[Interlude]

[What follows is the outcome of a singular event; a mischievous Cat jumped up on the Jukebox, and wandered as cats do all over the buttons. It might have been expected that the Jukebox would spring in to random life, but what actually happened was at first apparently nothing at all. The Jukebox was processing the input however, and some time later a neatly typed summary of conclusions came sliding smoothly out of the bottom. This is that list . . .]



1. . . . . Charles I, Louis XVI and Nicholas II; all weak well-meaning men; born into their positions, they didn't have to fight to get them and therefore only had a tenuous grip on the realities and limits of power; all with harridan wives; and crucially all completely incapable of dealing with the situation in which they found themselves. Whether anyone else would have been is quite a different question . . . .



2. . . . . the Bronze Age, so called because they used a great deal of bronze . . . . imagine the processions during the sacred festivals at Eleusis ! I'm sure the same thing happened in Britain - the tribes gathering and then processing up the sacred roads to Avebury - it must have been quite a sight - our sense of the numinous has become so attenuated that it has almost ceased to exist . . . .



3. . . . . he had an unusally highly developed ability to see himself objectively. He was like an actor - but then we are all actors. The fact that it is a truism doesn't make it any less true . . . .



4. . . . . it's important to bear in mind about the period immediately before the Reformation that the people then were the heirs of a very long continuous tradition, about a thousand years or so, so it's no wonder things had got very intricate and complicated, precedents on precedents on precedents. The sheer shock of the fundamental hermeneutical shift, the radical shift in interpretation, is impossible for us to fully appreciate - because we are the heirs of that shift . . . .



5. . . . . take any possible set of potential variables on a given religious, philosophical or aesthetic position; and you will find that any position that CAN be held, IS held - even if only by a crazed minority. [I can provide illustrative examples by the wheelbarrow load, and if you apply to me privately I will do so, but leave it here to you to think of some, thereby exploring the validity or otherwise of my point.] Why ? Because everyone needs to locate themselves somewhere. Sometimes this is done by joining, and sometimes by rejecting, by contrast . . . .



6 . . . . . the urge to adornment, whether it be of one's person or dwelling, or the dwelling of the chief or deity, is fundamental in humans; it is inescapable; the rejection of adornment, as in Puritanism, is simply that impulse finding expression by negation; similarly for hermits and the fundamental human drive to be sociable . . . .



7. . . . . fascinating organisms, lichens . . . .




8. . . . . if events are a book, this is a running commentary in the margins . . . .



9. . . . . although it is true that the totalitarian systems in the 1930's in Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union were extraordinarily similar, and both headed by would-be god-men, it is important to bear in mind the very great differences between Hitler and Stalin in their routes to power: Hitler was a demagogue, perhaps the most successful ever, and hated administration and office work; Stalin by contrast was a committee man through and through, and liked nothing better - he was famous for his perfectly genuine attention to these tasks, it was one of his techniques of power, knowing what was going on in great detail . . . .



10. . . . .[Warning ! The following comes without a warning !] . . . . anyone who aspires to the Cool MUST have a jazz side . . . .



11. . . . . as to whether one can legitimately aspire to the Cool in the sense of actively seek to embody it, which seems like a contradiction, I refer you to Captain Hook's dilemma over good form/bad form in ch. 14 of 'Peter and Wendy'; not to solve the problem, just to illustrate it . . . ."Most disquieting reflection of all, was it not bad form to think about good form ?" ( - 'Peter and Wendy', OWC 9780199537846, p.189) . . . .



12. . . . . one of the greatest album titles ever is surely Miles Davis' 'Birth of the Cool'; a major claim if you're going to make it and one that you would have to live up to having done so . . . . like calling your band after your own name then adding 'Experience' . . . .




13. . . . .don't carry around stuff that you don't need . . . . illusions perdus . . .
.


