As you read through our various readings this week (please prioritize: 1. Sanes, 2. Prester John, 3. Alice, 4. Swift!) please consider the following:
How do we draw and redraw our cultural hopes and dreams through popular media? How does popular media at the same time shape our hopes/dreams/even our reality? How might we infer cultural realities (dreams, hopes, fears, social structures, gender roles, etc.) from 'fantastic' stories?
Sunday, April 29, 2007
Sanes: A Culture Based on Fantasy and Acting Out
Robert Stoller, Sigmund Freud and Heinz Kohut provide essential insights into the way contemporary entertainment lets us act out fantasies and desires.
A Culture Based on Fantasy and Acting Out
In a rundown section of downtown Boston, inside a partially abandoned building, one can find an indoor playing field for a combat simulation game known as paintball. The playing field consists of two large rooms splattered with paint on the walls and concrete floors. Free-standing wooden barriers have been placed at random in both rooms to provide players with something to hide behind when their opponents fire at them.
Players divide into two teams and take positions behind the barriers. Each player is equipped with a protective suit, including knee pads and goggles, along with an air-powered gun that shoots "paintballs" or gum ball-sized gelatin capsules filled with paint. When a game begins, players proceed to fire at each other with their air guns in an attempt to eliminate opponents or capture something on the other team's territory. When players are hit by one of the paintballs, they feel a pinch as it explodes and "bleeds" on their clothes and skin. They are then officially "dead" and have to wait out the rest of the game.
Paintball is one of a growing number of combat simulations that turn the mock gunfights of childhood into adult and adolescent war games, by paring down the elements of battle to a number of essentials: combatants with guns, an opportunity to run around, and places to protect oneself from enemy fire. In effect, it retains the form of a battle but not the substance, offering players a reenactment that lacks the stakes or physical injury of genuine combat.
There are similar indoor and indoor playing fields for paintball around the United States and a burgeoning subculture with its own tournaments and heroes. There is also a growing arsenal of air-powered guns that can be purchased by players, which parallels the fascination with real guns in the larger society.
Paintball is an example of a new kind of symbolic arena that now characterizes popular culture. By way of a preliminary definition, symbolic arenas are protected domains that make it possible for people to act out fantasies, embodying their fears and desires, in ways that aren't possible in everyday life. The settings, situations and actions they are created out of, are lifelike representations -- fictions -- masquerading as something authentic.
Some symbolic arenas make it possible for participants to directly play out fantasies, either by engaging in physical action and role playing, or by manipulating images or objects that represent them. In addition to paintball, examples of these "high-interaction" simulations include laser tag; video and computer games; interactive movies; some rain forest exhibits in zoos; virtual realities; board games; pinball; children's toys; sexual role playing; interactive computer pornography; voice acting on 900 numbers; and so-called MUDs on the Internet, in which people play roles in fictional worlds created with text descriptions instead of images.
Other symbolic arenas place the audience in a more passive role, in which it is taken for a ride or watches, and identifies with, characters who do things in fictional situations. These include television, traditional movies and the theater, amusement park rides and the more recent movie rides.
What kinds of fantasies do participants reenact in symbolic arenas? As in theme parks, they experience the illusion of transcendence, not only from time and space, but from the roles they play in society. They become part of stories that are larger and more interesting than those in everyday life. The adolescent video game player becomes a space pilot trying to save the universe; the child becomes a parent ministering to a doll that acts as a surrogate child; the television viewer, acting vicariously through the character of the detective, solves the crime and defends the moral order of society.
Symbolic arenas also provide participants with a sense of mastery and safety by showing us characters, or allowing us to play characters, with various abilities and forms of power. Through these characters, we then reenact the universal story line that is common to all fiction: danger and obstacles are faced, but we, or the characters we identify with, win in the end.
Thus, one can say that many symbolic arenas are acts of self- and world-repair: they allow us to face and overcome simulated dangers and problems, which are a more exciting version of what we face in everyday life. In these characteristics, they are similar to daydreams, in which we convert our defeats into victories and our losses into gains to bolster the sense of safety and self-esteem.
What Dr. Robert Stoller, a psychoanalytic theorist who looked at the way the mind creates scripts, said about art, daydreams and pornography, is true of all symbolic arenas. They allow us to convert personal trauma into "simulated trauma, mastered trauma," he said. And they create aesthetic excitement by presenting fictional dangers that seem real, while allowing us to control the production to be certain it isn't real.
"...aesthetics is like a game," Stoller wrote "Like chess or football, it simulates by manipulating the symbols of danger."*
In addition to letting us master trauma and danger, and escape the limits of physical reality, symbolic arenas also allow us to play out every other kind of desire we know from psychoanalytic theory and everyday life. Power, phallic aggression, revenge, sex, love and success are routinely acted out and temporarily sated in these fictional worlds.
Symbolic arenas, based on these principles, now define popular culture, which is becoming a giant arcade that draws everyone into its lifelike fictions. Overseeing it, we once again find growing numbers of designers and fabricators who take images and ideas from nature, history, the contemporary world and their own imaginations. They convert these into forms of entertainment, which make it possible for millions of people to act out personal and collective fears and desires in artificial worlds.
Like all entrepreneurs, the creators of symbolic arenas find and exploit market niches, designing story lines for specific personality constellations. In so doing, they have turned popular culture into a vast inventory of the fears and desires of the human personality.
Here are some examples of symbolic arenas:
* Video games provide a realm of virtual action in which players can incarnate in fictional worlds by manipulating image surrogates on the screen. Players choose from a selection of imaginary adventures that are, for the most part, the same as those found in television, movies and theme parks. Like those other forms of entertainment, video games offer simulations of journeys to exotic places, of space travel, of futuristic battles and one-on-one combat, to name a few well-known examples. And like them, video games let players experience a sense of transcendence from time and space, and from the roles that players routinely find themselves in, in everyday life.
But behind all these fictional roles and situations, many games are intended to make it possible for adolescent males to act out a limited set of desires that are central to their psychology, involving phallic aggression, competition, strength, the display of masculinity and conquest. This is a hormone-saturated simulation in which competition dominates and almost everything is an arena for a contest or fight. These basic desires may be dressed up in exotic situations but, in the end, the fantasies being acted out are very mundane.
Video games similarly allow players to express anger, hostility and desires for revenge, which are blended in with desires to express phallic aggression (as they are in life, in general) in the experience of destroying things on the screen.
As a 14-year-old player I interviewed for a newspaper story in 1983 put it: "It's a way, if you're mad, to get rid of your tensions. You can blow up wave after wave of spaceships."
His friend then added: "If you keep all this tension inside you, you can go crazy" -- a statement that says a good deal about the role of symbolic arenas in the lives of young people.
But what is unique about video games is that players are spectators, manipulators of the simulation and participants at the same time, controlling image surrogates that represent them on the screen, and acting in the virtual environment through their surrogate. In their role as spectators and manipulators, they watch and dominate the action. In their role as participants, they experience these image surrogates as an extension, not only of their will, but of their body. In essence, their body image expands to include the image under their control, allowing them to take on a virtual presence in the game, as part of their fictional role.
An example of how this division works can be seen in the way players act out a set of desires described by the psychoanalyst Heinz Kohut. Kohut said that children have the need to idealize the perceived greatness of adults, on the one hand, and they also need to have their own sense of grandiosity mirrored back to them, by having other people admire them. In effect, they need to admire and be admired -- needs that are carried into adolescence and adulthood, and acted out in various ways throughout life.
We can see these desires vividly expressed in video games, where players manipulate all those images of overdeveloped fighters and super-powered machines, so they experience themselves as having a kind of virtual body, full of strength and firepower, which express fantasies that they have grandiose physical selves. At the same time, because this virtual body is separate from them, they can admire it as if it is another person. The games thus provide a unique way for players to admire and be admired at the same time: the games are mirrors that reflect a grander self back to the player.
But the expression of these desires doesn't remain hermetically sealed inside the simulation, because playing video games can also be a form of social interaction in which players test their skills against each other and experience victory. In the game Sega Daytona USA, six players sit lined up in seats in front of six screens, all of which display the same virtual roadway. Each player is assigned the image of a car as his surrogate self. Each must navigate his car on this same virtual road, on which the images of cars controlled by the other players are also displayed, allowing players to try to bump each other off the road and see when their competitors pass them in the race.
This is a game of speed, competition, and violence. One can see in the players' expressions, the excitement of the chase, coupled with the enjoyment of bumping and knocking the cars controlled by their friends, so they will go off the road. The game is the equivalent of a wrestling match between adolescent males to see who will come out on top, but here transposed into a virtual world of images with a more exciting story line.
We can thus see in video games, the way basic elements of personality are acted out in a virtual world. Players experience excitement by facing and overcoming fictional dangers and obstacles; they experience greatness and victory, and enact phallic and aggressive urges; they learn tasks and have accomplishments, in which they win against the machine and other players, and they have opportunities to impress friends and confirm social standing, all of it made more exciting by the simulation, which makes it seem they are doing all this in ways that transcend the usual limits of life.
Just as there are a limited number of desires being expressed in the manifold story lines, so video games also operate almost entirely according to one basic principle: the player's surrogate self must come into contact with or avoid contact with other images. This is a world that moves as a result of a mock physical causality rather than according to the complex meanings of plot. This simple pattern of operation is able to generate so many possibilities because of the diversity of images and story lines; in other words, because of the richness of the simulation.
* Another kind of symbolic arena makes its appearance every Halloween, when theme parks modeled after horror movies pop up in many cities, using stage sets, props, costumed actors, animatronic figures and other special effects to create nightmare worlds full of ghoulish delights. Typical sights encountered by visitors include mutant creatures writhing in agony; zombies wandering the grounds; scenes of torture, and disembodied heads.
These haunted environments allow visitors to play the role of victims of evil, creating a fictional risk in which they survive to tell the tale. Visitors encounter their own nightmares and the kind of fantasized monsters that, as children, they imagined were hiding in the closet or under the bed at night. The excitement is in the fact that it looks dangerous and terrible, but isn't. As in video games, visitors win in the end, in this case by demonstrating to themselves that the evil that is portrayed is harmless after all.
* Toys provide another kind of symbolic arena, aimed at the developmental level and gender of children. Typically, the toys are used as props, which allow children to lose themselves in the dramas of play, acting out issues that are central to their stage of development. For girls, there are plastic reproductions of stoves, dishwashers, vacuum cleaners and other appliances, and lifelike dolls that talk, walk, cry, and offer (surprisingly explicit) opportunities to act out issues that revolve around toilet training. For boys, there are more opportunities to act out phallic aggression, with plastic guns and action figures, much of it spun off from the science fiction fantasies of the movies.
Like many other symbolic areas, toys are becoming strikingly realistic, resulting in such strange cultural objects as a lifelike imitation of Burger King Restaurant Food, which lets children stack plastic burger, lettuce, tomato, onion and pickle on a plastic bun. Walking through toy stores, today, one finds oneself in a simulation bazaar lined with boxes, each trying to lure would-be customers with claims that they contain an imitation that is so realistic, the buyer won't be able to distinguish it from the real thing.
------
How are symbolic arenas created?
Using an analogy to the psychoanalytic idea of dreamwork, one might refer to the process by which these invented worlds are spun out of our minds as simulation-work. Simulation-work involves everything that is done by artists and those in the entertainment industry to make simulations as realistic possible. But it also involves the way all of this is completed by audiences and participants, who spontaneously suspend disbelief and work to enhance the lifelikeness of the experiences. Thus, the creators of paintball provide players with barriers and imitation guns; it is the players who complete the simulation, running around like they are soldiers in battle.
Simulation-work also has another element discussed, to some degree, by Stoller: making certain the simulation isn't so real that it creates a physical danger to participants or compromises their moral identities. And it involves making the simulation unlike reality in ways that enhance the aesthetic experience, for example, by condensing the events portrayed into a brief period of time or making them all relate to the story.
Finally, it involves the process that makes it possible for these invented worlds to embody narratives and images that express and disguise our fears and desires. In short, the creators of all kinds of fiction start off with fears and desires. which are invested in cognitive schemas or models of themselves and their surroundings. They then take hold of whatever raw materials are available (words, paint, computers, etc) and whatever artistic techniques their culture offers (or that they can develop) and they spin those schemas into imaginary worlds that let us act out what is on our minds.
The history of art and entertainment is the history of advances in the techniques and technology of simulation-work, from stories told around the campfire and paintings on cave walls to contemporary movies, Disney World, and Back to the Future...The Ride. Today, those advances are enhancing the realism of our invented worlds; expanding our opportunities to experience physical, sensory and psychological immersion in our invented worlds; and allowing for more participation in the simulation. In place of looking at an imitation of life, we increasingly find ourselves inside one. In place of identifying with the characters, we increasingly are the characters. In place of merely enjoying scripted stories, we have more opportunities to create part or all of the story as we go along. And in place of imagining a relationship with various characters, we increasingly interact with them.
This change is resulting giving us a new kind of fiction that only existed in an undeveloped form, before. Whereas traditional literature and drama allow us to see characters with all kinds of abilities and desires, this new kind of fiction creates the illusion that we have these abilities and desires, ourselves. The manufactured experiences of art cease to be merely vicarious and happen to us directly.
But this culture of acting out environments that refer to various meanings in ourselves, comes with a number of dangers. One is that we will act out issues that are central to our personalities and culture, in disguised form, in place of becoming aware of them. As Freud said, we can reenact the traumas of the past or we can remember them. But we can't do both at once because the reenactment is a defense against remembering. In other words, popular culture is, in part, the ultimate stealth simulation. It is a maze of forgetting, a road away from the truth of the self, even as it also expresses the self in disguised ways.
There is also the danger that this culture will draw us into fields of engagement in which nothing is at stake. It invites us to stand at a remove from things; to act decisively when the stakes aren't real and when there is no danger that we will make a true mistake. It encourages us to encounter other people only through mediations -- computer images, voices, and so on -- and to interact with fictional characters in place of people, so we are protected from intimacy or the judgment of others. Behind the facade of daring exploits and journeys, it offers a reality in which we always play it safe. Simulation, the ultimate imitation of life, becomes a wall that stands between us and the true experience of life.
*Robert J. Stoller, Observing the Erotic Imagination (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1985) pp. 58-61.
Ken Sanes. Transparency. “A Culture Based on Fantasy and Acting Out.”Accessed April 29, 2007. http://www.transparencynow.com/actout.htm.
A Culture Based on Fantasy and Acting Out
In a rundown section of downtown Boston, inside a partially abandoned building, one can find an indoor playing field for a combat simulation game known as paintball. The playing field consists of two large rooms splattered with paint on the walls and concrete floors. Free-standing wooden barriers have been placed at random in both rooms to provide players with something to hide behind when their opponents fire at them.
Players divide into two teams and take positions behind the barriers. Each player is equipped with a protective suit, including knee pads and goggles, along with an air-powered gun that shoots "paintballs" or gum ball-sized gelatin capsules filled with paint. When a game begins, players proceed to fire at each other with their air guns in an attempt to eliminate opponents or capture something on the other team's territory. When players are hit by one of the paintballs, they feel a pinch as it explodes and "bleeds" on their clothes and skin. They are then officially "dead" and have to wait out the rest of the game.
Paintball is one of a growing number of combat simulations that turn the mock gunfights of childhood into adult and adolescent war games, by paring down the elements of battle to a number of essentials: combatants with guns, an opportunity to run around, and places to protect oneself from enemy fire. In effect, it retains the form of a battle but not the substance, offering players a reenactment that lacks the stakes or physical injury of genuine combat.
There are similar indoor and indoor playing fields for paintball around the United States and a burgeoning subculture with its own tournaments and heroes. There is also a growing arsenal of air-powered guns that can be purchased by players, which parallels the fascination with real guns in the larger society.
Paintball is an example of a new kind of symbolic arena that now characterizes popular culture. By way of a preliminary definition, symbolic arenas are protected domains that make it possible for people to act out fantasies, embodying their fears and desires, in ways that aren't possible in everyday life. The settings, situations and actions they are created out of, are lifelike representations -- fictions -- masquerading as something authentic.
Some symbolic arenas make it possible for participants to directly play out fantasies, either by engaging in physical action and role playing, or by manipulating images or objects that represent them. In addition to paintball, examples of these "high-interaction" simulations include laser tag; video and computer games; interactive movies; some rain forest exhibits in zoos; virtual realities; board games; pinball; children's toys; sexual role playing; interactive computer pornography; voice acting on 900 numbers; and so-called MUDs on the Internet, in which people play roles in fictional worlds created with text descriptions instead of images.
Other symbolic arenas place the audience in a more passive role, in which it is taken for a ride or watches, and identifies with, characters who do things in fictional situations. These include television, traditional movies and the theater, amusement park rides and the more recent movie rides.
