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The afterword for “Speech Sounds” was elucidating. Octavia Butler revealed that she had lost faith in humanity in a misanthropic manner when her friend was diagnosed with myeloma. On a bus ride she had witnessed a fight between two people that highlighted the lengths human beings will go to in order to establish nonsensical and misconstrued differences that allow us to ignore the individual in front of us and only visualize a nonentity in need of an ass kicking. That experience was the catalyst and inspiration behind “Speech Sounds.” This information spoke volumes about the creative process and how artists construct stories from their experiences. However, if you read closely, you notice the prescience that science fiction authors have. Octavia Butler was in a category with Phillip K. Dick and Arthur C. Clarke. Able to make predications about the future state of existence and, while off the proverbial mark at times, hit rather close to home. This passage I extracted from “Speech Sounds” immediately led me to associations from Butlers experience and exaggeration of said experience to the current experiences of society under the COVID-19 pandemic. Language and the way we communicate has irrevocably changed under our new conditions. And analogous to “Speech Sounds,” some people have maintained the ability to fluently communicate and others have been reduced to guttural grunts that resemble “intellectual impairment.” When particular demographics of people express feelings of confinement and imprisonment under COVID-19 SAFETY regulations (with the largest possible emphasis on SAFETY) they do it with actions that resemble “chimpanzees” (as Rye noted in “Speech Sounds”). People choose to burn mask’s rather then productively communicate through different methods. A United States Representative called COVID-19 vaccinations the “mark of the beast” (which implies being vaccinated is the mark of Satan). That is the greatest example I could provide of illness causing language to be be “lost or severely impaired.” This U.S. Representative should be followed around by John Williams “The Imperial March” because she is Darth Vader reincarnated, attempting to destroy the galaxy with anti-intellectual rhetoric. All flights into political fancy aside, we should be able to recover our misanthropic feelings through the method that cured Octavia Butler of her initial pessimism; creative works. Ah, mon cher, take a leap into the creative!

I usually read my copy of The New Yorker while under my veranda, sipping, with my pinky out, a glass of Domaine de la Romanee-Conti with slices of Pule on my gold charcuterie china, while listening to Schubert. However, the other day I was forced to read it over the internet. Blah! How disgusting! Blah, blah, blah! I was flabbergast. The chagrin from such inanity prevented me from immediately posting my notes on the matter. Alas, mon cher, here they are.

“Anton’s crippling inadequacy stemmed, not from the miasmic putrescence of his very being, nor his unbearable predilection with those who dared to be born taller then him, but from his infantile handwriting. Anton would listen to Schubert's “Leise Flehen Meine Lieder” (my songs plead softly) locked in a cupboard (similar to the titular Harry Potter) with a deluge of tears that seeped through the floor and flooded his spiteful parents basement. For, his handwriting was that atrocious. The symbol he associated his writing with was the nails that streaked across chalkboards, penetrating the ears with a terror only tinnitus could cause. Ah, mon cher (my dear) reader, Anton’s handwriting pleaded softly, “don’t read me, for I am hideous.” — Biographer

Since, that has been addressed, as a team (writer and reader) we may eloquently transition to Emily Dickinson.

Surprise is like a thrilling-pungent- Upon a tasteless meat Alone-too acrid-but combined An edible Delight.