14. . . . . Matt-a-pillarius Didacticus ! with right hand out and forefinger extended for emphasis - the preaching finger ! just as his grandfather Tom Meadley used to do . . . . you've all seen it . . . .



15. . . . . Caravaggio . . . .



16. . . . . I want you all to take a moment and think about a list of musicians active in the U.S.A. in the late 1940's: Lightnin' Hopkins [go and put some on now ! ], John Lee Hooker, Muddy Waters, Hank Williams, Charlie Parker. KAPOW ! A very powerful time for music . . . . a lot of foundations being laid . . .




17. . . . . Room 101 is straight out of a folk or fairy tale: the place you are inevitably heading for one way or another where your deepest wish will be granted/you will encounter your true deepest fear . . . .



18. . . . . the fatal consequences of eating the Fruit ! the disasters that that act precipitates ! is a motif that comes up over and over and over again - like the Orphan Hero, but let's concentrate - for instance Adam and Eve and the apple in the Garden, Persephone eating the pomegranate . . . . the old merchant plucking the rose from the Beast's garden is a near relation of these . . . .



19. . . . . the Orphan Hero ! How long have you got ? Moses, Vito Corleone, David Copperfield, Harry Potter, Luke Skywalker . . . . it's so attractive because the Hero, lacking the restriction of responsibility towards his parents, has such a wider scope of activity . . . . and is also thrust out into an indifferent if not actively hostile world, and forced to find his own way . . . .



20. . . . . Marxism is oedipal; it wants to kill its father, Christianity, and replace him . . . .


21. . . . . meanwhile Christianity is precisely that form of Paganism which was energetic and ruthless enough to co-opt, absorb or destroy all its rivals in Antiquity . . . .



22. . . . . one often comes across or takes part in that controversy 'Which was the greatest record label ever ?' Stax, Motown, Island, Chess etc. etc. . . . . I must confess to being rather puzzled by the continuing discussion, since the conclusive answer is so evident - the greatest record label ever is SUN ! . . . .



23. . . . . Zlta Ponorka . . . .



24. . . . . if you don't want people to look, don't put 'em on display, baby ! . . . .




25. . . . . language: usage is king . . . .



26. . . . . the common factor between a young revolutionary and the same person become an old reactionary - I'm thinking of Wordsworth here - is that young and old, they both think that they know better, and believe in the use of force to impose their opinions on others . . . . revolution and secret police forces go hand in hand . . . . very soon the revolution so-called becomes a means of the secret police maintaining their grip on power, as with KGB in Soviet Russia . . . . in vicious tenacity, your average security bureaucracy is almost as bad as the English governing class ! although ofcourse they can give lessons to everyone, because they've been at it so long, and have successfully undergone so many transformations . . . . their eclipse, so often heralded, doesn't seem to me to be coming anytime soon . . . .



27. . . . . as they would tell you in a candid moment, assuming they ever have such a thing or have sufficient self-knowledge or powers of reflection to be able to, Power is the ultimate drug . . . .



28. . . . . the impatient man's functional lunch . . . .



29. . . . . you can't trip up on what isn't there . . . . obviously true on the level of the material world; it's a good motto for remembering to keep the gangways clear; and exemplifies the larger truth that it is constant small appropriate interventions which produce large successful outcomes, almost seemingly mysteriously but really quite straightforwardly . . . . but it is also true psychologically; the fact that you're tripping up on it is evidence that the block or problem is there - you can see the effects of the block and thereby track it down, but not the actual block itself, for that exists nowhere but in the sufferer's own mind - unless perhaps also in mankind's collective mind, a thing whose existence I neither assert nor deny . . . . I wonder though if it's because of a block, a blindness, in our collective mind that we keep going to war . . . .



30. . . . . Black Sabbath and the Stooges are like the Marx Brothers and Bunuel; they arrived at very similar places from different starting points . . . .



31. . . . . the point with Sabbath and the Stooges is to strip it down, get to the nub, the rawness . . . . it is deliberately basic, and therein lies its power . . . .