What kinds of fantasies do participants reenact in symbolic arenas? As in theme parks, they experience the illusion of transcendence, not only from time and space, but from the roles they play in society. They become part of stories that are larger and more interesting than those in everyday life. The adolescent video game player becomes a space pilot trying to save the universe; the child becomes a parent ministering to a doll that acts as a surrogate child; the television viewer, acting vicariously through the character of the detective, solves the crime and defends the moral order of society.
Symbolic arenas also provide participants with a sense of mastery and safety by showing us characters, or allowing us to play characters, with various abilities and forms of power. Through these characters, we then reenact the universal story line that is common to all fiction: danger and obstacles are faced, but we, or the characters we identify with, win in the end.
Thus, one can say that many symbolic arenas are acts of self- and world-repair: they allow us to face and overcome simulated dangers and problems, which are a more exciting version of what we face in everyday life. In these characteristics, they are similar to daydreams, in which we convert our defeats into victories and our losses into gains to bolster the sense of safety and self-esteem.
What Dr. Robert Stoller, a psychoanalytic theorist who looked at the way the mind creates scripts, said about art, daydreams and pornography, is true of all symbolic arenas. They allow us to convert personal trauma into "simulated trauma, mastered trauma," he said. And they create aesthetic excitement by presenting fictional dangers that seem real, while allowing us to control the production to be certain it isn't real.
"...aesthetics is like a game," Stoller wrote "Like chess or football, it simulates by manipulating the symbols of danger."*
In addition to letting us master trauma and danger, and escape the limits of physical reality, symbolic arenas also allow us to play out every other kind of desire we know from psychoanalytic theory and everyday life. Power, phallic aggression, revenge, sex, love and success are routinely acted out and temporarily sated in these fictional worlds.
Symbolic arenas, based on these principles, now define popular culture, which is becoming a giant arcade that draws everyone into its lifelike fictions. Overseeing it, we once again find growing numbers of designers and fabricators who take images and ideas from nature, history, the contemporary world and their own imaginations. They convert these into forms of entertainment, which make it possible for millions of people to act out personal and collective fears and desires in artificial worlds.
Like all entrepreneurs, the creators of symbolic arenas find and exploit market niches, designing story lines for specific personality constellations. In so doing, they have turned popular culture into a vast inventory of the fears and desires of the human personality.
Here are some examples of symbolic arenas:
* Video games provide a realm of virtual action in which players can incarnate in fictional worlds by manipulating image surrogates on the screen. Players choose from a selection of imaginary adventures that are, for the most part, the same as those found in television, movies and theme parks. Like those other forms of entertainment, video games offer simulations of journeys to exotic places, of space travel, of futuristic battles and one-on-one combat, to name a few well-known examples. And like them, video games let players experience a sense of transcendence from time and space, and from the roles that players routinely find themselves in, in everyday life.
But behind all these fictional roles and situations, many games are intended to make it possible for adolescent males to act out a limited set of desires that are central to their psychology, involving phallic aggression, competition, strength, the display of masculinity and conquest. This is a hormone-saturated simulation in which competition dominates and almost everything is an arena for a contest or fight. These basic desires may be dressed up in exotic situations but, in the end, the fantasies being acted out are very mundane.
Video games similarly allow players to express anger, hostility and desires for revenge, which are blended in with desires to express phallic aggression (as they are in life, in general) in the experience of destroying things on the screen.
As a 14-year-old player I interviewed for a newspaper story in 1983 put it: "It's a way, if you're mad, to get rid of your tensions. You can blow up wave after wave of spaceships."
His friend then added: "If you keep all this tension inside you, you can go crazy" -- a statement that says a good deal about the role of symbolic arenas in the lives of young people.
But what is unique about video games is that players are spectators, manipulators of the simulation and participants at the same time, controlling image surrogates that represent them on the screen, and acting in the virtual environment through their surrogate. In their role as spectators and manipulators, they watch and dominate the action. In their role as participants, they experience these image surrogates as an extension, not only of their will, but of their body. In essence, their body image expands to include the image under their control, allowing them to take on a virtual presence in the game, as part of their fictional role.
An example of how this division works can be seen in the way players act out a set of desires described by the psychoanalyst Heinz Kohut. Kohut said that children have the need to idealize the perceived greatness of adults, on the one hand, and they also need to have their own sense of grandiosity mirrored back to them, by having other people admire them. In effect, they need to admire and be admired -- needs that are carried into adolescence and adulthood, and acted out in various ways throughout life.
We can see these desires vividly expressed in video games, where players manipulate all those images of overdeveloped fighters and super-powered machines, so they experience themselves as having a kind of virtual body, full of strength and firepower, which express fantasies that they have grandiose physical selves. At the same time, because this virtual body is separate from them, they can admire it as if it is another person. The games thus provide a unique way for players to admire and be admired at the same time: the games are mirrors that reflect a grander self back to the player.
But the expression of these desires doesn't remain hermetically sealed inside the simulation, because playing video games can also be a form of social interaction in which players test their skills against each other and experience victory. In the game Sega Daytona USA, six players sit lined up in seats in front of six screens, all of which display the same virtual roadway. Each player is assigned the image of a car as his surrogate self. Each must navigate his car on this same virtual road, on which the images of cars controlled by the other players are also displayed, allowing players to try to bump each other off the road and see when their competitors pass them in the race.
This is a game of speed, competition, and violence. One can see in the players' expressions, the excitement of the chase, coupled with the enjoyment of bumping and knocking the cars controlled by their friends, so they will go off the road. The game is the equivalent of a wrestling match between adolescent males to see who will come out on top, but here transposed into a virtual world of images with a more exciting story line.
We can thus see in video games, the way basic elements of personality are acted out in a virtual world. Players experience excitement by facing and overcoming fictional dangers and obstacles; they experience greatness and victory, and enact phallic and aggressive urges; they learn tasks and have accomplishments, in which they win against the machine and other players, and they have opportunities to impress friends and confirm social standing, all of it made more exciting by the simulation, which makes it seem they are doing all this in ways that transcend the usual limits of life.
Just as there are a limited number of desires being expressed in the manifold story lines, so video games also operate almost entirely according to one basic principle: the player's surrogate self must come into contact with or avoid contact with other images. This is a world that moves as a result of a mock physical causality rather than according to the complex meanings of plot. This simple pattern of operation is able to generate so many possibilities because of the diversity of images and story lines; in other words, because of the richness of the simulation.
* Another kind of symbolic arena makes its appearance every Halloween, when theme parks modeled after horror movies pop up in many cities, using stage sets, props, costumed actors, animatronic figures and other special effects to create nightmare worlds full of ghoulish delights. Typical sights encountered by visitors include mutant creatures writhing in agony; zombies wandering the grounds; scenes of torture, and disembodied heads.
These haunted environments allow visitors to play the role of victims of evil, creating a fictional risk in which they survive to tell the tale. Visitors encounter their own nightmares and the kind of fantasized monsters that, as children, they imagined were hiding in the closet or under the bed at night. The excitement is in the fact that it looks dangerous and terrible, but isn't. As in video games, visitors win in the end, in this case by demonstrating to themselves that the evil that is portrayed is harmless after all.
* Toys provide another kind of symbolic arena, aimed at the developmental level and gender of children. Typically, the toys are used as props, which allow children to lose themselves in the dramas of play, acting out issues that are central to their stage of development. For girls, there are plastic reproductions of stoves, dishwashers, vacuum cleaners and other appliances, and lifelike dolls that talk, walk, cry, and offer (surprisingly explicit) opportunities to act out issues that revolve around toilet training. For boys, there are more opportunities to act out phallic aggression, with plastic guns and action figures, much of it spun off from the science fiction fantasies of the movies.
Like many other symbolic areas, toys are becoming strikingly realistic, resulting in such strange cultural objects as a lifelike imitation of Burger King Restaurant Food, which lets children stack plastic burger, lettuce, tomato, onion and pickle on a plastic bun. Walking through toy stores, today, one finds oneself in a simulation bazaar lined with boxes, each trying to lure would-be customers with claims that they contain an imitation that is so realistic, the buyer won't be able to distinguish it from the real thing.
------
How are symbolic arenas created?
Using an analogy to the psychoanalytic idea of dreamwork, one might refer to the process by which these invented worlds are spun out of our minds as simulation-work. Simulation-work involves everything that is done by artists and those in the entertainment industry to make simulations as realistic possible. But it also involves the way all of this is completed by audiences and participants, who spontaneously suspend disbelief and work to enhance the lifelikeness of the experiences. Thus, the creators of paintball provide players with barriers and imitation guns; it is the players who complete the simulation, running around like they are soldiers in battle.
Simulation-work also has another element discussed, to some degree, by Stoller: making certain the simulation isn't so real that it creates a physical danger to participants or compromises their moral identities. And it involves making the simulation unlike reality in ways that enhance the aesthetic experience, for example, by condensing the events portrayed into a brief period of time or making them all relate to the story.
Finally, it involves the process that makes it possible for these invented worlds to embody narratives and images that express and disguise our fears and desires. In short, the creators of all kinds of fiction start off with fears and desires. which are invested in cognitive schemas or models of themselves and their surroundings. They then take hold of whatever raw materials are available (words, paint, computers, etc) and whatever artistic techniques their culture offers (or that they can develop) and they spin those schemas into imaginary worlds that let us act out what is on our minds.
The history of art and entertainment is the history of advances in the techniques and technology of simulation-work, from stories told around the campfire and paintings on cave walls to contemporary movies, Disney World, and Back to the Future...The Ride. Today, those advances are enhancing the realism of our invented worlds; expanding our opportunities to experience physical, sensory and psychological immersion in our invented worlds; and allowing for more participation in the simulation. In place of looking at an imitation of life, we increasingly find ourselves inside one. In place of identifying with the characters, we increasingly are the characters. In place of merely enjoying scripted stories, we have more opportunities to create part or all of the story as we go along. And in place of imagining a relationship with various characters, we increasingly interact with them.
This change is resulting giving us a new kind of fiction that only existed in an undeveloped form, before. Whereas traditional literature and drama allow us to see characters with all kinds of abilities and desires, this new kind of fiction creates the illusion that we have these abilities and desires, ourselves. The manufactured experiences of art cease to be merely vicarious and happen to us directly.
But this culture of acting out environments that refer to various meanings in ourselves, comes with a number of dangers. One is that we will act out issues that are central to our personalities and culture, in disguised form, in place of becoming aware of them. As Freud said, we can reenact the traumas of the past or we can remember them. But we can't do both at once because the reenactment is a defense against remembering. In other words, popular culture is, in part, the ultimate stealth simulation. It is a maze of forgetting, a road away from the truth of the self, even as it also expresses the self in disguised ways.
There is also the danger that this culture will draw us into fields of engagement in which nothing is at stake. It invites us to stand at a remove from things; to act decisively when the stakes aren't real and when there is no danger that we will make a true mistake. It encourages us to encounter other people only through mediations -- computer images, voices, and so on -- and to interact with fictional characters in place of people, so we are protected from intimacy or the judgment of others. Behind the facade of daring exploits and journeys, it offers a reality in which we always play it safe. Simulation, the ultimate imitation of life, becomes a wall that stands between us and the true experience of life.
*Robert J. Stoller, Observing the Erotic Imagination (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1985) pp. 58-61.
Ken Sanes. Transparency. “A Culture Based on Fantasy and Acting Out.”Accessed April 29, 2007. http://www.transparencynow.com/actout.htm.
The Letter of Prester John
The Letter of Prester John to the Prince of Constantinople, 1155(?) (12th c.)
…Should you desire to learn the greatness and excellency of our Exaltedness and of the land subject to our sceptre, then hear and believe: I, Presbyter Johannes, the Lord of Lords, surpass all under heaven in virtue, in riches, and in power; seventy-two kings pay us tribute ... In the three Indies our Magnificence rules, and our land extends beyond India, where rests the body of the holy apostle Thomas [Judas the Twin]; it reaches towards the sunrise over the wastes, and it trends toward deserted Babylon near the Tower of Babel. Seventy-two provinces, of which only a few are Christian, serve us. Each has its own king, but all are tributary to us.
Our land is the home of elephants, dromedaries, camels, crocodiles, meta-collinarum, cametennus, tensevetes, wild asses, white and red lions, white bears, white merules, crickets, griffins, tigers, lamias, hyenas, wild horses, wild oxen, and wild men -- men with horns, one-eyed men, men with eyes before and behind, centaurs, fauns, satyrs, pygmies, forty-ell high giants, cyclopses, and similar women. It is the home, too, of the phoenix and of nearly all living animals.
We have some people subject to us who feed on the flesh of men and of prematurely born animals, and who never fear death. When any of these people die, their friends and relations eat him ravenously, for they regard it as a main duty to munch human flesh. Their names are Gog, Magog, Anie, Agit, Azenach, Fommeperi, Befari, Conei-Samante, Agrimandri, Vintefolei, Casbei, and Alanei. Theses and similar nations were shut in behind lofty mountains by Alexander the Great, towards the north. We lead them at our pleasure against our foes, and neither man nor beast is left undevoured, if our Majesty gives the requisite permission. And when all our foes are eaten, then we return with our hosts home again.
These accursed fifteen [twelve?] nations will burst forth from the four quarters of the earth at the end of the world, in the times of the Antichrist, and overrun all the abodes of the saints as well as the great city Rome, which, by the way, we are prepared to give to our son who will be born, alon with all Italy, Germany, the two Gauls, Britain, and Scotland. We shall also give him Spain and all of the land as far as the icy sea.
The nations to which I have alluded, according to the words of the prophet, shall not stand in the judgement on account of their offensive practices, but will be consumed to ashes by a fire which will fall on them from heaven.
Our land streams with honey and is overflowing with milk. In one region grows no poisonous herd, nor does a querulous frog ever quack in it; no scorpion exists, nor does the serpent glide amongst the grass, not can any poisonous animals exist in it or injure anyone.
Among the heathen flows, through a certain province, the River Indus. Encircling Paradise, it spreads its arms in manifold windings through the entire province. Here are found the emeralds, sapphires, carbuncles, topazes, chrsolites, onyxes, beryls, sardius, and other costly stones. Here grows the plant Assidos which, when worn by anyone, protects him from the evil spirit, forcing it to state its business and name -- consequently the foul spirits keep out of the way there. In a certain land subject to us all kinds of pepper is gathered and is exchanged for corn and bread, leather and cloth ...
At the foot of Mount Olympus bubbles up a spring which changes its flavor hour by hour, night and day, and the spring is scarcely three days' journey from Paradise, out of which Adam was driven. If anyone has tasted thrice of the fountain, from that day he will feel no fatigue, but will, as long as he lives, be as a man of thirty years. Here are found the small stones called Nudiosi which, if borne about the body, prevent the sight from waxing feeble and restore it where it is lost. The more the stone is looked at, the keener becomes the sight.
In our territory is a certain waterless sea consisting of tumbling billows of sand never at rest. None have crossed this sea -- it lacks water all together, yet fish of various kinds are cast up upon the beach, very tasty, and the like are nowhere else to be seen.
Three days' journey from this sea are mountains from which rolls down a stony, waterless river which opens into the sandy sea. As soon as the stream reaches the sea, its stones vanish in it and are never seen again. As long as the river is in motion, it cannout be crossed; only four days a week is it possible to traverse it.
Between the sandy sea and the said mountians, in a certain plain, is a fountain of singular virtue which purges Christians and would-be Christians from all transgressions. The water stands four inches high in a hollow stone shaped like a mussel-shell. Two saintly old men watch by it and ask the comers whether they are Christians or are about to become Christians, then whether they desire healing with all their hearts. If they have answered well, they are bidden to lay aside their clothes and to step into the mussel. If what they said be true, then the water begins to rise and gush over their heads. Thrice does the water thus lift itself, and everyone who has entered the mussel leaves it cured of every complaint.
Near the wilderness trickles between barren mountians a subterranean rill which can only by chance be reached, for only occassionally the earth gapes, and he who would descend must do it with precipitation, ere the earth closes again. All that is gathered under the ground there is gem and precious stone. The brook pours into another river and the inhabitants of the neighborhood obtain thence abundance of precious stones. Yet they never venture to sell them without having first offered them to us for our private use. Should we decline them, they are at liberty to dispose of them to strangers. Boys there are trained to remain three of four days under the water, diving after the stones.
Beyond the stone river are the ten tribes of Israel which, though subject to their own kings, are, for all that, tributary to our Majesty.
In one of our lands, hight Zone, are worms called salamanders. These worms can only live in fire, and they build cocoons like silk-worms which are unwound by the ladies of our palace and spun into cloth and dresses which are worn by our Exaltedness. These dresses, in order to be cleaned and washed, are cast into flames ...
When we go to war, we have fourteen golden and bejewelled crosses borne before us instead of banners. Each of these crosses is followed by ten thousand horsemen and one hundred thousand foot soldiers, fully armed, without reckoning those in charge of the luggage and provision.
