The Once and Future King

Thu, 26 Jun 2008 11:50:47 GMT

"Lo mejor para la tristeza -contestó Merlín, empezando a soplar y resoplar- es aprender algo. Es lo único que no falla nunca. Puedes envejecer y sentir toda tu anatomía temblorosa; puedes permanecer durante horas por la noche escuchando el desorden de tus venas; puedes echar de menos a tu único amor; puedes ver el mundo a tu alrededor devastado por locos perversos; o saber que tu honor es pisoteado por las cloacas de inteligencias inferiores. Entonces sólo hay una cosa posible: aprender. Aprender por qué se mueve el mundo y lo que hace que se mueva. Es lo único que la inteligencia no puede agotar, ni alienar, que nunca la torturará, que nunca le inspirará miedo ni desconfianza y que nunca soñará con lamentar, de la que nunca se arrepentirá. Aprender es lo que te conviene. Mira la cantidad de cosas que puedes aprender: la ciencia pura, la única pureza que existe. Entonces puedes aprender astronomía en el espacio de una vida, historia natural en tres, literatura en seis. Y entonces, después de haber agotado un millón de vidas en biología y medicina y teología y geografía e historia y economía, pues entonces, puedes empezar a hacer una rueda de carreta con la madera apropiada, o pasar cincuenta años aprendiendo a empezar a vencer a tu contrincante en esgrima. Y después de eso, puedes empezar de nuevo con las matemáticas hasta que sea tiempo de aprender a arar la tierra."

Thanksgiving Prayer

Fri, 24 Nov 2006 13:11:05 GMT

http://www.inter-zone.org/thanks.html

A scanner darkly (Author´s afterword)

Sun, 22 Oct 2006 15:25:41 GMT

Philip K. Dick dedico su novela 'A scanner darkly' a sus amigos que murieron o quedaron gravemente enfermos por culpa del consumo de drogas, incluso incluyo su propio nombre en la lista 'Phil: daño pancreatico permanente'.

Por cierto os recomiendo ver la pelicula que se ha estrenado esta semana, aunque sin mucho bombo, solo se ha estrenado en 3 salas de barcelona y solo en v.o. pero la verdad que les ha quedado genial, y la estetica de dibujos animados le hace mucho bien para ambientar el film.

This has been a novel about some people who were punished entirely too much for what they did. They wanted to have a good time, but they were like children playing in the street; they could see one after another of them being killed -- run over, maimed, destroyed -- but they continued to play anyhow. We really all were very happy for a while, sitting around not toiling but just bullshitting and playing, but it was for such a terrible brief time, and then the punishment was beyond belief: even when we could see it, we could not believe it. For example, while I was writing this I learned that the person on whom the character Jerry Fabin is based killed himself. My friend on whom I based the character Ernie Luckman died before I began the novel. For a while I myself was one of these children playing in the street; I was, like the rest of them, trying to play instead of being grown up, and I was punished. I am on the list below, which is a list of those to whom this novel is dedicated, and what became of each.

Drug misuse is not a disease, it is a decision, like the decision to step out in front of a moving car. You would call that not a disease but an error in judgment. When a bunch of people begin to do it, it is a social error, a life-style. In this particular life-style the motto is "Be happy now because tomorrow you are dying," but the dying begins almost at once, and the happiness is a memory. It is, then, only a speeding up, an intensifying, of the ordinary human existence. It is not different from your life-style, it is only faster. It all takes place in days or weeks or months instead of years. "Take the cash and let the credit go," as Villon said in 1460. But that is a mistake if the cash is a penny and the credit a whole lifetime.

There is no moral in this novel; it is not bourgeois; it does not say they were wrong to play when they should have toiled; it just tells what the consequences were. In Greek drama they were beginning, as a society, to discover science, which means causal law. Here in this novel there is Nemesis: not fate, because anyone of us could have chosen to stop playing in the street, but, as I narrate from the deepest part of my life and heart, a dreadful Nemesis for those who kept on playing. I myself, I am not a character in this novel; I am the novel. So, though, was our entire nation at this time. This novel is about more people than I knew personally. Some we all read about in the newspapers. It was, this sitting around with our buddies and bullshitting while making tape recordings, the bad decision of the decade, the sixties, both in and out of the establishment. And nature cracked down on us. We were forced to stop by things dreadful.

If there was any "sin," it was that these people wanted to keep on having a good time forever, and were punished for that, but, as I say, I feel that, if so, the punishment was far too great, and I prefer to think of it only in a Greek or morally neutral way, as mere science, as deterministic impartial cause-and-effect. I loved them all. Here is the list, to whom I dedicate my love:

To Gaylene

deceased

To Ray

deceased

To Francy

permanent psychosis

To Kathy

permanent brain damage

To Jim

deceased

To Val

massive permanent brain damage

To Nancy

permanent psychosis

To Joanne

permanent brain damage

To Maren

deceased

To Nick

deceased

To Terry

deceased

To Dennis

deceased

To Phil

permanent pancreatic damage

To Sue

permanent vascular damage

To Jerri

permanent psychosis and vascular
damage

...and so forth.

In Memoriam. These were comrades whom I had; there are no better. They remain in my mind, and the enemy will never be forgiven. The "enemy" was their mistake in playing. Let them all play again, in some other way, and let them be happy.

"What does a scanner see? Into the head? Down into the heart? Does it see into me? Into us? Clearly or darkly?"
— Fred

+ i n f o :

http://everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=67311 OJO SPOILERS!!!!

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/news/comments/?entryid=344007

To Gaylene	deceased
To Ray	deceased
To Francy	permanent psychosis
To Kathy	permanent brain damage
To Jim	deceased
To Val	massive permanent brain damage
To Nancy	permanent psychosis
To Joanne	permanent brain damage
To Maren	deceased
To Nick	deceased
To Terry	deceased
To Dennis	deceased
To Phil	permanent pancreatic damage
To Sue	permanent vascular damage
To Jerri	permanent psychosis and vascular damage

Hic Sunt Leones: Libros

The Once and Future King

Thanksgiving Prayer

A scanner darkly (Author´s afterword)