Friday 30 December 2022

Zani-whoop!

 
The majority of these early pantomimes were re-tellings of a story from ancient Greek or Roman literature, with a break between the two acts during which the harlequinade's zany comic business was performed. The theatre historian David Mayer explains the use of the "batte" or slapstick and the transformation scene that led to the harlequinade:

"Rich gave his Harlequin the power to create stage magic in league with offstage craftsmen who operated trick scenery. Armed with a magic sword or bat (actually a slapstick), Rich's Harlequin treated his weapon as a wand, striking the scenery to sustain the illusion of changing the setting from one locale to another. Objects, too, were transformed by Harlequin's magic bat."




"The sight of these poor revellers appeared to interest the Spirit very much, for he stood with Scrooge beside him in a baker’s doorway, and taking off the covers as their bearers passed, sprinkled incense on their dinners from his torch. And it was a very uncommon kind of torch, for once or twice when there were angry words between some dinner-carriers who had jostled each other, he shed a few drops of water on them from it, and their good humour was restored directly. For they said, it was a shame to quarrel upon Christmas Day. And so it was! God love it, so it was!

In time the bells ceased, and the bakers were shut up; and yet there was a genial shadowing forth of all these dinners and the progress of their cooking, in the thawed blotch of wet above each baker’s oven; where the pavement smoked as if its stones were cooking too.

“Is there a peculiar flavour in what you sprinkle from your torch?” asked Scrooge.
“There is. My own.”
“Would it apply to any kind of dinner on this day?” asked Scrooge.
“To any kindly given. To a poor one most.
“Why to a poor one most?” asked Scrooge.
“Because it needs it most.”
“Spirit,” said Scrooge, after a moment’s thought, “I wonder you, of all the beings in th

Wednesday’s Children



“I left Nix Uotan, Last of the Monitors, in his human guise at the end of Final Crisis – a cosmic being grounded on Earth disguised as an ordinary human being with everyday problems – like the need to pay his rent, which frames the entire story. 

For his appearance in The Multiversity, we chose to streamline Uotan into a more superheroic figure; I asked Ivan Reis to sex up Uotan’s previous A Clockwork Orange look to make it more of a sleek sci-fi superhero costume in black and gold with an impressive cape. I figured he’d have adopted a style more in keeping with his surroundings in the DC Universe.  

We never really resolve whether or not Uotan’s unnamed human identity is hallucinating his adventures as he lies reading comics on Xannies and Zoloft. Are stories real? Monitors move in mysterious ways…

Superjudge is an album by psychedelic rock band Monster Magnet. Frontman Dave Wyndorf is a long-time comics fan, often citing Kirby in his lyrics. Dave kindly gave me permission to use Superjudge as Nix Uotan’s official superhero name, and he’s thanked in the last issue of the series.

If Nix Uotan is Wotan, the God of Wednesday when the comics come out, if Wotan, like The Babylonian Nabu, Roman Mercury, Greek Hermes, Egyptian Thoth and many others is a god of speed, communication, language,  then Stubbs represents the so-called ‘Ape of Thoth’, the cynocephalus that capers around the silver-tongued mage like the Jester taunts the King, pricking pomposity with humour, obscuring wisdom with inane chatter and madcap interpretation.

Nix Uotan was created to be DC’s Dr. Who equivalent – in this case, a super-powerful black character traversing the many worlds of the Multiverse, solving problems in his cosmic yellow submarine with a wisecracking pirate chimp for company! I’ve always been a little disappointed no-one has thought to pick him up and run with the concept.

As our two heroes travel in their shiftship, the Ultima Thule to answer a distress call from Earth-7, they encounter only ruin and horror and a universe broken and spoiled…”





RINGO :
 Woe... is Me.

Liverpool can be a lonely place 
on a Saturday night.

And this is only 
Thursday morning.

(Thinks) Compared with my life, 
Eleanor Rigby's was a gay, mad whirl.

Nothing ever happens to me.

(Thinks) I feel like an old, splintered drumstick.
I'd jump into the River Mersey, but it looks like rain.

Nothing ever happens to me.

(Engine whirring)

LIVERPUDLIAN POLICEMAN: 
Puss, puss-puss. Puss, puss, puss. Here, pussy.
Here, pussy, pussy, pussy. Here, pussy, pussy.
Ahem, er... (Cat meows)

RINGO :
Would you believe me if I told you 
I was being followed by 
A Yellow Submarine?

LIVERPUDLIAN POLICEMAN: 
No, I would not.

RINGO :
Oh yeah, I didn't think you would.
(Engine whirring)
I could have sworn there 
was a Yellow Submarine.
But that isn't logical, is it?

It must have been one of them 
unidentified flying cupcakes
or a figment of my imagination.

(Thinks) But I don't have an imagination.

(Engine whirring)

(Knocking)
Help, help, help!

RINGO
Thanks, I don't need any.

Help! Won't you please, 
please Help Me?

RINGO: 
Be specific.

(Talking gibberish)
...Blue Meanies!

What you need is...

'H' for hurry, 
'E' for Urgent,
'L' for love me and 
'P' for p-p-please help.

(Door creaks open)

(Door slams loudly)

(Slamming doors and strange noises)

Hiya, baby!

♪♪

(Screeching halt)

Your story has touched my heart.
Jump in, we'll get my friends.


- Bless you! - Did I sneeze? 

Thursday 29 December 2022

Timothy



Dumbo (1941) - Dumbo Meets Timothy

Ah.