When we ride abroad plainly we have a wooden, unadorned cross without gold or gems about it, borne before us in order that we meditate on the sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ; also a golden bowl filled with earth to remind us of that whence we sprung and that to which we must return; but besides these there is borne a sliver bowl full of gold as a token to all that we are the Lord of Lords.
All riches, such as are upon the world, our Magnificence possesses in superabundance. With us, no one lies, for he who speaks a lie is thenceforth regarded as dead -- he is no more thought of or honored by us. No vice is tolerated by us. Every year we undertake a pilgrimage, with retinue of war, to the body of the holy prophet Daniel which is near the desolated site of Babylon. In out realm fishes are caught, the blood of which dyes purple. The Amazons and the Brahmins are subject to us.
The palace in which our Superemincency resides is built after the pattern of the castle built by the apostle Thomas [Judas the Twin] for the Indian king Gundoforus. Celings joists, and architrave are of Sethym wood, the roof ebony, which can never catch fire. Over the gable of the palace are, at the extremities, two golden apples, in each of which are two carbuncles, so that the gold may shine by day and the carbuncles by night. The greater gates of the palace are of sardius with the horn of the horned snake inwrought so that no one can bring poison within. The other portals are of ebony; the windows are of crystal; the tables are partly of gold, partly of amethyst; the columns supporting the tables are partly of ivory, partly of amethyst. The court in which we watch the jousting is floored with onyx in order to increase the courage of the combatants. In the palace at night, nothing is burned for light, but wicks supplied with balsam ...
Before our palace stands a mirror, the ascent to which consists of five and twenty steps of porpyry and serpintine ... This mirror is guarded day and night by three thousand men. We look therein and behold all that is taking place in every province and region subject to our sceptre.
Seven kings wait upon us monthly, in turn, with sixty-two dukes, two hundred and fifty-six counts and marquises. Twelve archbishops sit at table with us on our right and twenty bishops on the left, besides the patriarch of St. Thomas, the Sarmatian Protopope, and the Archpope of Susa ...
Our high lord stewart is a primate and king, our cup-bearer is an archbishop and king, our chamberlain a bishop and king, and our marshal a king and abbot.
The Letter of Prester John. 1155. From About.com. http://altreligion.about.com/library/texts/bl_presterjohn.htm. Accessed April 29, 2007.
…Should you desire to learn the greatness and excellency of our Exaltedness and of the land subject to our sceptre, then hear and believe: I, Presbyter Johannes, the Lord of Lords, surpass all under heaven in virtue, in riches, and in power; seventy-two kings pay us tribute ... In the three Indies our Magnificence rules, and our land extends beyond India, where rests the body of the holy apostle Thomas [Judas the Twin]; it reaches towards the sunrise over the wastes, and it trends toward deserted Babylon near the Tower of Babel. Seventy-two provinces, of which only a few are Christian, serve us. Each has its own king, but all are tributary to us.
Our land is the home of elephants, dromedaries, camels, crocodiles, meta-collinarum, cametennus, tensevetes, wild asses, white and red lions, white bears, white merules, crickets, griffins, tigers, lamias, hyenas, wild horses, wild oxen, and wild men -- men with horns, one-eyed men, men with eyes before and behind, centaurs, fauns, satyrs, pygmies, forty-ell high giants, cyclopses, and similar women. It is the home, too, of the phoenix and of nearly all living animals.
We have some people subject to us who feed on the flesh of men and of prematurely born animals, and who never fear death. When any of these people die, their friends and relations eat him ravenously, for they regard it as a main duty to munch human flesh. Their names are Gog, Magog, Anie, Agit, Azenach, Fommeperi, Befari, Conei-Samante, Agrimandri, Vintefolei, Casbei, and Alanei. Theses and similar nations were shut in behind lofty mountains by Alexander the Great, towards the north. We lead them at our pleasure against our foes, and neither man nor beast is left undevoured, if our Majesty gives the requisite permission. And when all our foes are eaten, then we return with our hosts home again.
These accursed fifteen [twelve?] nations will burst forth from the four quarters of the earth at the end of the world, in the times of the Antichrist, and overrun all the abodes of the saints as well as the great city Rome, which, by the way, we are prepared to give to our son who will be born, alon with all Italy, Germany, the two Gauls, Britain, and Scotland. We shall also give him Spain and all of the land as far as the icy sea.
The nations to which I have alluded, according to the words of the prophet, shall not stand in the judgement on account of their offensive practices, but will be consumed to ashes by a fire which will fall on them from heaven.
Our land streams with honey and is overflowing with milk. In one region grows no poisonous herd, nor does a querulous frog ever quack in it; no scorpion exists, nor does the serpent glide amongst the grass, not can any poisonous animals exist in it or injure anyone.
Among the heathen flows, through a certain province, the River Indus. Encircling Paradise, it spreads its arms in manifold windings through the entire province. Here are found the emeralds, sapphires, carbuncles, topazes, chrsolites, onyxes, beryls, sardius, and other costly stones. Here grows the plant Assidos which, when worn by anyone, protects him from the evil spirit, forcing it to state its business and name -- consequently the foul spirits keep out of the way there. In a certain land subject to us all kinds of pepper is gathered and is exchanged for corn and bread, leather and cloth ...
At the foot of Mount Olympus bubbles up a spring which changes its flavor hour by hour, night and day, and the spring is scarcely three days' journey from Paradise, out of which Adam was driven. If anyone has tasted thrice of the fountain, from that day he will feel no fatigue, but will, as long as he lives, be as a man of thirty years. Here are found the small stones called Nudiosi which, if borne about the body, prevent the sight from waxing feeble and restore it where it is lost. The more the stone is looked at, the keener becomes the sight.
In our territory is a certain waterless sea consisting of tumbling billows of sand never at rest. None have crossed this sea -- it lacks water all together, yet fish of various kinds are cast up upon the beach, very tasty, and the like are nowhere else to be seen.
Three days' journey from this sea are mountains from which rolls down a stony, waterless river which opens into the sandy sea. As soon as the stream reaches the sea, its stones vanish in it and are never seen again. As long as the river is in motion, it cannout be crossed; only four days a week is it possible to traverse it.
Between the sandy sea and the said mountians, in a certain plain, is a fountain of singular virtue which purges Christians and would-be Christians from all transgressions. The water stands four inches high in a hollow stone shaped like a mussel-shell. Two saintly old men watch by it and ask the comers whether they are Christians or are about to become Christians, then whether they desire healing with all their hearts. If they have answered well, they are bidden to lay aside their clothes and to step into the mussel. If what they said be true, then the water begins to rise and gush over their heads. Thrice does the water thus lift itself, and everyone who has entered the mussel leaves it cured of every complaint.
Near the wilderness trickles between barren mountians a subterranean rill which can only by chance be reached, for only occassionally the earth gapes, and he who would descend must do it with precipitation, ere the earth closes again. All that is gathered under the ground there is gem and precious stone. The brook pours into another river and the inhabitants of the neighborhood obtain thence abundance of precious stones. Yet they never venture to sell them without having first offered them to us for our private use. Should we decline them, they are at liberty to dispose of them to strangers. Boys there are trained to remain three of four days under the water, diving after the stones.
Beyond the stone river are the ten tribes of Israel which, though subject to their own kings, are, for all that, tributary to our Majesty.
In one of our lands, hight Zone, are worms called salamanders. These worms can only live in fire, and they build cocoons like silk-worms which are unwound by the ladies of our palace and spun into cloth and dresses which are worn by our Exaltedness. These dresses, in order to be cleaned and washed, are cast into flames ...
When we go to war, we have fourteen golden and bejewelled crosses borne before us instead of banners. Each of these crosses is followed by ten thousand horsemen and one hundred thousand foot soldiers, fully armed, without reckoning those in charge of the luggage and provision.
When we ride abroad plainly we have a wooden, unadorned cross without gold or gems about it, borne before us in order that we meditate on the sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ; also a golden bowl filled with earth to remind us of that whence we sprung and that to which we must return; but besides these there is borne a sliver bowl full of gold as a token to all that we are the Lord of Lords.
All riches, such as are upon the world, our Magnificence possesses in superabundance. With us, no one lies, for he who speaks a lie is thenceforth regarded as dead -- he is no more thought of or honored by us. No vice is tolerated by us. Every year we undertake a pilgrimage, with retinue of war, to the body of the holy prophet Daniel which is near the desolated site of Babylon. In out realm fishes are caught, the blood of which dyes purple. The Amazons and the Brahmins are subject to us.
The palace in which our Superemincency resides is built after the pattern of the castle built by the apostle Thomas [Judas the Twin] for the Indian king Gundoforus. Celings joists, and architrave are of Sethym wood, the roof ebony, which can never catch fire. Over the gable of the palace are, at the extremities, two golden apples, in each of which are two carbuncles, so that the gold may shine by day and the carbuncles by night. The greater gates of the palace are of sardius with the horn of the horned snake inwrought so that no one can bring poison within. The other portals are of ebony; the windows are of crystal; the tables are partly of gold, partly of amethyst; the columns supporting the tables are partly of ivory, partly of amethyst. The court in which we watch the jousting is floored with onyx in order to increase the courage of the combatants. In the palace at night, nothing is burned for light, but wicks supplied with balsam ...
Before our palace stands a mirror, the ascent to which consists of five and twenty steps of porpyry and serpintine ... This mirror is guarded day and night by three thousand men. We look therein and behold all that is taking place in every province and region subject to our sceptre.
Seven kings wait upon us monthly, in turn, with sixty-two dukes, two hundred and fifty-six counts and marquises. Twelve archbishops sit at table with us on our right and twenty bishops on the left, besides the patriarch of St. Thomas, the Sarmatian Protopope, and the Archpope of Susa ...
Our high lord stewart is a primate and king, our cup-bearer is an archbishop and king, our chamberlain a bishop and king, and our marshal a king and abbot.
The Letter of Prester John. 1155. From About.com. http://altreligion.about.com/library/texts/bl_presterjohn.htm. Accessed April 29, 2007.
Carroll: Alice's Adventures in Wonderland: Chapter VI, The Pig and the Pepper
CHAPTER VI
Pig and Pepper
For a minute or two she stood looking at the house, and wondering what to do next, when suddenly a footman in livery came running out of the wood--(she considered him to be a footman because he was in livery: otherwise, judging by his face only, she would have called him a fish)--and rapped loudly at the door with his knuckles. It was opened by another footman in livery, with a round face, and large eyes like a frog; and both footmen, Alice noticed, had powdered hair that curled all over their heads. She felt very curious to know what it was all about, and crept a little way out of the wood to listen.
Fish and Frog servants
The Fish-Footman began by producing from under his arm a great letter, nearly as large as himself, and this he handed over to the other, saying, in a solemn tone, `For the Duchess. An invitation from the Queen to play croquet.' The Frog-Footman repeated, in the same solemn tone, only changing the order of the words a little, `From the Queen. An invitation for the Duchess to play croquet.'
Then they both bowed low, and their curls got entangled together.
Alice laughed so much at this, that she had to run back into the wood for fear of their hearing her; and when she next peeped out the Fish-Footman was gone, and the other was sitting on the ground near the door, staring stupidly up into the sky.
Alice went timidly up to the door, and knocked.
`There's no sort of use in knocking,' said the Footman, `and that for two reasons. First, because I'm on the same side of the door as you are; secondly, because they're making such a noise inside, no one could possibly hear you.' And certainly there was a most extraordinary noise going on within--a constant howling and sneezing, and every now and then a great crash, as if a dish or kettle had been broken to pieces.
`Please, then,' said Alice, `how am I to get in?'
`There might be some sense in your knocking,' the Footman went on without attending to her, `if we had the door between us. For instance, if you were inside, you might knock, and I could let you out, you know.' He was looking up into the sky all the time he was speaking, and this Alice thought decidedly uncivil. `But perhaps he can't help it,' she said to herself; `his eyes are so very nearly at the top of his head. But at any rate he might answer questions.--How am I to get in?' she repeated, aloud.
`I shall sit here,' the Footman remarked, `till tomorrow--'
At this moment the door of the house opened, and a large plate came skimming out, straight at the Footman's head: it just grazed his nose, and broke to pieces against one of the trees behind him.
`--or next day, maybe,' the Footman continued in the same tone, exactly as if nothing had happened.
`How am I to get in?' asked Alice again, in a louder tone.
`Are you to get in at all?' said the Footman. `That's the first question, you know.'
It was, no doubt: only Alice did not like to be told so. `It's really dreadful,' she muttered to herself, `the way all the creatures argue. It's enough to drive one crazy!'
The Footman seemed to think this a good opportunity for repeating his remark, with variations. `I shall sit here,' he said, `on and off, for days and days.'
`But what am I to do?' said Alice.
`Anything you like,' said the Footman, and began whistling.
`Oh, there's no use in talking to him,' said Alice desperately: `he's perfectly idiotic!' And she opened the door and went in.
The door led right into a large kitchen, which was full of smoke from one end to the other: the Duchess was sitting on a three-legged stool in the middle, nursing a baby; the cook was leaning over the fire, stirring a large cauldron which seemed to be full of soup.
`There's certainly too much pepper in that soup!' Alice said to herself, as well as she could for sneezing.
There was certainly too much of it in the air. Even the Duchess sneezed occasionally; and as for the baby, it was sneezing and howling alternately without a moment's pause. The only things in the kitchen that did not sneeze, were the cook, and a large cat which was sitting on the hearth and grinning from ear to ear.
Cook, Duchess, Cheshire Cat, Baby, and Alice
`Please would you tell me,' said Alice, a little timidly, for she was not quite sure whether it was good manners for her to speak first, `why your cat grins like that?'
`It's a Cheshire cat,' said the Duchess, `and that's why. Pig!'
She said the last word with such sudden violence that Alice quite jumped; but she saw in another moment that it was addressed to the baby, and not to her, so she took courage, and went on again:--
`I didn't know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn't know that cats could grin.'
`They all can,' said the Duchess; `and most of 'em do.'
`I don't know of any that do,' Alice said very politely, feeling quite pleased to have got into a conversation.
`You don't know much,' said the Duchess; `and that's a fact.'
Alice did not at all like the tone of this remark, and thought it would be as well to introduce some other subject of conversation. While she was trying to fix on one, the cook took the cauldron of soup off the fire, and at once set to work throwing everything within her reach at the Duchess and the baby --the fire-irons came first; then followed a shower of saucepans, plates, and dishes. The Duchess took no notice of them even when they hit her; and the baby was howling so much already, that it was quite impossible to say whether the blows hurt it or not.
`Oh, please mind what you're doing!' cried Alice, jumping up and down in an agony of terror. `Oh, there goes his precious nose'; as an unusually large saucepan flew close by it, and very nearly carried it off.
`If everybody minded their own business,' the Duchess said in a hoarse growl, `the world would go round a deal faster than it does.'
`Which would not be an advantage,' said Alice, who felt very glad to get an opportunity of showing off a little of her knowledge. `Just think of what work it would make with the day and night! You see the earth takes twenty-four hours to turn round on its axis--'
`Talking of axes,' said the Duchess, `chop off her head!'
Alice glanced rather anxiously at the cook, to see if she meant to take the hint; but the cook was busily stirring the soup, and seemed not to be listening, so she went on again: `Twenty-four hours, I think; or is it twelve? I--'
`Oh, don't bother me,' said the Duchess; `I never could abide figures!' And with that she began nursing her child again, singing a sort of lullaby to it as she did so, and giving it a violent shake at the end of every line: `Speak roughly to your little boy, And beat him when he sneezes: He only does it to annoy, Because he knows it teases.' CHORUS.
(In which the cook and the baby joined):-- `Wow! wow! wow!'
While the Duchess sang the second verse of the song, she kept tossing the baby violently up and down, and the poor little thing howled so, that Alice could hardly hear the words:-- `I speak severely to my boy, I beat him when he sneezes; For he can thoroughly enjoy The pepper when he pleases!' CHORUS. `Wow! wow! wow!'
`Here! you may nurse it a bit, if you like!' the Duchess said to Alice, flinging the baby at her as she spoke. `I must go and get ready to play croquet with the Queen,' and she hurried out of the room. The cook threw a frying-pan after her as she went out, but it just missed her.
Alice caught the baby with some difficulty, as it was a queer-shaped little creature, and held out its arms and legs in all directions, `just like a star-fish,' thought Alice. The poor little thing was snorting like a steam-engine when she caught it, and kept doubling itself up and straightening itself out again, so that altogether, for the first minute or two, it was as much as she could do to hold it.
