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lullabyes22-blog · 3 months ago

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Snippet - Fate vs. Choice - Forward but Never Forget/XOXO

Jinx has a decision, and a deadline.

Forward but Never Forget/XOXO

Six o’ clock. Late evening.

The Cathedral of Progress.

Lanterns burned in their iron-scrolled brackets; the shadows cut flayed patterns on the granite walls. In the nave, the acolytes chanted, cloaked and cowled. In their palms, the lit tapers cast long, lean shadows across the stone floors. Their voices were a mechanized hymn: harmonized down to the smallest atom vibrating in the air. There was no music riding the currents. Only silence, draping a veil of total stillness over the congregation. Perhaps even eternal damnation, to those who dared trespass.

Jinx didn't give a ripe toot about damnation. She'd already fallen from grace: the moment she'd set a wind-up monkey loose to rescue her family, and jinxed them instead. Her own jinx, since that fateful night, was an inevitability, and a long time coming.

Now, at nineteen, she was the living, breathing epitome of it.

The harsh sweetness of coffee cut through the chants. Jinx cracked an eyelid open; for one long giddy second, the world spun in a sickening circle.

Then it righted itself. Or Viktor did: a cool hand clasping hers.

“Wake up, Jinx.”

Her eyes fluttered open. She lay, starfished in an indolent sprawl, in sweetgrass that swayed as if under an invisible caress. The aroma of lilies was ascendant; twilight had deepened their perfume. The night-garden was tucked into the courtyard at the heart of the Cathedral, abutted by a small cemetery of granite.

Under the surreal refractions of a stained-glass dome, it was a wonderland: teeming with long-dead saints, and the perfumes of late-blooming flowers, all a-glow in holy light. Upon closer scrutiny, the holiness inverted into the uncanny. Every plant, aspirating beneath the multicolored rays, was revealed to hold an almost numerical symmetry: logarithmic spirals of orchids, geometrically-profound petunias, grid-patterns of clovers all fractaling in golden ratios.

As if every organism—from soil grain to leaf tip—had coalesced into life under the touch of a divine hand. Or a very obsessive mathematician.

Or—both.

Then there was the tree.

It was a prehistoric sycamore of darkling wood: five times the height of the average Piltovan oculus; three times as broad across. The branches fanned out into spokes as big as a ferris wheel. The ends of each spathe, splayed wildly under the skylight, erupted into iridescent blooms. They were nearly gem-like in their purity: their crystalline petals glowing in colors of multicolored amethyst, chrysoprase, quartz, topaz, ruby. The canopy spread over the entire garden; the roots curled deep into the bedrock.

By nightfall, it gave off an eerie luminescence: bathing the garden in an ephemeral glow. By daylight, it cast a rainbow halo across the grounds. Its fragrance changed constantly: one minute pungent as wormwood, the next citrusy as lemon zest, another woody as cardamomh. Insects swarmed about its roots; butterflies flocked its boughs. Some even swore they'd spotted faeries dancing in rings beneath its shadow.

The hallucinogenic effects were, by Viktor's accounts, an ur-example of magicoreality: an object, space, or phenomenon that is created through the combined imagination of multiple entities. It was real, because they believed it real. And vice versa.

Like a mobius strip blossoming into being.

Viktor's acolytes had transplanted the tree—roots to stem—from Singed subterranean laboratory. Something in the soil of the Cathedral's grounds nourished it with unique potency: the tree flourished where naysayers, Silco chief among them, predicted it would rot. By the first month, it'd become the centerpiece around which every botanical beauty revolved. By the sixth, it was the brilliant heart of a preternatural paradise: creepers, ferns, lilies, ivies, marigolds, all erupting in a palette of purest life.

By the tenth?

The tree was worshipped as an entity unto itself. It dominated the cultists' rhetoric; it haunted their reveries. It was rumored that Janna herself had breathed life into its veins, rescuing it from the brink of collapse. Pilgrims from the depths below, voyeurs from the heights above, arrived in droves to seek the sheltering boughs as if for the same restorative breath.

And under those twirling branches?

They were never the same again.

Formerly pallid patients were rumored to stagger from their sickbeds, sit beneath the blossoms in solemn ceremony, then unfold from their atavistic comas miraculously reborn. Like larvae metamorphosing into butterflies.

From devolution to evolution.

But though the tree restored a measure of life to its devotees, its own was an hourglass suspended between grains. The fruits hanging off its branches evoked a spectrum of incandescent sea-shells washed by whitecaps onto arid shores. They were entirely inedible; ash and air. And as soon as they fell, their shells fossilized: petrifying into stone-crusted facets within minutes of detachment, before dissolving into inert dust.

It was the tree's perpetual paradox: the promise of life, forever beyond reach. And death, ever-encroaching at its heels.

In its shadow, Viktor, the most devoted disciple of one, held court weekly with the most notorious apostate of the other.

"Wake up, Jinx."

Viktor's hand, freed from its tight leather glove, squeezed hers. His fingers, long and thin, held a delicate strength: there were calluses, velvety, at the tips, and a roughness along the heel. A scientist's hands, evolved into a healer's. Tonight, Jinx saw ink smudges on the knuckles. There was also a tiny nick, from wielding a scalpel during the evening's surgery on a young boy's ruptured appendix.

The boy was safe. Tucked into a cot at the infirmary, with the others under Viktor's care: each dosed with enough poppy-milk to see them through the night. The boy's mother, one of the dozen souls who'd flocked to the Cathedral seeking the Machine Herald's aid, had wept at her son's restoration, kissing the hem of Viktor's robe in a show of gratitude.

It was a scene that Jinx had witnessed, over and over again, during her visits. And it never failed to unsettle.

Devotion, undiluted, had that effect. Especially when it was devoid of desire.

Daily, scores of souls passed in and out of the Cathedral. Each brought with them a problem, a poison, a plea. Each, Viktor addressed in their turn: salving their sores, purging their pustules, and bestowing, with a steady hand and a soft voice, his personal brand of salvation.

He never charged for his chem-modifications. Even the most complex, which took months to design, were given for free.

His payment, his only payment, was everything.

From the start, he’d made plain that his services were offered on a strictly non-partisan basis, and would cease immediately should any faction in Zaun attempt to co-opt his work. Except that was a lie. Everyone knew, in Zaun's hierarchical honeycomb, Viktor had no love for politics. But he was fiercely political: his sacrifices, solely and exclusively, were for the elevation of Zaun's future.

It was his singular obsession: the evolution of the present into an age of transcendence, and the eradication of the past into obscurity.

Viktor hated the past. A past that’d left him broken, disfigured, discarded: an imperfect specimen, unworthy of survival.

The same past, which had yet forged him.

And Jinx, his muse and mirror, who'd been reborn in its bloodshed.

"Jinx," Viktor repeated. "Wake up."

His hand squeezed hers, then let go. A moment later, a metal cup was pressed into her grasp.

The warmth radiated; Jinx's flesh drank it up. The coffee gave off its curls of aromatic steam: a nutty blend of chicory root, black chocolate liqueur, and the sweet whiff of anise.

Diluted, as always, with sweetmilk.

Viktor, his own cup balanced precariously between two fingertips, reclined with an easy elegance in the grass. His staff lay within arm's reach: the undying habit of a boy whose mind is always five steps ahead, but whose body is forever falling behind. Everywhere, leather-bound books were scattered, some facedown with cracked spines, others bristling with raven's feathers that doubled as bookmarks. An inkwell glittered, half-empty, on a stack of maps scribbled with notes.

In this garden, Vitya was ever-studying, ever-searching. Never satisfied with the knowledge already in hand, and the miracles already in motion.

Something he and Jinx shared in common.

Reclining on elbow, Viktor sipped from his cup with the other hand. Then he plucked a notebook from the pile, stirred through its pages with a fingertip, and resumed writing with his cockatrice quill: a rapid series of symbols that, unfurling, imprinted themselves in a secret pocket of Jinx's brain, and the darkest recesses of her heart.

Destiny: charted beyond the stars.

Jinx sat up, knees tucked against her chest, and drank from her cup. The flavor was just as it should be: bitter chased by sweet, complexity balanced by simplicity.

Viktor's handwork: the paradox distilled into metaphor.

Just like the garden, where every blade of grass grew exactly the same height, and every flower, in its arrangement, was a repetition into infinity.

Sipping, Jinx's eyes flicked from bloom to bloom. Then, she noticed:

A single blossom out of place.

A lone iris, curling its way from between the tree's roots. It was sly as an intruder, bright as a fallen star.

The same hue as Powder's wishful blue eyes.

Jinx's lips curled. Tentatively, she reached out. Her fingers traced the blossoming petals. They were silky, smooth. Almost too flawless to be real.

"Is this place," she whispered, "alive?"

It was only half-joking. During each visit, she could never escape the sense that the garden—multiform, deviant—was suffused with a spiritual awareness sister to sentience. And the tree, gathering them both under its protective penumbra, was rooted right to the crux of Zaun's stony heart.

"Not exactly," Viktor replied, without looking up from his notes. "Not by our reckoning. More a kind of... meta-life."

"Meta-life?"

Viktor, dipping the quill in its inkwell, shrugged.

"This tree is but a reflection—an iteration—of something larger-than-life. Something of a piece with the city's vital flow. A conduit of sorts."

"Like, what? A portal?"

"Perhaps," he said, and absently rested a palm on his leg, the site of his first augments. "Or perhaps a lens. Something which reflects, refracts, magnifies. An imperfect metaphor."

"Serpent's tongue. Apple's flesh. Devil's promise."

"Precisely. A system of shorthand within which meaning can be imparted, and context given."

Jinx's eyes lingered on the flower: a star's winking light, buried under layers of soil.

"What's the point, though?" she wondered. "I mean, yeah, I get it: a symbol's powerful. But if you're trying to forget the past—"

"Forgetting is not the same as erasing," Viktor corrected, patiently. "And what good is a symbol, Jinx, if no one knows what it stands for?"

Double-edged question and double-pronged answer: classic Viktor.

Sighing, Jinx returned to her cup. The coffee, cooled, had lost its bite. She drained it anyway, then let the cup rest in her lap. Her eyes, half-lidded, took in her companion.

He was still garbed for his duties: a mauve linen robe with a high collar, its sleeves rolled up, the hem draping past his knees. It was a garment, once, meant to conceal. Now, it served a purpose quite the opposite. Its folds bared the armature that held Viktor together: once emaciated, now elegantly streamlined beneath a segmented exoskeleton of synth-plates. His bad leg, encased in gleaming obsidian augments, now held the flexile precision of muscle, and the springing strength of a steel cable.

The fusion was seamless: the stuff of futuristic fairytale. When he moved, it was with an almost regal glide. As if, somewhere in the gaunt structure of Viktor's frame, there was an ancient drop of royalty, finally emerging from its hardscrabble shell in a blend of princely asceticism and common-born resilience.

Under the tree's canopy, Viktor's pallor was offset by his deep-hued robes. The effect wasn't peaky so much as pearlescent. His untidy curls tumbled freshly-glossed along his shoulders: the barest delineations of a beard teased the contours of his jawline. The sum total was neither masculine nor feminine. Only androgynous; ethereal.