Who is this, 
who is coming?



You know, as long 
as I've known Him,
Everything Works for Him.

There's nothing He can't handle.
I can't handle ANYTHING --
School, Parents, The Future...

Ferris can Do ANYTHING...
I don't know What I'm Gonna Do.


Ferris Bueller's Parade


ah (interj.)
mid-15c., an expression of surprise, delight, disgust, or pain in nearly all Indo-European languages, but not found in Old English (where the equivalent expression was la!), so perhaps from Old French a "ah!, oh! woe!"

ach (interj.)
aspirated form of ah; in English often used in representations of German or Celtic speech.

 
ow (interj.)
14c. as an exclamation of surprise; by 1895 as an expression of sudden pain. Compare oh, ah, ouch.

 
a-ha (interj.)
also aha, exclamation of surprise or delighted discovery, late 14c., from ah + ha.

This seely widewe and hire doughtres two ... cryden out "harrow!" and "weloway! A ha! þe fox!" and after him they ran [Chaucer]
Related entries & more
 
egad (interj.)
1670s, I gad, a softened oath, second element God, first uncertain; perhaps it represents exclamation ah.






It's getting late, buddy, we better go 
get the car back Home.

Ferrous Lad :
What? What Do You...
We have a few hours.
We have until 6:00.

I'm sorry, I mean, I know You Don't Care
but it does Mean 
My Ass.

You think I Don't Care?

I know You Don't Care.

Oh, that hurts, Cameron.
Cameron, what have you seen today?
-Nothing Good.

Nothing...

Nothing Good? This...
What do you mean, "Nothing Good"?
We've seen everything Good!
We've seen the whole city!

We went to a museum,
We saw priceless works of art.
We ate pancreas.
Saw... What?
What's wrong?

Look over there.

What's he doing?

He's licking the glass and making
obscene gestures with his hands.

What?

Don't! Don't.

He didn't leave.
He's probably Doing Something.

No, it really busts my hump, you know?

Oh, Cameron, he didn't ditch us
or anything. He's Here.

For all we know, he went back to school.

He would not go back to school.

Yeah, he'd do it. He'd just do it 
just to make me sweat.

No, he would not
Cameron, come on.

Makes me mad.

Ladies and Gentlemen,
You're such a wonderful crowd.
We'd like to play a little tune for you.
It's one of my personal favorites
and I'd like to dedicate it
to a Young Man who doesn't think
he's seen anything Good, today.
Cameron Frye, This One's for You.

-Ferris! Get off of the float!
-What are you doing?

Get off the float! l can't believe you.

How'd you get up there?
You're out of your mind!

You know, as long as I've known Him,
Everything Works for Him.

There's nothing He can't handle.
I can't handle ANYTHING --
School, Parents, The Future...

Ferris can Do ANYTHING...
I don't know What I'm Gonna Do.

-College.
-Yeah. But to do what?

What are you interested in?

Nothing.

Me neither.

You're crazy!

What do you think 
Ferris is gonna do?



 
ha-ha 
also haha, used of laughter since ancient times; Old English ha ha. Also in Greek (ha ha, in Euripides, Aristophanes), Latin (hahae). A different attempt at representation in English is py-hy (1580s).

Sometimes interchanged with ah and expressing surprise, distress, etc. A ha-ha (1712), from French, was "an obstacle interrupting one's way sharply and disagreeably;" so called because it "surprizes ... and makes one cry Ah! Ah!" [Alexander Le Blond, "The Theory and Practice of Gardening," 1712].

Related entries & more
 
la (3)
Anglo-Saxon interjection of mild wonder or surprise, or grief; "oh, ah, indeed, verily."

Related entries & more
 
sis-boom-bah 
cheerleading chant, by 1924, originally (1867) an echoic phrase imitating the sound of a skyrocket flight (sis), the burst of the fireworks (boom), and the reaction of the crowd (ah).

Related entries & more
 
Bing (adj.)
in reference to a a dark red type of cherry widely grown in the U.S., 1889, said to have been developed 1870s and named for Ah Bing, Chinese orchard foreman for Oregon fruit-grower Seth Lewelling. 

Monday 26 December 2022

When Parenting Goes Wrong

When Parenting Goes Wrong | Stephanie Davies-Arai | #316

The Dr Jordan B Peterson Podcast
Dr Peterson's extensive catalog is available now on DailyWire+: https://utm.io/ueSXh

Dr Jordan B Peterson and Stephanie Davies-Arai discuss parenting and the pitfalls of compassion when linked to trans ideology. 

Stephanie Davies-Arai is the founder and director of Transgender Trend, the leading UK organization calling for evidence-based healthcare for gender dysphoric children and young people and fact-based teaching in schools. She is the author of Communicating with Kids with a background in teacher training and parent support. She was shortlisted for the John Maddox Prize 2018 for the schools guide Supporting gender diverse and trans-identified students in schools. In 2020 Stephanie was an intervener in the High Court in support of Keira Bell and Mrs A, who brought a landmark case against the Tavistock Gender Identity Development Service in a claim that under-18s are not old enough to consent to treatment with puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones. In 2022 Stephanie was awarded the British Empire Medal as founder of Transgender Trend for services to children in the Queen’s Jubilee Birthday Honours list.


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- Links - 

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Transgender Trend Website: https://www.transgendertrend.com/

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My Body is Me: https://www.transgendertrend.com/prod...