We, as a team, clearly notice the powerful message behind Dickinson's brevity. However, what we miss is the material Emily wrote this poem on. It was written on an envelope, concise and confined to small area of the envelope, while close to the adhesive of said envelope. I interpreted this choice to write on an envelope as a representation of a flash of inspiration, rather than, a well thought out poem. We typically retrieve mail and open it in our kitchens, or around the kitchen. Most of our belongings gravitated towards the kitchen table when we first receive it. Ergo, we may look at the subject matter of the poem, which is surprise commingled with food, and reach the contrived conclusion that Emily Dickinson wrote these four sentences out of necessity. Inspiration forced her hand and the only material around her was an envelope. Thus, her inspiration was written on an envelope, with adequate room left behind for further development of her initial idea. However, as writers can attest too, scrape pieces of paper with half-baked ideas usually amount to nothing. That’s why I made the association that inspiration is a form of surprise. It has a pungent quality that makes a mundane and oblique life be filled with a momentary delight. A delight that forces one to grab any object around them in which to transcribe an epiphany. However, we need that mundane (that tasteless meat). Otherwise, surprise would lose its value and be “acrid”. How come we can have a flash of inspiration or motivation in one moment when we were completely barren from inspiration or motivation moments before? We do not choose to be inspired! It simply arises in consciousness at that particular moment. Ergo, we can’t choose surprise. Otherwise, we would become apathetic to surprise. We need the backdrop of tasteless meat, we need a lack of Free Will, for surprise or inspiration to have the euphoric quality that it possess. The day we consciously choose to be surprised, or to have inspiration, is the day its ceases to have its appeal. Therefore, let us continue to associate surprise or inspiration with agency, rather then the blunt truth; that both simply arise in consciousness, despite our opinion on the matter.

I’ll tell you about a hoax! The idea that we would have covered all these topics in class! We wouldn’t have even got past the title! Which is why I have enjoyed the opportunity to expatiate upon these topics further in our asynchronous class. Analogous to Poe in “The Balloon Hoax” I have the opportunity to talk about topics that interest me, assimilating into the analysis my own knowledge of the subject, with the possibility it may all be nonsensical and proverbial cannon fodder. However, that doesn’t make it any less fun. What interested me the most about “The Balloon Hoax” was the possibility that Poe had littered his fake periodical with enough evidence for the laymen to discover that this balloon, that reportedly crossed the Atlantic in three days, was indeed a hoax. For me, it wasn’t in the accounts of the travelers. Or, the peculiar descriptions of the voyage itself. In which the Balloon was able to go forty-five miles per hour across an ocean, yet not inhibit clear communication between the gallant voyagers. Or, cause any of the voyagers to be swept up by ferocious winds and be blown off. In fact, from all accounts the voyage was as smooth as a walk in the park. Any person could chalk that up to the exaggeration of a past event that we are all privy too. The hoax therefore was obscured in the details of the dimension of the balloon. If we were to be earnest, that was the section of the counterfeit article that produced the most boredom. We want to read about the Large Hadron Collider, only if the information provided is about particles colliding into one another and creating miniature black holes. No one wants to read about the specs. Ah, mon cher, did you know the large hadron collider is composed of this many screws? Of course not! Poe had to be methodical in his hidden (in plain sight) clues that this periodical was false. He understood that certain paragraphs of information, when they delved into the most analytical of details, were the junctures in which readers would skim through. Eo ipso (thereby), one might miss the line hidden within those minute and nuanced dimensions (e.g., the line “The car is much smaller and lighter, in proportion, than the one appended to the model.”). One could easily read the measurements and find them concurrent with the rest of the fake article. Never taking into consideration how small this “flying machine” would actually be if the measurements were taken seriously. And, if the measurements were off, then the account of five people supposedly on the “flying machine” must be fabricated too.

americanrussiananton

What form of torture was this? If “The Evening Post” was weekly, I have pity for the poor chap that had to read this gallimaufry of miniscule writing that only an ant could read; if that ant had a microscope. Then be subjected to the same trials and tribulation at the start of the every successive week. Was each edition of “The Evening Post” handed out with magnifying glasses and an antediluvian form of Lasik eye surgery from the inevitable strain? The cause of my strain to read this could be in part the presentation of the document. I truly don’t know if the document as a whole constituted an entire page of “The Evening Post” or if the document was segmented. I would say the advantages of small lettering is the obvious inclination to look at lettering that is bold, italicized, or capitalized (e.g., Ill read a headline, yet, avoid reading the smaller text underneath. But, still have the audacity to repeat what I read in the headline as if I read the entirety of the article).To avoid the abhorrent size of most of the content, I immediately gravitate towards dates and subject titles, which are treated with a readable gravitas! Ergo, my eyes are spotlights strobing the document for any relevant lettering that is actually readable from a simple glance. Which allows me to notice the interesting dichotomy between size and the number of letters. The five letter word “Ships” stands out because it is colossal in comparison to “In Bankruptcy.” This could be cast aside as a minor issue dealing with format. Or, I could wear my tinfoil hat and cry “CONSIPRACY!” Eo ipso (thereby), capturing your attention to a greater degree because of the unavoidable size I made the word “conspiracy” appear in. You might have even forgot already the minor error we could attribute to formatting issues. Because the real crime is attracting my attention to meager ships instead of the pertinent information included in the section of “In Bankruptcy.” Perchance, I was distracted by the section “Ships”, grew bored of such a dull subject and threw the paper away, missing the vital information that my accountant or family member was mentioned in the “In Bankruptcy” column. Therefore, by my own biased Prownian analysis, I would have described a newspaper as a fallible form of entertainment/news. Allowing the reader to pick and choose what was important. With the possibility that I could miss vital information because of the allure of text that appeared from a few glances degrees more accessible.

