A Hell of a Good Read

There's a million things to keep a soul from writing, all in the service of making you better at it. Remember that, Alice law. Hell is a writers' market. 

--Katabasis, R.F. Kuang

Well, I've finished Kuang's journey through Hell, and sadly all too quickly, for I enjoyed every page and looked forward to reading the next. But oh well, I can always return to it again in the future, if I live long enough, and if my eyesight holds out, which is something I've said about many novels which wait on the bookshelf for my return.

As I mentioned in an earlier post (I think), this novel is not for everyone, and certainly not for the casual reader; but for one who is familiar with the old classics, Dante, Homer, Milton, Plato et al, it is a sheer delight. 

Kuang gets a bit lost during the last quarter of the book in the mazes of hell (in my opinion anyway), but she finds her way again in the end, through the seven courts of hell, and wraps things up nicely, tying up the ends of an old tale, in her own new way, of love, sacrifice, redemption, and rebirth.

The Beast

A beast gnaws at me at all hours of the day, but you can't see it. I feel so weak and scattered my mind won't work...

--,Katabasis, R.F. Kuang

In this passage from Katabasis, the author describes the sufferings of a man inflicted with Crohn's disease, which, like MS, is an incurable autoimmune disorder. But the characterization in general may as well refer to all such disorders. It certainly strikes a note in me, for I am suffering these days from a very active phase of MS which is coinciding with and working alongside a problem with herniated discs in my back and neck, exacerbating the problem and exaggerating the pain. Not only does it influence the pain in my shoulder, neck and back, but then modulates to neuropathic symptoms in my legs. This begins with a feeling of numbness in my feet, which then begins to rise up through my ankles and calves in the form of an intense aching stiffness. This in turn makes me want to continually move, to get up and walk around in circles, to stamp my feet on the floor. If I sit down or lie down it will soon feel as if I want to crawl right out of my own skin. I guess this is similar to the RLS I used to often experience, or is a variant form of RLS. There have also been many times when I wake from sleep with a feeling of intense heat in my legs, as if my skin is actually on fire. Pregabalin helps with this, but I have been taking 300 mg a day, separated in three doses, and that feels like a bit much over the long term. So next week I hope to see the doctor and perhaps we can find out what other interventions might help. Until then, thank you, R.F. Kuang, for your sympathetic description.

Over the River and Through the Trees

I had another interesting dream a couple nights ago. In this dream I wanted to cross over a body of water to the other side, wherein, as was my impression, there would be some kind of transcendence, a sort of promised land. One had to wade across this water, which was not very deep, just about waist deep. 

So I started out and got about halfway when the water around me begin to churn and push against my progress, and it was filled with some kind of thick sludge, like wading through a sewer. I could see the clear, refreshing water before me and all I wanted was to press on and reach that pure water and bathe myself and drink of the water. 

But of course I woke before I got across. 

There is something that we must struggle through. There is a barrier. But there is deliverance on the other side.

Heaven

Last night, I had a dream where I came upon a place in the beloved forests of my youth. There was a king size bed in this place, all made up with white sheets and blanket, just lying open in nature, and around the top of the headboard were sprigs of holly. I laid down on the bed and my God how comfortable it was! There was to be a gathering, I understood, down by the lakeside. My son showed up then and we walked together to the lakeside where we joined a group of people singing praise songs. We knew the songs by heart and we sang along with ardor.

I woke, considered this dream for a bit, and then slept again and dreamed this time of discussing the dream with one of my wives. Louise, I think. 

It was impossible, we said. Quite impossible. Just think of what would become of that bed in the open, without walls, without a roof, when the rain came and the snow and the winds. Surely it would go all soggy and gradually disappear into the forest floor. And how would one live in that place anyway during the winter? It was quite unreasonable, wasn't it? 

Faith and disbelief. Life and death, and death and life. 

The assurance of things hoped for. The conviction of things not seen. 

The conviction that there is no such thing as things not seen.

Pascal's Wager:

• if you believe in God and God exists, you gain eternal bliss. 

• if you don't believe in God and God exists, you risk eternal torment. 

• if you believe in God and God does not exist, you may suffer some finite disadvantages in this life.

• if you don't believe in God and God does 

not exist, you may gain some finite pleasures in this life.