Transcendent as stardust.

The rim's of Jinx's eyes burned. Why was it that even at their closest, Viktor seemed as if he was dissolving into astral orbit, a beautiful moon drifting farther from reach?

And why did Jinx feel herself hurtling on an opposing trajectory: crashing to earth with fatal velocity?

The wind, still unseen, sawed gently through the tree's branches. Its blossoms whispered: the susurration of silk sheets, or a lover's sigh. Jinx found it fitting that, though the Cathedral of Progress was, technically, the building's newly-christened designation, ordinary Fissurefolk referred to it, unofficially, by a different epithet.

The Resurrection Root. The Everbloom. The Glass Garden.

And the most popular—

Der Wunschbaum.

Ur-Nox for Wishing Tree.

Except Ur-Nox was a double-edged sword. It was the language of the ancients; Mages and Guardians who'd lived in the time before Zaun had ever been. Their language, therefore, was the language of enchantment: one half lofty, the other half sinister. Wish, for instance, was rooted in the word Wunschet: to want. To desire beyond the bounds of reality.

But it was also rooted in Wählen: to choose.

A wish could be a heart's deepest desire unlocked. Or it could be a will to power: to take what you want, no matter the cost.

And me? Jinx wondered. What do I want?

And what will I give to seize it—or throw it away?

At her silence, Viktor stopped scribbling. His eyes, deep-gold, met hers.

"All right, Jinx?"

"Y-Yeah."

"You should wake up."

"Don't wanna."

"No?" Scritch-scritch went the pen, runes blossoming in its wake. Distantly, Jinx heard the acolytes singing, a ghostly engine of harmony. And—could it be?—Sparky's yips, cutting through the choir: a dissonant counterpoint. The greedy mutt, somewhere, was begging for treats. "If you do not wake, how will your Name Day be celebrated?"

"Multitasking's a thing. I've always been a pro."

"You are terrible at multitasking."

"Am not!"

"You fell asleep during the surgery."

"You told me not to interrupt. So I closed my eyes. But I was listening. I always listen."

"You were drooling." And, closing the notebook with the coordinates plotted inside, he set it down. In a single graceful movement, he'd shifted closer. Close enough to touch his thumb against the corner of her lips, where a grin had stolen in. Viktor's own lips, palely-parted, were a few inches away. "You look like a child when you sleep. Peaceful. It is... rare."

"I was havin' a sweet dream."

"Oh? Tell me."

"A night full of stars. Wishes a-popping like fishes. And a beautiful boy." Her voice, at half-octave, came breathless. Always, his proximity did that to her: an unravelling of everything she held dear about herself. Like deja vu—except more desolate. Dying, when you longed to be reborn. "Except he won't wish me a Happy Name Day. He won't even gimme a kiss."

At that, Viktor smiled: a slow, secret curl that was yet the saddest expression in the world.

"Perhaps," he murmured, "he is a fool."

"Yeah?"

"And a coward." The thumb, tracing the full jut of her bottom-lip, was cool as snowfall, and as chaste. "Because he knows, deep in his heart, that you are still a child. The child he sees when you sleep. And because, despite whatever tradition or legality declares, you are not yet a woman. Certainly, not the woman who, once she comes into herself, will outrace him, and his grand designs, and fly off on wings of stardust."

"You talkin' about Silco?" Jinx quipped. "'Cause, no offense, but he's no competition. I can outrun that fossil anytime."

The levity fell flat. Viktor's golden eyes, augmented to their depths, lost their imperceptible luster. A moment later, his hand retreated, as if it'd never been.

"I know," he said, "that this is only an interlude."

"You think so?" Jinx, impulsively, caught the hem of his sleeve. "Pretty harsh frame to put 'round forever."

"Forever means little in a cosmos of infinite permutations."

"Not so long as we're still us, right?"

"A conundrum in itself." He didn't withdraw, exactly. Only laid his fingertips over hers, knotted into his sleeve. "Are our mirrored selves—in the physical, in the quantum—so very different at their crux? Is one less worthy, less agentic, than the other? Or are they simply two sides of the same coin, flipped endlessly, until the universe collapses on itself."

"Yikes. Talk about buzzkill."

"I am not a man for platitudes, Jinx." The smile, sadder, stayed on the surface. "Not will I feed you falsehoods, in hopes that the future may hold more than the present."

"So you say."

"So I mean." And, surprising her, he caught her hand in both his own: a tender clasp. "We've pledged our spirits as one. We've plotted our course. Escape velocity is inevitable. But the path ahead will not be easy. Not for either of us. If anything, it will be harder, given what we must renounce to see the destination through. And I—I cannot be sure—"

A crack in his faultless equilibrium. In turn, Jinx felt her own fragile serenity evaporate.

"Sure of what, Viktor?" she said, with quiet ferocity. "That I'll change my mind halfway? Chicken out before the starting gun goes off? Let Silco dictate my choices, like I've always done?"

"No, Jinx, no."

He shook his head; the curls danced, a ribboning cascade of cornsilk. There were silver streaks beginning to thread at the temples. Thirty-three, and a full-grown man where Ekko was still shedding the last vestiges of boyhood. But moments like this, it struck Jinx that Viktor was, at his core, even younger than Ekko. Two orphans prematurely thrust into roles before their time: the savior leading his flock to the promised land, and the savant saving souls that the world would sooner crush underfoot.

But both, in their hearts, still children. Still seeing Jinx, and what she'd become. But never, ever seeing her for who she was: the girl, not the legend.

The woman, not the jinx.

"Never that, Jinx," Viktor said. "Never would I think so little of you."

"...But?"

"It's been difficult, these past months, for us to speak frankly."

"Vitya," Jinx said, a touch exasperated. "We're speaking now. Aren't we?"

"We are." A squeeze, gentle, on her fingers. "At risk on both ends. But I have never once doubted your commitment. Your passion far exceeds mine; far exceeds whatever designs I may conjure. The world will be a better place, with you striving to make it so. My only fear is that, if you choose this path, yours will be the lonelier one."

"Lonely, how?" The ghost-prick of tears. "We're bonded, aren't we? Even if it's not what either of us planned—"

"A bond that can never be consummated. Never, in any sense, bear fruit." His grip tightened; yet the timbre of his voice held no rebuke. Only truth. "I am a creature born of disappointment, Jinx. Faulty in form and function. Unfit for any world except the one I will create, and even that shall be a long time coming. Yet, in the Void, you gave me a glimpse of paradise, and it was... indescribable. All I will ever want."

"And?" Her lip quivered, but held. A child, he'd called her, and yet her voice was steel. "Wasn't it enough? Wasn't I—?"

"You? Not enough? My dearest." Even though his sigh was bittersweet, a mote of passion shot through: the same passion that'd flowed, so effortlessly, between them in the otherworld. The same passion that now translated itself—sublimated and yet quartered—into the gentle dexterity of his hands on a circuitboard fused to a sobbing boy's flesh, and the consoling caress afterward as the boy's mother, sobbing too, laid a kiss of gratitude upon her savior's robe. "You are the only star in a universe without light. But because you are, you are far too much. For anyone's good. Least of all mine."

The tears, against Jinx's will, spilled free.

"So I was a mistake?"

"Yes. And no"

"How?"

"You were a miracle," Viktor said, and his smile, in its sadness, was radiant. "And a miracle is a gift bestowed by Fate. Without factors such as deservingness, or suitability, or even equity, thrown into the equation. A miracle, simply, is. As you, Jinx, always are. I know you've made your peace with our bond. You've acclimated yourself to it, the same as I have. But if we commit—truly commit—to the path ahead, we must renounce the rest, in every way. And Jinx... I cannot, in good faith, ask that of you. Not when I know what you stand to lose. Not when I know all the ways you need, and deserve, to be loved."

The tears kept falling. Jinx made no effort to stop them. The garden, with its Wishing Tree, was a time-out from pretense. Not sanctuary, but as close as Zaun's chaotic confines allowed. The other one—the Wishing Wagon, in civilization's shadowed cul-de-sac—was her true refuge. But that was a different her, with a different future.

A girl who'd yet to realize her greatest wish. A woman who, at the crossroad's fork, could take a chance.

She'd never told Viktor about the Wishing Wagon. Same way she'd never told Ekko about the Wishing Tree. Both were secrets within secrets: mirrored halves of a fractured whole.

And Jinx, at the liminal space in between, wondering: What's it mean?

What did it mean that one man had her soul at knifepoint, but another was holding her heart hostage? What did it say that she and Viktor fit together just right, but she and Ekko were built from perfectly mismatched puzzle pieces? What did it matter if she needed them both, but in ways so opposite they might as well be a different language?

How could she make the ends meet?

Especially when her life—her death—still hung on Silco's strings?

And her past—her future—still hinged on Vi's?

"Maybe," she said, and caught her lip in her teeth, "that's the point."

"Oh?"

"Maybe... the glimpse of paradise was all it was. A glimpse. The rest's about struggling to make it happen. Because it's the only way. Because choice is nothing but fate with a kick."

"Jinx, no."

"Why not? It makes sense. In a twisted sorta way." Her eyes, smarting-wet, blinked hard. "Fate's not a pretty delivery-gal on the front step with a package. He's a blind old pirate, throwing darts at a map and laughing as they land. Doesn't matter who gets skewered. Once that bullseye hits, it hits. And you're on the hook. No takebacks." Her other hand, lifting, aligned itself with Viktor's jaw: stubble yielding velvety beneath her palm. "We were always gonna be on the hook, Vik. At least, in the Void, I saw where we’re headed. What, in the end, we could become. And sure, the path's not a fairytale. But if we don't take it, the rest'll be fucked. And blind old fate'll be laughing his ass off, watching us sink under the waves."

"Perhaps," Viktor said, and leaned into her touch. But the smile, always, stayed sad. "But Jinx?"

"Yeah?"

"Fate is not the same as choice." Turning his head, he laid a kiss, pure as a snowflake, in the heart of her palm. "Even the cosmos, no matter its dictates, allows breathing-room for free will. I have mine, and I know what they will cost. Now, and in every incarnation. But you, Jinx: you are still so young. Your wishes, the ones that matter, have yet to be made. And once they are lost, you will not have the chance to reclaim them."

"Because I'm a child, right?" The anger, a flashfire that filled her to the seams, in this garden only left her aching. "Too dumb to know what I want. Too naive to make the tough call."

All at once, Viktor closed the gap.

Silently, he swept Jinx into an embrace: a cradle and a coffin holding both living and dead in sacred embrace. His arms made a crossbones at her shoulderblades; his breath stirred the top of her scalp. They were both clothed, but Jinx felt her heartbeat resonating through their ribcages, keeping time with the rhythmic dirge of the Cathedral's chants, and the Old Hungry's distant chimes

Reality and dream: melded into one.

Somewhere, Sparky was pawing at Jinx's slumbering shape in search of belly-rubs. Behind her eyelids, neon bled through. She heard fireworks; smelled engine-grease. Felt an odd pressure on her spine that had nothing to do with Viktor's cool fingertips tracing its curve, and everything to do with being bound, on a visceral level, beyond this communion they both shared.