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First, in paying attention to details and working backwards to find significance, lets start with the narrator and Dupin “arm in arm...roaming far and wide.” Then lets work backward, they went from being shut in a dark room lit by a few candles deeply invested in books to a stroll with a jubilant gait. I found this funny. Imagining them serious and obsequious in their own work, to carefree and hunky-dory. Perchance, it elucidates the ad hoc break we need from analytical analysis. Whatever form that takes. Simple ingenuity in the case of “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” takes the form of a headline in a periodical. Ah, mon cher, this article reads, “A grizzly murder,” thus the cause could only be a man imagined with the razor fingernails of a grizzly bear. Or a man imagined to have the cruelty we attribute to such animals that kill grizzly bear cubs in order to entice the mother of the cubs, female grizzly's, to forget about their progeny, and birth new ones (Ah, yes, mon cher, for the sake of having their own cubs, grizzly bears will kill the cubs of single grizzly bear mothers). It doesn’t take much effort to read a headline and allow the imagination to run away in different fantastical directions. However, true analytical power requires the ability to read past the headline of the article, to read the content of the periodical; the details and evidence that point a certain direction, and still allow the imagination to form different conclusions. The animal that kills women in a gruesome fashion and leaves all money behind could be a self-conscious animal we call human. But, it couldn’t scale up a building by mere acrobatics alone. The strength it would require to accomplish such a feat would be the same strength required in the atrocious killing itself. In a way, it takes no strength or effort to sift through a periodical, find the most revealing headlines and titles, and make up our mind that we have reached the only obvious conclusion. While, it takes an analytical mind to read further, and to reach the meat of the periodical that would allow us to reach the conclusion that our killer is not a monster in human form, but a orangutan, which can be a monster when released into the public with a razor blade.

What form of torture was this? If “The Evening Post” was weekly, I have pity for the poor chap that had to read this gallimaufry of miniscule writing that only an ant could read; if that ant had a microscope. Then be subjected to the same trials and tribulation at the start of the every successive week. Was each edition of “The Evening Post” handed out with magnifying glasses and an antediluvian form of Lasik eye surgery from the inevitable strain? The cause of my strain to read this could be in part the presentation of the document. I truly don’t know if the document as a whole constituted an entire page of “The Evening Post” or if the document was segmented. I would say the advantages of small lettering is the obvious inclination to look at lettering that is bold, italicized, or capitalized (e.g., Ill read a headline, yet, avoid reading the smaller text underneath. But, still have the audacity to repeat what I read in the headline as if I read the entirety of the article).To avoid the abhorrent size of most of the content, I immediately gravitate towards dates and subject titles, which are treated with a readable gravitas! Ergo, my eyes are spotlights strobing the document for any relevant lettering that is actually readable from a simple glance. Which allows me to notice the interesting dichotomy between size and the number of letters. The five letter word “Ships” stands out because it is colossal in comparison to “In Bankruptcy.” This could be cast aside as a minor issue dealing with format. Or, I could wear my tinfoil hat and cry “CONSIPRACY!” Eo ipso (thereby), capturing your attention to a greater degree because of the unavoidable size I made the word “conspiracy” appear in. You might have even forgot already the minor error we could attribute to formatting issues. Because the real crime is attracting my attention to meager ships instead of the pertinent information included in the section of “In Bankruptcy.” Perchance, I was distracted by the section “Ships”, grew bored of such a dull subject and threw the paper away, missing the vital information that my accountant or family member was mentioned in the “In Bankruptcy” column. Therefore, by my own biased Prownian analysis, I would have described a newspaper as a fallible form of entertainment/news. Allowing the reader to pick and choose what was important. With the possibility that I could miss vital information because of the allure of text that appeared from a few glances degrees more accessible.