32. . . . . first served, first come . . . .



33. . . . . don't forget your trunks . . . .



34. . . . . looked at in one way, we're just a puff of cigarette smoke in the night air; in another, we're as infinite and enduring as the Universe . . . .



35. . . . . 'Friends and Romans', 'Crystal Gazers', 'The Peninsula', 'Top C', 'Sabbatical' . . . .



37. . . . . it's no secret and anyway extremely evident that La Rochefoucauld is a particular favourite of mine and one of the main progenitors of this Interlude . . . . he combined wide experience, remarkable insight and singular powers of expression . . . . he can put his finger on things in a way very few other writers can, though many try . . . . the precision . . . . he cuts right through to the essence . . . .



38. . . . . television,art, publishing, advertising, music of all genres, politics; they're all incredibly imitative. Originality is rare and powerful, and most practitioners spend their time knocking out ever more feeble copies of the last Big Thing, until they flog it to death . . . . think 'Dangerous Book for Boys', Tony Blair . . . .



39. . . . . bear in mind that Goebbels and Mussolini had very significant careers as newspaper editors . . . . like W. R. Hearst (no wonder he admired them so much !), the power to mould and direct public opinion, to conjure wars into existence, to make the victory of their organisations seem inevitable . . . .



40. . . . . Mozart ! . . . . the start of the first movement of his Sonata for two pianos in F major, K497, the Adagio - 'I think I'll just invent 19th century music ! Why not ?' . . . . and the second movement, the Andante - Chopin took good heed of that, no question. You would think it was Chopin ! . . . .



41. . . . . ROME ! . . . . the great crossing-point in European history . . . . the ginnel which Clio walked through to get from the Ancient to the Medieval . . . .



42. . . . . Mozart and ROME ! . . . . it's appropriate that they're next to each other . . . . because as Mozart is to european music, so Rome is to european history . . . . the crucial filter, the indispensable, unavoidable mechanism of transition and transformation . . . . the sine qua non . . . .



43. . . . . there is no observation 43 ! . . . .



44. . . . . there is an observation 44, but I'm not going to tell you what it is . . . . which is a shame, because 44 is the key to the entire work . . . . not to mention the solution to the riddle of existence . . . . and it has a very useful bottle-opener built in, which also doubles as a sub-etheric psychic communicator and mind-reading device . . . . observation 44, were it revealed to you, also foretells the future, both individual and collective, with uncanny accuracy . . . . you wouldn't believe it . . . . it's really quite unnerving ! . . . .



45. . . . . you'll no doubt be relieved to know there is also an observation 45 . . . . phew ! . . . . all's in order ! . . . .



46. . . . . [gravelly Hollywood movie-trailer voice] : For Savinien de Cyrano, it was just an ordinary day . . . .



47. . . . . never understimate the power of retro, the lost Golden Age, the lost Arcadia . . . . the tantalising image of freedom and ease just below the threshold of the realisable, at the very edge of actual memory, so close . . . . the Forest of Arden, Atlantis, Lyonesse, Hazard County, the Greenwood, the Garden of Eden, the Shire, the Pleasure Palace, the Hesperides, Avalon, Paradise, the Happy Hunting Ground, Heaven, Valhalla, Camelot . . . . the sheer profusion of examples, their frequency and wide distribution of occurrence, testifies to the haunting power of this image . . . . exemplified so often in pre-raphaelitism . . . .



48. . . . . with great reluctance and some embarrassment, we must inform you that observation 47, having delivered itself of its wisdom, has run off with the milkman . . . . well I never . . . .



49. . . . .