An Introductory Guide to Sex and Gender: https://www.transgendertrend.com/prod...


- Chapters -

(0:00) Coming up
(1:27) Intro
(2:40) When we dislike our own kids
(4:00) The importance of duality in parenting
(6:40) Optimal family dynamics
(10:35) Post-Freudian world, the dismay in peace
(19:43) Camps of discipline
(24:55) Parenting books, lack of scrutiny
(27:24) The terror in total freedom
(31:50) Sam Brinton, subjective truth
(40:00) Gender identity is the new counter culture
(47:45) Creativity and negative flux
(53:12) Twenge, self confidence, affirmation
(58:52) The folly of self consciousness
(1:05:11) Depression spirals
(1:08:30) Demi-Boys and unstable categories
(1:15:57) Anxiety, women, and social contagion
(1:21:00) Objectification and over correction
(1:27:55) The job of your therapist
(1:35:08) Compassion and the lie of self harm
(1:39:00) Facing the narcissism of compassion


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The Cenci. A Tragedy In Five Acts

The Cenci. A Tragedy In Five Acts 
by Percy Bysshe Shelley.


Percy Bysshe Shelley - Cenci / The Cenci

Antonin Artaud adaptation
Antonin Artaud staged his adaptation Les Cenci in 1935 at the Theatre Folies-Wagram.[5]:1099 The production closed after 17 performances due to poor reviews.[6]:132 Artaud staged the production in line with his theory for a Theatre of Cruelty, though he stated that it "is not Theatre of Cruelty yet, but is a preparation for it."[7]:103 Artaud drew on Shelley's text, as well as a version of the tale by Stendhal, and his adaptation "exaggerated the sadistic and pathological elements of the play to a point of violence".[5]:1099

Critical reception
In his May 15, 1886 review of the play, Oscar Wilde concluded: "In fact no one has more clearly understood than Shelley the mission of the dramatist and the meaning of the drama.
Alfred and H. Buxton Forman also praised The Cenci as a "tragic masterpiece", elevating Shelley into the company of Sophocles, Euripides, and Shakespeare. Leigh Hunt, to whom the play was dedicated, effused over Shelley's "great sweetness of nature, and enthusiasm for good". Mary Shelley, in her note on the play, wrote that "[u]niversal approbation soon stamped The Cenci as the best tragedy of modern times." 
She critically assessed Act V: "The Fifth Act is a masterpiece. It is the finest thing he ever wrote, and may claim proud comparison not only with any contemporary, but preceding, poet." 
She noted that "Shelley wished The Cenci to be acted", intending the work, which she wrote was of "surpassing excellence", to be an acting play, not a "closet drama". Shelley sought unsuccessfully to have the play staged at Covent Garden.

Byron wrote his criticisms of the play in a letter to Shelley: "I read Cenci – but, besides that I think the subject essentially un-dramatic, I am not a great admirer of our old dramatists as models. I deny that the English have hitherto had a drama at all. Your Cenci, however, was a work of power and poetry." Byron told Thomas Medwin in conversation: "The Cenci is... perhaps the best tragedy modern times have produced." 
William Wordsworth reportedly called the play "the greatest tragedy of the age."
After seeing a performance of the play in 1886, George Bernard Shaw commented that 
"Shelley and Shakespeare are the only dramatists who have dealt in despair of this quality."

A reviewer writing for the Literary Gazette in 1820, on the other hand, wrote that the play was "noxious", "odious", and "abominable". The taboo subjects of incest, patricide, and parricide, as well as the negative depiction of the Roman Catholic Church, however, prevented The Cenci from being staged publicly.

The Cenci by Percy Bysshe Shelley

The Cenci by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792 - 1822)
Genre(s): Tragedy

Read by:  in English
Cover design by David Purdy.

Chapters:
00:00:00 - 01 - ACT I
00:32:07 - 02 - ACT II
00:56:17 - 03 - ACT III
01:28:49 - 04 - ACT IV
02:03:20 - 05 - ACT V



More information: https://librivox.org/the-cenci-by-per...

LibriVox - free public domain audiobooks (https://librivox.org/)



The Cenci by PB Shelley

A comprehensive overview of Shelley's closet drama The Cenci. No such video or comprehensive material on the play other than this is available in the internet. Immensely useful for students of English Literature preparing for BA, MA courses, NTA NET English, university entrance exams, etc.


 

DEDICATION, TO LEIGH HUNT, ESQ. 

Mv dear friend I inscribe with your name, from a distant country, and after an absence whose months have seemed years, this the latest of my literary efforts. Those writings which I have hitherto published, have been little else than visions which impersonate my own apprehensions of the beautiful and the just. I can also perceive in them the literary defects incidental to youth and impatience; they are dreams of what ought to be, or may be. The drama which I now present to you is a sad reality. I lay aside the presumptuous attitude of an instructor, and am content to paint, with such colours as my own heart furnishes, that which has been. Had I known a person more highly endowed than yourself with all that it becomes a man to possess, I had solicited for this work the ornament of his name. One more gentle, honourable, innocent and brave; one of more exalted toleration for allwho do and think evil, and yet himself more free from evil; one who knows better how to receive, and how to confer a benefit, though he must ever confer far more than he can receive; one of simpler, and, in the highest sense of the word, of purer life and manners I never knew: and I had already been fortunate in friendships when your name was added to the list. In that patient and irreconcilable enmity with domestic and political tyranny and imposture which the tenor of your life has illustrated, and which, had I health and talents, should illustrate mine, let us, comforting each other in our task, live and die. All happiness attend you! Your affectionate friend, 

PERCY B. SHELLEY. 