americanrussiananton

Description: The image of "Death and Liberty" painted the parliaments wielding of laws as a misuse of power employed to protect religion, the crown, and loyalty while the proletarians (common people) suffer from slavery, starvation, murder, and accusations of immorality and blasphemy.

Assumptions: The image was self-deprecating. It portrayed the proletarians attempts for reform as sweeping death to the establishment. Radical reform was depicted as a phantasmagorical entity that assaults Lady Liberty. The image assumed that the audience would resonate with the demonic representation the establishment and bourgeoisie pinned on to the common people.

What's Obscured: Obviously, there was no defence, or rebuttal, from the oppressive establishment. Any response by them would reaffirm the shield they were hiding behind and the loyalty they coveted. What was obscured from this image was the possibility that this changing tide in ideology was also taking root in the establishment.

Significance: Similar to my criticism of Percy Shelley's "Ozymandias", symbols are used to aggregate depictions of grasps for power in a manner that vilifies a certain figure/party/ideology. The statue of Ozymandias and the adamantine sword of laws held by Lady Liberty portray the disastrous effects of unchecked power/ unchecked grasps for power.

americanrussiananton

Percy Shelly's England in 1819 comments on the oppression from Parliament and the establishment depicted in "Death and Liberty." Percy Shelley travels a layer deeper to comment on the ambivalent stance of the rulers of his country. Dying Kings can't see the "people starved and stabbed in th' untilled field." The use of laws and institutionalized religion only make matters worse when it is employed to exacerbate the oppression of the proletarians/common people. If the laws enacted at that time to protect the establishment were simply unrepealed, England as a whole, would be able to see the negative effects that are leading to daily and ubiquitous "tempestuous days." The countenance of an army doesn't demonstrate power in Percy Shelley's eyes, however, elucidates the cowardice that power hides behind.

These notions are recapitulated in Percy Shelly's "Ozymandias". We want to use symbols to construct kings and rulers as successful conquerors, instead they are the demise of their own kingdoms/regimes. We want to see decimated kingdoms/failed states as great and immortal. However, when one figure or body grasps for power and immortality, it only ends in a society's destruction. Ozymandias, the king of kings, claim to power left his kingdom in ruins.

Description: The image of "Death and Liberty" painted the parliaments wielding of laws as a misuse of power employed to protect religion, the crown, and loyalty while the proletarians (common people) suffer from slavery, starvation, murder, and accusations of immorality and blasphemy.

Assumptions: The image was self-deprecating. It portrayed the proletarians attempts for reform as sweeping death to the establishment. Radical reform was depicted as a phantasmagorical entity that assaults Lady Liberty. The image assumed that the audience would resonate with the demonic representation the establishment and bourgeoisie pinned on to the common people.

What's Obscured: Obviously, there was no defence, or rebuttal, from the oppressive establishment. Any response by them would reaffirm the shield they were hiding behind and the loyalty they coveted. What was obscured from this image was the possibility that this changing tide in ideology was also taking root in the establishment.

Significance: Similar to my criticism of Percy Shelley's "Ozymandias", symbols are used to aggregate depictions of grasps for power in a manner that vilifies a certain figure/party/ideology. The statue of Ozymandias and the adamantine sword of laws held by Lady Liberty portray the disastrous effects of unchecked power/ unchecked grasps for power.