50. . . . . [cue truism of the week !] drama is about obstacles . . . . in 'Hamlet', Hamlet has all sorts of external obstacles, but the fundamental ones are within himself - the paralysis induced by his grief, compounded by being too insightful, seeing things from too many sides, which is a good quality in some ways but can be fatal to decision-making, as he describes so eloquently . . . . in 'Cyrano de Bergerac' the basic obstacle is that Roxanne's affections lie elsewhere . . . . but, think about it, isn't that really how Cyrano wants it ? . . . . he can have a secure object for his affections, it has the complexity of limitted reciprocation but not the complexity of full reciprocation ! . . . . Shakespeare and Rostand have put their fingers squarely on fundamental recurring problems of the individual . . . . hence the enduring fascination of these plays, and the central characters . . . .



51. . . . . the fundamental obstacle is oneself . . . .



52. . . . . it's perfectly simple . . . . it don't mean a thing, if it ain't got that swing . . . .



53. . . . . having power doesn't make you right; it just gives you greater scope to enforce your opinion . . . . e.g. the Roman Catholic Church in the Counter-Reformation . . . . or the Bolsheviks in Russia 1923-89 . . . .



54. . . . . everything is a contest of power, power is all there is . . . . this may seem nihilistic, Machiavellian . . . . but before dismissing it I would ask you to reflect on the true nature of power, the gross and subtle aspects of that concept . . . .



55. . . . . [over to you ! insert your own observation here . . . . right here . . . .]



56. . . . . chien mechant, cave canem . . . . hmmm, do you think their might be a reason there is that standard phrase 'beware of the dog' in so many languages ? . . . .I mean, because dogs in the whole are stupid and annoying, barking indiscriminately at whoever is passing them by . . . . the indulgence accorded to dogs by their owners and expected by them of everyone else is truly astounding . . . . if I rushed up to you barking completely unprovoked and out of the blue in the middle of the street you would quite rightly think I was mad . . . . nor would you I suspect be strongly in favour of me shitting under your kitchen window . . . . both of which is frequently done to me by other people's dogs . . . . I'm very well aware of the hackles this will raise, and that it may well be the most controversial of all these observations . . . . English people in the main don't give a monkeys about philosophical disputes or the nature of being or meaning . . . . but express contempt for dogs in general ! . . . . or their dog in particular ! . . . . almost as bad as the ultimate crime, [whisper it !], not liking football ! . . . .



57. . . . . 'he doesn't like dogs ! . . . . [mounting indignation] he doesn't like football ! . . . . and he openly proclaims these delinquencies ? . . . . and has the temerity to flaunt his supposed intellectuality ? . . . . what kind of Englishman is this ? . . . . a decidedly rum one . . . .'



58. . . . . one often finds creative people in the early stages of their career imitating great masters from the previous generation very, very closely indeed. Examples that spring to mind, I'm sure you can provide more to re-inforce the point, are [the one being imitated second]: Velazquez and Caravaggio; Bob Dylan and Woody Guthrie; George Jones and Hank Williams; Keith Richards and Chuck Berry . . . .I'll put more on if I think of them, or let me know yours and I'll put them on . . . . if I think they're valid, natch . . . .



59. . . . . the essence of drama is the conflict of imperatives within the protagonist . . . .there follow two illustrative examples of this . . . .



60. . . . . a) in 'Gawain and the Green Knight', when Gawain is at Sir Bertilak's castle and his host's wife is making advances to him, under the rules of courtesy it is discourteous to refuse her . . . . but it is also discourteous to cuckold his host . . . . plus, she's beautiful . . . . so what should he do ? . . .



61. . . . . b) in 'Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid', Pat and Billy are old friends . . . . but Pat has also taken on the responsibility from his (profoundly corrupt !) employers to make him leave the territory . . . . and if Billy won't, he's going to have to hunt him down and kill him . . . .



62. . . . . the essence of comedy is incongruity . . . .



63. . . . . incongruity can also be sinister and threatening; hence aspects of the comedy of Harold Pinter and Peter Cook . . . .



64. . . . . you know that light in her eyes, that sparkle; roguish, but also deeply honest . . . .