Rome, May 29, 1819. 

PREFACE 

A manuscript was communicated to me during my travels in Italy, which was copied from the archives of the Cenci Palace at Rome, and contains a detailed ac- count of the horrors which ended in the extinction of one of the noblest and richest families of that city during the Pontificate of Clement VIII, in the year 1599. The story is, that an old man having spent his life in debauchery and wickedness, con- ceived at length an implacable hatred towards his children; which showed itself to- wards one daughter under the form of an incestuous passion, aggravated by every circumstance of cruelty and violence. This daughter, after long and vain attempts to escape from what she considered a perpetual contamination both of body and mind, at length plotted with her mother-in-law and brother to murder their com- mon tyrant. The young maiden, who was urged to this tremendous deed by an im- pulse which overpowered its horror, was evidently a most gentle and amiable being, a creature formed to adorn and be admired, and thus violently thwarted from her nature by the necessity of circumstance and opinion. The deed was quickly discovered, and, in spite of the most earnest prayers made to the Pope by the highest persons in Rome, the criminals were put to death. The old man had during his life repeatedly bought his pardon from the Pope for capital crimes of the most enormous and unspeakable kind, at the price of a hundred thousand crowns; the death therefore of his victims can scarcely be accounted for by the love of jus- tice. The Pope, among other motives for severity, probably felt that whoever killed the Count Cenci deprived his treasury of a certain and copious source of revenue. (The Papal Government formerly took the most extraordinary precautions against the publicity of facts which offer so tragical a demonstration of its own wickedness and weakness; so that the communication of the manuscript had become, until very lately, a matter of some difficulty.) Such a story, if told so as to present to the reader all the feelings of those who once acted it, their hopes and fears, their confidences and misgivings, their various interests, passions, and opinions, acting upon and with each other, yet all conspiring to one tremendous end, would be as a light to make apparent some of the most dark and secret caverns of the human heart. On my arrival at Rome I found that the story of the Cenci was a subject not to be mentioned in Italian society without awakening a deep and breathless interest; and that the feelings of the company never failed to incline to a romantic pity for the wrongs, and a passionate exculpation of the horrible deed to which they urged her, who has been mingled two centuries with the common dust. All ranks of people knew the outlines of this history, and participated in the overwhelming interest which it seems to have the magic of exciting in the human heart. I had a copy of Guido's picture of Beatrice which is preserved in the Colonna Palace, and my ser- vant instantly recognized it as the portrait of La Cenci. This national and universal interest which the story produces and has produced for two centuries and among all ranks of people in a great City, where the imagination is kept for ever active and awake, first suggested to me the conception of its fitness for a dramatic purpose. In fact it is a tragedy which has already received, from itscapacity of awakening and sustaining the sympathy of men, approbation and suc- cess. Nothing remained as I imagined, but to clothe it to the apprehensions of my countrymen in such language and action as would bring it home to their hearts. The deepest and the sublimest tragic compositions, King Lear and the two plays in which the tale of Oedipus is told, were stories which already existed in tradition, as matters of popular belief and interest, before Shakspeare and Sophocles made them familiar to the sympathy of all succeeding generations of mankind. This story of the Cenci is indeed eminently fearful and monstrous: anything like a dry exhibition of it on the stage would be insupportable. The person who would treat such a subject must increase the ideal, and diminish the actual horror of the events, so that the pleasure which arises from the poetry which exists in these tem- pestuous sufferings and crimes may mitigate the pain of the contemplation of the moral deformity from which they spring. There must also be nothing attempted to make the exhibition subservient to what is vulgarly termed a moral purpose. The highest moral purpose aimed at in the highest species of the drama, is the teaching the human heart, through its sympathies and antipathies, the knowledge of itself; in proportion to the possession of which knowledge, every human being is wise, just, sincere, tolerant and kind. If dogmas can do more, it is well: but a drama is no fit place for the enforcement of them. Undoubtedly, no person can be truly dishon- oured by the act of another; and the fit return to make to the most enormous in- juries is kindness and forbearance, and a resolution to convert the injurer from his dark passions by peace and love. Revenge, retaliation, atonement, are pernicious mistakes. If Beatrice had thought in this manner she would have been wiser and better; but she would never have been a tragic char- acter: the few whom such an exhibition would have interested, could never have been sufficiently interested for a dramatic purpose, from the want of finding sym- pathy in their interest among the mass who surround them. It is in the restless and anatomizing casuistry with which men seek the justification of Beatrice, yet feel that she has done what needs justification; it is in the superstitious horror with which they contemplate alike her wrongs and their revenge, that the dramatic character of what she did and suffered, consists. I have endeavoured as nearly as possible to represent the characters as they prob- ably were, and have sought to avoid the error of making them actuated by my own conceptions of right or wrong, false or true: thus under a thin veil converting names and actions of the sixteenth century into cold impersonations of my own mind. They are represented as Catholics, and as Catholics deeply tinged with reli- gion. To a Protestant apprehension there will appear something unnatural in the earnest and perpetual sentiment of the relations between God and men which per- vade the tragedy of the Cenci. It will especially be startled at the combination of an undoubting persuasion of the truth of the popular religion with a cool and deter- mined perseverance in enormous guilt. But religion in Italy is not, as in Protestant countries, a cloak to be worn on particular days; or a passport which those who do not wish to be railed at carry with them to exhibit; or a gloomy passion for pene- trating the impenetrable mysteries of our being, which terrifies its possessor at the darkness of the abyss to the brink of which it has conducted him. Religion coex- ists, as it were, in the mind of an Italian Catholic, with a faith in that of which all men have the most certain knowledge. It is interwoven with the whole fabric of life. It is adoration, faith, submission, penitence, blind admiration; not a rule for moral conduct. It has no necessary connection with any one virtue. The most atrocious villain may be rigidly devout, and without any shock to established faith, confess himself to be so. Religion pervades intensely the whole frame of society, and is according to the temper of the mind which it inhabits, a passion, a persuasion, an excuse, a refuge; never a check. Cenci himself built a chapel in the court of his Palace, and dedicated it to St. Thomas the Apostle, and established masses for the peace of his soul. Thus in the first scene of the fourth act Lucretia's design in exposing herself to the consequences of an expostulation with Cenci after having administered the opiate, was to induce him by a feigned tale to confess himself before death; this being esteemed by Catholics as essential to salvation; and she only relinquishes her purpose when she perceives that her perseverance would expose Beatrice to new outrages. I have avoided with great care in writing this play the introduction of what is com- monly called mere poetry, and I imagine there will scarcely be found a detached simile or a single isolated description, unless Beatrice's description of the chasm appointed for her father's murder should be judged to be of that nature. (An idea in this speech was suggested by a most sublime passage in "El Purgaterio de San Patricio" of Calderon; the only pla- giarism which I have intentionally committed in the whole piece.) In a dramatic composition the imagery and the passion should interpenetrate one another, the former being reserved simply for the full development and illustration of the latter. Imagination is as the immortal God which should assume flesh for the redemption of mortal passion. It is thus that the most remote and the most familiar imagery may alike be fit for dramatic purposes when employed in the illus- tration of strong feeling, which raises what is low, and levels to the apprehension that which is lofty, casting over all the shadow of its own greatness. In other re- spects, I have written more carelessly; that is, without an over-fastidious and learned choice of words. In this respect I entirely agree with those modern critics who assert that in order to move men to true sympathy we must use the familiar language of men, and that our great ancestors the ancient English poets are the writers, a study of whom might incite us to do that for our own age which they have done for theirs. But it must be the real language of men in general and not that of any particular class to whose society the writer happens to belong. So much for what I have attempted; I need not be assured that success is a very different matter; particularly for one whose attention has but newly been awakened to the study of dramatic literature. I endeavoured whilst at Rome to observe such monuments of this story as might be accessible to a stranger. The portrait of Beatrice at the Colonna Palace is ad- mirable as a work of art: it was taken by Guido during her confinement in prison. But it is most interesting as a just representation of one of the loveliest specimens of the workmanship of Nature. There is a fixed and pale composure upon the fea- tures: she seems sad and stricken down in spirit, yet the despair thus expressed is lightened by the patience of gentleness. Her head is bound with folds of white drapery from which the yellow strings of her golden hair escape, and fall about her neck. The moulding of her face is exquisitely delicate; the eyebrows are distinct and arched: the lips have that permanent meaning of imagination and sensibility which suffering has not repressed and which it seems as if death scarcely could extin- guish. Her forehead is large and clear; her eyes, which we are told were remarkable for their vivacity, are swollen with weeping and lustreless, but beautifully tender and serene. In the whole mien there is a simplicity and dignity which, united with her exquisite loveliness and deep sorrow, are inexpressibly pathetic. Beatrice Cenci appears to have been one of those rare persons in whom energy and gentleness dwell together without destroying one another: her nature was simple and pro- found. The crimes and miseries in which she was an actor and a sufferer are as the mask and the mantle in which circumstances clothed her for her impersonation on the scene of the world. The Cenci Palace is of great extent; and though in part modernized, there yet re- mains a vast and gloomy pile of feudal architecture in the same state as during the dreadful scenes which are the subject of this tragedy. The Palace is situated in an obscure corner of Rome, near the quarter of the Jews, and from the upper windows you see the immense ruins of Mount Palatine half hidden under their profuse over- growth of trees. There is a court in one part of the Palace (perhaps that in which Cenci built the Chapel to St. Thomas), supported by granite columns and adorned with antique friezes of fine workmanship, and built up, according to the ancient Italian fashion, with balcony over balcony of open-work. One of the gates of the Palace formed of immense stones and leading through a passage, dark and lofty and opening into gloomy subter- ranean chambers, struck me particularly. Of the Castle of Petrella, I could obtain no further information than that which is to be found in the manuscript.