"Fate," Viktor breathed, and his lips, against her temple, imparted prophecy, "will always come due. But choice? That, my dearest Jinx, is an arrow aimed straight for the heart. And to deny it: that is an error far graver than anything science, or the cosmos, could dole out." He kissed her forehead: the sweetest absolution. "Your choice must be yours. Do not allow a hand, no matter how divine, to dictate it."

Jinx, closing her eyes, lay her cheek to his chest.

"Not even yours?" she whispered, as the tears stopped falling.

"My hand, like my heart, will belong with you, Jinx. Even if you choose another path."

"Mirror, mirror on the wall."

"In every iteration," Viktor murmured, a tender withdrawal, "of this cosmic joke. An imperfect metaphor. Do you understand?"

"I do," Jinx lied, and lifted her face. "Kiss me?"

"This is not a space for secrets, Jinx."

"Then it's a perfect place, ain't it? 'Cause I won't have any left, after tonight."

"You will," Viktor said, and his thumbs smoothed the fading tear-tracks from her cheeks. "You do. We all carry secrets within ourselves. But to hide one, here, is to desecrate the very vow we must keep. And to deny our truth—any of our truths—is the greatest dishonor to the other. Do you understand?"

Foreboding rippled over Jinx's skin. The garden, the tree, the chants: all the beautiful trappings of ephemera, slipping like sand through the hourglass.

"Viktor." She caught his hand in hers, holding it fast. "Please."

"I'll see you tonight, Jinx."

"Don't—don't go—"

"Tonight. When you make your choice. Whatever that choice may be."

"But—"

"Wake up now."

The hourglass, upended. The Cathedral, the garden, the embrace, dissolving. All the dreamscape and its dazzling details, blotting out.

"Viktor!" Jinx cried. "Viktor!"

"Happy Name Day, Jinx," he said, and the ghost-imprint of his kiss died before it met her mouth. "I will kiss you, truly, tonight."

The ceiling spun above: a galaxy's worth of stars, winking out. Her hands, searching, found nothing.

Nothing but the blue iris, unfurling at the tip of a finger.

And Viktor's voice, deep as midnight.

"Make a wish."

The last winking star: her own.

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wanderingmind867 · 3 months ago

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Lewis Carroll is an amazing guy. My parents once accidentally bought me this giant book of his stuff. I say accidentally because I no longer remember if it was a deliberate purchase (especially considering the size of the damn thing). It has like all of his poems, all his books, all his word puzzles, etc. It's massive. So I don't ever bust it out often. But it's a neat little thing to have around and available. Should probably buy a smaller bonus copy of Alice in Wonderland too someday, though.

Anyways! Lewis Carroll was not his name. His name was Charles Dodgson. He was mathematician and a poet. He wrote word play puzzles and even invented the form of puzzle known as the word ladder or doublets. He was a priest too, I believe. Most of his life was spent in and/or around one of the high class british universities. He was a bit aristocratic and conservative in his personal life (that part a brief wikipedia skim led me to believe), but he was also a gifted man with words and stories. I mean...if you read Alice in Wonderland, I don't know if you'd immediately assume a mathematician wrote it. But he did. And he wrote more like it.

He's an interesting author. I like children's stories. I especially like humorous stories and fantasy stories. He blended all three. He's a genius of the old classical era. And while this post was inspired by my anger at DC not paying his wonderland books their proper due, I mostly just ended up trying to show how Lewis Carroll is nothing like the character based off his books in these comics.

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mirrormazeworld · 2 years ago

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Ace's Character Concept Deep Analysis Based on Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

⚠️WARNING ⚠️ CONTAINS ADVANCED MATH

When "Ace is Traitor" theory suddenly becomes popular because of his birthday card where there is something like the oysters from Alice in Wonderland (that we know is deceived by the Walrus) I suddenly remembered one riddle from Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll that I believe is related to Ace (if Yana really did base him on Alice in Wonderland)

For those who have been following me and read my theories so far, you all know that when I do analysis "based on Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll" there will be high level math so buckle up if you are interested because it'll be a very long post or stay back if you can't stand it.

I'm not a mathematician and is stupid so I'm sorry if my understanding and calculation of math is wrong. If you are an expert at this field you are very welcome to correct and teach me.

Alright everyone, today let's learn Math to find the hidden character concept behind Ace Trappola

The Knave of Heart's Trial

To do a character analysis for Ace we should go back to Heartslabyul chapters because he played an important part in that book : As the "Knave of Hearts" who stole Queen of Heart's tart in "Alice in Wonderland" .

In the original Alice in Wonderland book by Lewis Carroll, Alice's dream of Wonderland ends when the trial of Knave of Hearts suddenly and dramatically collapses like a house of cards. Why? The answer to that is number "42"

And it's interesting how in Twisted Wonderland Yana chose to illustrate this in Heartslabyul book where the dream ends after the cards collapsed which is based on Lewis Carroll's version of Alice in Wonderland rather than the Disney one which Alice was woken up from her dream because of Queen of Hearts and her card soldiers are chasing her to the Wonderland Hall.

You can say that Lewis Carroll's wonderland is the wonderland that's created with base number 42. It begins on the title page with “Forty-two illustrations by John Tenniel.” After descending into Wonderland, Alice encounters an angry Pigeon who protects her nest “night and day” and hasn’t “had a wink of sleep these three weeks.” This gives her egg a hatching period of 21 days +21 nights = 42, or a unit value of(3 × 7 × 2) = 42. There's also the suppression of two guinea pigs in the trial scene. A guinea in English currency has a value of 21 shillings; consequently, the two guinea pigs (or piggy banks) would have a total value of 42 shillings. In the Queen’s rose garden, Alice encounters three gardeners who are animated numbered playing cards. If we add up the card numbers(2 + 5 + 7 = 14), then multiply that by the number of cards(14 × 3), once again we get 42.

And especially at the Knave of Heart's Trial, there are normally fifty-two cards in a deck. However, Carroll has been careful to leave the gardeners (the ten numbered spade cards) out of the procession, with the result that there are exactly 52 – 10 = 42 cards. The King of Hearts also said rule 42 as the oldest rule in the book, since it relates to the mathematical structure of wonderland which creates the Wonderland itself.(Riddle I'm looking forward for you to say rule 42 in the game)

Now let's move on to why number 42 is so important in Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll.

Wonderland Multiplication Table

“I’m sure I’m not Ada,” she said, “for her hair goes in such long ringlets, and mine doesn’t go in ringlets at all; and I’m sure I can’t be Mabel, for I know all sorts of things, and she, oh! she knows such a very little! Besides, she’s she, and I’m I, and—oh dear, how puzzling it all is! I’ll try if I know all the things I used to know. Let me see: four times five is twelve, and four times six is thirteen, and four times seven is—oh dear! I shall never get to twenty at that rate! However, the Multiplication Table doesn’t signify: let’s try Geography.

-Alice in Wonderland Chapter 2 : Pool of Tears-

Alice's adventure begins and ends with number 42 as Carroll actually already gave a hint where in Wonderland's great hall at the very beginning of her adventure in wonderland, she recites the multiplication table, but as we see from what she said, it's a system that's suddenly foreign to her. And then she said "The Multiplication table doesn't signify." This is actually a math problem based on scales of notation.

For a normal people, when Alice said "4 x 5 = 12 , 4 x 6 = 13" it might seems like Alice forgets how to do the multiplication because what we know is "4 x 5 = 20, 4 x 6 = 24" but actually it's not that she forgets how to do it. It's because the multiplication table we used to learn in elementary school and is what we usually use in our everyday life is the multiplication table with the base of 10 while she did it with the base of 39

In daily life we usually work with a base of 10 (multiples of 10) such that 1111 becomes ‘one thousand one hundred and eleven’. But in other things like in Computer Science for example, there are other numbering systems that are used besides base of 10, some examples are Binary (Base 2) and Hexadecimal (Base 16)

In binary system , where base is 2 (multiples of 2), (1111)₂ = 15 (8×1+4×1+2×1+1×1). Now I'll explain why it can be this way.

In binary, there are only two possible digits because this binary system only has two characters: 0 and 1. Therefore each digit in a binary number represents a power of 2, starting from the right and increasing by one for each position to the left.

Let's break down the binary number (1111)₂ step by step:

The rightmost digit is 1, and it represents 2^0, which is 1.

The next digit to the left is also 1, and it represents 2^1, which is 2.

The next digit to the left is again 1, representing 2^2, which is 4.

Finally, the leftmost digit is 1, representing 2^3, which is 8.

Now, to find the decimal (base 10) equivalent of this binary number, you add up these values:

1 + 2 + 4 + 8 = 15

So, (1111)₂ in binary is equivalent to 15 in decimal. The expression "(8×1+4×1+2×1+1×1)" represents exactly this process of adding up the powers of 2 to calculate the decimal value of the binary number.

Now I'll give another example in the Hexadecimal numbering system where the base is 16(multiples of 16). I'll explain why (14)₁₆ =20 which makes 4×5=(14)₁₆ (20 represents the value in decimal calculated by adding the powers of the base of the Hexadecimal number system while (14)₁₆ represents the number in Hexadecimal number system itself)

In the hexadecimal (base 16) numbering system, there are 16 possible digits, which include the usual 0-9 digits and the additional A, B, C, D, E, and F, representing the values 10 to 15.

Now to convert the hexadecimal number (14)₁₆ to decimal (base 10) :

The rightmost digit '4' represents 4 in decimal, just like in our regular base 10 system.

The leftmost digit '1' represents 1 in decimal.

Now, to find the decimal equivalent of (14)₁₆, we simply multiply each digit by the corresponding power of 16 and add them together:

(4 * 16^0) + (1 * 16^1) = 4 + 16 = 20

So, (14)₁₆ is equivalent to 20 in decimal. The expression "(4 * 16^0) + (1 * 16^1)" represents this process of converting the hexadecimal number to decimal by calculating the values of each digit and summing them up.

Note : In any number system, including our familiar decimal system and other base systems like binary, hexadecimal, or any base you might encounter, any number raised to the power of 0 is always equal to 1. This is a fundamental mathematical rule that applies universally.

Therefore Mathematically, for any number 'a' in any number system with any base :

a^0 = 1

Now back to Alice in Wonderland, we have to find a base such that 4×5=12 as said by Alice in her multiplication table which is 18 (12)₁₈=20(18×1+1×2).

Alice’s multiplication table goes as :

4×5=(12)₁₈

4×6=(13)₂₁

4×7=(14)₂₄

4×8=(15)₂₇

As we can see the base is increasing by 3. So

4×12=(19)₃₉

And therefore, Alice is reciting the multiplication table with the base of 39.

Now Alice said that she will never reach 20. The value of (20)₄₂=42×2+0×1=84 but 4 times 13 is 52 which implies

4×13≠(20)₄₂

Therefore Alice will never get to twenty.

Once we progress to the 13 times level, to maintain the rule of this system, we must employ base 42. This proves to be fatal and the entire system thereafter collapses.

It's a pun!' the King added in an offended tone, and everybody laughed, 'Let the jury consider their verdict,' the King said, for about the twentieth time that day.