65. . . . . Shakespeare's plays for instance, and musicals . . . . they can be condemned as unrealistic . . . . but in a way they're more realistic . . . . that is, closer to the emotion in question . . . .



66. . . . . the truth is often unpalatable, sometimes extremely so . . . .

2. In Which You Become Stearns . . . Eliot Stearns

! ! ! KA - ZAM ! ! !

A flash of light, a whiff of phosphorous, and you are in the process of becoming someone else - an abrupt and unheralded transformation. When it is complete, you will experience these adventures through the eyes of our Protagonist, in fact they will become his adventures.

You feel a bit peaky as everything pulses slowly on and off into negative around you, like a cheap special effect in a particularly poor and deservedly forgotten episode of Doctor Who, known only to the most rarefied of the most obsessive devotees. Involuntarily you tip your head back and clench your teeth, and the ground also tips this way and that as in an earthquake. You throw your arms in front of your face to protect yourself - a futile gesture. You tingle all over, you feel something scanning through your memory like a computer searching through files to erase them - you feel your long-familiar and cherished personality melting away like a dab of butter in a hot frying pan - your limbs change, getting thinner and lengthening, becoming masculine if you are a woman - suddenly everything is still, the process is over, light normal, ground level, and you tentatively explore your new body and personality to find out who or what you have become. A werewolf ? The Incredible Hulk ? George Clooney ? Robert Plant c. 1974 ?

Suddenly it clicks and you know. You have become Stearns . . . . . Eliot Stearns - elongated, balding intellectually, dressed in tweeds and brogues. You - henceforth he - are famous for among other things waving a coffee spoon in a threatening manner, which is thrilling to ladies of a certain disposition. He also is often seen and pictured with a literary-minded spinster draped adoringly on each arm - the only drawback with them is they do rather tend to come and go, talking of Michaelangelo - which however good that painter is, and his merit does not require my reinforcement - can get insufferably tedious. 'What about Giovanni Bellini ?' Stearns sometimes inwardly protests, but noblesse oblige . . . . every station in life has its drawbacks. He has indeed become philosophical, almost Senecan, but whether that infamous gap between precept and practice which bedevils so many issuers of advice - the Max Stirner problem as we call it in Our Mythology - is a feature of our Hero - as it definitely was for Seneca, Rousseau, Francis Bacon, [insert your favourite example here, then nod sagely, content in the excercise of your erudition] - which will have to be left for this Tale to reveal.

Eliot was in front of the Mushroom, with the Matt-a-pillar on top, who was only intermittently curious at the shenanigans just described and seemed as ever to have a significant part of his attention focussed on inner voices. Whether Eliot could be said 'still' to be there is a question not easy to resolve, because although he had not moved, nevertheless he was until a few moments ago someone else i.e. you. However that may be, he was in front of the Mushroom and the Jukebox.

"How are you feeling ?" said the Matt-a-pillar.

"I'm growing old, I'm growing old . . . ."

"Yes ?"

"I shall wear the bottom of my trousers rolled."

"Nasty ! Well, no doubt you'll feel better in a minute. How are all your faculties ? It's most important that they're in tip-top condition before you go any further."

"I don't know, I really don't know," said Eliot. "How could we test them ?"

"Well, the best and most infallible way, a diagnostic tool found across all cultures and epochs of humanity, like the belief in goats - "

Eliot wasn't quite sure he'd heard that right, but since he wasn't sure about the state of his faculties either, or the state of his judgement, he let it pass.

" - is to recite something from the classics - something you've always known, and is very widely known."

"Mmmm. Do you think so ?"

The Matt-a-pillar disdained to reply, but his expression said quite clearly "I have stated it, therefore it is the case." You can see he was not overburdened with humility when it came to his opinions, I'm afraid - it was one of his qualities which he felt fitted him so well for Pope. (His plans for the Church when he was enthroned were well-prepared and terrifying/sacrilegious or hilarious/long overdue depending on your point of view; but the exact details of them are another thing which will have to be left to this Tale to reveal.)