The moment I opened Pinterest I laid my eyes upon the double helix of DNA. I read this quote by Stephen Jay Gould and spent the next fifteen minutes sifting through this great paleontologists quotes. Whether reading quotes about Gould's stalwart Atheism, his bohemian thinking that there has been those with the intellect of Einstein who have died in cotton fields and sweatshops, or his illuminating view on evolution and the nature of history, the only content I had access to was Gould's. I immediately recognized the bias built into this platform (Pinterest). I wasn't met with quotes of St. Augustine or St. Aquinas, but instead, quotes that predominantly conformed to my own views. Which is great! I want to be reassured of my worldviews, however, it shows the limitations of Pinterest. While it is a fairly diverse platform with a plethora of diverging ideas, it's run by an algorithm that understands I will be less likely to visit the website if photos appear and I disagree with there central tenets. A way to overcome or situate this bias would be a feed that compares and contrasts the images that percolate in my feed. This Anton kid enjoys the work of Evolutionary Biologists. BAM! Right next to it is a photo with a message by a theologian. It would be interesting if pinterest was able to gauge—when you first signed up—your particular leanings. What's Anton's political stance? What's Anton's stance on establishment? What could I do as an app to curate an experience that caters to both? If I can ask these questions as a platform, am I conscious?

I want to sperate the lines on this page. 'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings,' should be double spaced between the line before and after it. There are a few iterations of Percy Shelley's "Ozymandias" on Pinterest. Some are remade fan collections, one is the Epilogue to a Marvel comic from 1968 about Ultron, another ones from "Watchmen", and a few are snippets of the most famous part of this small poem. However, the image I chose was the most compact version. "Ozymandias" is fourteen lines in every iteration, however, this image (taken from a book) is the only version that makes me realize how short fourteen lines truly are. It in no way diminishes this fantastic poem, but it almost steals and takes away the grandiosity. As if such an illustrious poem could be this small—a quaint—paragraph in a book that any reader could miss. Pinterest made me appreciate the other versions of "Ozymandias" that provides Percy's lines proper spacing and the diligence it deserves.

Say Hello to Nectocaris! Nectocaris is a five hundred million year old species from the Cambrian Period discovered in the Burgess Shale. It was dubbed "swimming shrimp" because of its perceived anatomy. Further analysis provided a different anatomical configuration that most would laugh at. Look at that cone nose! However, Nectocaris is a beautiful example of the inherent diversity of nature. This is one of the saved photos I have on Pinterest. I'm a huge fan of Pinterest. Especially, since it's marketed as a discovery engine for ideas. Pinterest, similar to nature, is innately diverse too. It provides so many different avenues of discovery. Its a visual tool for learning. It provides you with captions and links. However, the first thing you see is an image. How do you provide literary criticism in a image Anton? Great question! First, you attract the attention of the reader with eye popping colors! Then you direct said reader towards your caption or link. The equivalent to Pinterest and literary criticism is a crazy wall or an evidence board. You're drawing conclusions from the diverging connections of photos and the ephemeral digital strings that attach them!

Pulling and Beating! Every beater and pullers favorite eighteenth century job. Phillip Gaskell said, "Presses were sometimes worked by a single pressman...who beat...and pulled alternately. " However, I want to focus on the dynamic of two pressmen—beater and puller. The sun shined and half blinded both. The city stank of shit (based on what Patrick Süskind said in "Perfume"). The pressmen (beater and puller) were at each other's throats, mumbling vulgar imprecations. Fights even broke out. However, here was the process that allowed pressmen—beaters and pullers—to make book magic!

1) The senior pressman was tasked with making the press ready.

2) The younger pressman "knocked up the balls and prepared the ink."

3) The beater "moved his balls over the forme" (I know how it sounds, but let's be adults!). The rest of the time the beater "distributed the ink over the surface of the balls."

4) The beater looked over the last printed sheet as it "layed on the horse to see that it had no obvious blemishes."

5) The puller "lifted a sheet of clean paper from the heap and laid it on the tympan."

6) The puller lowers "the frisket and folded tympan, paper, and frisket together down on the forme."

7) The puller takes the handle of the windlass (the rounce) and gives it one full turn anti-clockwise. With his right hand, the puller grasps the crooked bow of the bar and gives "one strong straight pull."

8) The beater "pushes the bar back onto its catch after the pull."

9) The puller gives "the rounce another half turn anti-clockwise" and pulls again.

10) The puller lifts the new-pringed sheet and lays it on the horse. Then turns to the next sheet.

