Combination of the Two (20)

COULD YOU BE LOVED

Marley in the lyric here has the line

Don't let them fool ya
Or even try to school ya
Oh, no
We've got a mind of our own

Moderns are predisposed to believe they are being educated into truth, but what if the reverse is the truth? In other words, that the convincing reality we live in is a sorcerous illusion!

Going by various things – such as “Another Tone Productions” (First Thing in the Morning Kiki Dee prev), Rory Stewart’s seeming perplexity in the mismatch of tradition to modern, the Woodstock era of bodies-in-motion against the prevailing norms – that notion isn’t new.

The real problem is if something is very convincing, how do you disprove it? How not to be a crank? As for the latter, if sorcery was running things, acolytes would automatically use the trick to maintain the status quo.

The side of reality which is convincing is bright and shiny and associated with ordered social life. The side of reality which is associated with decay and rebirth is dark and gloomy and disordered, so it makes good sense that an illusion of social order can be mistaken for reality.

With decay and disorder come the gaiety of rebirth (Dionysus), so that too much social order is a denial of the rustic god (the theme of Euripides’ The Bacchae The False Apollo). So, a reality that is convincingly ordered is not associated with rebirth. As Cindy Sherman’s photographic stills show, it does resemble a perspective illusion.

This goes back to the mirrors of Karam Akkad (Hyborian Bridge 20). They are confusingly, reflectively real but not the actual reality of primeval shape on Earth.

 Yag-Kosha, Conan #4

While the competitive order of modern reality is a scripted routine (DNA, algorithms), the physical reality is primeval shape. This is the universe which weaves between pleasure (desirability) and reason; the universe of the dangerous serpent and of Weird Tales (Pictorial 1)

The serpent is a priori, a cosmic interweaving of sun and moon, the physical universe of motion  -rotation of earth, natch, against the cosmos. Show me a motion, a poetry of cosmic power, a poetic dance of destiny. Obviously there is no verifiable proof of this archaic predatory serpent; like Claude Levi-Strauss it is a useful myth.

Behind the mirrors of Karam Akkad is the perspective illusion of order, the invisible world we see through lenses (“Pets” Hyborian Bridge 56) Whereas the physical world has primeval rhythm – sun and moon – the perspective world has scripted routine, such as DNA. In other words, the invisible world we see through lenses is the world of order, not primeval rhythm. Reason being, that’s what perspective is: a type of order (C5)

Rhythm and archaic symmetry are what an elephant has, not order

 

The physique in action in a landscape of dirt and disorder, triumph and rebewal. As archaic as Hyboria.

The universe we live in is a sorcerous parallel to this physically desirable one of shape. Now, of course, you’re gonna say if you look through a microscope (lens) at something small, you do see shape!

Yes, all molecules have shapes, but I’m talking about the primeval symmetry of the cosmos which produces archaic shapes like an elephant. Shapes that are Earthbound, and Earth is placed midway between sun and moon (Midgard). They are cosmically attuned to the destiny of Earth twirling in space.

Physiques have cosmic meaning in a physical universe of sun and moon, planets and stars, not in the parallel reality of perspective (sun). The real problem is any parallel universe of order is very convincing, whereas the real universe of myth (shape and power) has no verifiable proof.

One way to look at it is the universe of order is bright and shiny and for the living, but what is our destiny? Since it’s to die, what does that imply? It would imply decay, so unless you are a believer in rebirth and a cosmic cycle, the modern order has no great appeal!

Destiny is gloomy and disordered, at trek with Orpheus, but at least it’s not nothing. The real problem with order is “they” have to tell you to compete and so forth, but why is it so good not to have a destiny?

Destiny is strength, the strength of the predator, the strength of the cycle of creation and destruction, of dirt and cleanliness. Destiny is gloomy, a forest stillness, leaves crackling underfoot but it is not nothing.

This is the enduring appeal of Weird Tales and Howard. They do not blanch at the destiny of Man but face it squarely. We live in an age of weakness and order (of politicians) when the stars are our destiny.

 

The Tower of the Elephant

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What “they” are selling us is simply physical boredom. We are entering an alternate reality that is not physical, and so we are trapped by our own physique, which cannot be denied.

A physical reality is primitive, unthinking. There is the chase, communal gaiety, feasting. Such is the case in action dramas of the South China Seas. Al Couteli’s La Dame De Singapour (Tales of Faith 2) has its antecedents in perhaps the original and greatest of them all, Caniff’s Terry and the Pirates.

Largely what is lacking in the modern scene is ambiance, since it is simply something that is left to its own devices to have spontaneity. This was largely the attraction of San Francisco’s dance-hall culture, going by the memoirs of Kantner and Slick (Hyborian Bridge 62/2)

Something that is left is free to be what it wants to be; it’s kind of a proto-rebellion that is always present in something that has physical roots. By roots one could just mean farming, as was the case with Shanghai (Tales of Faith 2). It’s also present in ancient Chinese philosophy of Tao and Confucianism, Tao by the unthinking gaiety, Confucianism by the communal solidarity.