As soon as she had made out the proper way of nursing it, (which was to twist it up into a sort of knot, and then keep tight hold of its right ear and left foot, so as to prevent its undoing itself,) she carried it out into the open air. `If I don't take this child away with me,' thought Alice, `they're sure to kill it in a day or two: wouldn't it be murder to leave it behind?' She said the last words out loud, and the little thing grunted in reply (it had left off sneezing by this time). `Don't grunt,' said Alice; `that's not at all a proper way of expressing yourself.'
The baby grunted again, and Alice looked very anxiously into its face to see what was the matter with it. There could be no doubt that it had a very turn-up nose, much more like a snout than a real nose; also its eyes were getting extremely small for a baby: altogether Alice did not like the look of the thing at all. `But perhaps it was only sobbing,' she thought, and looked into its eyes again, to see if there were any tears.
No, there were no tears. `If you're going to turn into a pig, my dear,' said Alice, seriously, `I'll have nothing more to do with you. Mind now!' The poor little thing sobbed again (or grunted, it was impossible to say which), and they went on for some while in silence.
Alice and pig baby
Alice was just beginning to think to herself, `Now, what am I to do with this creature when I get it home?' when it grunted again, so violently, that she looked down into its face in some alarm. This time there could be no mistake about it: it was neither more nor less than a pig, and she felt that it would be quite absurd for her to carry it further.
So she set the little creature down, and felt quite relieved to see it trot away quietly into the wood. `If it had grown up,' she said to herself, `it would have made a dreadfully ugly child: but it makes rather a handsome pig, I think.' And she began thinking over other children she knew, who might do very well as pigs, and was just saying to herself, `if one only knew the right way to change them--' when she was a little startled by seeing the Cheshire Cat sitting on a bough of a tree a few yards off.
The Cat only grinned when it saw Alice. It looked good-natured, she thought: still it had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt that it ought to be treated with respect.
`Cheshire Puss,' she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. `Come, it's pleased so far,' thought Alice, and she went on. `Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?'
Alice speaks to Cheshire Cat
`That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat.
`I don't much care where--' said Alice.
`Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat.
`--so long as I get somewhere,' Alice added as an explanation.
`Oh, you're sure to do that,' said the Cat, `if you only walk long enough.'
Alice felt that this could not be denied, so she tried another question. `What sort of people live about here?'
`In that direction,' the Cat said, waving its right paw round, `lives a Hatter: and in that direction,' waving the other paw, `lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they're both mad.'
`But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.
`Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: `we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'
`How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.
`You must be,' said the Cat, `or you wouldn't have come here.'
Alice didn't think that proved it at all; however, she went on `And how do you know that you're mad?'
`To begin with,' said the Cat, `a dog's not mad. You grant that?'
`I suppose so,' said Alice.
`Well, then,' the Cat went on, `you see, a dog growls when it's angry, and wags its tail when it's pleased. Now I growl when I'm pleased, and wag my tail when I'm angry. Therefore I'm mad.'
`I call it purring, not growling,' said Alice.
`Call it what you like,' said the Cat. `Do you play croquet with the Queen to-day?'
`I should like it very much,' said Alice, `but I haven't been invited yet.'
`You'll see me there,' said the Cat, and vanished.
Alice was not much surprised at this, she was getting so used to queer things happening. While she was looking at the place where it had been, it suddenly appeared again.
`By-the-bye, what became of the baby?' said the Cat. `I'd nearly forgotten to ask.'
`It turned into a pig,' Alice quietly said, just as if it had come back in a natural way.
`I thought it would,' said the Cat, and vanished again.
Alice waited a little, half expecting to see it again, but it did not appear, and after a minute or two she walked on in the direction in which the March Hare was said to live. `I've seen hatters before,' she said to herself; `the March Hare will be much the most interesting, and perhaps as this is May it won't be raving mad--at least not so mad as it was in March.' As she said this, she looked up, and there was the Cat again, sitting on a branch of a tree.
`Did you say pig, or fig?' said the Cat.
`I said pig,' replied Alice; `and I wish you wouldn't keep appearing and vanishing so suddenly: you make one quite giddy.'
`All right,' said the Cat; and this time it vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.
Cheshire Cat fading to smile
`Well! I've often seen a cat without a grin,' thought Alice; `but a grin without a cat! It's the most curious thing I ever saw in my life!'
She had not gone much farther before she came in sight of the house of the March Hare: she thought it must be the right house, because the chimneys were shaped like ears and the roof was thatched with fur. It was so large a house, that she did not like to go nearer till she had nibbled some more of the lefthand bit of mushroom, and raised herself to about two feet high: even then she walked up towards it rather timidly, saying to herself `Suppose it should be raving mad after all! I almost wish I'd gone to see the Hatter instead!'
Carroll, Lewis. Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland. (Originally Published as “Alice’s Adventures Under Ground”). 1865. The Millenium Fulcrum Edition 3.0. http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rgs/alice-table.html. Accessed April 29, 2007.
Pig and Pepper
For a minute or two she stood looking at the house, and wondering what to do next, when suddenly a footman in livery came running out of the wood--(she considered him to be a footman because he was in livery: otherwise, judging by his face only, she would have called him a fish)--and rapped loudly at the door with his knuckles. It was opened by another footman in livery, with a round face, and large eyes like a frog; and both footmen, Alice noticed, had powdered hair that curled all over their heads. She felt very curious to know what it was all about, and crept a little way out of the wood to listen.
Fish and Frog servants
The Fish-Footman began by producing from under his arm a great letter, nearly as large as himself, and this he handed over to the other, saying, in a solemn tone, `For the Duchess. An invitation from the Queen to play croquet.' The Frog-Footman repeated, in the same solemn tone, only changing the order of the words a little, `From the Queen. An invitation for the Duchess to play croquet.'
Then they both bowed low, and their curls got entangled together.
Alice laughed so much at this, that she had to run back into the wood for fear of their hearing her; and when she next peeped out the Fish-Footman was gone, and the other was sitting on the ground near the door, staring stupidly up into the sky.
Alice went timidly up to the door, and knocked.
`There's no sort of use in knocking,' said the Footman, `and that for two reasons. First, because I'm on the same side of the door as you are; secondly, because they're making such a noise inside, no one could possibly hear you.' And certainly there was a most extraordinary noise going on within--a constant howling and sneezing, and every now and then a great crash, as if a dish or kettle had been broken to pieces.
`Please, then,' said Alice, `how am I to get in?'
`There might be some sense in your knocking,' the Footman went on without attending to her, `if we had the door between us. For instance, if you were inside, you might knock, and I could let you out, you know.' He was looking up into the sky all the time he was speaking, and this Alice thought decidedly uncivil. `But perhaps he can't help it,' she said to herself; `his eyes are so very nearly at the top of his head. But at any rate he might answer questions.--How am I to get in?' she repeated, aloud.
`I shall sit here,' the Footman remarked, `till tomorrow--'
At this moment the door of the house opened, and a large plate came skimming out, straight at the Footman's head: it just grazed his nose, and broke to pieces against one of the trees behind him.
`--or next day, maybe,' the Footman continued in the same tone, exactly as if nothing had happened.
`How am I to get in?' asked Alice again, in a louder tone.
`Are you to get in at all?' said the Footman. `That's the first question, you know.'
It was, no doubt: only Alice did not like to be told so. `It's really dreadful,' she muttered to herself, `the way all the creatures argue. It's enough to drive one crazy!'
The Footman seemed to think this a good opportunity for repeating his remark, with variations. `I shall sit here,' he said, `on and off, for days and days.'
`But what am I to do?' said Alice.
`Anything you like,' said the Footman, and began whistling.
`Oh, there's no use in talking to him,' said Alice desperately: `he's perfectly idiotic!' And she opened the door and went in.
The door led right into a large kitchen, which was full of smoke from one end to the other: the Duchess was sitting on a three-legged stool in the middle, nursing a baby; the cook was leaning over the fire, stirring a large cauldron which seemed to be full of soup.
`There's certainly too much pepper in that soup!' Alice said to herself, as well as she could for sneezing.
There was certainly too much of it in the air. Even the Duchess sneezed occasionally; and as for the baby, it was sneezing and howling alternately without a moment's pause. The only things in the kitchen that did not sneeze, were the cook, and a large cat which was sitting on the hearth and grinning from ear to ear.
Cook, Duchess, Cheshire Cat, Baby, and Alice
`Please would you tell me,' said Alice, a little timidly, for she was not quite sure whether it was good manners for her to speak first, `why your cat grins like that?'
`It's a Cheshire cat,' said the Duchess, `and that's why. Pig!'
She said the last word with such sudden violence that Alice quite jumped; but she saw in another moment that it was addressed to the baby, and not to her, so she took courage, and went on again:--
`I didn't know that Cheshire cats always grinned; in fact, I didn't know that cats could grin.'
`They all can,' said the Duchess; `and most of 'em do.'
`I don't know of any that do,' Alice said very politely, feeling quite pleased to have got into a conversation.
`You don't know much,' said the Duchess; `and that's a fact.'
Alice did not at all like the tone of this remark, and thought it would be as well to introduce some other subject of conversation. While she was trying to fix on one, the cook took the cauldron of soup off the fire, and at once set to work throwing everything within her reach at the Duchess and the baby --the fire-irons came first; then followed a shower of saucepans, plates, and dishes. The Duchess took no notice of them even when they hit her; and the baby was howling so much already, that it was quite impossible to say whether the blows hurt it or not.
`Oh, please mind what you're doing!' cried Alice, jumping up and down in an agony of terror. `Oh, there goes his precious nose'; as an unusually large saucepan flew close by it, and very nearly carried it off.
`If everybody minded their own business,' the Duchess said in a hoarse growl, `the world would go round a deal faster than it does.'
`Which would not be an advantage,' said Alice, who felt very glad to get an opportunity of showing off a little of her knowledge. `Just think of what work it would make with the day and night! You see the earth takes twenty-four hours to turn round on its axis--'
`Talking of axes,' said the Duchess, `chop off her head!'
Alice glanced rather anxiously at the cook, to see if she meant to take the hint; but the cook was busily stirring the soup, and seemed not to be listening, so she went on again: `Twenty-four hours, I think; or is it twelve? I--'
`Oh, don't bother me,' said the Duchess; `I never could abide figures!' And with that she began nursing her child again, singing a sort of lullaby to it as she did so, and giving it a violent shake at the end of every line: `Speak roughly to your little boy, And beat him when he sneezes: He only does it to annoy, Because he knows it teases.' CHORUS.
(In which the cook and the baby joined):-- `Wow! wow! wow!'
While the Duchess sang the second verse of the song, she kept tossing the baby violently up and down, and the poor little thing howled so, that Alice could hardly hear the words:-- `I speak severely to my boy, I beat him when he sneezes; For he can thoroughly enjoy The pepper when he pleases!' CHORUS. `Wow! wow! wow!'
`Here! you may nurse it a bit, if you like!' the Duchess said to Alice, flinging the baby at her as she spoke. `I must go and get ready to play croquet with the Queen,' and she hurried out of the room. The cook threw a frying-pan after her as she went out, but it just missed her.
Alice caught the baby with some difficulty, as it was a queer-shaped little creature, and held out its arms and legs in all directions, `just like a star-fish,' thought Alice. The poor little thing was snorting like a steam-engine when she caught it, and kept doubling itself up and straightening itself out again, so that altogether, for the first minute or two, it was as much as she could do to hold it.
As soon as she had made out the proper way of nursing it, (which was to twist it up into a sort of knot, and then keep tight hold of its right ear and left foot, so as to prevent its undoing itself,) she carried it out into the open air. `If I don't take this child away with me,' thought Alice, `they're sure to kill it in a day or two: wouldn't it be murder to leave it behind?' She said the last words out loud, and the little thing grunted in reply (it had left off sneezing by this time). `Don't grunt,' said Alice; `that's not at all a proper way of expressing yourself.'
The baby grunted again, and Alice looked very anxiously into its face to see what was the matter with it. There could be no doubt that it had a very turn-up nose, much more like a snout than a real nose; also its eyes were getting extremely small for a baby: altogether Alice did not like the look of the thing at all. `But perhaps it was only sobbing,' she thought, and looked into its eyes again, to see if there were any tears.
No, there were no tears. `If you're going to turn into a pig, my dear,' said Alice, seriously, `I'll have nothing more to do with you. Mind now!' The poor little thing sobbed again (or grunted, it was impossible to say which), and they went on for some while in silence.
Alice and pig baby
Alice was just beginning to think to herself, `Now, what am I to do with this creature when I get it home?' when it grunted again, so violently, that she looked down into its face in some alarm. This time there could be no mistake about it: it was neither more nor less than a pig, and she felt that it would be quite absurd for her to carry it further.
So she set the little creature down, and felt quite relieved to see it trot away quietly into the wood. `If it had grown up,' she said to herself, `it would have made a dreadfully ugly child: but it makes rather a handsome pig, I think.' And she began thinking over other children she knew, who might do very well as pigs, and was just saying to herself, `if one only knew the right way to change them--' when she was a little startled by seeing the Cheshire Cat sitting on a bough of a tree a few yards off.
The Cat only grinned when it saw Alice. It looked good-natured, she thought: still it had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt that it ought to be treated with respect.
`Cheshire Puss,' she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. `Come, it's pleased so far,' thought Alice, and she went on. `Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?'
Alice speaks to Cheshire Cat
`That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat.
`I don't much care where--' said Alice.
`Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat.
`--so long as I get somewhere,' Alice added as an explanation.
`Oh, you're sure to do that,' said the Cat, `if you only walk long enough.'
Alice felt that this could not be denied, so she tried another question. `What sort of people live about here?'
`In that direction,' the Cat said, waving its right paw round, `lives a Hatter: and in that direction,' waving the other paw, `lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they're both mad.'
`But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.
`Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: `we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'
`How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.
`You must be,' said the Cat, `or you wouldn't have come here.'
Alice didn't think that proved it at all; however, she went on `And how do you know that you're mad?'
`To begin with,' said the Cat, `a dog's not mad. You grant that?'
`I suppose so,' said Alice.
`Well, then,' the Cat went on, `you see, a dog growls when it's angry, and wags its tail when it's pleased. Now I growl when I'm pleased, and wag my tail when I'm angry. Therefore I'm mad.'
`I call it purring, not growling,' said Alice.
`Call it what you like,' said the Cat. `Do you play croquet with the Queen to-day?'
`I should like it very much,' said Alice, `but I haven't been invited yet.'
`You'll see me there,' said the Cat, and vanished.
Alice was not much surprised at this, she was getting so used to queer things happening. While she was looking at the place where it had been, it suddenly appeared again.
`By-the-bye, what became of the baby?' said the Cat. `I'd nearly forgotten to ask.'
`It turned into a pig,' Alice quietly said, just as if it had come back in a natural way.
`I thought it would,' said the Cat, and vanished again.
Alice waited a little, half expecting to see it again, but it did not appear, and after a minute or two she walked on in the direction in which the March Hare was said to live. `I've seen hatters before,' she said to herself; `the March Hare will be much the most interesting, and perhaps as this is May it won't be raving mad--at least not so mad as it was in March.' As she said this, she looked up, and there was the Cat again, sitting on a branch of a tree.
`Did you say pig, or fig?' said the Cat.
`I said pig,' replied Alice; `and I wish you wouldn't keep appearing and vanishing so suddenly: you make one quite giddy.'
`All right,' said the Cat; and this time it vanished quite slowly, beginning with the end of the tail, and ending with the grin, which remained some time after the rest of it had gone.
Cheshire Cat fading to smile
`Well! I've often seen a cat without a grin,' thought Alice; `but a grin without a cat! It's the most curious thing I ever saw in my life!'
She had not gone much farther before she came in sight of the house of the March Hare: she thought it must be the right house, because the chimneys were shaped like ears and the roof was thatched with fur. It was so large a house, that she did not like to go nearer till she had nibbled some more of the lefthand bit of mushroom, and raised herself to about two feet high: even then she walked up towards it rather timidly, saying to herself `Suppose it should be raving mad after all! I almost wish I'd gone to see the Hatter instead!'
Carroll, Lewis. Alice’s Adventure in Wonderland. (Originally Published as “Alice’s Adventures Under Ground”). 1865. The Millenium Fulcrum Edition 3.0. http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~rgs/alice-table.html. Accessed April 29, 2007.