Mary Shelley's Introductory Note, 1839 edition

The sort of mistake that Shelley made as to the extent of his own genius and powers, which led him deviously at first, but lastly into the direct track that enabled him fully to develop them, is a curious instance of his modesty of feeling, and of the methods which the human mind uses at once to deceive itself, and yet, in its very delusion, to make its way out of error into the path which Nature has marked out as its right one. He often incited me to attempt the writing of a tragedy: he conceived that I possessed some dramatic talent, and he was always most earnest and energetic in his exhortations that I should cultivate any talent I possessed, to the utmost. I entertained a truer estimate of my powers; and above all (though at that time not exactly aware of the fact) I was far too young to have any chance of succeeding, even moderately, in a species of composition that requires a greater scope of experience in, and sympathy with, human passion than could then have fallen to my lot, -- or than any perhaps, except Shelley, ever possessed, even at the age of twenty-six, at which he wrote The Cenci.
On the other hand, Shelley most erroneously conceived himself to be destitute of this talent. He believed that one of the first requisites was the capacity of forming and following-up a story or plot. He fancied himself to be defective in this portion of imagination: it was that which gave him least pleasure in the writings of others, though he laid great store by it as the proper framework to support the sublimest efforts of poetry. He aserted that he was too metaphysical and abstract, too fond of the theoretical and the ideal, to succeed as a tragedian. It perhaps is not strange that I shared this opinion with himself; for he had hitherto shown no inclination for, nor given any specimen of his powers in framing and supporting the interest of a story, either in prose or verse. Once or twice, when he attempted such, he had speedily thrown it aside, as being even disagreeable to him as an occupation.