This philosophy permeates Hong Kong kung fu films, which are quite often a defence of territory, as in Fists of Fury. The unthinking joy of battle almost goes over the top in Jackie Chan’s gay rooftop romps. There is an animal aspect to the fights that is exotic and primitive. The unthinking aspect of life is when it is left to itself with no plan of Man.

The fight could therefore be said to represent decay and disorder as a principle in the universe. Without decay there can be no triumph or eventual revival of fortune. Life and death are ever-present forces in the natural cycle.

This Hong Kong fairy tale of aerial battles is therefore much more true to physical reality than the pedantically verbose western dramas! This was brought home to me by a 2013 interview with Rory Stewart by America’s own Harry Kleister. Stewart is a son of Empire who was born in Hong Kong of ancient Scots blood.

His fairly famous walk across Asia he describes in terms of physical reality, staying in about 500 villages en route. The sense I got was that a traditional society is disordered, while a modern society is ordered.

Or, as I tend to say here, one is physique, the other is head. The physique expresses itlelf in everyday acts. For example, he mentions that Afghan villagers were opposed to a bureaucratic plan to lay a pipeline infrastructure because they washed in their courtyards where mud would get in the pipes.

Bureaucrats see the infrastructure as order (of the head), whereas the physical expression of the body in traditional societies is usually disordered, exposed to dirt or mud. The physique is associated with both dirt and cleanliness and, likewise, with the creation of dirt and the destruction of dirt (by washing and toiletries).

In terms of physique, this is glaringly obvious and animal-like. But in terms of bureaucratic self-justification – which only deals in hygiene – it doesn’t really exist! Stewart put his experiences – as both wanderer and government official – in different but similar terms. What he didn’t say but what I’m saying here is that a society of the head cannot physically experience creation and destruction (in their daily activities.)

The villages used pack animal where this cycle is continually occurring and the landscape they travelled through was ruggedly dirt-ridden – maybe like the Old West. The experience of the physical destruction of dirt is no longer part of the modern lexicon (apart from odd tourist attractions, natch.)

A society of the physique has this literally at their doorstep. It is not hygiene, it is dirt where cleanliness is a moral duty (Mosaic Law Tales of Faith 10). I did mention somewhere that microbes in dirt reinforce our immune-defences, most likely because it is a natural cycle we as homo sapiens have historically lived in (Pictorial 34, Hyborian Bridge 31, 36)

In a society of courtyard bathing, mud and dirt, decay is in the air but so by the same token is bodily strength and cleanliness. The black loam that fertilized Man’s crops is born of decay and the strength of this cycle is the physical strength of Earth. A traditional society of the physique is of earth, while a modern society of the head is not. This could be why it often appears the Martians are here!

Stewart seemed genuinely perplexed, and one problem is that a society of the head is very convincing. I happened to spot a feature on “selfie” pioneer Cindy Sherman, and it struck me that photographic perspective makes it very easy to lie since what is in the frame is so convincing.

 Untitled Film Still #21

 Untitled #466

In other words, what is ordered (sun or perspective) can easily be an illusion, a copy, mirror image or reflection. Artists like BWS who make use of perspective in a basically disordered world are much more true to reality; the reality of disorder or the cycle of lifedeath. A classical reality is unthinking, it is not of the head. Often what is depicted is a fight, or the everlasting hunt, Diana in physical action, coupling, martyrdom.

Going back to Hong Kong films, the creative action of bodies-in-motion is quite animalistic. The hutongs and chic hotel interiors offer an odd comparison to Nyoka (Drama1) with the frenetic clambering over balconies and protrusions.

If, as Bruce Lee said, kung fu is a battle between a wild beast and a robot, the battle is never won. For the same reason, Helene of Rome (Tros of Samothrace Hyborian Bridge 18) is thigh-slapping fury personified. The savage grace of Howard’s prose is born of the wildness and freedom that is the human physique in action in a landscape of dirt and disorder, triumph and rebirth.

Combination of the Two (18)

You may recall from Euripides The Bacchae  (The False Apollo) that king Pentheus was torn asunder by the vengeful revellers. It may seem a bit unfair since he was only imposing social order, and they are only the followers of Dionysus who gyrate and gambol round sacred groves.

Except that a dance is a creative physical act that establishes shape and pattern in the world. Pentheus you might say represents the words of politicians that say this or that is good; the revellers represent the power of ritual as a memory in the world as it pirouettes in space.

Well do I recall the barn dances of yore the few years I spent on an organic farm in Wales. The thing with rituals is they are patterns in space established by bodies-in-motion. This is a type of physical reality that a political world has no real conception of. It springs from the work and the activities of people together on the land.