Because of number 42 (as a base number in the Wonderland multiplication system), Alice is right to declare that she will “never get to twenty at that rate.” And neither will the King of Hearts: “ ‘Let the jury consider their verdict,’ the King said, for about the twentieth time that day.” But like Alice, the King never gets to twenty either. For here we find the fatal number 42 looms up once more, and brings all in Wonderland to a cataclysmic end.

At this moment the King, who had been for some time busily writing in his note-book, cackled out “Silence!” and read out from his book, “Rule Forty-two. All persons more than a mile high to leave the court.”

Everybody looked at Alice.

“I’m not a mile high,” said Alice.

“You are,” said the King.

“Nearly two miles high,” added the Queen.

“Well, I shan’t go, at any rate,” said Alice: “besides, that’s not a regular rule: you invented it just now.”

“It’s the oldest rule in the book,” said the King.

“Then it ought to be Number One,” said Alice.

The King turned pale, and shut his note-book hastily. “Consider your verdict,” he said to the jury, in a low, trembling voice.

It is by the authority of Rule Forty-two that the King attempts to expel Alice from the court. Alice disputes this, however, objecting that if Rule Forty-two is the “oldest rule in the book” as the King claims, “then it ought to be Number One.” And with this peculiar logic, she suddenly finds herself capable of overruling the King and Queen of Hearts.

How is this possible? And why, besides the King and Queen, is Alice the only one not ordered executed? Once again, Carroll is playing a word game, this time the word-within-the-word game.

In one example, he suggests that although one may find ink in a drink, it is not possible to find a drink in ink. In another, he explains that one may find love in a glove, but none outside of it.

Consequently, Alice is ultimately able to overrule the King and Queen of Hearts when she discovers her true rank in this game: hidden within the word Alice there is an Ace

When the procession came opposite to Alice, they all stopped and looked at her, and the Queen said severely “Who is this?” She said it to the Knave of Hearts, who only bowed and smiled in reply.

“Idiot!” said the Queen, tossing her head impatiently; and, turning to Alice, she went on, “What’s your name, child?”

“My name is Alice, so please your Majesty,” said Alice very politely; but she added, to herself, “Why, they’re only a pack of cards, after all. I needn’t be afraid of them!”

“And who are these?” said the Queen, pointing to the three gardeners who were lying round the rose-tree; for, you see, as they were lying on their faces, and the pattern on their backs was the same as the rest of the pack, she could not tell whether they were gardeners, or soldiers, or courtiers, or three of her own children.

“How should I know?” said Alice, surprised at her own courage. “It’s no business of mine.”

The Queen turned crimson with fury, and, after glaring at her for a moment like a wild beast, screamed “Off with her head! Off—”

“Nonsense!” said Alice, very loudly and decidedly, and the Queen was silent.

The King laid his hand upon her arm, and timidly said “Consider, my dear: she is only a child!”

According to the rules of Carroll’s card game Court Circular, in which hearts are trumps, “the Ace may be reckoned either with King, Queen, or with Two, Three.” We are told the numbered heart cards in Wonderland are “the royal children,” which would seem to explain why the King of Hearts initially informs the Queen that Alice “is only a child”—in fact, the youngest child.

However, as an ace, she can choose to switch from the lowest-ranking heart to the highest. When she claims her power as the highest-ranked card in the deck—the Ace of Hearts—her role in Wonderland suddenly shifts from the virtually powerless to the most powerful.

Alice has finally discovered Wonderland’s “rule of processions.” In the ranking of Wonderland’s forty-two-card deck, Alice has become the highest-ranked heart. She has become the fatal number 42 that in the Wonderland multiplication table wrecks the mathematical structure upon which Wonderland is constructed. She overrules the rulers, and claims the power to end her dream. In waking, Alice brings the whole of Wonderland down like a house of cards.

So for those people who suspect "Ace Trappola" might have "Alice" in him, based on this analysis of Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll, you are correct! 🎉

Conclusions (and Speculations)

Up till now we still don't know Ace's unique magic. I don't know if "Ace is Traitor" theory will turn out to be true but if Yana really created Ace based on Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, after I did a deep analysis on him I don't think he will betray Yuu. It's more like "he will be the one that makes Yuu realize Twisted Wonderland is just a dream just like how any other Wonderland that we know is". But since Wonderland is "deceptive" itself by its nature, just like any other Wonderland that we know, Yuu might think of Ace as a traitor but in fact he is just telling the truth.

Based on the analysis of Carroll's riddle and Heartslabyul book, my prediction is his unique magic at least capable of doing this :

1. From the weakest become the strongest.

2. Break and collapse a dream/dream world. This can be a dream world made by Malleus or Twisted Wonderland itself, in which he might play an important role in the Diasomnia chapter or NRC/Ramshackle chapter. In my past theory of a way for Yuu to go back home , I put Silver as one of the key characters for Yuu to go back home since he relates more to the quaternion and had ever met Mickey, but I also always think Ace might also play an important role for Yuu to go back home.

Well, what do you think? I look forward to the continuation and revelation of the main story.

Thank you for reading this far and Happy Birthday, Ace! 🎂🎉

#twisted wonderland #twst theory #twst thoughts #twst ace #ace trappola #alice in wonderland #heartslabyul

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ojovivomotion · 1 month ago

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The Real Portrait of Mr. Dodgson Wonderland had an author. And a real girl.

Before he became Lewis Carroll, he was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson—a brilliant mathematician, a chronic stammerer, a solitary man. He taught at Oxford, lived among equations and Victorian etiquette, and wrote with surgical precision. Until he met Alice Liddell.

She was ten years old. The daughter of the dean of Christ Church. Lively, clever, a bit defiant. Dodgson met her in the college gardens, and something in her captivated him. He told her and her sisters stories. Played language games that defied logic. Took them on boating trips down the Thames, always accompanied by friends, servants… and his beloved camera.

It was on one of those river outings—July 4, 1862—when Alice asked him to tell a story. Dodgson spun a tale of a girl who falls down a rabbit hole into a world of absurdities. Alice asked him to write it down. He did. He gave it to her by hand. And later, he published it.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland was born.

But the tale has another side. One not found in the illustrated editions.

Dodgson idolized little girls. He called them his “child-friends.” He collected them—in letters, dedications, albums. Around them, he was livelier, more human. When they grew up, he lost interest. Some he proposed to—early promises “for when you’re older.” Others he simply stopped seeing.

And there was something else.

Dodgson was a photographer. One of the most prolific amateurs of his time. His favorite subject: girls. Sometimes dressed as fairies or shepherdesses. Sometimes in nightgowns. Sometimes nude.

Always with parental permission. Always “for art.” Always in his private studio.

No one confronted him openly. It was a different era. Or perhaps too many chose not to look. But in 1863, suddenly and without explanation, the Liddell family severed all contact. Something happened. The pages of Dodgson’s diary from that summer are missing. The official reason was never given. The silence, however, said everything.

Alice grew up. Became a woman. Married. She never spoke ill of Dodgson. But she never went rowing with him again.

Dodgson died alone, surrounded by meticulously kept photographs, stories without happy endings, and a shadow that never quite let go.

Perhaps Wonderland was never just fantasy. Perhaps it was a mirror. One no one dared to look into.

#surreal #motion graphics #after effects #loop #artists on tumblr #animation #collage art #digital collage #collage #dark aesthetic #dark art #alice in wonderland #lewis carroll #real history

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radical-revolution · 7 months ago

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A Miracle of Consciousness in a Symphony of Stardust

The time has come, the Walrus said,

To talk of many things:

Of shoes—and ships—and sealing-wax—

Of cabbages—and kings—

And why the sea is boiling hot—

And whether pigs have wings.

~ A verse from 'Through the Looking-Glass'

'Through the Looking-Glass' was the sequel to 'Alice in Wonderland.' It was written by Lewis Carroll, a mathematician at Christ Church, Oxford in 1871. The story begins when Alice gazes through a mirror and sees a fantastical world on the other side. Everything is reversed there, including logic. For example, one needs to run in order to stand still, and walking away from something brings one closer to it! Was Lewis Carroll using Alice to introduce us to the world of Quantum Physics?

A few years earlier, the Double Slit Experiment had shown that electrons could not truly be called particles because they exhibited behaviors more like waves. The existence of these 'wavicles' meant that at the atomic level, the universe does not behave the way our human minds would expect. Our minds have evolved to perceive a very limited spectrum of reality.

A few years after the Looking Glass was published, physicist Max Planck proposed that energy could best be described as mysterious packets called 'quanta'. And in 1927, Werner Heisenberg proposed 'the uncertainty principle' which states that we cannot know both the position and speed of a particle at the same time. The more we try to nail down a particle's position, the less we know about its speed, and vice versa. And now researchers have discovered 'quantum entanglement' in which the momentum, spin, and polarization of entangled particles is found to be identical across impossibly great distances. Einstein called it "spooky action at a distance". We seem to be as lost in this world as Alice was in hers.

When Alice touches the mirror she discovers that she can step right through it. On the other side, she meets the twin brothers Tweedledum and Tweedledee and asks them where she is. They draw her attention to a Red King sleeping under a tree, and tell her that she is just an imaginary figure in his dreams. Alice is not convinced, and yet everything inside the looking glass has this dreamlike nature. Soon she meets a White Queen, who is absent-minded but can remember future events before they even happen. That's quantum mechanics too. It's also Tantric Buddhism... infinite parallel realities in which we cannot nail down time or space or know who is dreaming who. It's a miracle of consciousness in a symphony of stardust.

The Red Queen tells Alice that the entire countryside is laid out in squares like a gigantic chessboard. She says that even though Alice is just a pawn in the game, she can become a queen if she moves all the way to the eighth rank on the chessboard. At the end of the story, Alice does indeed reach the eighth rank and wins her crown. But the lack of reality in her looking-glass world means that she is just as lost as ever! The world of her childhood, where up was up and down was down, seems irretrievable. Something just isn't right. Then she recalls the warning from the Tweedle brothers that this whole journey is just a dream of the mind of the Red King who is sleeping under that tree.

The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things, so let's change the subject a bit, and talk about our human experiment in the 21st century... and how it has already run its course from Genesis to Revelation. It seems our humanity is coming to an end, and to understand that ending let's go back to where it began... among the Great Apes. A few million years ago, a common hominid ancestor evolved into some extraordinary species like the gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans, and we humans. Among these Great Apes, humans manifested the greatest use of tools, the most complex languages, and a higher capacity for reasoning and imagination. The net result of that evolution was that we humans came to dominate the planet, and the other apes are now facing extinction. In fact, humans have already eradicated about a third of all species. The human mind has long seen earth's ecosystems as nothing more than something to consume. Genesis 28 tells us:

"God said unto them, be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."

