"It's like these cults who believe the world will end on such and such a day," Roswell opined, "they get rid of all their earthly possessions and head off in a group for some mountaintop and wait, and then the end of the world doesn't happen. The world keeps going on. What a disappointment! Everybody has to troop back down the mountain with their spiritual tails dragging, except for one or two incurably grinning idiots who see it as a chance to start a new life, fresh, without encumbrances, to be reborn, in fact.
* * * * * * * * * *
First things first: I did not forget the end quote punctuation. Roswell continues to speak in the paragraph which follows this one which explains how Pynchon and I didn't make a mistake to those who understand the idiosyncrasies of written English dialogue. To those who don't understand it, well now maybe you do.
"It's like these cults who believe the world will end on such and such a day"
Young people of every generation probably think the first time they hear about a particular day being the end of the world, it's the first time anybody has ever declared that. But as you learn more and more history, across the whole expanse of human civilization, you realize somebody out there constantly thinks they know the end point of that civilization. But what's even more funny is that, as in the case of the Romans, nobody recognizes the end of your world even months and years after it already happened. You just go about your business not realizing that your world is dead until you find you're somehow living in another world that you hadn't planned on. But since that's only going to affect one generation, it's barely noticed or remembered, especially since it basically happened to the previous generation and your generation just has to be all, "Oh, wait. How come this world isn't anything like what mom and dad said it was?"
That bit about not realizing your civilization is already dead but you continue to live in it? That's not just like Rome; it's also like relationships! If you've never been in a relationship before and you're wondering what it feels like to have one end even before either person truly knows it's over, you should read "Melenctha" by Gertrude Stein! Although maybe you shouldn't read it because if I know the kinds of people who read my blogs, you would absolutely hate it and then hate me for suggesting it. So never mind. Maybe go read Sam and the Firefly instead. That was my favorite book in elementary school.
And just for clarification before I move on to the next bit, the "it's like" part should be acknowledged as it means Roswell's comparing the Ætherists loss of their belief system regarding how light works to these cults. I just want to make sure the pronoun's antecedent is clear before I go entirely off the rails talking about end of the world cults. This isn't directly about them. It's about the Ætherists and, more generally, anybody who must face the consequences of a new discovery in science and all which that discovery winds up destroying.
"they get rid of all their earthly possessions"
This is the closest a person living in a capitalist system can get to death. Material possessions are like your video game health bar. When you've lost them all, the next loss is your life. Or, as we'll see by the end of Roswell's thought, a clean slate through a kind of materialist reincarnation. We are our memories and our experiences. But in a capitalist system, many people are merely their seemingly endless collection of horrible Funko Pops.
"head off in a group for some mountaintop and wait"
If you do this alone, you're a crazy hermit. If you do it with a group, it's a religious movement.
"and then the end of the world doesn't happen"
I like the tense of this sentence, or whatever you call it. What am I? A grammarian?! Oh, sure, I knew how to use antecedent correctly. I think. But that doesn't mean anything at all! Anyway, I like that Roswell's not just rebuking end of the world cults of the past with this statement but all those in the future as well.
"The world keeps going on. What a disappointment!"
I mean, yeah. You don't need a cult to have this revelation five or six times per day. But I suppose it's worse for those who not only burned every bridge in their life because they didn't think they'd need to cross any more rivers ever again but were probably really self-righteous while doing it.
These two lines bring to mind The Entertainment from Infinite Jest. Himself's terrible, possibly-actual-world ending movie that destructively takes away the "what a disappointment" part of the equation from the people who watch it. One of my lifelong rants has been how I never asked to be born into this world of pain. I didn't give my parents consent to suffer this turmoil! And so when I finally got to the description of Himself's "Infinite Jest" film, I found I would probably have readily succumbed to it. A movie filmed with a special holographic lens that puts the viewer in the mind of a baby while its mother repeatedly apologizes to it? Yes please.
"except for one or two incurably grinning idiots who see it as a chance to start a new life, fresh, without encumbrances, to be reborn"
Speaking of Infinite Jest, I think Pynchon just wrote it in three lines here (minus all the drama about how parents shape their children's lives and with fewer allusions to Hamlet). This is Don Gateley's story! Shedding all material possessions (past traumas and addictions most definitely included) to be reborn a free man, able to experience life and feel actual human emotions again! Plus Don gets the added benefit of getting as close as possible to dying so he can be reborn. Plus we get to see how Himself continues to direct movies from the afterlife due to Gately's near death condition. I think.
Anyway, that's a different book that I need to re-read! What these "grinning idiots" understand is that they don't have to be tied to those stupid fucking Funko Pops! You can throw them in the trash and be free! You can give yourself a second chance at actually experiencing life! Stop cosplaying a dragon! Let the dwarves take your ugly treasures! Let their theft awaken you from your gold-hypnotized slumber! Be angry or joyous but whatever you do, fly! FLY, DAMMIT, FLY!
No comments:
Post a Comment