Eliot had an idea for something to recite. He said:

"How about 'Atlantic City' ?"

"Capital !" said the Matt-a-pillar. "A superb piece - just the thing," then added pointedly,"he's a far better poet than you, you know - it's just that people get stuck on categories, 'high'/'low' culture, think they must stick with one or the other, terrible shame, miss out on so much. Anyway, if you're going to recite some of the Boss, there's someone nearby who I think should join us - "

The Matt-a-pillar made a gesture towards a copse of trees nearby, and - Eliot found this distinctly unnerving - one of them detached itself, approached, and stood next to the Mushroom unmoving, giving Eliot a chance to study the new arrival, whatever it was.

It was an extremely tall figure, 6'4 at least, completely covered in a cloak of camouflage material with a large hood - Eliot could not see its feet or hands, if it had any. But it did certainly have hands, because they emerged and pulled back the hood, revealing a striking face, long blonde hair like a Viking or an Angel, and two particularly remarkable features: two tendrils grew out of its or rather his mouth, one on either side, which reminded Eliot of medieval carved representations of the Green Man (which was quite appropriate because the figure was in fact among many other things the Green Man); the other feature was the eyes - as Eliot looked at them they were an ordinary if bright blue, but suddenly the figure tipped its head back slightly, smiled in a not altogether reassuring manner, and his eyes, the whole eye socket, became completely green like the Sea, one seemed to see waves and currents passing across them, they were infinite, menacingly indifferent, one could imagine sailing on them endlessly in pursuit of some splendid and elusive goal, some Hesperides. Then the figure tipped his head forward again and the efect disappeared.

"You're no doubt wandering who this is, " said the Matt-a-pillar to Eliot, and went on before he had a chance to reply one way or another, "This is Standalf the Magus, and among his many other talents, attributes and ritual taboos he is one of the foremost authorities on Bruce Springsteen in Jukeland - in fact in the known and unknown Universe."

Standalf said nothing to this but merely smiled in acknowledgement.

"It is most fortunate that he is here to hear you recite because his opinion is held to be decisive, and is sought and treasured by even the most learned in these matters, somewhat as if he was a top rabbi or imam . . ."

Eliot was vivibly more and more nervous.

" . . . Not that this should put you off," added the Matt-a-pillar maliciously, then sharply, "Well - in your own time . . . "

Standalf's alert silence was even more intimidating than the Matt-a-pillar's rudeness. Eliot felt four glittering eyes upon him, and was not at all sure about the wisdom or efficacy of this course, but plainly he was tied to the stake, so -

"Come, come," said the Matt-a-pillar. "'Atlantic City', as promised - "

- Eliot began -

Well they put up a chicken house in Philly last night

Yeah, they moved in the chicken too

Out on the boardwalk they're looking forward to their eggs

Gonna see what that chicken can do

Can't get no eggs from out of state

And the co-op has completely run out

Gonna be some omelettes a-sizzlin' if that chicken comes through

And scrambled eggs as well for anyone else who's about

Chorus: Oh, baby ! - Every chicken flies, baby, that's a fact
Maybe every one that flies some day comes back
Make your parody close, make your parody witty
And meet me tonight in Atlantic City !

When he had finished Eliot felt the unvoiced contempt of his auditors quite as strongly as if it had actually been spoken.

"That is not quite right, I'm afraid, " he apologised.

"It's nonsense from beginning to end," stated the Matt-a-pillar flatly. "Heresy by thought, word and deed. You are evidently a man of unsound mind."

There was an awkward pause. Standalf, though obviously disgusted, still said nothing. Then the Matt-a-pillar made one of his curious abrupt transitions, as if all that had happened up to that point was forgotten entirely, as if it had not happened.