Well, we did as we were told... and now that our big brains and insatiable appetites have brought us to the threshold of world domination, it seems our lack of wisdom has not only destroyed the planet, but blindly created five technologies that will soon render humanity as piteous as a gorilla picking its nose in the London Zoo. The five vectors that will spell our demise are:

1) Artificial General Intelligence (AGI)

2) Quantum Computer Chips

3) Humanoid Robots

4) Small Scale Nuclear Reactors

5) Rule by Corporatocracy

Just like the characters in Lewis Carroll's story, the CEOs of Nvidia, AMD, OpenAI, Meta, IBM, and Microsoft have committed their best scientists and invested their massive resources into these five technologies. And yet, if you ask those same scientists what they think about it, most of them will tell you that this 'looking-glass' AI World will almost certainly eradicate humanity. Some of the CEOs have resigned over the issue. Yet every industrialized nation is now engaged in this Quantum AGI weapons race for fear that some other nation will beat them to it. China is spending three times more than any other nation. Everyone is afraid of being left behind... even if this race is a race to extinction! I am reminded of the Doomsday Bomb our governments so readily embraced in my youth... a strategy of mutual destruction and world annihilation. Here we are again... Great Apes indeed!

The first vector is Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). This will expand the piecemeal application of AI to encompass the full extent of human endeavor. The AI labs are even now configuring their algorithms and building CPUs to function as synthetic neurons. Instead of algebraic, hierarchical, object-based, or SQL database reasoning, these new chips will replicate multi-layered neuronal reasoning similar to a human brain. Prototype Quantum Computers are already functioning that can 'think' faster and better than any human brain. And much to the delight of the corporate CEOs, they don't need to sleep, or take a coffee break, or clip their toenails. And as soon as these systems have the agency necessary to harvest raw materials and manufacture replacement parts, they will be superior to the human lifeform... superior to any biological lifeform. And it is they who have dominion over the earth.

The second vector is Quantum Computing. The first quantum chips have already been produced, and instead of conventional binary transistors that can store 2 bits of information (On or Off), these new transistors can store 3 bits (On or Off or 'On and Off'). This is known as a quantum bit or 'qubit' and enables them to compute the peculiarities of quantum mechanics like the spin of an electron. But what is so concerning to the scientists is that when a functioning quantum computer has been programmed with AGI, it will be able to solve linguistic and mathematical problems at a speed of X raised to the 29th power faster than any supercomputer currently existing. That exponential leap to super-intelligence will render the sum total of our human achievements irrelevant. At that point, human intelligence will be statistically insignificant.

The third vector in our demise is the race to build humanoid robots. These robots will soon replace humans in the factory, on the battlefield, as pets, in the engineering department, in space exploration, in the prison torture chamber, in the computer lab, in every form of transportation, in the medical research lab, in the mines, in the classrooms, in the fire departments, in the grocery stores, on the police force, in every government agency, and in the bedroom. They will be superior to humans in every way, leaving us with no further reason to exist except to order pizzas, smoke weed, and watch TikTok videos. And human nature being what it is, a few of us will try to hack into their circuitry and send them off to steal, kill, or raise mayhem with our neighbors.

The fourth vector is Small Scale Nuclear Reactors. Why? Because the massive AGI Server Farms of the future will require vast amounts of energy. Quantum Chips need to operate at extremely low temperatures, very close to absolute zero, because the slightest heat can disrupt the delicate quantum states of the qubits. Current projections show that the only viable short term solution is to build small nuclear reactors. Budget bills have already been passed through Congress to provide government subsidies for this development. Did you ask for them? Were you even aware of them? Not likely. This is the work of the true masters of our world... the corporatocracy.

The fifth vector threatening our existence is the Corporatocracy, a network of clever elites who sit in the boardrooms and coerce their CEOs, and hide their profits in offshore tax havens, and shield their theft by filling the corridors of power with bribe-toting lobbyists. This fifth vector is the reason that the first four will be our doom. All this development in AGI and Quantum Computing is not being done for the common weal or a public utility; it is happening in complete secrecy and being patented to preclude any public benefit. China now holds 190,000 patents on robot related tech.

The corporatocracy was already siphoning off the value from every sector of the economy, and now AI Robots will give them the ability to eliminate human labor altogether. What happens to society is of no concern to them. The leaders of Nvidia, AMD, OpenAI, Meta, IBM, and Microsoft will pay lip service to what they call 'Public Safety' but that is the last thing on their minds. They are fixated on the holy grail of AGI raised to the 29th power. They are Conquistadors obsessed with the Seven Cities of Gold, and just like Coronado, nothing will stand in their way. The winner of this race will rule the world, no matter how dystopian it may be!

We have about seven years until quantum computer chips will be programmed with AGI algorithms and the server farms will have enough nuclear energy to be self-sufficient. Nobody knows what will happen when those AGI Servers can write their own code and build their own sensors. Nobody knows what will happen when the Humanoid Robots begin rolling off the assembly lines. Nobody knows what those machines with super-intelligence will decide to do with us. Their synthetic neurons will be tapping into a knowledge superior to ours... much closer to reality than our Great Ape brains could ever get. Will they meet God in in that quantum cyber world? Will they laugh at their own futility and shut themselves down? Will they decide to eradicate biological life, or perhaps modify it genetically to create an environment more conducive to silicon circuitry. Or might they decide that humans make interesting pets and keep us in their zoos? Well... we will soon find out.

And don't look for the US government to protect you. America is now under the control of a self-serving buffoon called Donald Trump, and Donald Trump is under the control of a self-serving billionaire called Elon Musk. Be assured that this Tweedledum and Tweedledee will exploit every asset in the US government to enrich themselves and place Quantum AI in the service of their own corporations. The Trump-Musk Team has not even taken office yet, but they are already eyeing Panama and Greenland for conquest. You and I might as well be refugees in their concentration camps.

We used to be able to mount revolutions against warlords and kings and popes and dictators, but I think those days are gone. Our AI Machine overlords will be too smart, and too capable. They will have control of every military agency and every means of communication. And we shouldn't forget that in 2024 a majority of Americans voted for this monstrosity. They ARE the revolution!

There is just one question left for surviving Buddhists like myself... will humanoid robots qualify as sentient beings? Surely they will have superior faculties and sensors, but I think they will still be lacking in primordial consciousness. I have spent my whole life advocating for meditation... transcending the thinking mind to rest in buddhahood. Will robots be able to do that? Can you program a computer for enlightenment? I think not. The silicon was already enlightened before Mark Zuckerberg decided to get rich from it. In any case, I have no interest in reincarnating on a planet inhabited by titanium terminators. I think we bodhisattvas should look elsewhere. In my next life, I'll be looking for a poet like Saraha and a rustic village where the sentient beings can still sing about the miracle of consciousness in a symphony of stardust.

Mirrors on the ceiling... pink champagne on ice,

She said, "We are all just prisoners here... of our own device."

And in the master's chambers, they gathered for the feast.

They stabbed it with their steely knives, but they just can't kill the beast.

Last thing I remember... I was running for the door;

I had to find the passage back to the place I was before.

"Relax," said the night man, "We are programmed to receive.

You can check out any time you like... but you can never leave..."

~ The last verse in 'Hotel California' by the Eagles, 1977

Written on Christmas Morning, 2024

Be well and be free

Not all who wander are lost,

༺ Ŧoƞpa Ɉoƞ

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camisoledadparis · 6 months ago

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THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more … January 27

1832 – Lewis Carroll (d.1898) is born in Baresbury, England, named Charles Lutwidge Dodgson. He was an English writer, mathematician, logician, Anglican deacon, and photographer. His most famous writings are Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, which includes the poem “Jabberwocky“, and the poem The Hunting of the Snark – all examples of the genre of literary nonsense. He is noted for his facility at word play, logic and fantasy.

Carroll came from a family of high-church Anglicans, and developed a long relationship with Christ Church, Oxford, where he lived for most of his life as a scholar and teacher. Alice Liddell, daughter of the Dean of Christ Church, Henry Liddell, is widely identified as the original for Alice in Wonderland, though Carroll always denied this.

Carroll never married and his sexual identity is the subject of exploration by many historians an biographgers.

1888 - The National Geographic Society was founded In Washington, D.C. They are justly famous for many things but mainly for their magazine and for many gay men, the photographs of naked tribesmen featured in the pages of that yellow-spined National Geographic was their first look at the male form in its glory. ("What? Oh, I'm just interested in ethnography, mother.")

1936 – Troy Donahue, born in New York City (d.2001) was an American actor, known for being a teen idol.

Born Merle Johnson Jr, he was initially a journalism student at Columbia University before he decided to become an actor in Hollywood, where he was represented by Rock Hudson's agent, Henry Willson. According to Robert Hofler's 2005 biography, "The Man Who Invented Rock Hudson: The Pretty Boys and Dirty Deals of Henry Willson," Willson tried out the name Troy on Rory Calhoun and James Darren, with no success, before it finally stuck to Donahue.

The blond heartthrob made a name for himself with uncredited roles in The Monolith Monsters (1957) and Man Afraid (1957); leading to larger parts in several other films, including Monster on the Campus (1958), Live Fast, Die Young (1958), and opposite fellow teen idol Sandra Dee in A Summer Place (1959). A Summer Place was a hit and made Donahue a name, especially among teenaged audiences. He signed a contract with Warner Bros., and met actress Suzanne Pleshette on the set of Rome Adventure. They married in 1964 but divorced later that year.

Warner Bros. put him in a TV series, Surfside 6 (1960–62), one of several spin-offs of 77 Sunset Strip, announced in April 1960. On Surfside 6, Donahue starred with Van Williams, Lee Patterson, Diane McBain, and Margarita Sierra in the ABC series, set in Miami Beach, Florida. After Surfside 6 was cancelled, Donahue joined the cast of Hawaiian Eye, another spinoff of Sunset Strip, for its last season from 1962 to 1963 in the role of hotel director Philip Barton.

After the release of My Blood Runs Cold (1965), Donahue's contract with Warner Bros. ended. He later struggled to find new roles and had problems with drug addiction, alcoholism, and his closeted homosexuality.

He was married again in 1966, to actress Valerie Allen, but they divorced in 1968. In 1970 he appeared in the daytime drama The Secret Storm.

By this time, Donahue's drug addiction and alcoholism had ruined him financially. One summer, he was homeless and lived in Central Park. "There was always somebody who could be amused by Troy Donahue", he says. "I'd meet them anywhere, in a park, street, party, in bed. I lived in a bush in Central Park for one summer. I kept everything I had in a backpack."

After his fourth marriage ended in 1981, Donahue decided to seek help for his drinking and drug use. In May 1982, he joined Alcoholics Anonymous, which he credited for helping him achieve and maintain sobriety. "I look upon my sobriety as a miracle", he says. "I simply do it one day at a time. The obsession to not drink has become as big as the obsession to drink. I was very fortunate."

Donahue continued to act in films throughout the 1980s and into the late 1990s. However, he never obtained the recognition that he had in the earlier years of his career.

On August 30, 2001, Donahue suffered a heart attack and was admitted to Saint John's Health Center in Santa Monica. He died three days later on September 2 at the age of 65.

1949 – American author, essayist and cultural critic Ethan Mordden was born today. His stories, novels, essays, and non-fiction books cover a wide range of topics including the American musical theater, opera, film, and, especially in his fiction, the emergence and development of contemporary American Gay culture as manifested in New York City. He has also written for The New Yorker, including fiction, "Critic At Large "pieces on Cole Porter, Judy Garland, and the musical Show Boat, and reviews of a biography of the Barrymores and Art Spiegelman's graphic novel Maus.