The more we live in an order of “script” (DNA and algorithms) the less will we live in a psychic reality. And yet script without primeval rhythm is meaningless (prev). Those like Hameroff (of Quantum Consciousness) are all transhumans of one kind or another, dismissive of the wriggling worm underfoot. And yet the activities of worms are the bedrock of loose, crumbly organic humus, the black loam that fertilized the country estates of landed gentry in days of yore.

The physical perfection of primeval rhythm is the archaic power of Earth, something that no alternate reality script can comprehend. This is the weakness of the head that doesn’t understand the physical power that underpins all psyche.

This goes back to Mozart’s The Magic Flute (Hyborian Bridge 27) which is almost a template for The Enlightenment. In the battle of solar order versus the Queen of the Night, Sarastro imposes his authoritarian routine on Pamina – daughter of the Queen of the Night – to compel obedience.

In the opera it’s sold as a love-match with prince Tamino, but it also points to a world of routine and nothing else. Seductive rituals that compel their votaries are all very well but, over time, rituals can lose their meaning, becoming scripts that are physically and psychically weak (Alternates 3 If)

Sarastro is a commanding figure issuing instructions as the figurehead of the sun - exactly the world we are entering. The likes of Musk, Bezos, Branson, Hameroff, Anissimov – transhuman all – are establishing via satellite a “smart planet”. That is to say, an immaterial world of the head. What “they” say – that we live in material world – is the exact opposite of the truth.

The material world is the landed gentry of yore, the black loam that fertilizes fields and crops galore. Hounds that bay, deer that stray, blood that sprays, horses that neigh. Material reality of the Earth. Of course, “their” reality has the perspective of light (C5) and so is very convincing. The only problem is it’s not real.

In Mozart’s day this may not have been known, but now we can all see Disney’s Pixar animations or MS’s hololenses and realize the unreality of it all. The reality of the immaterial world of light. Not the archaic physicality of the Earth as it spins twixt sun and moon, a destiny which is born of decay and rebirth in the dark loam of Mother Earth.

This is the world of dirt and cleanliness that is strong and pure. Where the physical activities of the body create shape and patterns in the world. Because living is a creative act, it can’t be told or recited as a script. To put it bluntly, urinating is a creative act; the reasons are manifold so I won’t bother to list them (see Fulling Hyborian Bridge 60)

What you could say is there is a creative aspect to actions of the unthinking body independent of the immaterial head. The two are completely separate; one is an animal aspect or spoor. In nature this is free expression (meaning, gamekeeping Tales of Faith 11) and represents the freedom of the body in active country pursuits.

This entire universe of wildness and freedom – hunting and Diana – is closed off by the compulsions of the immaterial head to plan, to cut off free expression. The spontaneity of communal living is lost but, since the physique cannot be denied, the result is physical boredom.

It’s the old Bruce Lee mantra of a war between a wild beast and a robot (The Big Pretence – there’s a gag to that effect near the start of Enter the Dragon). Classical Greece is neither head nor body but a basic balance between the two that our transhuman buddies presumably never knew.

Where there is balance there is freedom because the body dances to a communal beat. It’s the ancient scepticism of Diogenes for all philosophies, living the simplest of lives in a barrel surrounded by the hurly-burly. Philosophies which are radical can be dangerous to the freedom of citizens to be what they are without thought. This was the fate of Socrates, forced to drink hemlock by the Athenian elders.

Societies that lack thought have the spontaneity of Latin American favelas (prev). These two aspects to society – bodily freedom and mental planning – are always there and always different. The idea of planning for a body which is essentially free always has this sense of compulsion (Grace Slick quote Hyborian Bridge 62/1) This is the basic physical boredom of a world that is planned with no consideration for free expression.

The boredom is of the head but, since physique can’t be denied, also of the body. The universe dances twixt night and day, and the archaic symmetry gives living a primeval meaning, simple like childhood. Myth has this simple fascination, a dance of time and space moderns have denied to their future chagrin. The simplicity of

FIRST THING IN THE MORNING (the video by Another Tone Production is macabre but not bad)

Conan #24 The House That Rand Built 2

 

Combination of the Two (17)

“I didn’t find that format really worked for me and I am going to have to learn how I can flourish in a strange format of alternative reality.. I thought maybe if I took my tie off we could get back to a bit of reality. I was beginning to feel on those strange BBC bar stools that we were moving off into an alternate reality.”

Poor old Stew even had to yank off his tie so, even had he become prime minister, he would still have found the alternate reality uncomfortable. Why? Because the head is forever asked to solve the problems of the world and there’s one it can’t solve.

That the body is a material reality, not a statement of fact (script), a shape with savage grace, the warrior aspect of the statesman, blood, strength, honour, desirability. The political alternate reality cannot conceive of a world where the physical has meaning (physique) and power (ontology) in the world.