"Have you ever seen a Bardic riddling contest ?" he asked Eliot cordially, who was mightily relieved to be cleared of his difficulty so easily, and willingly replied,

"No - but I would like to. How could I see such a thing ?" which was a big fat fib because he didn't really know what one was.

"It's the easiest thing in the world," said the Matt-a-pillar, glancing across at Standalf who met his look and smiled conspiratorially. "We'll give you a demonstration, a friendly so to speak."

And abruptly they began shouting lines at each other, first the Matt-a-pillar, then Standalf, as if it was a well-rehearsed game; and this is what they shouted :

What is the Spirit that grows in the Leaves ?

What is the Spirit that grows in the Grass ?

What is the Force when a lover's chest Heaves ?

What is the Force in a beautiful Arse ?



What's so Delicious that resides in the Face ?

What's so Delicious that vibrates in the Voice ?

What is the Knowledge beyond Time and Space ?

What is the X-ness beyond all Choice ?



All is Contingent, that's all we can Know

Though we can Dress up that Insight a Million Ways

Understanding resides in the Flow

And then they shouted the last line in unison -

The Less a man knows, the More he says !

Standalf reached over and slapped the Matt-a-pillar on the back, and they both collapsed into delighted laughter, clearly extremely pleased with themselves; although Eliot felt that their rhymes, while vigorous and zestful, were painfully old-fashioned. He bridled inside. Had they not heard of Modernism in this strange realm of Jukeland ? Could anyone really be so backward ? But he merely observed,

"If it was a contest - who won ?"

"Well, it was a friendly," said the Matt-a-pillar, out of the corner of his mouth, both because he was lighting yet another thick cigarette and because he was still chortling, as indeed was his cohort.

"The thing to bear in mind is, I know his, " indicating Standalf, "secret name. Obviously I'm not going to tell you what it is, but observe - "

And he bent over and whispered in Standalf's ear. A look of understanding passed between them, and Standalf nodded and smiled. But whether the Matt-a-pillar really did know Standalf's secret name, or whether the Magus was content to humour his friend's strange quirk that he thought that he did, neither Eliot, nor I, nor you, will ever know !

TO BE CONTINUED.

TUNE IN NEXT TIME FOR DRAGONS, BEAUTIFUL MAIDENS TIED TO ROCKS, MUSCLY PROTAGONISTS, FRACTIOUS GODS, RUNAWAY TRAINS, BLOODTHIRSTY PIRATES, A HEROIC LAST STAND . . . . ALL THE USUAL IN SHORT . . . . THOUGH UNFORTUNATELY THIS TRAIL IS UNRELIABLE AND NONE OF THE FOREGOING MAY OCCUR . . . . IT MIGHT IN FACT FEATURE A MIDDLE-AGED MAN IN SLIPPERS SAT CALMLY READING THE PAPER, WITH A MINUTE DESCRIPTION OF THE PERFECTLY ORDINARY ROOM HE'S SAT IN . . . . ONE OF THOSE POINTLESS LITERARY EXCERCISES WHERE YOU THINK AS YOU'RE READING 'SURELY THERE MUST BE SOME POINT TO THIS', BUT IF YOU'RE BRAVE OR FOOLISH ENOUGH TO STICK WITH IT, YOU FIND OUT THAT THERE ISN'T . . . . YOU'LL JUST HAVE TO TUNE IN NEXT TIME AND SEE !

1. The Hobbyhorse's Trial Run

This is the proverbial first pace . . .

The title refers to my interests, my obsessions. Hopefully you will share enough of them to make the journey interesting. Perhaps it will engage, perhaps enrage, perhaps confirm, or confront, or introduce you to something new - or a new angle on something thought familiar. Whatever happens, as everything must, it will definitely evolve . . .