Swift: Gulliver's Travels - Part IV "A Voyage to the Land of the Houyhnhnms"
THE READER may be disposed to wonder how I could prevail on myself to give so free a Representation of my own Species, among a Race of Mortals who were already too apt to conceive the vilest Opinion of human Kind from that entire Congruity betwixt me and their Yahoos. But I must freely confess, that the many Virtues of those excellent Quadrupeds placed in opposite View to human Corruptions, had so far opened my Eyes and enlightened my Understanding, that I began to view the Actions and Passions of Man in a very different Light, and to think the Honour of my own Kind not worth managing; which, besides, it was impossible for me to do before a Person of so acute a Judgment as my Master, who daily convinced me of a thousand Faults in myself, whereof I had not the least Perception before, and which among us would never be numbered even among human Infirmities, I had likewise learned from his Example an utter Detestation of all Falsehood or Disguise; and Truth appeared so amiable to me, that I determined upon sacrificing every thing to it…
When I had answered all his Questions, and his Curiosity seemed to be fully satisfied; he sent for me one Morning early, and commanded me to sit down at some Distance, (an Honour which he had never before conferred upon me) he said, He had been very seriously considering my whole Story, as far as it related both to myself and my Country: That he looked upon us as sort of Animals to whose Share, by what Accident he could not conjecture, some small Pittance of Reason had fallen, whereof we made no other Use than by its Assistance to aggravate our natural Corruptions, and to acquire new ones which Nature had not given us: That we disarmed ourselves of the few Abilities she had bestowed, had been very successful in multiplying our original Wants, and seemed to spend our whole Lives in vain Endeavours to supply them by our own Inventions. That as to myself, it was manifest I had neither the Strength or Agility of a common Yahoo, that I walked infirmly on my hinder Feet, had found out a Contrivance to make my Claws of no Use or Defence, and to remove the Hair from my Chin, which was intended as a shelter from the Sun and the Weather. Lastly, That I could neither run with Speed, nor climb Trees like my Brethren (as he called them) the Yahoos in this Country…
[Gulliver’s Master Houyhnhnm related]
That in some Fields of his Country there are certain shining Stones of several Colours, whereof the Yahoos are violently fond, and when part of these Stones is fixed in the Earth, as it sometimes happeneth, they will dig with their Claws for whole Days to get them out, then carry them away, and hide them by Heaps in their Kennels; but still looking round with great Caution, for Fear their Comrades should find out their Treasure. My Master said, he could never discover the Reason of this unnatural Appetite, or how these Stones could be of any Use to a Yahoo; but now he believed it might proceed from the same Principle of Avarice which I had ascribed to Mankind: that he had once, by way of Experiment, privately removed a Heap of these Stones from the Place where one of his Yahoos had buried it: Whereupon, the sordid Animal missing his Treasure, by his loud lamenting brought the whole Herd to the Place, there miserably howled, then fell to biting and tearing the rest, began to pine away, would neither eat, nor sleep, nor work, till he ordered a Servant privately to convey the Stones into the same Hole, and hide them as before; which when his Yahoo had found, he presently recovered his Spirits and good Humour, but took good Care to remove them to a better hiding-place, and hath ever since been a very serviceable Brute.
My Master farther assured me, which I also observed myself, that in the Fields where the shining Stones abound, the fiercest and most frequent Battles are fought, occasioned by perpetual inroads of the neighbouring Yahoos.
He said, it was common when two Yahoos discovered such a Stone in a Field, and were contending which of them should be the Proprietor, a third would take the Advantage, and carry it away from them both; which my Master would needs contend to have some kind of Resemblance with our Suits at Law; wherein I thought it for our Credit not to undeceive him; since the Decision he mentioned was much more equitable than many Decrees among us: Because the Plaintiff and Defendant there lost nothing beside the Stone they contended for, whereas our Courts of Equity, would never have dismissed the Cause while either of them had any thing left.
My Master, continuing his Discourse, said, There was nothing that rendered the Yahoos more odious, than their undistinguishing Appetite to devour every Thing that came in their way, whether Herbs, Roots, Berries, the corrupted Flesh of Animals, or all mingled together: And it was peculiar in their Temper, that they were fonder of what they could get by Rapine or Stealth at a greater Distance, than much better Food provided for them at home. If their Prey held out, they would eat till they were ready to burst, after which Nature had pointed out to them a certain Root that gave them a general Evacuation.
There was also another kind of Root very juicy, but somewhat rare and difficult to be found, which the Yahoos sought for with much Eagerness, and would suck it with great Delight; and it produced in them the same Effects that Wine hath upon us. It would make them sometimes hug, sometimes tear one another, they would howl and grin, and chatter, and tumble, and then fall asleep in the Dirt.
I did indeed observe, that the Yahoos were the only Animals in this Country subject to any Diseases; which however, were much fewer than Horses have among us, and contracted not by any ill Treatment they meet with, but by the Nastiness, and Greediness of that sordid Brute. Neither has their Language any more than a general Appellation for those Maladies, which is borrowed from the Name of the Beast, and called Hnea-Yahoo, or the Yahoo's Evil, and the Cure prescribed is a mixture of their own Dung and Urine forcibly put down the Yahoo's Throat. This I have since often taken myself, and do freely recommend it to my Countrymen, for the publick Good, as an admirable Specifick against all Diseases produced by Repletion.
As to Learning, Government, Arts, Manufactures, and the like, my Master confessed he could find little or no Resemblance between the Yahoos of that Country and those in ours. For, he only meant to observe what Parity there was in our Natures. He had heard indeed some curious Houyhnhnms observe, that in most Herds there was a sort of ruling Yahoo (as among us there is generally some leading or principal Stag in a park), who was always more deformed in Body and mischievous in Disposition, than any of the rest. That this Leader had usually a Favourite as like himself as he could get, whose Employment was to lick his Master's Feet and Posteriors, and drive the Female Yahoos to his Kennel; for which he was now and then rewarded with a piece of Ass's Flesh. This Favourite is hated by the whole Herd, and therefore to protect himself, keeps always near the Person of his Leader. He usually continues in Office till worse can be found; but the very Moment he is discarded, his Successor at the Head of all the Yahoos in that District, Young and Old, Male and Female, come in a Body, and discharge their Excrements upon him from Head to Foot. But how far this might be applicable to our Courts and Favourites, and Ministers of State, my Master said I could best determine.
I dared make no Return to this malicious Insinuation, which debased human Understanding below the Sagacity of a common Hound, who has Judgment enough to distinguish and follow the Cry of the ablest Dog in the Pack, without being ever mistaken.
My Master told me, there were some Qualities remarkable in the Yahoos, which he had not observed me to mention, or at least very slightly, in the Accounts I had given him of human kind; he said, Those Animals, like other Brutes, had their Females in common; but in this they differed, that the She-Yahoo would admit the Male, while she was pregnant; and that the Hees would quarrel and fight with Females as fiercely as with each other. Both which Practices were such Degrees of Brutality, that no other sensitive Creature ever arrived at.
Another thing he wondered at in the Yahoos, was their strange Disposition to Nastiness and Dirt, whereas there appears to be a natural Love of Cleanliness in all other Animals. As to the two former Accusations, I was glad to let them pass without any Reply, because I had not a Word to offer upon it in Defence of my Species, which otherwise I certainly had done from my own Inclinations. But I could have easily vindicated Human Kind from the Imputation of Singularity upon Article, if there had been any Swine in that Country (as unluckily for me there were not) which although it may be a sweeter Quadruped than a Yahoo, cannot I humbly conceive in Justice pretend to more Cleanliness; and so his Honour himself must have owned, if he had seen their filthy way of feeding, and their Custom of wallowing and sleeping in the Mud.
My Master likewise mentioned another Quality which his Servants had discovered in several Yahoos, and to him was wholly unaccountable. He said, a Fancy would sometimes take a Yahoo, to retire into a Corner, to lie down and howl, and groan, and spurn away all that came near him, although he were young and fat, wanted neither Food nor Water; nor could the Servants imagine what could possibly ail him. And the only Remedy they found was to set him to hard Work, after which he would infallibly come to himself. To this I was silent out of Partiality to my own Kind; yet here I could plainly discover the true seeds of Spleen, which only seize on the Lazy, the Luxurious, and the Rich; who, if they were forced to undergo the same Regimen, I would undertake for the Cure.
His Honour had further observed, that a Female-Yahoo would often stand behind a Bank or a Bush, to gaze on the young Males passing by, and then appear, and hide, using many antick Gestures and Grimaces, at which time it was observed, that she had a most offensive Smell; and when any of the Males advanced, would slowly retire, looking often back, and with a counterfeit shew of Fear; run off into some convenient Place where she knew the Male would follow her.
At other times if a Female Stranger came among them, Three or Four of her own Sex would get about her, and stare and chatter, and grin, and smell her all over; and then turn off with Gestures that seemed to express Contempt and Disdain.
Perhaps my Master might refine a little in these Speculations, which he had drawn from what he observed himself, or had been told him by others: However, I could not reflect without some Amazement, and much Sorrow, that the Rudiments of Lewdness, Coquetry, Censure, and Scandal, should have place by Instinct in Womankind.
I expected every Moment that my Master would accuse the Yahoos of those unnatural Appetites in both Sexes, so common among us. But Nature, it seems, has not been so Expert a School-mistress; and these politer Pleasures are entirely the Productions of Art and Reason, on our Side of the Globe.
Lee Jaffe, ed. Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver’s Travels. 1726. July 29, 2000. http://www.jaffebros.com/lee/gulliver/. Accessed April 29, 2007.
When I had answered all his Questions, and his Curiosity seemed to be fully satisfied; he sent for me one Morning early, and commanded me to sit down at some Distance, (an Honour which he had never before conferred upon me) he said, He had been very seriously considering my whole Story, as far as it related both to myself and my Country: That he looked upon us as sort of Animals to whose Share, by what Accident he could not conjecture, some small Pittance of Reason had fallen, whereof we made no other Use than by its Assistance to aggravate our natural Corruptions, and to acquire new ones which Nature had not given us: That we disarmed ourselves of the few Abilities she had bestowed, had been very successful in multiplying our original Wants, and seemed to spend our whole Lives in vain Endeavours to supply them by our own Inventions. That as to myself, it was manifest I had neither the Strength or Agility of a common Yahoo, that I walked infirmly on my hinder Feet, had found out a Contrivance to make my Claws of no Use or Defence, and to remove the Hair from my Chin, which was intended as a shelter from the Sun and the Weather. Lastly, That I could neither run with Speed, nor climb Trees like my Brethren (as he called them) the Yahoos in this Country…
[Gulliver’s Master Houyhnhnm related]
That in some Fields of his Country there are certain shining Stones of several Colours, whereof the Yahoos are violently fond, and when part of these Stones is fixed in the Earth, as it sometimes happeneth, they will dig with their Claws for whole Days to get them out, then carry them away, and hide them by Heaps in their Kennels; but still looking round with great Caution, for Fear their Comrades should find out their Treasure. My Master said, he could never discover the Reason of this unnatural Appetite, or how these Stones could be of any Use to a Yahoo; but now he believed it might proceed from the same Principle of Avarice which I had ascribed to Mankind: that he had once, by way of Experiment, privately removed a Heap of these Stones from the Place where one of his Yahoos had buried it: Whereupon, the sordid Animal missing his Treasure, by his loud lamenting brought the whole Herd to the Place, there miserably howled, then fell to biting and tearing the rest, began to pine away, would neither eat, nor sleep, nor work, till he ordered a Servant privately to convey the Stones into the same Hole, and hide them as before; which when his Yahoo had found, he presently recovered his Spirits and good Humour, but took good Care to remove them to a better hiding-place, and hath ever since been a very serviceable Brute.
My Master farther assured me, which I also observed myself, that in the Fields where the shining Stones abound, the fiercest and most frequent Battles are fought, occasioned by perpetual inroads of the neighbouring Yahoos.
He said, it was common when two Yahoos discovered such a Stone in a Field, and were contending which of them should be the Proprietor, a third would take the Advantage, and carry it away from them both; which my Master would needs contend to have some kind of Resemblance with our Suits at Law; wherein I thought it for our Credit not to undeceive him; since the Decision he mentioned was much more equitable than many Decrees among us: Because the Plaintiff and Defendant there lost nothing beside the Stone they contended for, whereas our Courts of Equity, would never have dismissed the Cause while either of them had any thing left.
My Master, continuing his Discourse, said, There was nothing that rendered the Yahoos more odious, than their undistinguishing Appetite to devour every Thing that came in their way, whether Herbs, Roots, Berries, the corrupted Flesh of Animals, or all mingled together: And it was peculiar in their Temper, that they were fonder of what they could get by Rapine or Stealth at a greater Distance, than much better Food provided for them at home. If their Prey held out, they would eat till they were ready to burst, after which Nature had pointed out to them a certain Root that gave them a general Evacuation.
There was also another kind of Root very juicy, but somewhat rare and difficult to be found, which the Yahoos sought for with much Eagerness, and would suck it with great Delight; and it produced in them the same Effects that Wine hath upon us. It would make them sometimes hug, sometimes tear one another, they would howl and grin, and chatter, and tumble, and then fall asleep in the Dirt.
I did indeed observe, that the Yahoos were the only Animals in this Country subject to any Diseases; which however, were much fewer than Horses have among us, and contracted not by any ill Treatment they meet with, but by the Nastiness, and Greediness of that sordid Brute. Neither has their Language any more than a general Appellation for those Maladies, which is borrowed from the Name of the Beast, and called Hnea-Yahoo, or the Yahoo's Evil, and the Cure prescribed is a mixture of their own Dung and Urine forcibly put down the Yahoo's Throat. This I have since often taken myself, and do freely recommend it to my Countrymen, for the publick Good, as an admirable Specifick against all Diseases produced by Repletion.
As to Learning, Government, Arts, Manufactures, and the like, my Master confessed he could find little or no Resemblance between the Yahoos of that Country and those in ours. For, he only meant to observe what Parity there was in our Natures. He had heard indeed some curious Houyhnhnms observe, that in most Herds there was a sort of ruling Yahoo (as among us there is generally some leading or principal Stag in a park), who was always more deformed in Body and mischievous in Disposition, than any of the rest. That this Leader had usually a Favourite as like himself as he could get, whose Employment was to lick his Master's Feet and Posteriors, and drive the Female Yahoos to his Kennel; for which he was now and then rewarded with a piece of Ass's Flesh. This Favourite is hated by the whole Herd, and therefore to protect himself, keeps always near the Person of his Leader. He usually continues in Office till worse can be found; but the very Moment he is discarded, his Successor at the Head of all the Yahoos in that District, Young and Old, Male and Female, come in a Body, and discharge their Excrements upon him from Head to Foot. But how far this might be applicable to our Courts and Favourites, and Ministers of State, my Master said I could best determine.
I dared make no Return to this malicious Insinuation, which debased human Understanding below the Sagacity of a common Hound, who has Judgment enough to distinguish and follow the Cry of the ablest Dog in the Pack, without being ever mistaken.
My Master told me, there were some Qualities remarkable in the Yahoos, which he had not observed me to mention, or at least very slightly, in the Accounts I had given him of human kind; he said, Those Animals, like other Brutes, had their Females in common; but in this they differed, that the She-Yahoo would admit the Male, while she was pregnant; and that the Hees would quarrel and fight with Females as fiercely as with each other. Both which Practices were such Degrees of Brutality, that no other sensitive Creature ever arrived at.
Another thing he wondered at in the Yahoos, was their strange Disposition to Nastiness and Dirt, whereas there appears to be a natural Love of Cleanliness in all other Animals. As to the two former Accusations, I was glad to let them pass without any Reply, because I had not a Word to offer upon it in Defence of my Species, which otherwise I certainly had done from my own Inclinations. But I could have easily vindicated Human Kind from the Imputation of Singularity upon Article, if there had been any Swine in that Country (as unluckily for me there were not) which although it may be a sweeter Quadruped than a Yahoo, cannot I humbly conceive in Justice pretend to more Cleanliness; and so his Honour himself must have owned, if he had seen their filthy way of feeding, and their Custom of wallowing and sleeping in the Mud.
My Master likewise mentioned another Quality which his Servants had discovered in several Yahoos, and to him was wholly unaccountable. He said, a Fancy would sometimes take a Yahoo, to retire into a Corner, to lie down and howl, and groan, and spurn away all that came near him, although he were young and fat, wanted neither Food nor Water; nor could the Servants imagine what could possibly ail him. And the only Remedy they found was to set him to hard Work, after which he would infallibly come to himself. To this I was silent out of Partiality to my own Kind; yet here I could plainly discover the true seeds of Spleen, which only seize on the Lazy, the Luxurious, and the Rich; who, if they were forced to undergo the same Regimen, I would undertake for the Cure.
His Honour had further observed, that a Female-Yahoo would often stand behind a Bank or a Bush, to gaze on the young Males passing by, and then appear, and hide, using many antick Gestures and Grimaces, at which time it was observed, that she had a most offensive Smell; and when any of the Males advanced, would slowly retire, looking often back, and with a counterfeit shew of Fear; run off into some convenient Place where she knew the Male would follow her.
At other times if a Female Stranger came among them, Three or Four of her own Sex would get about her, and stare and chatter, and grin, and smell her all over; and then turn off with Gestures that seemed to express Contempt and Disdain.
Perhaps my Master might refine a little in these Speculations, which he had drawn from what he observed himself, or had been told him by others: However, I could not reflect without some Amazement, and much Sorrow, that the Rudiments of Lewdness, Coquetry, Censure, and Scandal, should have place by Instinct in Womankind.