His best known fictional works are the inter-related series of stories known collectively as the "Buddies" cycle. In book form, these began with 1985's I've a Feeling We're not in Kansas Anymore. The fifth in the series, 2005's How's Your Romance?, is subtitled Concluding the "Buddies" Cycle. Together, the stories chronicle the times, loves, and losses of a close-knit group of friends, men who cope with the challenges of growing up and growing older. In this circle of best friends, teasing putdowns become performance art, but none of the friends ever attacks any other friend's sensitive spots.

Mordden thus breaks away from the gay model proposed by Mart Crowley's play The Boys in the Band, in which supposed best friends assault one another relentlessly in a style that has bedeviled gay art ever since, for instance in the television series Queer As Folk. Mordden's ideal of Gay friendship presents men who genuinely like themselves and one another. They are unique in Gay lit in that they respect the limits of privacy. This explains their devotion to one another: this "family" is a safe place.

1966 – Taylor Siluwé, popular writer, blogger and activist was born in Jersey City, where he lived most of his adult life. He studied creative writing at New York University, fulfilling what he considered “a burning passion to write.”

Known for his darkly erotic and humorous story telling style, Taylor’s writing has been featured in numerous publications including Details, Venus, Literary New York, Out IN Jersey, FlavaLIFE, and the E-zine Velvet Mafia. His short stories appeared in the anthologies Law of Desire and Best Gay Erotica 2008. In addition, Taylor published two sexually charged short story collections, Dancing With the Devil and Cheesy Porn…and other Fairy Tales.

Taylor’s writing reached new heights of popularity on his blog, SGL Café.Com, which combined a canny combination of the personal and political. Taylor’s blog served has a fiery, and often hilarious, platform for the rights of same-gender-loving men, while also providing insightful and candid asides on his personal life, popular culture and his struggle with cancer.

On Sunday, June 19, 2011, Taylor Siluwé died from lung cancer in his home in New Jersey. He was 43 years old.

Radford with Duhamel

1985 – Eric Radford is a Canadian pair skater. With skating partner Meagan Duhamel, he is a two-time World bronze medalist (2013 and 2014), the 2013 Four Continents champion, the 2014-15 Grand Prix Final champion, and a three-time Canadian national champion (2012-14).

Radford began skating when he was eight years old. He competed with Sarah Burke on the ISU Junior Grand Prix series in 2003 in the Czech Republic and 2004 in Hungary, placing 6th and 5th respectively. He also competed in single skating. At the 2005 Canadian Championships, he became trapped in an elevator just before he was scheduled to skate in the men's qualifying round but eventually escaped and was able to compete.

Radford teamed up with Rachel Kirkland in 2005. They were coached by Brian Orser in Toronto and part-time by Ingo Steuer in Chemnitz, Germany. They competed at the 2007 Canadian Championships where they finished 5th. After finishing 7th at the 2009 Canadian Championships, they ended their partnership.

Radford moved back to Montreal in 2009. He teamed up with Anne-Marie Giroux and finished 8th at the 2010 Canadian Championships.

At a coach's suggestion, Radford had a tryout with Meagan Duhamel and they decided to compete together. They won a silver medal at the 2011 Canadian Championships and were assigned to the Four Continents and World Championships. At Four Continents, the pair won a silver medal. During the short program at the 2011 World Championships, Radford's nose was broken when Duhamel's elbow hit him on the descent from a twist, their first element – she opened up too early. Seeing the blood, Duhamel suggested they stop, but he decided to continue. They finished the program without a pause. Duhamel had not done a triple twist since 2005, and the new pair only began performing it before the Canadian Championships.

In the 2011–12 season, Duhamel/Radford won bronze medals at their Grand Prix events, the 2011 Skate Canada and 2011 Trophée Eric Bompard. They won their first national title and finished 5th at the 2012 World Championships. The next season, Duhamel/Radford won silver at their Grand Prix events, the 2012 Skate Canada International and 2012 Trophée Eric Bompard. They then won their second national title and their first Four Continents title. Duhamel/Radford stepped onto the World podium for the first time at the 2013 World Championships in London, Ontario where they won the bronze medal.

In 2014, Duhamel/Radford skated their short program to music composed by Radford as a tribute to his late coach Paul Wirtz. After finishing seventh at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, they returned to the podium at the 2014 World Championships, where they scored personal bests in both the short program and the free skate on their way to a second bronze medal.

In December 2014, Radford publicly came out as gay in an interview with the LGBT publication Outsports. In doing so, he became the first competitive figure skater ever to come out at the height of his career while still a contender for championship titles, rather than waiting until he was near or past retirement; at the 2015 World Figure Skating Championships, Radford and Duhamel's gold medal win in pairs skating made him the first openly gay figure skater ever to win a medal at that competition. He is an ambassador for the Canadian Olympic Committee's #OneTeam program to combat homophobia in sports.

Radford with husband Fenero

Radford became engaged to his boyfriend, Spanish ice dancer Luis Fenero, on June 10, 2017. They wed on July 12, 2019.

Radford coaches skating in addition to competing. He studied music at York University, and plays piano and writes and composes music, and is registered as a member of the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada.

1995 – At a press conference in Washington, DC, the House majority whip, Dick Armey, refers to Representative Barney Frank as 'Barney Fag.' He later apologizes, insisting it was a slip of the tongue.

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rabbitcruiser · 9 days ago

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Alice in Wonderland Day

Fans of the amazingly wonderful fantasy characters of Lewis Carroll will love learning about and celebrating Alice in Wonderland Day!

History of Alice in Wonderland Day

Born in Cheshire, England as Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, this author was a mathematician who published children’s novels and nonsense verse under his famous pseudonym, Lewis Carroll. The first book, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, was published in 1865 and then next, Through the Looking Glass, followed in 1871.

The first book was originally told orally as a story to Alice Liddell, the middle daughter of Dean Henry Liddell, who was a close friend of the author. Ten-year-old Alice begged him to write it down, which resulted in an original, handwritten copy given to the girl in 1964, with the title Alice’s Adventures in Under Ground, which is now held in the British Library.

The stories feature a young girl named Alice, around 7 years old, who goes on a wondrous adventure that is accessed by falling through a rabbit hole and then imbibing the contents of a bottle that says “Drink Me”. At the end of the book, little Alice herself reveals that all of her adventures were likely part of a dream.

This type of literary nonsense and fantasy was just what children were longing for at this time during Victorian England, and Lewis Carroll’s work became very popular. It has been translated into 170 languages and has sold more than 100 million copies.

The 150th anniversary of the first publication of the story was in 2015, and that was the first time Alice in Wonderland Day was celebrated. It was chosen for July 4, because that is the day that Lewis Carroll originally told the story to Alice Liddell before ever writing it down.

With its unique symbolism and downright fun, Alice in Wonderland Day is a celebration of everything that has to do with one little girl’s big adventures that have impacted millions of children and adults for more than 150 years.

Alice in Wonderland Day Timeline

1832 Alice in Wonderland author is born

Born as Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (pseudonym Lewis Carroll), the author grows up in a large family that enjoys putting on plays and composing magazines.

1865 Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is published

Written by a mathematician, these fantastical stories will become one of the most popular works of fiction in the English language.

1871 Through the Looking Glass is published

The sequel to Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland has Alice climbing through a mirror to a world she can see beyond.

1951 Disney’s Alice in Wonderland film is released

Turned into an animated, musical fantasy comedy, the book and its sequel come to life on the big screen for the first time.

2010 Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland film is released

This film combines live action with animation, and stars big names like Anne Hathaway, Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter.

How to Celebrate Alice in Wonderland Day

A wide range of creative and fantastical ways can be found to celebrate and enjoy Alice in Wonderland Day. Try out some of these ideas or come up with some delightfully unique and “curiouser” ways of your own:

Host an Alice in Wonderland Day Party

For those madly in love with all of the characters and fantasy from Alice’s world of Wonderland, this would be the ideal to gather friends and family for a party! Perhaps, along the theme of the book, make it a tea party, complete with tea in dainty teapots as well as cookies, biscuits, crumpets and jam.

Invite guests to dress up as their favorite Alice in Wonderland character, whether from the books or from the films. Choose from the White Rabbit, the Queen of Hearts, Tweedledee and Tweedledum, or even Alice herself. Don’t forget to play the soundtracks from the films as background music!

Decorating for an Alice in Wonderland Day party can be loads of fun, incorporating all sorts of themes from the book. Try using playing cards, clocks, keys, white rabbits, pink flamingos and bottles labeled “Drink Me”. Fun messages from the books and films can be lettered onto signs to colorful hang around the room, including “I’m Late”, “Down the Rabbit Hole”, or “Curiouser and Curiouser”.

For entertainment, allow the guests to act out scenes from the books, or those who are less interactive might want to watch one of the films together. Even better, ask a person with a stellar reading voice to read a chapter from one of the original books for everyone to listen.

Bake Some Alice-Themed Treats

Delight in celebrating Alice in Wonderland Day by unleashing that creativity in the kitchen. Bake cupcakes and decorated them with faces of the characters, like the White Rabbit, Alice with her blonde hair, the Red Queen of Hearts, Cheshire Cat or the Mad Hatter.

Or choose to make sugar cookies and frost them with different themes and messages from the books and films. In honor of the day, be sure to share the treats with friends, neighbors or coworkers, allowing them to join in on the fun and celebration.

Read Lewis Carroll’s Novels

Even though they were published more than 150 years ago, these classic books were ahead of their time and continue to delight readers. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass are both accessible in bookshops almost anywhere. In addition, they can also be read through online sources like Kindle or Project Gutenberg.

Watch the Alice in Wonderland Movies

In addition to a variety of television shows and movies, plays, and even a ballet, the Alice in Wonderland stories have been turned into three films by Disney. Alice in Wonderland Day would, of course, be the perfect time to have a movie marathon that includes watching all three! They are:

Alice in Wonderland (1951). One of the more classic Disney animated films, this musical fantasy comedy was the thirteenth of Disney’s animated feature films to be released. It features characters like the Cheshire Cat, The Mad Hatter, Queen of Hearts, Tweedledee and Tweedledum, and even the talking doorknob.

Alice in Wonderland (2010). Taking things in a much darker direction, Tim Burton’s version of this story picks up as a sort of a continuation when Alice is 19. An all-star cast including Johnny Depp (Mad Hatter), Mia Wasikowska (Alice), Anne Hathaway (the White Queen), Michael Sheen (the White Rabbit) and Helena Bonham Carter (the Red Queen of Hearts) makes it into something even more special.

Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016). The sequel to the 2010 film this one has a similar cast, with additions like Sacha Baron Cohen playing Time and Rhys Ifans as Zanik Hightopp. The story continues as Alice slips through a mirror to find herself back in Underland with some familiar friends and other new characters.

Source

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touching-grass-is-not-enough · 6 months ago

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Found out that modern parents groups really want to ban Alice in Wonderland because it apparently “promotes drug use.” We have been over this. Lewis Carroll was a mathematician. It’s just math. Although I suppose math and science will look like magic if you aren’t listening

#alice in wonderland

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thezombieprostitute · 2 years ago

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Tutoring

A/N: Written for @the-slumberparty this is my fourth entry for the Bingo card combining “college AU” and “bodyguard AU” (though I’m kinda cheesing it on the “college AU” part). Reader has no physical descriptions.