 

                                     going                            going                               gone

In this sequence from the last debate, Stew is obviously itching to dance with savage grace but, instead, is being forced to speak. The act of speaking immaterially (“script”) enters an alternate reality that is not physical. Like Katie Bouman’s black hole (Hyborian Bridge 56) the head is trapped by its own physique.

The itch to dance is a way out of this trap since dancing is a creative act of bodily meaning and power. Because the physicality of the body cannot be denied, the modernday politician’s alternate reality is one of physical boredom.

The introspective adventurer will always find this situation uncomfortable. The fact is that career politicians worldwide are essentially on the same ideological alternate reality – numerical/monetary/compulsive. All three, totalling global boredom. I know we’re supposed to think that the free-market is not an ideology but, if it is a product of a parallel world of “script”, that is not the case. Script is immaterial (head) not physical (body). You have to support Hong Kong in the face of Chinese aggression, but I’d support Bruce Lee more! A new boxer rebellion is called for. Words, speeches are no longer enough.

If you look back at Tales of Faith 2 the steaming physicality of the scenes is something else. Shanghai and Hong Kong evolved from 19^th century free trading ports and the freedoms were very real, anarchic even, sordid, surreal. The early Bruce Lee films hark back to that era and are very appealing (nostalgic).

China may be the big villain, but now so is the “script” that runs capital enclaves. Don’t get me wrong; I hate China and love Hong Kong, but it’s no longer as simple as good vs evil. If the Hong Kongers get physical I’ll support them; if not China only has to wait to extinguish them forever.

However, there is no longer “freedom” of the market when it has this order that is essentially a script. I guess you could say the best thing is to deal with the China threat first, and I get that. So, kill off the China threat then deal with the global order that kills freedom.

If you look back to Hyborian Bridge 62/2 there still seems to be an intermediate way between left and right which is what I tended to term the spontaneity of impoverished Latin American communes (Mexican favelas). I can’t pretend to know what’s going on in Latin America, except that the trek in search of the dollar is no solution.

The dollar now represents order, numerical, monetary and compulsive, of an immaterial script (head). The parallel reality that we inhabit. The more persistent is this order (script) the more immaterial is the mind all the more trapped by its own physique.

I guess you can see where this is heading, so what I plan to do is to return to the physical world of material reality. In Britain that used to be represented by country estates comprising vast ranges of farmland, woodland, lakeland, vast piles of stone and wood and chimneys, birdland, grassland.

In America, I guess it’s represented by a mixture of ranchland and the old Indian territories made into National Parks – Combination of the Two (7) - the old theme of decay and rebirth is ever present, dirt and cleanliness that is strong and pure. Wealth is Dionysian (revival and revelry). Modern wealth is Apollonian illusion.

Actually, it’s worth going back to the material wealth that predates both these, the medieval castle; As noted previouslyAlternates 8 a castle was filthy and cleanliness was a moral duty. Rushes were spread on the floor of the great hall where the stench of various fluids (animal, Man, vegetable) were disguised by fragrant herbs. Like fulling (Hyborian Bridge 60) two strong things counteract eachother.

Such a setting is something like a ranch that spreads hay or straw over dirt or wet ground; these are continual signs of decay and continual signs of cleanliness. Both are strong and have meaning and power.

All these aspects are to do with physical activities of the body, man or animal. Where I live there has been invoked a fine on spitting; this goes to show that the concept of cleanliness is no longer there since to have cleanliness there must be dirt.

The old theme of decay and rebirth is a physical reality of material wealth represented by all of the above. The predator-prey cycle that is the bedrock of strength in action. It’s born of animal behaviour, of our animal aspect (Dionysus). There is decadent meaning and savage aspect that are all too typical of a scene from Hyboria!

Destiny is not born of boredom, it is born of perfection, which is born of decay and rebirth, the primitive, archaic power of Earth twirling amongst the cosmos. The dance is a strong, physical act of meaning.

 Typical Hyborian scene from Red Sonja #7

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Is it possible that the immateriality of our rulers (numerical/monetary/compulsive) is an inevitable consequence of a tendency towards a parallel world of script (head). Britain has a leadership race on, and the contrast between the pitiful posing academic windbag Boris Johnson and the introspective warrior-statesman Rory Stewart tells its own story.

 

The head that is convinced by mainstream reality – the usual politician – is not living in the same world as the warrior-statesman and Homeric traveller. For Stewart, who met his American wife at the Turquoise Mountain - which he established at the request of the Afghan president –roved in Iran and smoked hashish in Bedouin tents, is a physical vagabond living in an immaterial world. Good luck to him!

I’m not saying he has just stepped out of the pages of fantasy; he is old Patrician Imperial Scots and just as establishment as Boris. No, but his roving foot gives him a sense of destiny, connects him to the savage grace of Homeric sunrise and moonfall over desert vastness. It is not the political world of information, and so his scope is as sure-footed as the goat.

