occurred. And if they know, should Diana actually be anywhere nearby…”
“Small wonder these are so glad to see me off. But you’re correct, aren’t you!”
“If gods cannot see through marble walls and read the thoughts of men, who can?”
“…And any goddess seeing 51 of her adopted sisters burned, wherever she resides, she may well be in an absolute rage.”
“Again, if she saw.”
“Oh, dear. Well, there’s nothing for it now. The sanctuary must be rebuilt. I will make my obeisance and sacrifice what appears proper in hope of expiation. And the one we need reconstruct in Ephesus, well... You’ll find this difficult to credit, Pompeianus, but I appreciate your honesty and I apologize.”
“Thank you, Caesar, but none is necessary.”
“See, an honest opinion is welcome. When I request one!”
“…It is appreciated, Caesar.”
“You and I, we’ll relax in Diocletian’s baths again one day, you know. Possibly we’ll have Diocletian hanging upside down outside its entryway by then…”
“I look forward to it.”
“Are the supply routes ready?”
“Caesar, we went over this. You send us a dispatch with every new garrison’s location and number, and we’ll start up deliveries. The Via Appia will bristle, as will the Via Appia Nova, as in the old days...”
“Oh, all of them, and both coming and going! And you’ll keep me informed about the digging out of the catacombs…”
“Caesar…”
“I know, I know! Apollo’s empty chariot lifts higher. Time we were away! Where’s my reminding man?”

With a salute Domitian steps to the line’s head/ banners rise, red and gold-fringed, sporting laurels and the letters ‘PQR’ in gold thread/ the breeze doesn’t quite lift them but Domitian decides not to notice/ while the Consul, of course, does

“The wind is lacking this morn.”
“Another non consulto, let’s say.”
“Agreed. Ave atque valle, Caesar!”
“Ave atque valle, Consul! Remember! Build my domus last of all!”
“At your command!”
(“See to it that all are learning their Latin!”)
(“At your command! Fare you well!”)

The purified trumpets sound/ Emperor and army take their first step/ the soldiers snap Petey’s chain and he lumbers with them/ the onlookers begin to wave, ready their bundles of flowers

“Have you not a duty to perform, young fellow?”
“Oh! Should I start now, Dominus et Deus?”
“Sooner as opposed to later, I’d think, yes…”
“'Remember, Dominus et Deus, you are one god of many.'”
“Most of the rest of whom are yet missing in action…”

-Was here doing a bit of research for me, I recall he was a ‘snap judgment’ sort of fellow… -- P.

“'Remember, Dominus et Deus, you are one god of many.'”
“You can skip the ‘Dominus et Deus’ while pronouncing the formula, I think…”
“Yes, Dominus et Deus.”
“And here, hold this ludicrous ‘pad’ thing and this stylus, you’ll be taking my dictation!”
“Yes, Dominus et Deus. Remember, you are one god of many.”
“Modern conveniences, indeed! All right, take this down.

Ancient blood in streaming floods,
Stations’ recapitulation…

Have you got that?”

All the while he waves to the crowd/ and Petey mutters/ and trumpets blare/ children shout “Io Triomphe!”/ their parents reminding them, ‘Nondum!’/ or ‘not yet’/ if they know how/ the Ardeatine Gate approaches/ sweeping away gaggles and troops of cats/ smelling the cured meat at the rear of the column/ blooms rise and fall in the still-early air/ horses draw Domitian’s chariot/ he walks behind, still dictating/ still waving/ still saluting

“Yes, Dominus et Deus.”
“Minds and hearts in a thousand shards,
The cardamom of eternal calm,
Sweeps of fire, new empires,
Iron rings whence poets sing,
Soft grey mornings, dire warnings,
Sweet demise... legions of flies…

Ah, well. Now what would come next…”
“Remember, you are one god of many.”
“Very good! Keep it up, or I may forget…”

-You have friends here, young man. No need to call me ‘sir.’ Thanks, but I don’t know that I’m… Worthy? –P.

The Ardeatine Gate yawns/ and they are away/

Copyright 2008 by K. Griffiths. All rights reserved.

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James Graham Ballard, 1930-2009

"It seems to me that the world we live in needs a certain amount of 'oil' to make the wheels go 'round. In the '60s sex provided that role; now, in our landscape sex is no longer a new frontier. You almost get the impression that sex has died out or doesn't take place any more."

A recent television show on The History Channel, LIFE AFTER PEOPLE, depicts how Earth will seem, how the evidence of our civilization will fare, once the human race has become extinct. This isn't something anybody actually says onscreen, naturally; we are told of 'a time after people.' 'After we are gone.' Weird. First, The History Channel up to now, that I've noticed, has exclusively covered events that have already occurred. That's what history is, after all. Are they saying something here? Also, where do you think we went? Not much screen time is given to the answer. I can nominate two authors who might best have been able to figure it out: Mr. Ballard, deceased this past Sunday from prostate cancer, and the equally late David Foster Wallace, dead at 46 late last year. I don't want to indulge in the morbid here, but perhaps now we'll just have to decide for ourselves what became of us.

