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Men who live by laws and rules are parasites. Others shed their strength to bring these laws out of nothing into the light of day, but the law-abiders live at their ease—they have conquered nothing for themselves.
― David Lindsay, A Voyage to Arcturus
“David Lindsay is at once one of the most remarkable and one of the most tragic figures in 20th-century literature. Anyone who is willing to read his work patiently, from that amazing fantasy A Voyage to Arcturus to the strange unfinished torso called The Witch, will agree that the man was a towering genius whose mind is cast in the same mould as that of Dostoevsky. The Philosophical Aphorisms published in 1972 in the Scottish magazine Lines reveal him as a thinker who deserves comparison with Nietzsche. His problem was simple. Ordinary technical ability, the literary talent that so many third-rate novelists possess in abundance, was denied to him. As a result, his works have simply failed to reach a wider audience, and remain confined to a small band of ardent admirers. For example, this novel, Sphinx, has been out of print ever since it first appeared in 1923. Yet anyone who is willing to take it seriously—that is, to put into it the same kind of energy he might put into reading acknowledged masterpieces like Joyce's Ulysses or Proust's Remembrance of Things Past—will agree that it is a work of power and originality, with a haunting quality that is uniquely its own.
(…)
Let me take a deep breath and try to summarise Lindsay's ideas, for the benefit of readers who are discovering him for the first time. The tremendous problems of his life tended to make him pessimistic. In his Philosophical Notes (263) he writes: 'Deep depression, even to the extent of a breaking heart; then a sudden flashing light of joy and defiance—that is when the Sublime appears in its elemental purity.’ Every writer knows what he means: immense disappointments that seem to drain all your courage and batter you to your knees, and then that sudden upsurge of pure strength and optimism that seems to sweep away all doubts. It was a sensation experienced over and over again by men I called (in my first book) 'Outsiders', men like Nietzsche, Van Gogh, Dostoevsky. The Outsider is a man who feels that he has somehow fallen between two stools: too intelligent to be a 'success' in the everyday world, yet not intelligent or forceful enough to compel the world to take him at his own valuation. A few Outsiders—the most pathetic—feel alienated because their physical appearance is repellant—like Victor Hugo's hunchback of Nôtre Dame or the philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. Edmond Rostand even treated the idea with a certain humour in Cyrano de Bergerac, whose noble spirit seems to be mocked by his monstrous nose. Lindsay himself was presentable enough as a human being, but his curious clumsiness with words, his inability to express his deepest ideas on paper, makes him an archetypal Outsider.
This deep sense of self-division led him to write Arcturus, with its fantastic power. The basic philosophy of the book is that 'this world' is vicious and trivial, a silly masquerade. The ‘beauty' that human beings regard so highly is, according to Lindsay, a sugary stupidity. Real 'truth' is to be found in the magnificence of unclimbed mountains, of the lonely sea and the sky, in the tremendous power of some of Beethoven's music. T.E. Lawrence once said with disgust that he had looked everywhere for a real 'meal' in literature, something that could fill his stomach, but could only find 'snacks' Lindsay felt exactly the same. And just as Lawrence tried to satisfy 'fellow seekers' with his marvellous Seven Pillars of Wisdom, so Lindsay made his own tremendous attempt to achieve 'the Sublime' in Arcturus.“ - Colin Wilson from his introduction to David Lindsay’s ‘Sphinx’
reading A Voyage to Arcturus (1920) like:
"It's alarming and frightening at the same time." said Wilbur Turner, chair of Advocacy Canada, which support the queer community.
At an anti-SOGI rally in downtown Kelowna, B.C., protesting against gender and sexual diversity education at schools, some of the words uttered by one of the speakers were shocking and appalling to some.
“It’s alarming and frightening at the same time.” said Wilbur Turner, chair of Advocacy Canada, which supports the LGTBQ2 community.
The speaker in question is David Lindsay, well-known in the city for organizing many anti-vaccine and anti-lockdown protests, which eventually got dubbed as so-called “freedom rallies”.
During his speech at the rally, Lindsay said, “It’s a pretty sad day when you get queers coming out. You know, every society that has let the queers take over has self-destructed from within and if it continues, Canada will self-destruct.”
Full article
Tagging: @politicsofcanada
Solemn Joust on London Bridge by Richard Beavis
Tydomin (with Crimtyphon); Slofork and Panawe from David Lindsay’s A Voyage To Arcturus.
Happy 100th Anniversary A Voyage To Arcturus! (1920-2020) 🚀🌌
An unforgettable classic sci-fi/fantasy book. If you are into Elric of Melniboné, Perelandra, or his dark materials you will definitely like it because all three were inspired by it.
What the hell did I just read?
This is A Voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay, originally published in 1920. This is the 1968 Ballantine edition, with a cover by Bob Pepper than has nothing to do with the actual story.
So, while wrapped in a cloak of fantasy and science fiction, this is really more a philosophical novel that questions the meaning of existence and the role of a Creator in it. It apparently had a powerful effect on C.S. Lewis, who recommended it to Tolkien, but I can’t say I detect much of Lindsay in Middle Earth. The whole thing is infused with a sort of psychedelia that makes me think Michael Moorcock probably appreciated it. I don’t honestly know why this is one of the books in Appendix N, though – aside of the casual use of murder to achieve one’s goals, there doesn’t seem to be much of Lindsay in D&D either. Maybe in how the people in it live their philosophy so stridently plays into alignment?
Very briefly: A guy shows up at a séance, encounters some strange people (one of which is super terrifying – the séance bit is best part of the book) and winds up traveling in a crystal ship to a planet orbiting Arcturus. There, he grows a couple extra organs – a third eye and a chest tentacle – and proceeds to travel along, meeting and often murdering the inhabitants. Eventually, he dies too, and it is revealed he is actually also another guy, who continues on to witness the Demiurge perverting the entirety of Creation – by doing this, He feels joy while all other living things experience suffering. And then...that’s kind of it? I suspect you could file it under “novels reckoning with the trauma of World War I.”
It is damned strange. Like, unrelentingly so. Every landscape and person is weird. But the narration is so...matter of fact? As if the writer doesn’t recognize the strangeness, which just makes it stranger. While it took me months to read, I never stopped. I think it was good?
“don’t you eat? is food in the same category as love?”
— david lindsay, a voyage to arcturus