I expected every Moment that my Master would accuse the Yahoos of those unnatural Appetites in both Sexes, so common among us. But Nature, it seems, has not been so Expert a School-mistress; and these politer Pleasures are entirely the Productions of Art and Reason, on our Side of the Globe.
Lee Jaffe, ed. Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver’s Travels. 1726. July 29, 2000. http://www.jaffebros.com/lee/gulliver/. Accessed April 29, 2007.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Our Other Reading this Week
Our other readings are only on PDF, therefore I can't post them, but must email them. This means that the other two (Mutiny on the Bounty excerpt and Heart of Darkness Excerpt) are not available unless I have your email! (Malik - ahem!:)
However, if you think you can find the excerpts on their own, they are the following:
Mutiny on the Bounty: Chapter entitled "an Indian Household," until the paragraph beginning with "The Bounty's people who remained on board". (About 7 pages in.)
Unfortunately, this book was written in the 1930s, so I can't link to the full text online - but try perusing something in paper (gasp!)
Heart of Darkness: Part II, beginning with the paragraph "Going up the river was like traveling back to the earliest beginnings of the world"
full text of the book available here:
http://etext.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=ConDark.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=2&division=div1
However, if you think you can find the excerpts on their own, they are the following:
Mutiny on the Bounty: Chapter entitled "an Indian Household," until the paragraph beginning with "The Bounty's people who remained on board". (About 7 pages in.)
Unfortunately, this book was written in the 1930s, so I can't link to the full text online - but try perusing something in paper (gasp!)
Heart of Darkness: Part II, beginning with the paragraph "Going up the river was like traveling back to the earliest beginnings of the world"
full text of the book available here:
http://etext.virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=ConDark.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=2&division=div1
Robert Louis Stevenson: Foreign Children
Foreign Children
by Robert Louis Stevenson
From A Child's Garden of Verses
Little Indian, Sioux or Crow,
Little frsoty Eskimo,
Little Turk or Japanee,
O! don't you wish that you were me?
You have seen the scarlet trees
And the lions over seas;
You have eaten ostrich eggs,
And turned the turtles off their legs.
Such a life is very fine,
But it's not so nice as mine;
You must often, as you trod,
Have wearied not to be abroad.
You have curious things to eat,
I am fed on proper meat;
you must dwell beyond the foam,
But I am safe and live at home.
Little Indian, Sioux or Crow,
Little Frosty Eskimo,
Little Turk or Japanee,
O! don't you wish that you were me?
by Robert Louis Stevenson
From A Child's Garden of Verses
Little Indian, Sioux or Crow,
Little frsoty Eskimo,
Little Turk or Japanee,
O! don't you wish that you were me?
You have seen the scarlet trees
And the lions over seas;
You have eaten ostrich eggs,
And turned the turtles off their legs.
Such a life is very fine,
But it's not so nice as mine;
You must often, as you trod,
Have wearied not to be abroad.
You have curious things to eat,
I am fed on proper meat;
you must dwell beyond the foam,
But I am safe and live at home.
Little Indian, Sioux or Crow,
Little Frosty Eskimo,
Little Turk or Japanee,
O! don't you wish that you were me?
English Imperialism and Expansion
Historical Setting of our Readings:
Britain and the New Imperialiasm
The policy and ideology of European colonial expansion between the 1870s and the outbreak of World War I in 1914 are often characterised as the "New Imperialism"[citation needed]. The period is distinguished by an unprecedented pursuit of what has been termed "empire for empire's sake", aggressive competition for overseas territorial acquisitions and the emergence in colonising countries of doctrines of racial superiority which denied the fitness of subjugated peoples for self-government[citation needed].
During this period, Europe's powers added nearly 8,880,000 square miles (23,000,000 km²) to their overseas colonial possessions[citation needed]. As it was mostly unoccupied by the Western powers as late as the 1880s, Africa became the primary target of the "new" imperialist expansion, although conquest took place also in other areas — notably south-east Asia and the East Asian seaboard, where Japan joined the European powers' scramble for territory.
Britain's entry into the new imperial age is often dated to 1875, when the Conservative government of Benjamin Disraeli bought the indebted Egyptian ruler Ismail's 44% shareholding in the Suez Canal for £4 million to secure control of this strategic waterway, a channel for shipping between Britain and India since its opening six years earlier under Emperor Napoleon III. Joint Anglo-French financial control over Egypt ended in outright British occupation in 1882.
Fear of Russia's centuries-old southward expansion was a further factor in British policy[citation needed]: in 1878 Britain took control of Cyprus as a base for action against a Russian attack on the Ottoman Empire, after having taken part in the Crimean War 1854–56 and invading Afghanistan to forestall an increase in Russian influence there. Britain waged three bloody and unsuccessful wars in Afghanistan, as ferocious popular rebellions, invocations of jihad and inscrutable terrain frustrated British objectives[citation needed]. The First Anglo-Afghan War led to one of the most disastrous defeats of the Victorian military when an entire British army was wiped out by Russian-supplied Afghan Pashtun tribesmen during the 1842 retreat from Kabul. The Second Anglo-Afghan War led to the British débâcle at the Battle of Maiwand in 1880, the siege of Kabul and British withdrawal into India. The Third Anglo-Afghan War of 1919 stoked a tribal uprising against the exhausted British military on the heels of World War I and expelled the British permanently from the new Afghan state. The "Great Game" in Inner Asia ended with a bloody British expedition against Tibet in 1903–04.
At the same time, some powerful industrial lobbies and government leaders in Britain, later exemplified by Joseph Chamberlain, came to view formal empire as necessary to arrest Britain's relative decline in world markets. During the 1890s Britain adopted the new policy wholeheartedly, quickly emerging as the front-runner in the scramble for tropical African territories[citation needed].
Britain's adoption of the New Imperialism may be seen as a quest for captive markets or fields for investment of surplus capital, or as a primarily strategic or pre-emptive attempt to protect existing trade links and to prevent the absorption of overseas markets into the increasingly closed imperial trading blocs of rival powers[citation needed]. The failure in the 1900s of Chamberlain's Tariff Reform campaign for Imperial protection illustrates the strength of free trade feeling even in the face of loss of international market share. Historians have argued that Britain's adoption of the "New imperialism" was an effect of her relative decline in the world, rather than of strength[citation needed].
British colonial policy
British colonial policy was always driven to a large extent by Britain's trading interests[citation needed]. While settler economies developed the infrastructure to support balanced development, some tropical African territories found themselves developed only as raw-material suppliers. British policies based on comparative advantage left many developing economies dangerously reliant on a single cash crop, which others exported to Britain or to overseas British settlements[citation needed]. A reliance upon the manipulation of conflict between ethnic, religious and racial identities, in order to keep subject populations from uniting against the occupying power — the classic "divide and rule" strategy — left a legacy of partition and/or inter-communal difficulties in areas as diverse as Ireland, India, Rhodesia, Cyprus, Sudan, and Uganda[citation needed].
Britain and the scramble for Africa
Main article: Scramble for Africa
Cecil Rhodes- "the Colossus of Rhodes" spanning "Cape to Cairo".
In 1875 the two most important European holdings in Africa were French controlled Algeria and Britain's Cape Colony. By 1914 only Ethiopia and the republic of Liberia remained outside formal European control. The transition from an "informal empire" of control through economic dominance to direct control took the form of a "scramble" for territory by the nations of Europe. Britain tried not to play a part in this early scramble, being more of a trading empire rather than a colonial empire; however, it soon became clear it had to gain its own African empire to maintain the balance of power[citation needed].
As French, Belgian and Portuguese activity in the lower Congo River region threatened to undermine orderly penetration of tropical Africa, the Berlin Conference of 1884–85 sought to regulate the competition between the powers by defining "effective occupation" as the criterion for international recognition of territorial claims, a formulation which necessitated routine recourse to armed force against indigenous states and peoples[citation needed].
Britain's 1882 military occupation of Egypt (itself triggered by concern over the Suez Canal) contributed to a preoccupation over securing control of the Nile valley, leading to the conquest of the neighbouring Sudan in 1896–98 and confrontation with a French military expedition at Fashoda (September 1898).
In 1899 Britain completed its takeover of what is today South Africa. This had begun with the annexation of the Cape in 1795 and continued with the conquest of the Boer Republics in the late 19th century, following the Second Boer War. Cecil Rhodes was the pioneer of British expansion north into Africa with his privately owned British South Africa Company. Rhodes expanded into the land north of South Africa and established Rhodesia. Rhodes' dream of a railway connecting Cape Town to Alexandria passing through a British Africa covering the continent is what led to his company's pressure on the government for further expansion into Africa.
British gains in southern and East Africa prompted Rhodes and Alfred Milner, Britain's High Commissioner in South Africa, to urge a "Cape-to-Cairo" empire linking by rail the strategically important Canal to the mineral-rich South, though German occupation of Tanganyika prevented its realisation until the end of World War I. In 1903, the All Red Line telegraph system communicated with the major parts of the Empire.
Paradoxically, Britain, the staunch advocate of free trade, emerged in 1914 with not only the largest overseas empire thanks to its long-standing presence in India, but also the greatest gains in the "scramble for Africa", reflecting its advantageous position at its inception. Between 1885 and 1914 Britain took nearly 30% of Africa's population under its control, compared to 15% for France, 9% for Germany, 7% for Belgium and 1% for Italy: Nigeria alone contributed 15 million subjects, more than in the whole of French West Africa or the entire German colonial empire[citation needed].
Home rule in white-settler colonies
Britain's empire had already begun its transformation into the modern Commonwealth with the extension of Dominion status to the already self-governing colonies of Canada (1867), Australia (1901), New Zealand (1907), Newfoundland (1907), and the newly-created Union of South Africa (1910). Leaders of the new states joined with British statesmen in periodic Colonial (from 1907, Imperial) Conferences, the first of which was held in London in 1887.
The foreign relations of the Dominions were still conducted through the Foreign Office of the United Kingdom: Canada created a Department of External Affairs in 1909, but diplomatic relations with other governments continued to be channelled through the Governors-General, Dominion High Commissioners in London (first appointed by Canada in 1880 and by Australia in 1910) and British legations abroad. Britain's declaration of war in World War I applied to all the Dominions.
But the Dominions did enjoy a substantial freedom in their adoption of foreign policy where this did not explicitly conflict with British interests: Canada's Liberal government negotiated a bilateral free-trade Reciprocity Agreement with the United States in 1911, but went down to defeat by the Conservative opposition.
In defence, the Dominions' original treatment as part of a single imperial military and naval structure proved unsustainable as Britain faced new commitments in Europe and the challenge of an emerging German High Seas Fleet after 1900. In 1909 it was decided that the Dominions should have their own navies, reversing an 1887 agreement that the then Australasian colonies should contribute to the Royal Navy in return for the permanent stationing of a squadron in the region.
From Wikipedia
Britain and the New Imperialiasm
The policy and ideology of European colonial expansion between the 1870s and the outbreak of World War I in 1914 are often characterised as the "New Imperialism"[citation needed]. The period is distinguished by an unprecedented pursuit of what has been termed "empire for empire's sake", aggressive competition for overseas territorial acquisitions and the emergence in colonising countries of doctrines of racial superiority which denied the fitness of subjugated peoples for self-government[citation needed].
During this period, Europe's powers added nearly 8,880,000 square miles (23,000,000 km²) to their overseas colonial possessions[citation needed]. As it was mostly unoccupied by the Western powers as late as the 1880s, Africa became the primary target of the "new" imperialist expansion, although conquest took place also in other areas — notably south-east Asia and the East Asian seaboard, where Japan joined the European powers' scramble for territory.
Britain's entry into the new imperial age is often dated to 1875, when the Conservative government of Benjamin Disraeli bought the indebted Egyptian ruler Ismail's 44% shareholding in the Suez Canal for £4 million to secure control of this strategic waterway, a channel for shipping between Britain and India since its opening six years earlier under Emperor Napoleon III. Joint Anglo-French financial control over Egypt ended in outright British occupation in 1882.
Fear of Russia's centuries-old southward expansion was a further factor in British policy[citation needed]: in 1878 Britain took control of Cyprus as a base for action against a Russian attack on the Ottoman Empire, after having taken part in the Crimean War 1854–56 and invading Afghanistan to forestall an increase in Russian influence there. Britain waged three bloody and unsuccessful wars in Afghanistan, as ferocious popular rebellions, invocations of jihad and inscrutable terrain frustrated British objectives[citation needed]. The First Anglo-Afghan War led to one of the most disastrous defeats of the Victorian military when an entire British army was wiped out by Russian-supplied Afghan Pashtun tribesmen during the 1842 retreat from Kabul. The Second Anglo-Afghan War led to the British débâcle at the Battle of Maiwand in 1880, the siege of Kabul and British withdrawal into India. The Third Anglo-Afghan War of 1919 stoked a tribal uprising against the exhausted British military on the heels of World War I and expelled the British permanently from the new Afghan state. The "Great Game" in Inner Asia ended with a bloody British expedition against Tibet in 1903–04.
At the same time, some powerful industrial lobbies and government leaders in Britain, later exemplified by Joseph Chamberlain, came to view formal empire as necessary to arrest Britain's relative decline in world markets. During the 1890s Britain adopted the new policy wholeheartedly, quickly emerging as the front-runner in the scramble for tropical African territories[citation needed].
Britain's adoption of the New Imperialism may be seen as a quest for captive markets or fields for investment of surplus capital, or as a primarily strategic or pre-emptive attempt to protect existing trade links and to prevent the absorption of overseas markets into the increasingly closed imperial trading blocs of rival powers[citation needed]. The failure in the 1900s of Chamberlain's Tariff Reform campaign for Imperial protection illustrates the strength of free trade feeling even in the face of loss of international market share. Historians have argued that Britain's adoption of the "New imperialism" was an effect of her relative decline in the world, rather than of strength[citation needed].
British colonial policy
British colonial policy was always driven to a large extent by Britain's trading interests[citation needed]. While settler economies developed the infrastructure to support balanced development, some tropical African territories found themselves developed only as raw-material suppliers. British policies based on comparative advantage left many developing economies dangerously reliant on a single cash crop, which others exported to Britain or to overseas British settlements[citation needed]. A reliance upon the manipulation of conflict between ethnic, religious and racial identities, in order to keep subject populations from uniting against the occupying power — the classic "divide and rule" strategy — left a legacy of partition and/or inter-communal difficulties in areas as diverse as Ireland, India, Rhodesia, Cyprus, Sudan, and Uganda[citation needed].
Britain and the scramble for Africa
Main article: Scramble for Africa
Cecil Rhodes- "the Colossus of Rhodes" spanning "Cape to Cairo".
In 1875 the two most important European holdings in Africa were French controlled Algeria and Britain's Cape Colony. By 1914 only Ethiopia and the republic of Liberia remained outside formal European control. The transition from an "informal empire" of control through economic dominance to direct control took the form of a "scramble" for territory by the nations of Europe. Britain tried not to play a part in this early scramble, being more of a trading empire rather than a colonial empire; however, it soon became clear it had to gain its own African empire to maintain the balance of power[citation needed].
As French, Belgian and Portuguese activity in the lower Congo River region threatened to undermine orderly penetration of tropical Africa, the Berlin Conference of 1884–85 sought to regulate the competition between the powers by defining "effective occupation" as the criterion for international recognition of territorial claims, a formulation which necessitated routine recourse to armed force against indigenous states and peoples[citation needed].
Britain's 1882 military occupation of Egypt (itself triggered by concern over the Suez Canal) contributed to a preoccupation over securing control of the Nile valley, leading to the conquest of the neighbouring Sudan in 1896–98 and confrontation with a French military expedition at Fashoda (September 1898).
In 1899 Britain completed its takeover of what is today South Africa. This had begun with the annexation of the Cape in 1795 and continued with the conquest of the Boer Republics in the late 19th century, following the Second Boer War. Cecil Rhodes was the pioneer of British expansion north into Africa with his privately owned British South Africa Company. Rhodes expanded into the land north of South Africa and established Rhodesia. Rhodes' dream of a railway connecting Cape Town to Alexandria passing through a British Africa covering the continent is what led to his company's pressure on the government for further expansion into Africa.
British gains in southern and East Africa prompted Rhodes and Alfred Milner, Britain's High Commissioner in South Africa, to urge a "Cape-to-Cairo" empire linking by rail the strategically important Canal to the mineral-rich South, though German occupation of Tanganyika prevented its realisation until the end of World War I. In 1903, the All Red Line telegraph system communicated with the major parts of the Empire.