Here's the set-up :

You have stumbled into Wonderland. If you know Caroll's immortal work, it will be a useful but not an entire guide. You are at once disorientated and exhilarated. Tired of being what you have come to feel is too small, you want to grow. You look all around you at the flowers and the blades of grass, but cannot see anything that looks like the right thing to eat or drink under the circumstances. Suddenly you see there is a large mushroom growing near you, about the same size as yourself. You inspect it more closely, and are amazed to see that the small black blotches the white mushroom is covered in are actually tiny symbols, which change and interchange continually as you look at it; there are rotating yin-yang signs, fylfots slowly swirling, crosses of all kinds, moons in all its phases, suns, stars, labyrinth patterns both round and geometric, both cretan and chinese, pyramids, ankhs, fish, frogs, horses, all the signs of the zodiac, tiny qabalahs, astronomical, alchemical, mathematic, heraldic and totemic figures of all kinds; a bewildering ever-shifting diversity, some of which you recognise and some not, but it is a fascinating and hypnotic display. You have the odd, inexplicable but nevertheless definite sensation that the mushroom is reading your mind; or that the mushroom is your mind; or rather that your mind and the muhroom are one. Shaking your head to clear the mesmeric attraction of the mushroom a little, you decide to look on top of it.

You stretch yourself on tiptoe, peep over the edge of the mushroom, and your eyes immediately meet the bespectacled ones of a large Matt-a-pillar, that is sitting on top, quietly smoking a thick roll-up - a loathsome habit -, and taking not the smallest notice of you or anything else.

The Matt-a-pillar has the most extraordinary appearance. As I have already said, it is smoking a thick roll-up and conveniently next to it on the mushroom is a tray with all sorts of things useful and necessary for making cigarettes on it, and a supply of the same ready rolled. It is dressed in black and white motley, the costume of the medieval Fool; on the black side of its chest is written 'Horse to Water' in white, and on the white side is written 'Duck to Water' in black. The Matt-a-pillar seems rather sad but he fixes you with a piercing left eye; it also appears to be drifting in and out of a trance. You cannot help but ask:

'Who are you ?'

'I am the Matt-a-pillar ofcourse' replies the strange figure, 'but you can call me -'
and he hands you a business card with many names on it in very small lettering. It reads:

Chevalier de Balibari/
Marquess of Carabas/
Comte de l'Angoisse et de la Guerison/
Pope Leo XIV (pending)/
Chevalier au Coeur-Bleu/
Chevalier Bleuatre-Nuageux/
Chevalier de la Main Effronte/
Altostratus Amphisbaena/
Chevalier de l'Etoile-Oubliee/
Pictor Ignotus/
Arthur Buffalo Sherlock Hood/

It's damnably puzzling. Which one should you actually call it ?

'Oh, don't worry,' says the Matt-a-pillar, just as if you'd asked it out loud. 'I respond to any of them or none, as the mood takes me.'

Abruptly you see for the first time that there is a Jukebox next to the mushroom - has it just appeared ? - with a lever labelled 'Push' and a button marked 'Pull'; it also has many other buttons, all neatly labelled as follows:

Ancient Rome esp. Augustus / History of Magic + Occultism / History of Christianity/


The Wild West/ Art History/ Western Philosphy/

Civil Wars/ French Culture/ Saints/

French Revolution + Napoleon/ Classical Mythology/ King Arthur/


The Renaissance/ Hitler + Nazism/ Lewis Carroll/

The Reformation/ World war II/ Dickens/

Conquerors/ Russian literature/ Shakespeare/

Empires/ 20th c. popular music/ Firsts/

Films, Actors, Directors/ English Literature/ And everything else



A scart lead goes out from the back of the Jukebox to the Matt-a-pillar's back.

'Press one', says the Matt-a-pillar,'and I will profess.'

'Profess what ?'

'Profess ! Profess ! Don't you know what 'profess' means ?'

'No'.

'It's a compression of 'professor' and 'prophecy', comprende ? Fancy not knowing that !'

Despite the Matt-a-pillar's rudeness, you want to accept the strange invitation. Which button will it be ?