Store up your treasures in heaven, where moth and vermin do not destroy.

Advice to Extraterrestrials

If these ETIs really do exist, most of us would have to admit that they have terrible timing. Humanity is fractured, bellicose, paranoid. It's the cosmological equivalent of having a guest come to the door when you're in the middle of a knockdown, drag out fight with your spouse, there are lines of coke on the coffee table, and your pants are down around your ankles. It isn't the failure to communicate that fascinates me: it's the implication that these ETIs appear to have no interest in communication at all. And we humans, vain, egotistical creatures that we are, can't help but take that a little personally.

--Axiom's End, Lindsay Ellis

Indeed, if you are listening, extraterrestrials, I would advise at the very least that you avoud visiting the United States any time soon.

Katabasis

On equipping for a trip to hell and back: 

She had flashlights, iodine, matches, rope, bandages, and a hypothermia blanket. She had a new, sparkling pack of Barkles' Chalk and every reliable map of Hell she could find in the University library carefully reproduced in a laminated binder. (Alas, they all claimed different typographies--she figured she would get somewhere high up and choose a map when she arrived). She had a switchblade and two sharp hunting knives. And she had a volume of Proust, in case at night she ever got bored. (To be honest she had never gotten round to trying Proust, but Cambridge had made her the kind of person who wanted to have read Proust, and she figured Hell was a good place to start.)

--Katabasis, R.F. Kuang. 

I have been eagerly looking forward to starting R.F. Kuang's new novel, Katabasis, waiting only to finish the Indonesian language version of Stephen King's Misery first, which I have now done. (And which by the way, is far creepier than I remember it being, and creepier than the movie as well. I first read Misery many years ago, and so my memory of the novel itself was a bit vague. I remembered the movie version better, for I had seen it more recently and I have seen it more than once. But the movie, as I now realize, left out a number of truly chilling details.) 

But back to Kuang...

Katabasis, in ancient Greek, means The story of a hero's descent to the underworld, and this is quite literally, not at all figuratively, what Alice, the hero of this novel, and her sidekick Peter do in this delightfully comical tour of the nether regions, guided on their way by the necessarily imperfect knowledge and wisdom, the tartarology, of the ancient greats--Dante, Orpheus, Plato, Aeneas and the rest of the whole crew--Oh, and throw in TS Eliot, though not so very ancient. By page 6, where the bit about Proust appears, I was laughing out loud, and I've been chuckling ever since through the next 130 pages or so. 

For a literary person, or one familiar with academia, this novel touches a symphony full of familiar chords. It is kind of like Kuang's previous novels, Babel and Yellowface, only on hallucinogenic drugs. On the other hand, it will surely be unsatisfying to those who enjoyed her fantasy trilogy, the Opium Wars (which I did not. Sorry, R.F.).

I love the playfulness here, the tongue in cheek humor, the vast sweep of literary, religious, and philosophical references all spilled out across the narrative plane like tiddlywinks in the search of a stable pattern. Who knew that the twisting path through Hell would lead to such pleasant reading!

Too Much Sun

A few days ago, the Russian man who was renting the house behind mine, which is owned by Louise and Wayne, came to my door late at night to drop off the key with me, as he was moving out. I was to hold it for Wayne. 

So far so good. 

The following morning, the maid who works at the house behind mine, and whom I have seen many times and occasionally had a chat with, came to my door asking for the key, as she was going to clean up after the Russian had departed. 

Still no problem. 

The problem waited till that night, when the maid showed up once again to return the key. This time, however, I thought she was my maid, Kaka, for some reason. I have been expecting Kaka to come to my house on Friday to do cleaning here, so after taking the key, I mentioned this.

Friday, right, right? I said. 

Friday? 

Yes.

Here?

Yes.

Why?

The poor girl's consternation was clear, but not so clear, in truth, as mine. My mind was working. What's happening here? it asked. What am I missing? Wait, is this in fact Kaka?

Slowly, sludgy gears grinding in my mind, I put it together. This was not Kaka. This was not my maid. She would not be coming here on Friday 🤪

Oh. Sorry, I said. I'm confused. 

She patted me on the shoulder, smiling sympathetically. 

You got too much sun at the beach today, Bapak.

Here in Indonesia it is called pikun. In English we call it senility.