Meaning (physique) and power (ontology) in the cosmos have perfection. For any animal to live and breathe and move it must be a perfect form, comprised of limbs, feathers and so on. Not only nature but Man produces perfect form in gothic churches, spired mosques and so on.

 

Alhambra arch courtyard fountain, Granada

You can say birds have mechanical means of flight and so on but, even so, in order to be perfect they must also have primeval rhythm. The rhythms that are found in the Alhambra are primeval and perfect.

Often artists who have a knack for the ancient and archaic are the ones able to illustrate Howard very tellingly: Tim Conrad’s Almuric  and Worms of the Earth, Roy Krenkel, Frank Frazetta, BWS (and his related prints, natch). I’d include Frank Thorne as I personally think with the Noto fairy tale influence it fits a Weird Tales ethos nicely!

Wizards of the Black Sun

Staying with Frank, the interwoven fronds, birds and flowery doo-dahs have a frieze-like tapestry effect that could either be art deco or Middle Ages. The archaic effect of natural form is striking, as it is in gothic churches.

If you look back to the Michaelina Wautier (C14) the inclusion of the donkey and goat has the same effect. They are ancient forms of perfection, from pointy ears to sure-footed cloven hooves.

This type of physical perfection represents the physical universe of meaning (physique) and power (ontology) in the cosmos, and so that might be why it has an archaic feel. There was Laurens Van der Post’s quote, that There was no magic in that sound, no gaiety. It was just full of everlasting nostalgia for that other half of ourselves from which we are all separated, of the nostalgia which the moon on the eve of her own rounded fulfilment provokes in all living matter, not excluding the most dimly-lit animal heart. (Hyborian Bridge 62/1)

If we live in an archaic universe, if we are “five billion year carbon”, that universe has no verifiable proof, it is strong, bloody, desirable. All these aspects are quite ancient; our relation to the cosmos through the rotation of Earth (ontology). The ancient physical universe of plants and animals, stars and streams.

 Cimmeria

I had a listen to Nicole Emmalhainz on “rhetorical situation” (Howard Days), the fact that Howard had conversations with his compatriots and was not this clichéd solitary genius at a typewriter. Apart from that, he must have had a conversation with the savage grace of nature, the sense of kindred with the wild physical space of Texas.

Here there comes a relation to Rory Stewart, because this gives them a wide idea of the reality of the cosmos. It is not verifiable proofs which apply to an immaterial universe, the one which the vast majority of politicians cohabit (with eachother!)

In order to get a sense of reality, meaning – the use of physique – and ontology – the physical power of the cosmos (Earth’s spin) are needed. In olden days, there would be market fairs of crafts and savage dancing, all sorts of fabrics, and the youth getting psyched into ancient ways

North Yorkshire County Show

When a kid I lived in Franco’s Spain, and the gaiety of the material world of old established pottery ware, bullfighting districts, the disorganized street-life sounds and leather and steel all together is to me material reality (similar to Latin America). The world we are living in now is an immaterial illusion dedicated to the dollar.

What is primitive and unprogressive is Dionysian reality. Apollo is the modern illusion. I remember the senoritas, the savage grace of flamenco dancing, those billowing dresses and castanets (ole!) Nostalgic, wretched and gay. Now Spain is just one other Eurozone (for $)

What is it that has been lost? The strong, the bloody, the desirable. Meaning through physique in dancing; physical perfection of the real world of material goods – fabrics, pottery, bulls, leather, steel, sounds, stenches. Read Papa Hemingway.

It’s not a right-wing world so much as a physical reality of light, air, smell, earth, birds, fountains, courtyards all together. The modern world is information (numerical and monetary); the old world is not, it’s physical presence of the material world of color, texture, shape, dance (ole!)

The old world is primitive because the cosmos has archaic power. The primitive side of things (Dionysian) has been lost to progression; but actually this type of progress is immaterial, it has no power, it’s in the head.

Conan #6, the material world

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Weird Tales, not only Howard’s special form of muscular heroism, but the lithe animal passions of CL Moore, of frolicsome manoeuvres in twilit vistas, represents a physical rebellion against the progressive thinking fashioned by Henry Ford and others around the turn of the century that equated happiness with material consumption

The 60s represented a further rebellion against the exact same ethic, and went much further in terms of popular culture (reaching the city of one million of Woodstock). So why did the rebellion fail to render any perceptible change? Why are things much worse now than in the 60s? For some of the reasons already compiled.

For a start, the material order is actually immaterial, comprising the electromagnetic universe (cars will soon all be electric). This universe is not only very convincing (a reflection) but is in the minds of acolytes or, more likely, their algorithms.

Not only that, but their minds are under a numerical/monetary compulsion (Hyborian Bridge 62/1). The more numerical they get, the more compulsive the minds – further convincing acolytes of the materiality of this universe of the head so that, the more immaterial the universe gets, the more convinced are the acolytes of its materiality!