Paradoxically, Britain, the staunch advocate of free trade, emerged in 1914 with not only the largest overseas empire thanks to its long-standing presence in India, but also the greatest gains in the "scramble for Africa", reflecting its advantageous position at its inception. Between 1885 and 1914 Britain took nearly 30% of Africa's population under its control, compared to 15% for France, 9% for Germany, 7% for Belgium and 1% for Italy: Nigeria alone contributed 15 million subjects, more than in the whole of French West Africa or the entire German colonial empire[citation needed].
Home rule in white-settler colonies
Britain's empire had already begun its transformation into the modern Commonwealth with the extension of Dominion status to the already self-governing colonies of Canada (1867), Australia (1901), New Zealand (1907), Newfoundland (1907), and the newly-created Union of South Africa (1910). Leaders of the new states joined with British statesmen in periodic Colonial (from 1907, Imperial) Conferences, the first of which was held in London in 1887.
The foreign relations of the Dominions were still conducted through the Foreign Office of the United Kingdom: Canada created a Department of External Affairs in 1909, but diplomatic relations with other governments continued to be channelled through the Governors-General, Dominion High Commissioners in London (first appointed by Canada in 1880 and by Australia in 1910) and British legations abroad. Britain's declaration of war in World War I applied to all the Dominions.
But the Dominions did enjoy a substantial freedom in their adoption of foreign policy where this did not explicitly conflict with British interests: Canada's Liberal government negotiated a bilateral free-trade Reciprocity Agreement with the United States in 1911, but went down to defeat by the Conservative opposition.
In defence, the Dominions' original treatment as part of a single imperial military and naval structure proved unsustainable as Britain faced new commitments in Europe and the challenge of an emerging German High Seas Fleet after 1900. In 1909 it was decided that the Dominions should have their own navies, reversing an 1887 agreement that the then Australasian colonies should contribute to the Royal Navy in return for the permanent stationing of a squadron in the region.
From Wikipedia
Tuesday, April 17, 2007
Chaucer - Context
Here's some great Middle Ages Context for our Readings, w/more questions (yay, I'm sure, right guys?!)
Chaucer’s Times:
Social Framework
In the Middle Ages, networks of personal agreements formed the basis of the political, economic and social systems. How these agreements developed and how they were utilised during the early Middle Ages are currently topics of scholarly debate. Nevertheless, by the late Middle Ages, the terminology and concepts that are implied in the designation of a feudal society had been defined by the legal profession and can be applied to the time period of this tutorial.
For noble and peasant alike, the family was the single most important social unit of the Middle Ages and the basis for other relationships. Functioning as a form of social security, the family provided protection and care to the children, the aged and infirm. Family alliances of blood and marriage were utilised to strengthen feudal ties and to increase power bases. In order to prevent the splintering of family property, the law of primogeniture was adopted across most of Europe. Under this law, the eldest son received the full inheritance of the father, leaving younger sons to make their own way…
During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Europe was faced with a series of agricultural, economic and demographic disasters. The arrival of a colder and wetter climate meant that large areas of previously fertile land became unproductive. Crop failures and famines were common by the early fourteenth century and the arrival of the Black Death further decimated the population. At first, the depopulation opened up lands for the survivors but successive sweeps left few to maintain even the best farmlands or to preserve feudal patrimonies…
- How does the role of primogeniture, especially in tandem w/famine and population shortage, reflect on the familial relations in Chaucer’s Man of Law’s Tale?
- How might the famine, plagues, and general social (and therefore governmental) insecurity be related to some themes in our reading?
In the late Middle Ages, the social classes underwent a period of fluidity. Economic conditions favoured the merchant and craft classes, and even the peasantry could demand better circumstances. Feudal obligations between lord and vassal were being replaced by contractual agreements based on payments of money. The economy expanding from an agricultural base to include commercial and manufacturing interests. Also, Europe was no longer in a constant state of warfare and even the Crusades had ceased to be a focus for the energies of the martial nobility. In an attempt to close ranks and protect social status, the noble elite turned their military attributes towards elaborate forms of "mock battle" such as jousts and tournaments, and the martial and moral aspects of feudal society were ritualised into chivalry. This diversion of military prowess developed the romantic ideals of courtly love and knightly honour that have been immortalised in the literature of the time. It is ironic that the fanciful picture of the dignified knight and his lady that will forever be associated with the knights of the Middle Ages was created by the demise of the very systems that shaped it.
- How are concepts of money and wealth approached in our reading?
- How might this reflect or speak to the social environment of the times?
- What personal insight does Chaucer’s tale give us about this situation? (If any – this is just a general question as it is the main point of the course!)
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages, “Feudal Institutions” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/feudframe.html
Arising Government and State Frameworks
As the Middle Ages progressed in Europe, feudalism created layers of conflicting laws, customs and traditions. Numerous feudal courts were established under dukes and earls whose interests were often contrary to those of the monarch, threatening royal authority. In an effort to rectify this situation, the monarchs of England, France, Spain, and Portugal took steps to re-establish their authority over the aristocracy and the clergy. They did this by centralising governmental offices and placing officials throughout the kingdom to represent royal interests. As they moved to secure autonomy within their own kingdoms, they also sought to solidify national boundaries. Those monarchies that experienced a move towards greater control by the king through a centralised government are known as the 'New Monarchies'. Despite the similarity of outcome, England, France, Spain, and Portugal each followed slightly different routes and the trend towards centralisation suffered a temporary setback between the early fourteenth and mid-fifteenth century. Wars, internal dissension, riots, famine, and plague disrupted governmental processes and it was not until the end of the fifteenth century that the royal houses of England, France, Spain, and Portugal were able to re-establish control.
- How is this situation portrayed in our reading?
- How does Chaucer approach this seminal time in governmental structuring in his themes?
- How might the idea of “foreign” be a part of this governmental boundary-laying?
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages, “New Monarchies” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/monaframe.html
Rome (as it is represented historically) in Chaucer’s Time
The disorganization of the Holy Roman Empire, its ongoing dispute with the papacy over the extent of Church authority in secular government and absentee foreign overlords left Italians largely self-governing within their communes. At the start of the fourteenth century, Italy was a patchwork of independent towns and small principalities whose borders were drawn and redrawn by battles, diplomatic negotiations and marriage alliances. During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, many of these petty principalities consolidated into five major political units that precariously balanced power on the Italian peninsula: the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily, the Papal States and the three major city-states of Florence, Venice and Milan. The other minor city-states which co-existed with these larger powers made political stability in Italy even more tenuous as their loyalties shifted from one main force to another.
- Does the disorganization of Europe and stagnation of trade over the continent contribute another layer of foreignness to our reading (esp. in our reading’s use of Rome as a main base of familiarity?)
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages, “Italy’s City-States” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/cityframe.html
Syria (as it is represented historically) in Chaucer’s Time
Although the Ottoman Empire is not considered a European kingdom per se, Ottoman expansion had a profound impact on a continent already stunned by the calamities of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and the Ottoman Turks must, therefore, be considered in any study of Europe in the late Middle Ages. The ease with which the Ottoman Empire achieved military victories led Western Europeans to fear that ongoing Ottoman success would collapse the political and social infrastructure of the West and bring about the downfall of Christendom. Such a momentous threat could not be ignored and the Europeans mounted crusades against the Ottomans in 1366, 1396, and 1444, but to no avail. The Ottomans continued to conquer new territories.
One of a number of Turkish tribes that migrated from the central Asian steppe, the Ottomans were initially a nomadic people who followed a primitive shamanistic religion. Contact with various settled peoples led to the introduction of Islam and under Islamic influence, the Turks acquired their greatest fighting tradition, that of the gazi warrior. Well trained and highly skilled, gazi warriors fought to conquer the infidel, acquiring land and riches in the process.
While the gazi warriors fought for Islam, the greatest military asset of the Ottoman Empire was the standing paid army of Christian soldiers, the janissaries. Originally created in 1330 by Orhan (d.1359), the janissaries were Christian captives from conquered territories. Educated in the Islamic faith and trained as soldiers, the janissaries were forced to provide annual tribute in the form of military service. To counter the challenges of the gazi nobility, Murad I (1319-1389) transformed the new military force into the elite personal army of the Sultan. They were rewarded for their loyalty with grants of newly acquired land and janissaries quickly rose to fill the most important administrative offices of the Ottoman Empire.
During the early history of the Ottoman Empire, political factions within Byzantium employed the Ottoman Turks and the janissaries as mercenaries in their own struggles for imperial supremacy. In the 1340's, a usurper's request for Ottoman assistance in a revolt against the emperor provided the excuse for an Ottoman invasion of Thrace on the northern frontier of the Byzantine Empire. The conquest of Thrace gave the Ottomans a foothold in Europe from which future campaigns into the Balkans and Greece were launched and Adrianople became the Ottoman capital in 1366. Over the next century, the Ottomans developed an empire that took in Anatolia and increasingly larger sections of Byzantine territories in Eastern Europe and Asia Minor.
- How does the Ottoman threat, which seemed to be barely held at bay by “Europe” at this time contribute to our understanding of the Sultan of Syria and his mother?
- How might the conclusion of the Syrian thread of the story be related to the current events w/which Chaucer was dealing? (How might the conclusion of their thread also be a promotion of the belief in Western superiority at that time?)
- What feelings/adjectives/rhythms in the language of the work give us the experience of Chaucer’s relationship to the foreign in this reading?
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages “Ottoman Turks” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/ottoframe.html
Chaucer’s Times:
Social Framework
In the Middle Ages, networks of personal agreements formed the basis of the political, economic and social systems. How these agreements developed and how they were utilised during the early Middle Ages are currently topics of scholarly debate. Nevertheless, by the late Middle Ages, the terminology and concepts that are implied in the designation of a feudal society had been defined by the legal profession and can be applied to the time period of this tutorial.
For noble and peasant alike, the family was the single most important social unit of the Middle Ages and the basis for other relationships. Functioning as a form of social security, the family provided protection and care to the children, the aged and infirm. Family alliances of blood and marriage were utilised to strengthen feudal ties and to increase power bases. In order to prevent the splintering of family property, the law of primogeniture was adopted across most of Europe. Under this law, the eldest son received the full inheritance of the father, leaving younger sons to make their own way…
During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, Europe was faced with a series of agricultural, economic and demographic disasters. The arrival of a colder and wetter climate meant that large areas of previously fertile land became unproductive. Crop failures and famines were common by the early fourteenth century and the arrival of the Black Death further decimated the population. At first, the depopulation opened up lands for the survivors but successive sweeps left few to maintain even the best farmlands or to preserve feudal patrimonies…
- How does the role of primogeniture, especially in tandem w/famine and population shortage, reflect on the familial relations in Chaucer’s Man of Law’s Tale?
- How might the famine, plagues, and general social (and therefore governmental) insecurity be related to some themes in our reading?
In the late Middle Ages, the social classes underwent a period of fluidity. Economic conditions favoured the merchant and craft classes, and even the peasantry could demand better circumstances. Feudal obligations between lord and vassal were being replaced by contractual agreements based on payments of money. The economy expanding from an agricultural base to include commercial and manufacturing interests. Also, Europe was no longer in a constant state of warfare and even the Crusades had ceased to be a focus for the energies of the martial nobility. In an attempt to close ranks and protect social status, the noble elite turned their military attributes towards elaborate forms of "mock battle" such as jousts and tournaments, and the martial and moral aspects of feudal society were ritualised into chivalry. This diversion of military prowess developed the romantic ideals of courtly love and knightly honour that have been immortalised in the literature of the time. It is ironic that the fanciful picture of the dignified knight and his lady that will forever be associated with the knights of the Middle Ages was created by the demise of the very systems that shaped it.
- How are concepts of money and wealth approached in our reading?
- How might this reflect or speak to the social environment of the times?
- What personal insight does Chaucer’s tale give us about this situation? (If any – this is just a general question as it is the main point of the course!)
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages, “Feudal Institutions” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/feudframe.html
Arising Government and State Frameworks
As the Middle Ages progressed in Europe, feudalism created layers of conflicting laws, customs and traditions. Numerous feudal courts were established under dukes and earls whose interests were often contrary to those of the monarch, threatening royal authority. In an effort to rectify this situation, the monarchs of England, France, Spain, and Portugal took steps to re-establish their authority over the aristocracy and the clergy. They did this by centralising governmental offices and placing officials throughout the kingdom to represent royal interests. As they moved to secure autonomy within their own kingdoms, they also sought to solidify national boundaries. Those monarchies that experienced a move towards greater control by the king through a centralised government are known as the 'New Monarchies'. Despite the similarity of outcome, England, France, Spain, and Portugal each followed slightly different routes and the trend towards centralisation suffered a temporary setback between the early fourteenth and mid-fifteenth century. Wars, internal dissension, riots, famine, and plague disrupted governmental processes and it was not until the end of the fifteenth century that the royal houses of England, France, Spain, and Portugal were able to re-establish control.
- How is this situation portrayed in our reading?
- How does Chaucer approach this seminal time in governmental structuring in his themes?
- How might the idea of “foreign” be a part of this governmental boundary-laying?
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages, “New Monarchies” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/monaframe.html
Rome (as it is represented historically) in Chaucer’s Time
The disorganization of the Holy Roman Empire, its ongoing dispute with the papacy over the extent of Church authority in secular government and absentee foreign overlords left Italians largely self-governing within their communes. At the start of the fourteenth century, Italy was a patchwork of independent towns and small principalities whose borders were drawn and redrawn by battles, diplomatic negotiations and marriage alliances. During the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, many of these petty principalities consolidated into five major political units that precariously balanced power on the Italian peninsula: the kingdoms of Naples and Sicily, the Papal States and the three major city-states of Florence, Venice and Milan. The other minor city-states which co-existed with these larger powers made political stability in Italy even more tenuous as their loyalties shifted from one main force to another.
- Does the disorganization of Europe and stagnation of trade over the continent contribute another layer of foreignness to our reading (esp. in our reading’s use of Rome as a main base of familiarity?)
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages, “Italy’s City-States” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/cityframe.html
Syria (as it is represented historically) in Chaucer’s Time
Although the Ottoman Empire is not considered a European kingdom per se, Ottoman expansion had a profound impact on a continent already stunned by the calamities of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and the Ottoman Turks must, therefore, be considered in any study of Europe in the late Middle Ages. The ease with which the Ottoman Empire achieved military victories led Western Europeans to fear that ongoing Ottoman success would collapse the political and social infrastructure of the West and bring about the downfall of Christendom. Such a momentous threat could not be ignored and the Europeans mounted crusades against the Ottomans in 1366, 1396, and 1444, but to no avail. The Ottomans continued to conquer new territories.
One of a number of Turkish tribes that migrated from the central Asian steppe, the Ottomans were initially a nomadic people who followed a primitive shamanistic religion. Contact with various settled peoples led to the introduction of Islam and under Islamic influence, the Turks acquired their greatest fighting tradition, that of the gazi warrior. Well trained and highly skilled, gazi warriors fought to conquer the infidel, acquiring land and riches in the process.
While the gazi warriors fought for Islam, the greatest military asset of the Ottoman Empire was the standing paid army of Christian soldiers, the janissaries. Originally created in 1330 by Orhan (d.1359), the janissaries were Christian captives from conquered territories. Educated in the Islamic faith and trained as soldiers, the janissaries were forced to provide annual tribute in the form of military service. To counter the challenges of the gazi nobility, Murad I (1319-1389) transformed the new military force into the elite personal army of the Sultan. They were rewarded for their loyalty with grants of newly acquired land and janissaries quickly rose to fill the most important administrative offices of the Ottoman Empire.
During the early history of the Ottoman Empire, political factions within Byzantium employed the Ottoman Turks and the janissaries as mercenaries in their own struggles for imperial supremacy. In the 1340's, a usurper's request for Ottoman assistance in a revolt against the emperor provided the excuse for an Ottoman invasion of Thrace on the northern frontier of the Byzantine Empire. The conquest of Thrace gave the Ottomans a foothold in Europe from which future campaigns into the Balkans and Greece were launched and Adrianople became the Ottoman capital in 1366. Over the next century, the Ottomans developed an empire that took in Anatolia and increasingly larger sections of Byzantine territories in Eastern Europe and Asia Minor.
- How does the Ottoman threat, which seemed to be barely held at bay by “Europe” at this time contribute to our understanding of the Sultan of Syria and his mother?
- How might the conclusion of the Syrian thread of the story be related to the current events w/which Chaucer was dealing? (How might the conclusion of their thread also be a promotion of the belief in Western superiority at that time?)
- What feelings/adjectives/rhythms in the language of the work give us the experience of Chaucer’s relationship to the foreign in this reading?
From The End of Europe’s Middle Ages “Ottoman Turks” from http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/endmiddle/FRAMES/ottoframe.html
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Chaucer: the Canterbury Tales: The Man of Law's Tale
Ok everyone, this reading is QUITE LONG (I"m sorry!) so I'm going to give it as the only reading this week. If the topic is cool enough, we can read the other two readings for next week and continue discussing the issues.