This cycle repeats every 14-15 seconds to produce 250 sheets an hour. That's what I call fun under the sun!

I got the photo from this link:

https://www.history.com/news/printing-press-renaissance

In the 15th century, an innovation enabled people to share knowledge more quickly and widely. Civilization never looked back.

anotherdarkarchive

americanrussiananton

Title: "The Bright Gleams From a Dark Side" New York 2021

Description: For an artist that tries to provide meaning to objects in a jar, Henry James provides inspiration:

"We work in the dark—we do what we can—we give what we have. Our doubt is our passion, and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art."

—Henry James

#artistic #meaningful #friendly #honest

Here is my Wundertopf; my jar and lid.

Inside I have placed:

The brain!

Books!

Music!

A chess piece!

God!

The universe!

The imagination!

Hallucigenia!

Myself!

And last but not least...Vladimir Putin.

Dr. Seuss says, "Oh, the places you'll go!'

I have an addendum:

"Oh, the places the mind will go!"

Tumblr, in case I don't see ya (again), good afternoon, good evening and goodnight!

The penultimate object/concept that I've placed in my jar is a book. Specifically,"Your Brain is a Time Machine" by neuroscientist Dean Buonomano. This single book is supposed to represent all books. To start with, "Your Brain is a Time Machine"—besides being a catchy title (and true)—allows the reader to explore the paradigm that Physics holds of time (Eternalism) and the paradigm that Neuroscience holds of time (Presentism). Albert Einstein once said, "For us believing physicists, the division into pass, present and future has merely the meaning of an albeit obstinate illusion." That's because Albert was a practicing Eternalist. His theory of relativity elucidated that the past, present and future coexist all at the same...wait for it...TIME. That's why Albert calls the division between the past, present and future an illusion. Dean Bunomomo educates the reader by explaining that time is the most commonly used noun in the English language, and that most neuroscientists are Presentists. That is to say, the past and future don't exist, only the present exists. From the perspective of the brain, presentism seems to be true. However, the external world seems to abide by eternalism. While exploring this terrain, and amalgamating neuroscience and physics, Dean Bunomomo makes an excellent case for why our brain is a time machine. Just try it out! Mentally time travel! Revisit your past, or imagine your future. We all do it on a daily basis. Dean ends the novel by asserting that, "each of us is given 86,400 seconds every day. We should view our parcels of time, particularly our free time, as packages to be wrapped and gifted to the people and activities we value the most." Besides music, every object/concept I've placed in this jar has been associated with a book I've read. Reading is a daily exercise for me that I take with great pride. What I read seeps into everything that I do. What I read has come to define the concepts and objects that I've placed into this jar. What I read is who I am! I am proud to have been able to share it; what I read and what it inturn conjures up in my imagination.

My last object/concept to be placed in the jar is music. I straightened out two paper clips. Twisted the paper clips to intertwine. Then bent the paper clips to create makeshift "legs". I proceeded to glue and tape a picture of David Bowie as Ziggy Stardust to the paper clip "body". Music was added to the jar because I've utilized music to write each explanation of the objects/concepts that I've chosen to place in my jar. I've also used music as a means to guide me down particular trajectories of inspiration. Inspiration is what you need when filling an empty jar with objects/concepts. In this way, music has a lot of power, especially in sparking the imagination. It took some introspection to acknowledge music was a part of this entire process. Ergo, I added music to the jar. Can't you hear it? The menial sound of Space Oddity emanating from the jar? "3...2...1...liftoff! THIS IS GROUND CONTROL TO MAJOR TOM!"

I added an actual object that I found in my house: a chess piece. Specifically, a rook. I play chess everyday. I thought of adding a chess piece to the jar in the middle of a chess game. To be perfectly earnest, I watch more chess than sports. A few days ago on Super Bowl Sunday, I had watched a chess tournament between the best players in the world rather then watching the Super Bowl. Perchance, the reason I enjoy Chess to such a degree is the thought process behind it. At times you notice a pattern and calculate moves. However, most of the time you make a move and hope it works. It trains the mind to find patterns and capitalize on them.

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