The subject he had suggested for a tragedy was Charles I: and he had written to me: 'Remember, remember Charles I. I have been already imagining how you would conduct some scenes. The second volume of [Godwin's] St. Leon begins with this proud and true sentiment: "There is nothing which the human mind can conceive which it may not execute." Shakespeare was only a human being.' These words were written in 1818, while we were in Lombardy, when he little thought how soon a work of his own would prove a proud comment on the passage he quoted. When in Rome, in 1819, a friend put into our hands the old manuscript account of the story of The Cenci. We visited the Colonna and Doria palaces, where the portraits of Beatrice were to be found; and her beauty cast the reflection of its own grace over her appalling story. Shelley's imagination became strongly excited, and he urged the subject to me as one fitted for a tragedy. More than ever I felt my incompetence; but I entreated him to write it instead; and he began, and proceeded swiftly, urged on by intense sympathy with the sufferings of the human beings whose passions, so long cold in the tomb, he revived, and gifted with poetic language. This tragedy is the only one of his works that he communicated to me during its progress. We talked over the arrangement of the scenes together. I speedily saw the great mistake we had made, and triumphed in the discovery of the new talent brought to light from that mine of wealth (never, alas, through his untimely death, worked to its depths) -- his richly gifted mind.

We suffered a severe affliction in Rome by the loss of our eldest child [William Shelley], who was of such beauty and promise as to cause him deservedly to be the idol of our hearts. We left the capital of the world, anxious for a time to escape a spot associated too intimately with his presence and loss.1 Some friends of ours were residing in the neighborhood of Leghorn, and we took a small house, Villa Valsovano, about half-way between the town and Monte Nero, where we remained during the summer. Our villa was situated in the midst of a podere; the peasants sang as they worked beneath our windows, during the heats of a very hot season, and at night the water-wheel creaked as the process of irrigation went on, and the fireflies flashed from among the myrtle hedges: Nature was bright, sunshiny, and cheerful, or diversified by storms of a majestic terror, such as we had never before witnessed.

At the top of the house there was a sort of terrace. There is often such in Italy, generally roofed. This one was very small, yet not only roofed but glazed. This Shelley made his study; it looked out on a wide prospect of fertile country, and commanded a view of the near sea. The storms that sometimes varied our day showed themselves most picturesquely as they were driven across the ocean; sometimes the dark lurid clouds dipped towards the waves, and became water spouts that churned up the waters beneath, as they were chased onward and scattered by the tempest. At other times the dazzling sunlight and heat made it almost intolerable to every other; but Shelley basked in both, and his health and spirits revived under their influence. In this airy cell he wrote the principal part of The Cenci. He was making a study of Calderon at the time, reading his best tragedies with an accomplished lady [Maria Gisborne] living near us, to whom his letter from Leghorn was addressed during the following year. He admired Calderon, both for his poetry and his dramatic genius; but it shows his judgement and originality, that, though greatly struck by his first acquaintance with the Spanish poet, none of his peculiarities crept into the composition of The Cenci; and there is no trace of his new studies, except in that passage to which he himself alludes, as suggested by one in El Purgatorio de San Patricio.

Shelley wished The Cenci to be acted. He was not a playgoer, being of such fastidious taste that he was easily disgusted by the bad filling-up of the inferior parts. While preparing for our departure from England, however, he saw Miss O'Neil several times; she was then in the zenith of her glory; and Shelley was deeply moved by her impersonation of several parts, and by the graceful sweetness, the intense pathos, and sublime vehemence of passion she displayed. She was often in his thoughts as he wrote: and, when he had finished, he became anxious that his tragedy should be acted, and receive the advantage of having this accomplished actress to fill the part of the heroine. With this view he wrote the following letter to a friend [Thomas Love Peacock, July, 1819] in London:

'The object of the present letter is to ask a favour of you. I have written a tragedy on the subject of a story well known in Italy, and, in my conception, eminently dramatic. I have taken some pains to make my play fit for representation, and those who have already seen it judge favourably. It is written without any of the peculiar feelings and opinions which characterize my other compositions; I having attended simply to the impartial development of such characters as it is probable the persons represented really were, together with the greatest degree of popular effect to be produced by such a development. I send you a translation of the Italian MS. on which my play is founded; the chief circumstance of which I have touched very delicately; for my principal doubt as to whether it would succeed as an acting play hangs entirely on the question as to whether any such a thing as incest in this shape, however treated, would be admitted on the stage. I think, however, it will form no objection; considering, first, that the facts are matter of history, and, secondly, the peculiar delicacy with which I have treated it.2
'I am exceedingly interested in the question of whether this attempt of mine will succeed or no. I am strongly inclined to the affirmative at present; founding my hopes on this -- that, as a composition, it is certainly not inferior to any of the modern plays that have been acted, with the exception of [Coleridge's] Remorse; that the interest of its plot is incredibly greater and more real; and that there is nothing beyond what the multitude are contented to believe that they can understand, either in imagery, opinion, or sentiment. I wish to preserve a complete incognito, and can trust to you that, whatever else you do, you will at least favour me on this point. Indeed, this is essential, deeply essential, to its success. After it had been acted, and successfully (could I hope such a thing), I would own it if I pleased, and use the celebrity it might acquire to my own purposes.