Main Theme Your Looking For:
How does the idea of "the foreign" give us an idea of who the creators of the media (i.e., Chaucer in this case) are by demarcating the boundaries around what is "normal" (familiar, universal) in the tale and what is "strange" (foreign, odd).
- this theme can be difficult to find in this reading due to the fact that it's from the Middle Ages, and we're having to try to separate what they would view as familiar from what they would view as odd. However, if you look closely, I think it's interesting how much you can see in the characterization, environments, and ethics of the players in the tale that give us a window into what traits were "familiar" and what traits were "foreign" (especially if you look at what adjectives are used to describe things, and also look at what is thought to be 'worth mentioning,' i.e., it wasn't a foregone conclusion, so it needed to be written about).
Here is the link to a great web page that gives a side-by-side translation of the tale in the original Middle English and Modern English (this is my preference for reading, as the reading is long, and you're not expected to understand Middle English for this class!)
Please continue Pressing "Next" until you get to the end of the Man of Law's tale, as there are a lot of pages (1163 LINES) to get through before you're done!
http://www.librarius.com/canttran/manlawtr/manlawtale134-147.htm
Main Theme Your Looking For:
How does the idea of "the foreign" give us an idea of who the creators of the media (i.e., Chaucer in this case) are by demarcating the boundaries around what is "normal" (familiar, universal) in the tale and what is "strange" (foreign, odd).
- this theme can be difficult to find in this reading due to the fact that it's from the Middle Ages, and we're having to try to separate what they would view as familiar from what they would view as odd. However, if you look closely, I think it's interesting how much you can see in the characterization, environments, and ethics of the players in the tale that give us a window into what traits were "familiar" and what traits were "foreign" (especially if you look at what adjectives are used to describe things, and also look at what is thought to be 'worth mentioning,' i.e., it wasn't a foregone conclusion, so it needed to be written about).
Here is the link to a great web page that gives a side-by-side translation of the tale in the original Middle English and Modern English (this is my preference for reading, as the reading is long, and you're not expected to understand Middle English for this class!)
Please continue Pressing "Next" until you get to the end of the Man of Law's tale, as there are a lot of pages (1163 LINES) to get through before you're done!
http://www.librarius.com/canttran/manlawtr/manlawtale134-147.htm
Malik:
(Hope I have the spelling right on your name!)
Here is what we discussed the first week of discussion, that is, the week for which the journal was due. I don't have your email yet, so hope you get a hold of this info easily!
We mainly discussed maps and boundaries, how these boundaries reflected different world views, and how we divide up the world according to our own cultural ideas (i.e., North America is all of Canada, U.S. and Latin America to people in India, but to us it seems like Latin America is more South American culturally).
If you'd like to write on the Iliad's way of dividing up the universe (it's own) that'd be great. You can respond w/a journal of 2-4 paragraphs... I'll also give a few questions, if you'd like to respond to one of them with a short (2-4 paragraph - unless you want to write more :)) response paper, that'd work, too!
1. How does Homer's map express the early Greek worldview as a whole (i.e., how does it map their knowledge of physical boundaries)
2. How does Homer's map express the early Greek cultural world (i.e., what they thought was important to show on a map/"logo" for what their country/culture IS - longhorn catte, things being eaten, cowardly dogs, etc)
3. What do our own "logos" flags, insignias, function to delineate us and express us to others? How do we feel a part of this message, how do we feel it does not express us?
4. How will people in the future divide us up? Will we be the Great Unified World Destroyers? The Many Dissenting Voices? How does this apply to how we're looking back?
5. What does translation have to do with how we're reading this text - both its own translation from Greek, and our own subjective readings "personal translations" of it?
Here is what we discussed the first week of discussion, that is, the week for which the journal was due. I don't have your email yet, so hope you get a hold of this info easily!
We mainly discussed maps and boundaries, how these boundaries reflected different world views, and how we divide up the world according to our own cultural ideas (i.e., North America is all of Canada, U.S. and Latin America to people in India, but to us it seems like Latin America is more South American culturally).
If you'd like to write on the Iliad's way of dividing up the universe (it's own) that'd be great. You can respond w/a journal of 2-4 paragraphs... I'll also give a few questions, if you'd like to respond to one of them with a short (2-4 paragraph - unless you want to write more :)) response paper, that'd work, too!
1. How does Homer's map express the early Greek worldview as a whole (i.e., how does it map their knowledge of physical boundaries)
2. How does Homer's map express the early Greek cultural world (i.e., what they thought was important to show on a map/"logo" for what their country/culture IS - longhorn catte, things being eaten, cowardly dogs, etc)
3. What do our own "logos" flags, insignias, function to delineate us and express us to others? How do we feel a part of this message, how do we feel it does not express us?
4. How will people in the future divide us up? Will we be the Great Unified World Destroyers? The Many Dissenting Voices? How does this apply to how we're looking back?
5. What does translation have to do with how we're reading this text - both its own translation from Greek, and our own subjective readings "personal translations" of it?
Saturday, April 7, 2007
The Popol Vuh: Book II, Chapter 8
Popol Vuh Book II, Chapter 8
For a synopsis of all the books, which is VERY HELPFUL to people who don't know the story, such as me, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popol_Vuh And scroll down to "Summary."
(For a somewhat informative [if not well-referenced] commentary on the Mayan underworld, which could help with this text, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xibalba)
(can anyone tell where I get most of my information? It's sad. If only it wasn't so easy!)
Then they went, each one carrying his blowgun, and went down in the direction of Xibalba. They descended the steps quickly and passed between several streams and ravines. They passed among some birds and these birds were called Molay. 1
They also passed over a river of corruption, and over a river of blood, where they would be destroyed, so the people of Xibalba thought; but they did not touch it with their feet, instead they crossed it on their blowguns.
They went on from there, and came to a crossway of four roads. They knew very well which were the roads to Xibalba; the black road, the white road, the red road, and the green road. So, then, they sent an animal called Xan. 2 It was to go to gather information which they wanted. "Sting them, one by one; first sting the one seated in the first place and then sting all of them, since this is the part you must play: to suck the blood of the men on the roads," they said to the mosquito.
"Very well," answered the mosquito. And immediately it flew on to the dark road and went directly toward the wooden men which were seated first and covered with ornaments. It stung the first, but this one said nothing; then
p. 76
it stung the next one, it stung the second, who was seated, but this one said nothing, either.
After that it stung the third; the third of those seated was Hun-Camé. "Ah!" he exclaimed when it stung him. "What is this, Hun-Camé? What is it that has stung you? Do you not know who has stung you? "said the fourth one of the lords, who were seated. 3
"What is the matter, Vucub-Camé? What has stung you?" said the fifth.
"Ah! Ah!" then said Xiquiripat. And Vucub-Camé asked him, "What has stung you?" and when they stung the sixth who was seated [he cried], "Ah!"
p. 77
"What is this, Cuchumaquic?" asked Xiquiripat. "What is it that has stung you?" And the seventh one seated said "Ah" when he was stung.
"What is the matter, Ahalpuh?" said Cuchumaquic. "What has stung you?" And when it stung him, the eighth of those seated said, "Ah!"
"What is the matter, Ahalcaná?" said Ahalpuh. "What has stung you?" And when he was stung the ninth of those seated said "Ah!"
"What is this, Chamiabac? "said Ahalcaná. "What has stung you?" And when the tenth of those seated was stung, he said "Ah!"
"What is the matter, Chamiaholom?" said Chamiabac. "What has stung you?" And when the eleventh of those seated was stung he said, "Ah!"
"What happened?" said Chamiaholom. "What has stung you?" And when the twelfth of those seated was stung, he said "Alas!"
"What is this, Patán?" they said. "What has stung you?" And the thirteenth of those seated said "Alas!" when he was stung.
"What is the matter, Quicxic?" said Patán. "What has stung you?" And the fourteenth of those seated when he was stung said "Alas!"
"What has stung you, Quicrixcac?" said Quicré.
In this way they told their names, as they all said them one to the other. 4 So they made themselves known 5 by telling their names, calling each chief, one by one. And in this manner each of those seated in his comer told his name.
Not a single one of the names was missed. All told their names when Hunahpú puffed out a hair of his leg, which was what had stung them. It was really not a mosquito
p. 78
which stung them which went for Hunahpú and Xbalanqué to hear the names of all of them.
They [the youths] continued on their way and arrived where the Lords of Xibalba were.
"Greet the lord, the one who is seated,' said one in order to deceive them.
"That is not a lord. it is nothing more than a wooden figure," they said, and went on. Immediately they began to greet them:
"Hail, Hun-Camé! Hail, Vucub-Camé! Hail, Xiquiripat! Hail, Cuchumaquic! Hail, Ahalpuh! Hail, Ahalcaná! Hail, Chamiabac! Hail, Chamiaholom! Hail, Quicxic! Hail, Patán! Hail, Quicré! Hail, Quicrixcac!" they said coming before them. And looking in their faces, they spoke the name of all, without missing the name of a single one of them.
But what the lords wished was that they should not discover their names.
"Sit here," they said, hoping that they would sit in the seat [which they indicated].
"That is not a seat for us; it is only a hot stone," said Hunahpú and Xbalanqué, and they [the Lords of Xibalba] could not overcome them.
"Very well, go to that house," the lords said. And they [the youths] went on and entered the House of Gloom. And neither there were they overcome.
Footnotes
78:1 p. 217 Molay and its derivatives in Maya mean "together," "flock," "herd," derived from mol, "to gather." The text possibly refers here to the large flocks of birds which are still to be found in the tropical woods and fields of Guatemala.
78:2 Mosquito. The same ally of Hunahpú and Xbalanqué who made a hole in the water jar of Xmucané.
78:3 Brasseur de Bourbourg corrected the text of this passage, which in the original manuscript reads as follows: ¿Naqui Hun-Camé, naquila mi-x-i tiouic? ¿Xah i na qu'i chila mi x-i tionic? x-cha chic u cah culel.
78:4 In the list of the Lords of Xibalba given here, some names appear which differ from those in Chapter 1 of this Part II, while others are omitted altogether. It is true that between one and another of these episodes a generation in time has elapsed and these changes are natural. Or is this still another version of these histories? The following are the new names: Quicxic (bloody wing), Quicrixcac (bloody claw), Quicré (teeth covered with blood). In the composition of all of these names, the word quic (blood) very appropriately appears.
78:5 X qui cut u vach, literally, "they showed their faces."
from:
http://www.sacred-texts.com/nam/maya/pvgm/pv25.htm
For a synopsis of all the books, which is VERY HELPFUL to people who don't know the story, such as me, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Popol_Vuh And scroll down to "Summary."
(For a somewhat informative [if not well-referenced] commentary on the Mayan underworld, which could help with this text, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xibalba)
(can anyone tell where I get most of my information? It's sad. If only it wasn't so easy!)
Then they went, each one carrying his blowgun, and went down in the direction of Xibalba. They descended the steps quickly and passed between several streams and ravines. They passed among some birds and these birds were called Molay. 1
They also passed over a river of corruption, and over a river of blood, where they would be destroyed, so the people of Xibalba thought; but they did not touch it with their feet, instead they crossed it on their blowguns.
They went on from there, and came to a crossway of four roads. They knew very well which were the roads to Xibalba; the black road, the white road, the red road, and the green road. So, then, they sent an animal called Xan. 2 It was to go to gather information which they wanted. "Sting them, one by one; first sting the one seated in the first place and then sting all of them, since this is the part you must play: to suck the blood of the men on the roads," they said to the mosquito.
"Very well," answered the mosquito. And immediately it flew on to the dark road and went directly toward the wooden men which were seated first and covered with ornaments. It stung the first, but this one said nothing; then
p. 76
it stung the next one, it stung the second, who was seated, but this one said nothing, either.
After that it stung the third; the third of those seated was Hun-Camé. "Ah!" he exclaimed when it stung him. "What is this, Hun-Camé? What is it that has stung you? Do you not know who has stung you? "said the fourth one of the lords, who were seated. 3
"What is the matter, Vucub-Camé? What has stung you?" said the fifth.
"Ah! Ah!" then said Xiquiripat. And Vucub-Camé asked him, "What has stung you?" and when they stung the sixth who was seated [he cried], "Ah!"
p. 77
"What is this, Cuchumaquic?" asked Xiquiripat. "What is it that has stung you?" And the seventh one seated said "Ah" when he was stung.
"What is the matter, Ahalpuh?" said Cuchumaquic. "What has stung you?" And when it stung him, the eighth of those seated said, "Ah!"
"What is the matter, Ahalcaná?" said Ahalpuh. "What has stung you?" And when he was stung the ninth of those seated said "Ah!"
"What is this, Chamiabac? "said Ahalcaná. "What has stung you?" And when the tenth of those seated was stung, he said "Ah!"
"What is the matter, Chamiaholom?" said Chamiabac. "What has stung you?" And when the eleventh of those seated was stung he said, "Ah!"
"What happened?" said Chamiaholom. "What has stung you?" And when the twelfth of those seated was stung, he said "Alas!"
"What is this, Patán?" they said. "What has stung you?" And the thirteenth of those seated said "Alas!" when he was stung.
"What is the matter, Quicxic?" said Patán. "What has stung you?" And the fourteenth of those seated when he was stung said "Alas!"
"What has stung you, Quicrixcac?" said Quicré.
In this way they told their names, as they all said them one to the other. 4 So they made themselves known 5 by telling their names, calling each chief, one by one. And in this manner each of those seated in his comer told his name.
Not a single one of the names was missed. All told their names when Hunahpú puffed out a hair of his leg, which was what had stung them. It was really not a mosquito
p. 78
which stung them which went for Hunahpú and Xbalanqué to hear the names of all of them.
They [the youths] continued on their way and arrived where the Lords of Xibalba were.
"Greet the lord, the one who is seated,' said one in order to deceive them.
"That is not a lord. it is nothing more than a wooden figure," they said, and went on. Immediately they began to greet them:
"Hail, Hun-Camé! Hail, Vucub-Camé! Hail, Xiquiripat! Hail, Cuchumaquic! Hail, Ahalpuh! Hail, Ahalcaná! Hail, Chamiabac! Hail, Chamiaholom! Hail, Quicxic! Hail, Patán! Hail, Quicré! Hail, Quicrixcac!" they said coming before them. And looking in their faces, they spoke the name of all, without missing the name of a single one of them.
But what the lords wished was that they should not discover their names.
"Sit here," they said, hoping that they would sit in the seat [which they indicated].
"That is not a seat for us; it is only a hot stone," said Hunahpú and Xbalanqué, and they [the Lords of Xibalba] could not overcome them.
"Very well, go to that house," the lords said. And they [the youths] went on and entered the House of Gloom. And neither there were they overcome.
Footnotes
78:1 p. 217 Molay and its derivatives in Maya mean "together," "flock," "herd," derived from mol, "to gather." The text possibly refers here to the large flocks of birds which are still to be found in the tropical woods and fields of Guatemala.
78:2 Mosquito. The same ally of Hunahpú and Xbalanqué who made a hole in the water jar of Xmucané.
78:3 Brasseur de Bourbourg corrected the text of this passage, which in the original manuscript reads as follows: ¿Naqui Hun-Camé, naquila mi-x-i tiouic? ¿Xah i na qu'i chila mi x-i tionic? x-cha chic u cah culel.
78:4 In the list of the Lords of Xibalba given here, some names appear which differ from those in Chapter 1 of this Part II, while others are omitted altogether. It is true that between one and another of these episodes a generation in time has elapsed and these changes are natural. Or is this still another version of these histories? The following are the new names: Quicxic (bloody wing), Quicrixcac (bloody claw), Quicré (teeth covered with blood). In the composition of all of these names, the word quic (blood) very appropriately appears.
78:5 X qui cut u vach, literally, "they showed their faces."
from:
http://www.sacred-texts.com/nam/maya/pvgm/pv25.htm
The Amduat
Here is a link to the page that includes the first book of the Amduat (lit. Book/description [am] of the Underworld [duat]), the Egyptian underworld book.
It is in pdf, so if you can't download it try the library. However, the first few pages are blank, so try scrolling before giving up!
Please note the use of pictures as well as language to describe the underworld. Egyptian hieroglyphs tended to use a picture-book method of communication. This inserts another level of subjectivity/interpretation to the stories, but also gives us access to another form of expression of their worldview.
http://www.invisiblebooks.com/MD1-51.pdf
It is in pdf, so if you can't download it try the library. However, the first few pages are blank, so try scrolling before giving up!
Please note the use of pictures as well as language to describe the underworld. Egyptian hieroglyphs tended to use a picture-book method of communication. This inserts another level of subjectivity/interpretation to the stories, but also gives us access to another form of expression of their worldview.
http://www.invisiblebooks.com/MD1-51.pdf
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