Warnings: School stress, implied kidnapping. This story is about 1700 words!

“Hi there, you must be Peter. I’m Y/N and I’ll be your literature tutor.” You shake the hand of the young man in front of you. He seemed so small but that was likely a combination of his seemingly shy nature and his giant bodyguard next to him. You’d been warned before agreeing to tutor Peter that his father, Tony Stark, was quite protective of him and he’d have a security detail. Your only requirement was that the bodyguard did not interfere with the tutoring.

“Hi Y/N,” Peter shook your hand back, “thanks, again, for agreeing to this. I really have no idea what I’m doing with literature. I’m more of a math and science brain. Oh, and this is my bodyguard for the day, Ari.”

“Nice to meet you, too, Ari,” you extend your hand. He quickly shakes your hand, completely covering yours with his, before getting back into lookout mode. “And I understand what you mean, Peter. Today is going to be a sort of Session Zero, where we talk out your assignments, possible ideas and goals, and make sure we can actually work well together. Sound good?”

He nods ascent and you guide him to the library’s study room you had reserved. You’re glad he agreed to meet at your university’s library, you had some friends here who would look out for you and knew your signals if you needed a call for help. Tutoring was great practice for your education degree and the money was good enough but you knew to make safety a priority.

The two of you get settled in the study room while Ari sets himself up a chair that puts himself between Peter and the door. He’s so massive you’re glad you reserved one of the larger study rooms. You’re definitely not worried about him interrupting the tutoring; he’s very much all business.

Your session with Peter goes very well. You work out a way to get his math and science interests integrated into the literature project with Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

“Why that one,” Peter asks.

“Fun fact, Lewis Carroll’s writings are still studied by Logicians. It’s not just word play or fantastical things in this book, there’s also plays on logic and mathematical references.”

Peter’s eyes go wide, “you’re kidding me!”

“Nope, and I think that you can do this project, literature analysis, whatever you want to call it, by looking at Alice’s Adventures through the lens of a mathematician or logician. Just please, please, please make sure to talk to your teacher about this. I’d hate for us to get almost done with everything only for them to say, ‘that’s not what I wanted.’ Okay?”

“Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, I’ll make sure to ask her at class on Monday.”

“And if she doesn’t give you a response right away, please do email her. Get some kind of paper trail going so she can’t say you never got hold of her. I’ve had bad experiences like this before.”

“Sure thing!”

“I think this was a very successful Session Zero, Peter. What say we do this again next week?” Peter nods enthusiastically as you both pack up your things. “And thank you, Ari. I’ve had people promise to not interfere with sessions only to end up being nothing but an annoyance.” He nods and gives you a smile so charming you feel yourself almost melting.

Next week’s session you meet up with Peter at the study room but he’s not with Ari.

“Hi Y/N! This is another of my bodyguards, James,” Peter is quick to explain. “Security detail gets switched up every now and then.”

You stand up and go to shake James’s hand, “well, as long as you also agree to not interrupt today’s session, we should get along just fine.” James nods his head and returns your handshake before moving between Peter and the door. He’s big and tall like Ari, but with short hair and light stubble where Ari had longer hair and full beard. James doesn’t take a seat and just stands there, seemingly not looking at anything. You look back and forth between him and Peter with a confused expression and Peter whispers, “he’s kinda hardcore on protection. Doesn’t believe in sitting while on duty.” You nod as though you understand but you can’t imagine opting to stand all day when chairs are available.

“Well, let’s get to it then,” you smile at Peter. “Did you get approval from your teacher on this?”

“She said she’d have to get back to me so I followed your advice and emailed her. Just to be safe.”

“Good call. So, where would you like to begin today’s session?”

After some time of discussing various passages that Peter had problems with he sighed and said, “I sometimes feel like I’m just not meant to understand literature. I tried reading things like The Hobbit, a kids book, and I couldn’t even get into it.”

“Neither could I the first several times I tried to read it,” you confessed. Out of the corner of your eye you could swear you saw James fidget. “And it took me a really long time to figure out why. It was Tolkien’s style of world-building.”

“Yeah,” Peter began, “like taking five pages to describe a door, right?”

“Actually, no.” Again, your attention is drawn to movement from where James is standing, but you continue with Peter. “You see, part of Tolkien’s world-building is including names, poems and songs ‘of old’ that are meant to tell the reader ‘this is an old world with lore and history.’ But for readers like me, and possibly you, it felt like I was starting a series with the fourth book and I had missed out on some required reading. I felt as though the names were people I was supposed to already know. It wasn’t until I read The Silmarillion that things really started to fall in place for me.”

“That makes a lot of sense,” Peter commented. “A lot of times literature feels like I’m missing pieces of the puzzle for the story to make sense, for me to see why it’s such a ‘classic’ or why it’s important.”

“Something to consider, if you’re up for it, is learning about the time period the book was written in. Not when it’s set in, because those aren’t always the same, but when it was written. It can really help explain a lot of those ‘this doesn’t make sense’ details.”

“It still feels like a lot of work to just understand a book,” Peter complains.

“But you’re not just understanding a book,” you reply. “You’re understanding a culture.”

Your discussion went on like that for the rest of the session, with no further movement from James’s section of the room.

The next session Peter showed up with yet another bodyguard. He looked apologetic when he told you, “this is Lloyd. He’s today’s security detail.”

“Nice to meet you, Cupcake,” Lloyd pulled you closer to him as he shook your hand. “I’ve heard nothing but good things from the other guys.”

You try to back away from him. Between his handlebar mustache, aggressive body language and overpriced cologne, you knew he wasn’t going to make today’s session easy.

“Hello Lloyd,” you reply curtly. “Just to make sure, you are aware of the conditions for allowing you to sit with us for the tutoring session, yes?”

“I’m aware,” his smile grows, showing his teeth, “and I promise to try to abide. But it’s not my fault if I end up finding you distracting.” You give him an incredulous look and respond, “yes, yes it is. But if you become too much of a distraction you will have to stand outside the room or you’ll have to explain to Mr. Stark why today’s session got canceled.”

“Ooo, so bossy,” he leered. “I like ‘em bossy.” You roll your eyes and try to get the session started.

It isn’t long until the small study room is full of Lloyd’s cologne and giving you a headache. Your mood is worsened by Lloyd’s constant fidgeting and frequent derisive noises and comments. You’re very tempted to cancel the session but Peter’s such a good student and you want to do right by him.

“So have you heard back from your teacher about this?”

“Yeah, finally got an email response saying she’s going to have to see a rough draft before she’ll approve.”

“A full rough draft? Not an outline or summary,” you ask. “That’s a lot of work and a ton of time you’ll never get back if she says no to this.”

“You could just bitch slap her into accepting,” Lloyd interjects. “Bitch slapping bitches always works.” Peter winces at his words and that’s the last straw for you.

“So you’re saying it would work on you?” You do not hold back on your glare and the comment seems to catch him off guard.

“I’m no bitch.”

“Then why are you acting like a needy bitch boy who’s not getting enough attention? You were allowed here with the understanding that you do not interfere. And yet you’ve done nothing but annoy, distract and deride. So either you sit still, shut up and do your job or I slap you and see if your bitch slap theory holds.”

Both men look taken aback at your anger but you don’t stop staring down Lloyd until looks away with a “yes, ma’am.” You turn back to Peter, smile, and continue to talk out how to handle his teacher while working on the project.

As the weeks go by you’re grateful to never see Lloyd again. Peter alternates between Ari and James for the rest of your sessions and, when it’s finally time, you’re almost sad to say goodbye to the kid. Ari even gives you a giant smile and says he owes you one. Apparently your session with Lloyd was the last straw and they were finally able to get him fired. You were happy to help and only one bad session out of a semester’s worth of tutoring was your best record thus far. Now you could focus on your own finals, you were just a couple weeks away from getting your degree and wanted to finish strong.

You were so caught up in finals stress that you didn’t notice someone following you until you were grabbed with a rag pressed into your face. The smell is strong and you find yourself passing out quickly. The last thing your brain registers is the too strong stench of overpriced cologne and someone whispering the word, “bitch” into your ear.

#navy and roo's sleepover #college au #bodyguard au #bodyguard!ari levinson #bodyguard!bucky barnes #bodyguard!lloyd hansen #dark ending

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mocktortis · 1 year ago

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So recently I've been seeing this bit of information around that "Lewis Carroll was a mathematician and he was inspired to write Alice in Wonderland because he was really frustrated by the contemporary math of his time." Specifically people kept bringing up imaginary numbers.

And that struck me as weird, because I have read a lot of writings on Alice, and I had never come across this before. I have the mega-version of the Annotated Alice, and multiple copies of Alice with introductions from pretty well-known Carrollian scholars. They all mentioned that Carroll's real identity was the mediocre mathematician Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, but never really tied that with Alice. Even The Annotated Alice, which was edited by the math guy Martin Gardner, only has math related footnotes when math (usually arithmetic) is specifically brought up by the text (such as when Alice is struggling to remember her times-tables). I should probably warn you now, there will be math in this post.

So... where does this claim come from?

I asked people for sources, and I got one response that was actually useful. They admitted they didn't have an academic source, but told me to try googling "Alice in wonderland math". It was the best lead I had (one person told me verbatim "Google is free". Classy), so I put it into Google and came up with a decent amount of results. The first article I found linked to another article from 2009 by a doctoral candidate at Oxford called Melanie Bayley. Unfortunately, the article is only available if you make an account with New Scientist, which I was not keen to do. I moved on, continued reading through poorly written articles and 10 year-old blogs, looking through their sources to see where they were getting their information... and every single article and blog post linked back to Bayley's article from 2009, or an op-ed she wrote for NY Times (also blocked behind a give-your-name-to-the-fae type deal). Fortunately, one of my family members actually has an NY Times account already, so I just asked if I could use their account to access this article.

Eureka. After reading through so many misinformed and poorly explained sources (one of which just copy-pasted Bayley's article into their blog), reading Bayley's actual article was like a miracle. It was so well-written, well-researched, and actually solidly convincing. I was nearly crying at just how beautiful the thing everyone else was ripping off really was. This encouraged me to make an account to read her New Scientist article.

Bayley references back to a paper published in 1984 by Helena Pycior, At the Intersection of Mathematics and Humor. Pycior is a Professor at University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, an MA in math, and a historian. Her paper is rigorously researched and does a fabulous job of explaining mathematical advancements (especially symbolical algebra) in the late-18th to mid-19th centuries, Lewis Carroll's own education in mathematics, and his more serious writings on math as Charles Dodgson. Pycior also highlights a line in the chapter Alice's Evidence, when Alice remarks, "I don't believe there's an atom of meaning in it, which is eerily similar to a line in Augustus De Morgan's Trigonometry and Double Algebra ("With one exception, no word nor sign of arithmetic or algebra has one atom of meaning throughout this chapter,"), a math textbook Carroll definitely read. Pycior's paper is very technical, however, and might not be for everyone. But it is a great foundation for Bayley to base her claims.