'What I want you to do, is to procure for me its presentation at Covent Garden. The principal character, Beatrice, is precisely fitted for Miss O'Neil, and it might even seem written for her (God forbid that I should ever see her play it -- it would tear my nerves to pieces); and in all respects it is fitted only for Covent Garden. The chief male character I confess I should be very unwilling that any one but Kean should play. That is impossible, and I must be contented with an inferior actor.'

The play was accordingly sent to Mr. Harris. He pronounced the subject to be so objectionable that he could not even submit the part to Miss O'Neil for perusal, but expressed his desire that the author would write a tragedy on some other subject, which he would gladly accept. Shelley printed a small edition at Leghorn, to insure its correctness; as he was much annoyed by the many mistakes that crept into his text when distance prevented him from correcting the press.
Universal approbation soon stamped The Cenci as the best tragedy of modern times. Writing concerning it, Shelley said: 'I have been cautious to avoid the introducing faults of youthful composition; diffuseness, a profusion of inapplicable imagery, vagueness, generality, and, as Hamlet says, words, words.' There is nothing that is not purely dramatic throughout; and the character of Beatrice, proceeding, from vehement struggle to horror, to deadly resolution, and lastly to the elevated dignity of calm suffering, joined to passionate tenderness and pathos, is touched with hues so vivid and so beautiful that the poet seems to have read intimately the secrets of the noble heart imaged in the lovely countenance of the unfortunate girl. The Fifth Act is a masterpiece. It is the finest thing he ever wrote, and may claim proud comparison not only with any contemporary, but preceding, poet. The varying feelings of Beatrice are expressed with passionate, heart-reaching eloquence. Every character has a voice that echoes truth in its tones. It is curious, to one acquainted with the written story, to mark the success with which the poet has inwoven the real incidents of the tragedy into his scenes, and yet, through the power of poetry, has obliterated all that would otherwise have shown too harsh or too hideous in the picture. His success was a double triumph; and often after was he earnestly entreated to write again in a style that commanded popular favour, while it was not less instinct with truth and genius. But the bent of his mind went the other way; and, even when employed on subjects whose interest depended on character and incident, he would start off in another direction, and leave the delineations of human passion, which he could depict in so able a manner, for fantastic creations of his fancy, or the expression of those opinions and sentiments, with regard to human nature and its destiny, a desire to diffuse which was the master passion of his soul.

1. Such feelings haunted him when, in The Cenci, he makes Beatrice speak to Cardinal Camillo of

'that fair blue-eyed child
Who was the lode-star of your life:' --
and say
'All see, since his most swift and piteous death,
That day and night, and heaven and earth, and time,
And all the things hoped for or done therein
Are changed to you, through your exceeding grief.'
2. In speaking of his mode of treating this main incident, Shelley said that it might be remarked that, in the course of the play, he had never mentioned expressly Cenci's worst crime. Every one knew what it must be, but it was never imaged in words -- the nearest allusion to it being that portion of Cenci's curse, beginning --

'That, if she have a child,' etc.

The Return of The Scapegoats



8. The Return of The Scapegoats

“  … and Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the people of Israel, and all their transgressions, and all their sins; and he shall put them upon the head of The Goat, and send him away into The Wilderness. … 

The Goat shall bear all their iniquities upon him to a solitary land; and he shall let The Goat go in The Wilderness.”

LEVITICUS 16:21–22

In Biblical times on Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, ALL The Sins of The Jewish People were heaped on The Back of A [•single•] Goat. 

The Goat was then driven off into The Wilderness, ostensibly taking all the evils away with it. To this day we “scapegoat” certain groups of people, conveniently blaming them for ALL the ills of Society.



Somebody — I wish I knew who it was — defined Our Age as the time when the Old Testament scapegoats are coming Home. Leading them is the original scapegoat, Dionysus.

The Goat was now off-limits. So, what did Judaism and, later, Christianity do for a symbol? It adopted The Sheep, “The Lamb of God who taketh away our sins”: about as opposite a symbol as one could devise.

The Sheep is certainly •not• like the mischievous goat. It is docile, The Eternal Victim. The Bible refers many times to The Sheep being separated from The Goats. We have translated this in our modern Western minds as separating the right from the wrong, the noble from the ignoble, the righteous from the unrighteous. That mythology has been built into us so deeply that The Goat quality, the ecstatic Dionysian quality, still does not function in us today.

Sheep represent everything of value in our Judeo-Christian world. The sheep, in fact, is the chief determinant of our currency. Every currency in the Western world—the shilling, the franc, the deutsche mark, the lira, the peso, and the Austrian thaller (from which we get our dollar)—was the price of one sheep. For centuries there was no inflation in the Western world because one of our money pieces was worth a sheep. You could count on that anywhere, anytime.