The best example of this is Katie Bouman’s black hole (Hyborian Bridge 56). In purely physical terms this is a lewd image; but in the immaterial terms of radio telescopes it’s just a fact with no physical meaning. This is the exact opposite to the physical universe of the ancients, where figures and animal shapes are imagined to form the constellations of the sky. Physical meaning is everything, whereas in Katie Bouman’s case it means nothing, and so the head is almost trapped by its own physique (body).

In a universe of the body the exact opposite is the case, since figures are imagined to be there even if in “reality” apparently there’s nothing there. Yes, but the physical universe doesn’t rely on verifiable proofs; what is there is rhythm and shape and that is what you see (in the figures).

Similarly for the Roy Krenkel picture (C3

) of satyrs which aren’t “real”, but primal rhythm and shape and strength of animal form

 

The immaterial universe (of modernity!) only appears real; it’s convincingly real, too real since it supplies script without the primal rhythm of the physical universe (see prev.) That is, the physical rotation of Earth against the cosmos.

From that point of view, DNA is only a script for the physical universe - not for the immaterial one – it’s not per se anything in itself. Similarly, Hameroff (prev) sees consciousness as a thing in itself, independent of the physical universe of motion in the cosmos.

The universe of movement is simple, primal, strong and nothing evokes it better thanWeird Tales. Why? Because movement is a type of poetry, a Homeric rise and fall of sun and moon over seas of green, a subtle grandeur that no amount of obfuscation can evoke. Because it’s not information at all; it’s actually the cosmic power (ontology) of the Earth spinning in space.

So, both meaning (physique) and ontology (being) are ignored by the acolytes of the parallel universe of lenses (perspective and light Hyborian Bridge 56). A parallel universe can be very convincing but it doesn’t change the fact that a physical universe has meaning (epistemology) and power (ontology) in the cosmos.

The human physique and conscience (religion) in a landscape where honour exists (chivalry, see prev.) Where horses are not a thing of the past because their high spirited ways are not hygienic information of vast lots (Drama1) but physique and physical power in the world of dirt and cleanliness.

Physique is meaning and power (And God Created) and implicates pursuits that emphasize the sexuality of the body (see Fulling Hyborian Bridge 60). The formality of the pursuits (riding, threshing) and the free-expression of the body-in-motion. Just like classical ballet, actually.

SHE USED TO WANNA BE A BALLERINA

Where the body-in-motion has meaning, you are in the world of classical structure (see prev on Claude Levi-Strauss).

LA BAYADERE

Strength and love (life); blood (death) and physical desirability. Man is attached to the stars via his physicality as the Earth twirls in space. Poetic dance is one of the closest ways one can get to a cosmic destiny. Again, there are no verifiable proofs because we are now in a physical universe, not one of acolytes’ heads’ numerical compulsions.

This all smacks of folk-art since ballet is just a progression of folk-dancing; maybe why Russians with a Cossack tradition are naturals? Youths learn the folk styles (as Nureyev did) so that there is a continual link between youth and ancient folk-art (see prev on Howard and his mother).

The two elements of life are very interrelatable, and maybe can be lost sight of in a formal education. No lesser an authority than Madonna now says that life is now too exhausting for an artist to grow and develop normally!

Taking away the ability to grow full stop. Folk relates the youth to the cosmos, and this applies more to smaller countries like Estonia (maybe parts of the US). Just as Howard’s mother related him to the ancient spirits, Weird Tales was the folk/fairy tales of the 30s.

Opposed to the progressive immaterialism of autos (now electric) and TV (now streaming) was the ancient, animal, caveman physicality of the cosmos, where the primitive rules in triumph.

Tim Conrad art

Combination of the Two (14) - part 3 of 3

“You are not an opponent, you are prey”

Strength and love; blood and physical desirability. The honour-bound chivalric code that Royal Kill in some ways resembles, till the sorcerous twist that joins good and evil in unholy alliance.

One way to look at it is that, while the Manichean struggle between good and evil may be torrid and not a bundle of laughs, the unholy joining of the two (by sorcerous means) is vastly worse and an aberration against nature.

When the two opposites are bound there can be no conscience (religion) or codes-of-honour (chivalry). Without those there is in effect nothing there save a scripted routine; in this case the one written by Morita (who plays both the sorcerer and Wraith’s employer at the end.)

The routine denies freedom, free-expression of the individual, and you wonder if this is the world we are actually in? I’ve already gone over some of this in the post-civil rights America (Pictorial 46). The one city which was allowed to develop its neighbourhoods independently (from federal law) was Detroit, and I’ll leave it to you to make any comparisons you care to.