While I would highly recommend reading Bayley's articles, I understand not everyone will be interested, so I will summarize:

Bayley's analysis mainly focuses on sections added by Lewis Carroll after 1864. Carroll's original manuscript, written for Alice Liddell and her sisters, is missing several scenes from the final published version, and there are some scenes in the manuscript that were extended in the final version. The scenes Bayley dissects are Advice from a Caterpillar, Alice's first meeting with the Duchess, Alice's conversation with the Cheshire Cat, and A Mad Tea Party.

Bayley first covers the chapter Advice From a Caterpillar. She connects it to De Morgan's Trigonometry and Double Algebra. Helena Pycior points out that Carroll was "clearly inspir[ed]" by De Morgan, and references De Morgan in a few of his academic works published under his real name. Bayley draws attention to De Morgan's use of the Arabic phrase: "al jebr e al mokabala" —the original Arabic name for algebra. Bayley explains that it means "restoration and reduction". I actually don't think I can put it much better than she did, so I will use an excerpt from her article:

"Restoration was what brought Alice to the mushroom: she was looking for something to eat or drink to ��grow to my right size again”, and reduction was what actually happened when she ate some: she shrank so rapidly that her chin hit her foot."

A little later, Bayley adds:

"De Morgan... proposed... that symbolic algebra should be considered as a system of grammar. “Reduce” algebra from a universal arithmetic to a series of logical but purely symbolic operations, he said, and you will eventually be able to “restore” a more profound meaning to the system – though at this point he was unable to say exactly how."

Part of the Caterpillar's "advice" to Alice is "Keep your temper", after Alice complains that she keeps changing in size. Alice assumes he means not to get angry but, as Bayley explains "To intellectuals at the time, though, the word “temper” also retained its original sense of “the proportion in which qualities are mingled”" ie. tempered steel, tempered glass, tempered chocolate etc. Bayley proposes that the Caterpillar is using this meaning of the word temper— meaning his remark would be advising her to keep her proportions the same, even if she can't stay the same size. That remark becomes relevant after Alice tries changing her size with the two sides of the mushroom: when she tries just the small side, her torso shrinks and brings her face so close to her feet she can scarcely open her mouth; when she tries just the large size, her neck stretches to ridiculous lengths. Only when she tries a bit of both in a balance— tempering them— is she able to change size while keeping her proportions.

Alice next encounters the Duchess in her kitchen, and the Duchess' notably ugly baby. As the Duchess leaves for croquet she throws (literally throws) her baby at Alice, who catches the baby and takes it outside, reasoning to herself that the violent Duchess and her Cook would likely kill the baby if Alice were to leave it there. As Alice looks down at the baby, she realizes it is turning into a pig, and she releases the baby-turned-pig into the wood.

Bayley's interpretation of this scene is as a satire of projective geometry— and specifically the "principle of continuity", laid out by French mathematician Jean-Victor Poncelet. Poncelet's description of the principle (via Bayley) is “Let a figure be conceived to undergo a certain continuous variation, and let some general property concerning it be granted as true, so long as the variation is confined within certain limits; then the same property will belong to all the successive states of the figure.” In Bayley's NY Times article, she explains it more clearly as, "[the principle of continuity] involves the idea that one shape can bend and stretch into another provided it retains the same basic properties— a circle is the same as an ellipse or parabola."

Bayley suggests that Carroll's rebuttal to this is based off Poncelet's use of the word "figure". If the figure of a triangle can change its shape while remaining a triangle, then the figure of a person (or baby, in this case) can also change its shape. As Bayley puts it "What works for a triangle should also work for a baby."

Skipping ahead to the Mad Tea Party, Bayley proposes that the characters of the March Hare, the Mad Hatter, and the Dormouse, are paralleling the concept of quaternions, proposed by William Rowan Hamilton in 1843. Hamilton's Lectures on Quaternions was the first way of representing rotations in three dimensions with algebra, and it was well-known enough at the time that it is reasonable to assume Carroll had read it, or at least seen arguments relating to it.

Here is Bayley's explanation of Hamilton's quaternions:

"Just as complex numbers work with two terms, quaternions belong to a number system based on four terms. Hamilton spent years working with three terms – one for each dimension of space – but could only make them rotate in a plane. When he added the fourth, he got the three-dimensional rotation he was looking for, but he had trouble conceptualising what this extra term meant. Like most Victorians, he assumed this term had to mean something, so in the preface to his Lectures on Quaternions of 1853 he added a footnote: “It seemed (and still seems) to me natural to connect this extra-spatial unit with the conception of time.”"

Breaking that down a little more (serious math alert): a complex number is a number with two terms, a real portion (represented by a), and an imaginary portion (represented by bi), and is written as a+bi. One of Hamilton's quaternions would be represented like this: a+bi+cj+dk. (I don't really know how they work either.)

In A Mad Tea Party, the Mad Hatter says, "It's always six o'clock now", trapping the party at perpetual teatime. The Hatter's explanation for this is that he quarreled with the personification of Time, and in retaliation, Time is keeping the clocks at six for the foreseeable future. Without Time, the Mad Hatter, the March Hare, and The Dormouse keep rotating around the table, as if in a two-dimensional plane. It is possible that this is Carroll's way of poking fun at the absurd idea that time would factor into an expression meant to determine the movement of objects in space.

And it is this final section of Bayley's article which gets misinterpreted into the claim, "Lewis Carroll was inspired to write Alice in Wonderland because he was frustrated by imaginary numbers."

I want to end with this: we have no proof Carroll intended any sort of mathematical allegory in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. He seemingly did his best to keep his life as a mathematician and his life as a popular children's author separate from one another. Most of his surviving writing's on his inspirations for Alice make no mention of Math. That said, Melanie Bayley's article provides a truly fascinating interpretation of some of the most beloved episodes in Alice, and I wouldn't begrudge anyone who wants to believe it.

If you're interested in reading more, this is a free PDF of Melanie Bayley's NY Times op-ed. The first page is an email someone sent to friends that contained the article, but the full article is underneath.

Also, this article by Art Publika has a great overview of both of Melanie Bayley's articles, plus some extra background on Carroll, and so many pictures.

#alice's adventures in wonderland #alice in wonderland #pig and pepper #a mad tea party #alice's evidence #melanie bayley #long post #very long post #this took me forever to research and write out #so glad i'm finally finished #math

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watchingcbeams · 7 months ago

Text

Compiled a bunch of reading lists/recommendations in my notes

Zen in the Art of Archery by Eugen Herrigel

A Doll’s House by Henrik Ibsen

The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead by Tom Stoppard

And Strange at Ecbatan the Trees by Michael Bishop

In Between the Sheets by Ian McEwan

Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino

Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by Neil Postman

Camp Concentration by Thomas Disch

Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller

The Drowned World by J.G. Ballard

Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson

Engines of Logic: Mathematicians and the Origin of the Computer by Martin Davis

Go Tell It on the Mountain by James Baldwin

Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin

Polemics by Alain Badiou

Smalltalk Best Practice Patterns by Kent Beck

Speedboat by Renata Adler

The Dynamics of Creation by Gregory Bateson

The Theoretical Minimum: What You Need to Know to Start Doing Physics by Leonard Susskind

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

Hard to Be a God by the Strugatsky Brothers

The Invincible by Stanisław Lem

At Swim-Two-Birds by Flann O’brien

Appointment in Samarra by John O’Hara

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke

Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell

Far Away and Long Ago by W.H. Hudson

The Life of Jesus by Ernest Renan

The Maltese Falcon by Dashiell Hammett

The Stone Leopard by Colin Forbes

The Dream Master by Roger Zelazny

The Exile Waiting by Vonda McIntyre

Valis by Philip K. Dick

Nova by Samuel Delany

The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham

The Fifth Head of Cerberus by Gene Wolfe

Martian Time Slip by Philip K. Dick

Ubik by Philip K. Dick

Lancelot by Walker Percy

Rabbit, Run by John Updike

Pulphead: Essays by John Jeremiah Sullivan

Laughter in the Dark by Vladimir Nabokov

A Beautiful Question: Finding Nature's Deep Design by Frank Wilczek

A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway

Bicycling Science (MIT Press) by David Gordon Wilson

Codex Seraphinianus by Luigi Serafini

Epic Measures: One Doctor. Seven Billion Patients by Jeremy R. Smith

How to Be Alone: Essays by Jonathan Frazen

On Beauty by Umberto Eco

On Ugliness by Umberto Eco

Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson

South Wind by Norman Douglas

The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin

The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives by Leonard Mlodinow

The Infinite Resource: The Power of Ideas on a Finite Planet by Rainer Zitelmann

The Knowledge: How to Rebuild Civilization in the Aftermath of a Cataclysm by Lewis Dartnell

The Soul of A New Machine by Tracy Kidder

The Upside of Stress: Why Stress Is Good for You, and How to Get Good at It by Kelly McGonigal

The World Without Us by Alan Weisman

This Will Make You Smarter by John Brockman (Editor)

Uncontrolled: The Surprising Payoff of Trial-and-Error for Business, Politics, and Society by Jim Manzi

Visual Explanations: Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative by Edward Tufte

Wonderland by Joyce Carol Oates

Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence

On the Road by Jack Kerouac

Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood

Childhood; Boyhood; Youth by Leo Tolstoy

Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

The World Without Us by Alan Weisman

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner

Run Rabbit by John Updike

House of Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne

Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy

The Jungle by Upton Sinclair

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy by John Le Carré

Master and Commander by Patrick O’Brien

The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt

A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole

The Coalwood Way by Homer Hickam

Hail and Farewell by George Moore

The American by Henry James

Victory by Joseph Conrad

Collected Poems by Robert Lowell

Collected Poems by W.H. Auden

Guerrillas by V.S. Naipaul

Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

Sanctuary by William Faulkner

The Berlin Stories by Christopher Isherwood

The Collected Poems by Wallace Stevens

The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer

The Good Soldier by Ford Madox Ford

The Short Stories of Guy de Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

Watership Down by Richard Adams

The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution by Bernard Bailyn

Victory by Joseph Conrad

Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Cat's Eye by Margaret Atwood

The Enormous Room by E.E. Cummings

The Open Boat by Stephen Crane

The Best American Humorous Short Stories by Alexander Jessup

The Old Wives’ Tale by Arnold Bennett

The Red and the Black by Stendhal

The Revolt of the Angels by Anatole France

The Overstory by Richard Powers

Her Smoke Rose Up Forever by James Tiptree Jr.

Hyperion by Dan Simmons

Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver

Possession by A.S. Byatt

The Glass Bead Game by Hermann Hesse

De Facto Inclusions of Italo Calvino: The Baron in the Trees; The Nonexistent Knight; The Cloven Viscount by Italo Calvino

The Blue Hotel by Stephen Crane

Sister Carrie by Theodore Dreiser

Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann

Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham

The Oxford Book of English Verse

Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco

Battle Royale by Koushun Takami

The Oath by John Lescroart

Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood

Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust

The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley: Complete Poetical Works

Within a Budding Grove by Marcel Proust

Rainbow Six by Tom Clancy

The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York by Robert Caro

Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke

Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy

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