Ballard rewrote the 20th and a portion of the 21st centuries from the inside out. The lion's share of a Ballard narrator's time in a given book is spent by himself; implying, perhaps, that we are not the social beings we think we are. Others, when encountered, speak in riddles, because they've made up their own sub-dialect of English. They also, like all the characters in Ballard's short-story collection about the vacation colony at the end of the world, VERMILION SANDS, have spent too much time alone. Not that strange, then, how trapped and half-immobilized in their respective situations most of his characters are. Outer stimulus breeds new connections. Solitude breeds only feedback loops. One character, Traven in Ballard's short story 'The Terminal Beach,' is unable to assemble any but the most fleeting coherences in order to deal with his self-marooning on the ruins of a Pacific atoll that the U.S. military has abandoned after a series of H-bomb tests. SUPER-CANNES, a novel from early this decade, spins out another cocoon entirely; a man recovering from a flying accident moves into an all-encompassing upper-middle-class residential condominium in the south of France. Sad to say, it's as dead as the former occupant of his co-op. The narrator looks about himself and finds no connection to life as it is actually lived; perfect gardens, washed cars, not a leaf out of place. What is being kept out of sight here? he wonders. We are. Then where did we all go? What became of us? Fear of the unknown figures in, naturally, but what else? I won't ruin your surprise (this article contains no spoilers) but let's remember Ballard's declaration in 1985 to RE/SEARCH's Andrea Juno and Vale: "In a perfectly ordered society, madness is the only freedom." Little wonder Ballard was surrealist master Salvador Dali's last great apologist. The Catalan painter's lunatic storm of images are available to everyone who cares to look deep enough, he implied. Those who disdain Dali may be disowning their own unconscious. That fusillade of melting Infantas and writhing shorelines in Dali's paintings is the beneath-the-surface noise in every brain that we call 'ideation.'

"Certainly this enormous novel we live in requires sensation to sustain itself. We're rather in the position of a great drowsing animal, drugged by some powerful narcotic, which requires electric shocks to keep it awake. And those shocks are provided by violence. Plane crashes, hijacks, car crashes on our own city streets..."

Perhaps that's what happened. Maybe we strangled ourselves on a glut of our own recycled images. We weren't the creatures that the Enlightenment said we were, either. We controlled our own environments to the furthest limit of our abilities, not really caring about all those other members of the human family who weren't in the club, to say nothing of the rest of the planet into which we dumped our waste (waste of any kind you care to name). We turned inward when nuclear obliteration became a very real possibility, and now that it's a somewhat diminished threat (not that India and Pakistan, in the midst of their very own Cold War II, would agree), we've largely forgotten to turn outward in response. Again, the human mind needs to look for exterior stimulation, but some of us couldn't even do that correctly; in Ballard's 2006 novel KINGDOM COME the mass of suburban Londoners do exactly that, if in exactly the wrong way. Stupefied with boredom, middle-aged men and women form British football team appreciation societies, don shirts with the St. George's cross (the red one that partially makes up the Union Jack, on a white field), go a-marching to games at the local stadium in step, and after the games
end, they head back out into the surrounding not-so-leafy neighborhoods for a bit of uncontrolled aggro. There you go! We turned inward, found the madness there, and fled from even that. Whatever we could not control or rationalize ceased to exist. Who knows? Western civilization is (in America at least) still so insulated from the exterior world that Darfur or Somalia appears to be another fiction. How can it not be? It's nowhere near as publicized as the newest episode of 'Heroes.' So how real is it, really?

Ballard was not exactly lauded for KINGDOM COME; many literary flacks said he'd devolved into self-parody. No, folks, I think it's us who did that. 'When the going gets tough,the tough go shopping' used to be a running dumb joke. Now it's one of the only truths out there that we don't laugh at. Everybody in KINGDOM COME hates the Metro Centre, an immense shopping mall, but everybody goes there. Why? Because there's nothing else to do. And that may well be what happened to us. Those who could afford to jettison everything, anyway. Including ourselves.

I've stopped watching LIFE AFTER PEOPLE on The History Channel because I already know how it all turns out, and I have Ballard to thank for that. I'd rather do something else with my time, anyway. In 1985 I sent Mr. Ballard a fan letter with a New York TIMES clipping that mentioned how coconuts on Pacific atolls bombed by the US military were still showing poisonous levels of radium, strontium-90 and other radioactive by-products, 40 years after the tests. He was kind enough to write back saying, "You know that coconuts can float for hundreds of miles and germinate on other islands. Imagine a spectral Pacific!" I'd rather not, but as it's already occurred, as it's already history -- not that you'll see it on The History Channel -- it looks like I don't have much choice. Ballard even envisioned, early in his career, an Earth engulfed by melting polar ice caps (THE DROWNED WORLD) - sounds familiar! - but a prophet he wasn't. Like Lenny Bruce ("I'm not a sick comedian. I'm the doctor and the world is sick"), he gave us hints in the form of very edgy entertainment as to where we might or might not have headed, had we cared enough to head it off. Apropos of nothing above, though I never met him I did hear his speaking voice once or twice and thought he might have made a good James Bond villain. Affable, chatting about his Shepperton garden flowers while his flacks cut off a prisoner's eyelids. That sort of thing. Last thoughts; I've been laughing kind of bitterly at how all the stories of collapsing cities, bridges, farms, etc. in LIFE AFTER PEOPLE never include any mention of shopping malls. So they'll be all that's left, will they? KINGDOM COME indeed. Now if only we knew whose.
Well, it was nice talking to you. I guess I'll let my characters take over again now. -- K. E.

Quotes from 'J.G. Ballard: Future Now' copyright by Torromfilm, Norway

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The new ground rules for this page
originally posted: February 19, 2009

Time to make up your own.

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Recent emails can be found above. Further commentary may go to the hyperlink at the end of any post, or to the following email addresses:

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Exactly how important is the author, anyway, when nobody has any idea where their creativity comes from or how the mechanics of inspiration works? Maybe it's something we all have access to. Maybe it's a sluice that empties into your head when you're facing in a particular direction and thinking a particular series of things. Then again, maybe not.
Whatever inspiration really is, I suspect that any good fictional character is a lot more interesting than the person who dreams it up. So mine speak for me here.