  The Scapegoat

  So the sheep was in and the goat, Dionysus, was out totally. The ecstatic quality, the capriciousness of life that the Greeks enjoyed so much, was discredited. The goat became the scapegoat. It was given a very bad name—so bad that it came to represent the worst evil. Dionysus Melangius, "Dionysus of the Black Goatskin," was an ancient scapegoat-satyr form of the god, whose appearance greatly influenced the medieval Christian notion of what the devil should look like. To this day the devil is pictured with the goat's horns, cloven hooves, and tail. In medieval Christian Europe, goats were renowned for their lechery and were said to be familiars of witches.

Significantly, the scapegoated groups are usually those that are out of power. The classic example of this in our own time is the scapegoating of the Jews by the Nazis in the 1930s and 1940s. In the West the decision makers are typically adult, white, Anglo-Saxon males who hold responsible positions. 

OUR scapegoats, then, are the ones who do not fit the mold — women, people of color or other religions, youth, artists. To these groups we give the attributes of Dionysus. 

Women are often said to be irrational, unpredictable, capricious, and likely to turn violent, especially sexually : "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned." (Remember Hera?) The stereotypical black or Latino is thought of as "naturally musical." Such groups are "not to be trusted" with rational decisions. And The Youth, of course, are considered to be hopeless. Their music screams, their dancing is wild, and they are completely unpredictable.

Return of the Scapegoat
What happens to a scapegoat? Does it disappear, never to be seen again? Absolutely not.
Scapegoats will eventually return to those who sent them away.

Our scapegoats are coming Home, and leading them is Dionysus emerging once again from the sea of the collective unconscious, reborn in our world and asking to be humanized before his archetypal energy runs amok. As he did in ancient times, the god is throwing off his chains, flowing as glorious wine, and demanding to be heard.

And he will be heard, because this is the inescapable Truth : You cannot kill a god. You can only repress him, sacrifice him, drive him to the underworld and to a new epiphany. But you cannot get rid of him. We carry the archetype of ecstasy deep within us, and it must be lived out with Dignity and Consciousness. The Scapegoat, Dionysus, is returning; and we must recognise him and welcome him back gladly.

 

Excerpt from: "Ecstasy : Understanding the 
Psychology of Joy" by Robert A. Johnson.

Read this book on Scribd: https://www.scribd.com/book/163644056

Saturday 24 December 2022

Humbuggery

The word "Humbug" is misunderstood by many people, 
which is a pity since 
the word provides 
a key insight into 
Scrooge's hatred 
of Christmas. 

The word "Humbug" describes deceitful efforts to fool people 
by assuming a fake loftiness or false sincerity. 

So when Scrooge calls 
Christmas a Humbug, 
he is claiming that people only 
feign charity and kindness 
in a scoundrel effort to delude him, 
each other, and themselves

In Scrooge's eyes, he is 
the one man honest enough 
to admit that no one really 
cares about anyone else, 
so for him, every wish 
for a 'Merry Christmas' 
is one more deceitful effort 
to fool or take advantage of him. 

This is a man who has turned to profit 
because he honestly believes 
that everyone else will 
someday betray him 
or abandon him 
the moment 
he trusts them.


Lincoln 4 cellar meeting 3 23



Lincoln :
Since we have the floor next in the de-bate, I thought I'd suggest you might temper your contribution so as not to frighten our conservative friends. 


Ashley insists you're ensuring approval 
by dispensing patronage to 
otherwise undeserving Democrats


I can't ensure a single damn thing if you scare the whole House silly with talk of land appropriations and revolutionary tribunals. 

When the war ends, I intend to push for full equality, the Negro vote, and much more. Congress shall mandate the seizure of every foot of Rebel land and every dollar of their property -- 
We'll use their confiscated wealth to establish hundreds of thousands of free Negro farmers and, at their side, soldiers armed to occupy and transform the heritage of traitors;
We'll build up a land down there of free men and free women and free children and Freedom

The Nation needs to know that we have such plans


Lincoln :
....That's the untempered version of reconstruction. 
It is not... It's not quite exactly what I intend
But we shall oppose one another in the course of time -- 
Now we're working together, and I'm asking you... 


....for patience, I expect. 

When the people disagree, bringing them together 
requires going slow until they're ready to... 


Shit on The People, and what they want 
and what they're ready for. 
I don't give a goddamn about the people and what they want --
This is the face of someone who has fought long and hard 
for The Good of The People 
without caring much for any of them. 
And I look a lot worse without my wig. 
The people elected me to represent them, 
to lead them, and I lead -- You ought to try it. 

I admire your zeal, Mr Stevens and I have tried 
to profit from the example of it --
But if I'd listened to you, I'd have declared every slave free 
the minute the first shell struck Fort Sumter --
The border states would have gone over to the Confederacy, 
The War would have been lost and the Union along with it, and instead of abolishing slavery as we hope to do in two weeks, we'd be watching, helpless as infants, as it spread from the American South into South America. 


Stephens :
Oh, how you have longed to say that to me.... 
You claim you trust them, 
but you know what The People are -- 
You know that the inner compass, that should direct the soul towards justice has ossified in white men and women, North and South, unto utter uselessness, through tolerating the evil of slavery. White people cannot bear the thought of sharing this country's infinite abundance with Negroes. A compass, I learned when I was surveying, it'll point you true north from where you're standing. But it's got no advice about the swamps and deserts and chasms that you'll encounter along the way. If in pursuit of your destination, you plunge ahead, heedless of obstacles and achieve nothing more than to sink in a swamp, what's the use of knowing true north?