The entire history of the West is the story of free-expression of the individual. The horror and bloodshed are part of folklore, but so are conscience and codes-of-honour. You can’t have one without the other. Rapine and bloodlust are not the product of machines, they come from human hearts. Those hearts also have consciences, and not all men and women are born without honour.

The history of the West IS America in its primitive, irrational elemental soul. Those who deny it are the sorcerers who wish to do without good or evil altogether, ie in the joining of Man with machine (AI).

That electromagnetic universe cannot have conscience or a code-of-honour (Alphaville Alternates 4), only scripted routines in the immaterial world (of the sun) not in the physical universe of moon and planets, cowboys and guitars, wild girls and Indians.

CALVARY/MONA (track 8 live and wild)

As you may have noticed, that archaic world is not only wild and free, but also full of animal shapes that soar over mountain tops and thunder over plains. In other words, primeval form as existed at the time of the dinosaurs (see “House of Elrig”). The Dionysian abandon of free expressive action, maidens dancing with donkeys in rites of spring (Pictorial 21

)

 

Michaelina Wautier, 17^th century baroque artiste from the Netherlands (where else?)

This is the reality of physical perfection in the primeval rhythms of the cosmos. That is, the physical universe of cowboys and guitars on plains of yore who follow no script; they are only conscious of the cosmos under the stars above.

A script cannot also have primeval rhythm; the two cannot be reconciled. The one thing that can be reconciled is poetry, be it Biblical or Red Nails. That’s one reason I liked Royal Kill as it is so visual with a minimal screenplay, leaving one to one’s own devices (like life?)

Scripts exist outside the physical universe of shape, in the immaterial one of the mind of acolytes. Acolytes who are convinced of verifiable proofs provided by lenses – microscopes, telescopes Hyborian Bridge 56, 61 (Conan the Conqueror) – of a universe we cannot see.

That universe is not physical; in other words, it has no primeval rhythm of the planets as Earth rotates in space. Without the physical universe, the psyche cannot be free to be what it wants to be; free of scripted routines of an immaterial world of the minds of acolytes (of mainly dead sorcerers).

Combination of the Two (14) - part 2

If shape is something a priori then it’s also not the competitive order we are nowadays instructed to follow. An order is something that follows instructions, a routine and is likely associated with algorithms. In a sense that goes against the freedom of the universe to just be itself, to freely and flexibly fight to stay alive and to thrive.

To be flexible there can be no scripted routine to follow; there can only be spontaneous action in-the-moment. This is actually the theme of Bruce Lee’s final film Game of Death, set in a pagoda where Lee encounters a different opponent on each level.

In order to win he can have no preset routine and must be free to respond to each different threat and style of attack. He called this Jeet Kune Do, which is sort of a mixture of a lot of preparation and then complete freedom of movement and attack.

This double-pronged approach means there’s no such thing as pure order (outside of the sun), since that involves routine (algorithms). Action is pure freedom, outside of technique (The Big Pretence)

The verifiable proofs of science (such as the double-helix) are scripted routines that exist outside of primordial rhythm (shape). The competitive order we follow is a scripted routine that has no basis in physical reality. Like a lot of these things, it exists in the head, or usually the algorithm.

The universe we have lost is the one of instinctive, primitive action at one with the beasts of the forest. What “they” would have us believe is that primitive instinct exists in the consciousness (apparently DNA), whereas actually they are primordial to the physical universe (sun and moon).

The physical universe is bloody and predatory (and superstitious – see Van der Post prev); without that structure, all that is there are electrochemical impulses. This is the implication of Hameroff’s Quantum Consciousness (C14) since he assumes consciousness exists (in neurons) without the need for action.

The real problem with these theories is they are all types of scripted routines. Whether DNA, algorithms or Quantum Consciousness (electrochemical impulses), they are all outside of conscience (religion) and codes-of-honour (blood sacrifice).

Where do these come from? From the physical universe of sun and moon, planets and stars (figures in the sky). So, how do they get into the consciousness? Quoting Babar Ahmed (C14) quoting Hamlet, “There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.” (interview)

The fantasy element of Royal Kill  (the game) is actually Manichean, the twist at the end as Wraith finds that the female assassin (Kim) is his evil self.

A Manichean universe is intrinsically bloody as there is a continual conflict going on, even within each individual, between right/wrong or good/evil (or male/female as in the film.)

Zoroasrtianism is an ancient Persian belief that predates Christianity, and you can find echoes of it especially in the Old Testament. “Angels were terrible beings”, to quote CC Beck, as this early Renaissance image by Cordoban painter Bartomole Berjemo attests

 

There is a physical universe that is strong and lusty; where physical actions are not scripted; where there is no order (of competition) but free-thinking irrational instinctive behaviour - of the unconscious, dream, of good/evil, male/female.

This is the universe of the dangerous serpent and of Weird Tales.

