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on symbols, hidden messages, culture yoga, and alice.
Well. These were an existentially strange past few days. I am so excited to be staring at a heap of folders, notebooks, and ideas for projects. At the same time, as I would get started, my mind would go to the geopolitical upheaval—this surreal, tragic reality that we are experiencing worldwide, where genocide and stock market results can be part of the same conversation. And THAT burst my bubble—throwing me to the waves of existential angst.
I would ask myself, “What are you doing?” People are being killed, nations are in turmoil, the darkest side of human nature is at the forefront, and you are putting down the blueprints, researching, gathering, and laying out the ‘intel’ ?
(“Intel” – that’s my code word phrase for preparing and creating plot outlines and character studies for books, artwork and projects.)
Speaking of intel…I HAVE TO SHARE THIS.
I came across some info that had totally escaped my eye…and I was surprised that it escaped me.
Apparently, it is buzzed about that the CIA had studied ‘Macondo’—trying to take apart this fictional hometown of A Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez.
The accounts say that the intelligence couldn’t believe that something this powerful, intriguing, compelling, and impeccably crafted as Macondo could be ‘just a tale.’ They believed it must have contained some revolutionary messages encoded within.
Granted, according to the CIA, the times and happenings back then, Marquez held political views that were ‘observation needy.’ ‘ So he was being observed for those reasons regardless of the book he had just written. (If you want to read more, check out this article Fifty Years of Disquietude by Joel Whitney in The Baffler.)
But it’s not his views on politics that interested me—everyone should believe what they want and have an opinion as they please. That’s what people in democracies do.
(I know, they are becoming extinct -I don’t mean people and their views, I mean democracies—although people with a viewpoint that isn’t herd feed are becoming a rare sight… Birth rates are going down, AI is doing our thinking… LOLOL, I joke, but it’s not a laughing matter.)
Back to what I was writing… What intrigued me was intelligence people taking apart the fictional world of Macondo, looking for encoded hidden messages or statements.
That is intriguing. Codes are intriguing. Symbolism is intriguing.
Which brings me to
my favorite writer,one of my top five favorite writers—Umberto Eco, who was a professor of semiotics (symbolism & interpretation). Besides being a brilliant academic, he could tell a tale like no other—and when writing them out, his tales would become a complicated, layered series of fiction and facts.The ultimate testimony to that fact? Foucault’s Pendulum.
A must read. Seriously. A must read.
Conspiracy lovers, Foucault’s Pendulum is your book…
This paragraph best sums up what Foucault’s Pendulum is about.
An editor, a cabalist, and a Templar scholar walk into a bar—this, essentially, is the setup for Umberto Eco’s maximalist occult epic Foucault’s Pendulum—and, out of boredom or desperation or something like existential ennui, these failed or failing intellectuals launch a sadly cynical investigation into the various conspiracy theories, urban legends, and supernatural spook stories that have possessed mankind for millennia. Hilarity obviously ensues, but I say “cynical,” because none of these investigators, such as they are, believe in the supernatural designs in their work, or not at first. What they end up building through their satirical scheme, though, weaving together the myths of those Knights Templar, of the Bavarian Illuminati, the Rosicrucians, and every other famous cult or historical bogeyman is, ironically, nothing less than the secret history of the world. – Umberto Eco by Chris Wallace at Interview Magazine.“An editor, a cabalist, and a Templar scholar walk into a bar…” sounds like a joke, no? But this book is far from joking, and the review is spot on—a rare book and an intense and fascinating read. Maybe with a bit of a perplexing aftertaste…
Meanwhile…Are You Doing Your Culture Yoga???
It’s cardio for the mind. Do it!!! Stretch the mind!!
Your imagination will thank you.
How to ‘do’ the culture yoga exercise?
Below are 7 cultural yoga statements.
I create them using moments of the human experience captured in a few words.
They can be sensory, cultural, emotional, or historical—you get my drift.
These statements are your weekly focal points for the exercise.
Close your eyes and try to envision the imagery from the statement.
And go from one statement to the next….
That’s it… Breathe slowly… Sip your coffee… Take your time…
Writers do it all the time…artists do it all the time…it’s a part of our make-up…
Statement by statement… capture the feeling… awaken the senses… stimulate the mind… stretch the imagination.
This week’s 7 statements to ‘culture yoga’ …
- 1. a striped, crumpled apron, bearing the toils of the chef, tossed onto the chair after a long night in the kitchen.
- 2. the town square on a drizzly, cold morning, with market stalls placed where the accused were hanged the day before.
- 3. koi fish, hardly noticed, swimming in circles, forgotten, as they are held in captivity in the pond of the palace grounds.
- 4. an abandoned, derelict building filled with the homeless and destitute seeking shelter from the sleet and cold during a windy winter’s night in the midst of the holiday season.
- 5. the poet sitting under the tree, alone, misunderstood, and unable to understand the world.
- 6. the shrill sound of a whistle pierces the air like a barrage of arrows as the policeman tries to direct the traffic at midday in the city.
- 7. magenta.
“Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality.”
― Lewis Carroll