Combination of the Two (14) - part 1

To what extent is fantasy a physical reality denied by modernity? Not only the heroic fantasy of a Howard, but also gaming. I don’t really know much about it, except that the pure physicality of gaming must be a hook to the body, the instinct for retaliation and kinetics. You wonder if it goes through the body owing to the realism, and puts one back in a physical universe of yore?

Admittedly, I have been saying up till now that realism goes via the head; but gaming is such a kinetic industry one wonders. This was sparked-off by watching a film called Royal Kill (Ninja’s Creed) which got generally appalling reviews. I thought the total opposite that it was the best I’d seen this century, admittedly with flaws that were probably budgetary.

Most reviewers were dismissive to the point of insulting of Babar Ahmed’s premise, which I’m not sure they really “got”. For a start, it has a Carpenterian feel and similar locations with hand-held cameras. Another connection is pro-wrestler Gail Kim plays an assassin; Carpenter employed pro-wrestler Roddy Piper in They Live! The assassin is after the last princess of a remote south Asian dynasty who has been hidden in America and lives with her American dad and the “royal maid”. A soldier (Alexander Wraith) from the far off kingdom must find the maid to preserve the princess and hopefully foment rebellion against the nefarious Scungy empire who have killed all the remaining royals.

The film’s ending leaves one wondering whether the entire plot ever took place, but along the way there are intriguing clues. Right at the start, her American dad (Eric Roberts) is palying chess with a neighbour and recites the line, “You..are the champion!” Is the entire film also a game? At the end of the film the soldier becomes a mere security guard, and recites the line, “To be ordinary.. the horror of modernity.”

There are other clues. Towards the beginning of the film dad disturbs his daughter (Lalaine) dressing and we see her nipples are exposed (briefly). This is a typical classical motif – usually of a goddess – a sign of physical luster and desirability (Hyborian Bridge 31)

Obviously, Babar Ahmed isn’t Greek or European, but I think the Asian deities have similar attributes. Added to the physicality is pro-wrestler Kim who wraps her legs round opponents’ heads, somersaulting in neck-cracking action.

If the film is a game, it’s a game of blood and desirability. These two attributes – strength and love – hark back to the heroic and irrational. We of the modern era – at least the elite – have a tendency to assume rational thinking (the likes of Hilary Mantel of Wolf Hall on Henry VIII).

What is much more likely is that men of the Middle Ages - and of course women like Jeanne  d’Arc - had conscience (religion) and a code-of-honour (chivalrous). You see this so much in Howard’s tales of Outremer and beyond; not only of Christian knights, but of valiant Saracens, particularly in The Sowers of the Thunder (Pictorial 11)

Rational thinking is more of a modern disease; a cold-blooded escape from physical constraints. If you take a medieval figure whose cause was seemingly just – 13^th century knight Simon de Montfort against the corrupt Henry III – his cause was truly Christian, and he raided Jews, as often as not, for their coffers.

  Simon de Montfort by Edmond Mennechet

His cause may have been just but it was far from rational, depending on the oaths of barons to attend constitutional parliaments (which they often broke). The conscience of a knight was a thing of strength borne of the body. When Simon was eventually defeated by Henry III’s troops, he was decapitated, feet, hands and testicles cut-off.

To what extent, then, is our modern rational universe a thing of the head, unreal and immaterial? Dismemberments, whether of animal or man, are gory things as the history of the West tells. History is gory; Howard is gory; the cycle of lifedeath and the destiny of individuals. Simon de Montfort was a rebel and lived and died by blood. It may not be pretty, but it may be that, in an immaterial universe (of the head) the only rebellion possible is a physical one (of the body).

Victory of Simon de Montfort by Jean Fouquet

Defeat of the barons

That will implicate free conscience (belief) and codes-of-honour (blood sacrifice). If life is a game then it’s a bloody one. I just saw this photo of a 40,000 year old timber wolf head, preserved in Siberian permafrost.

 

fangs for the memory (Pleistocene)

What really struck me were the predominant cartoon-like fangs that could rend and tear. Cubs will play games, primarily to practice their moves on prey.

This raises the question of how predatory is the universe as a physical thing? What I mean is; is there a primeval rhythm that is strong and flexible? I mean the primordial serpent, basically (Pictorial 1)

A serpent is androgenous and requires no verifiable proof (of existence) since its shape is intrinsic to the universe – of sun and moon, polar opposites spinning in space. Therefore, the shape is a priori to scientific method; meaning all the facts we have been given dating approximately from Newton (“Opticks” or sun).

The universe is intrinsically bloody and proportionate, having a predatory shape, and with that comes meaning and structure – Hyborain Bridge 59 . To seek to deny that may be rational but that doesn’t make it right! It’s an escape from the constraints of the body into the immaterial head (of electromagnetic impulses).

It’s almost a case of the predatory Howard of poetic meaning, versus the meaningless mumbo-jumbo of the likes of Hameroff; physique versus immateriality.