Sister Wendy: fiat lux

 

From The Story of Painting (1994), by Sister Wendy Beckett.

 

 

Re Andrea Mantegna, Death of the Virgin (ca. 1460):

 

The serene sun    bathes

lakes, palaces, priests

 

   and the dead virgin,

 

in the same  quiet  light.

 

~

 

Re the Erythraean Sibyl, from Michaelangelo’s Sistine Chapel:

 

pinks   glazed to whiteness

by the intensity   of the light

 

~

 

Re the tunic in Titian’s Ranuccio Farnese (1542):

 

The rich cloth  dazzles and shimmers

in the light falling on the boy’s chest --

the red almost bleached out,

so that bright gold and silver remains,

like the plumage of a bird.

 

 

Re the monochrome background in the same painting:

 

the all-enveloping blackness

in which Ranuccio is like a small, lighted candle

 

 

Light on (in) Canvas

Anent the Douanier:

The light that fills Rousseau’s paintings  from no apparent source or direction  holds everything in peaceful equilibrium. …

Rousseau painted only three lights:  high noon, moonlight, and the uniform floodlighting of a photographer’s studio. …

The formal effects of his light  guard the enigma of his work, the feeling that we cannot fathom   its sheer simplicity. …

The most singular quality of his work arises from the steady light that floods his compositions  and hushes them  as the world can be hushed  only by high noon and by moonlight.

-- Roger Shattuck, The Banquet Years:  The Origins of the Avan-Garde in France, 1885 to World War I (1955), p. 105-6

Note:  All that Shattuck says about the formal qualities of  these paintings  is no doubt true.  But there is a Chance-the-gardener aspect to Rousseau, which should caution us against reading too much into “the enigma of his work, the feeling that we cannot fathom its sheer simplicity.”  Similar remarks apply to Utrillo.   The life (if we can call it that) and work  of Henry Darger, are the final caveat against taking a master of composition as anything but a visual guide.  It represents Asperger’s Esthetics only.

Tableau avant-tempête

au-dessus de la ville …

un de ces immenses ciels crus  et gros de menaces

amoncelées de drame,

pareils à certains ciels,

de modernité presque parisienne,

de Mantegna  ou de Véronèse,

et sous lequel  ne pouvait s’accomplir

que quelque acte  terrible et solennel,

comme un départ en chemin de fer

ou l’érection de la Croix.

--Marcel Proust, A l’ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs (1919)

A hard rain’s gonna fall

Pour une vue d’ensemble cinématographique 

de la psychologie (in)tempestive,

consultez :

= >     Take Shelter (A l’abri !)

.

Diego Rivera monostich (resartus)

Two    great             elongated  ellipses

crosseEd AC otHher

in the center of the wall

[--Bertram Wolfe,  A Life in Two Centuries (1981), p. 600.

Describing the mural “Man at the Crossroads”, painted 1934 in the foyer of the RCA building, then destroyed by order of Nelson Rockefeller.]

Note:  Rocky is invariably cast as the bad-guy here;  but as with most of the leftie causes-célèbres of the period (Sacco & Vanzetti; the Rosenbergs; Alger Hiss), their perspective is blinkered.   Wolfe himself -- Rivera’s primary supporter and biographer -- gently admonished the Mexican painter, who had been content to take Rockefeller gold, then was indignant when his patron objected at Rivera’s sneaking in Lenin at the last minute, as the centerpiece of the whole mural, at the intersection of those two ellipses.  “Have I not the right, as painters have always done, to paint into my mural  people I know?  To use any model which seems suitable?”

Wolfe observed:  “Yes, Diego, but the great painters of the Renaissance painted either the patron or somebody related to him… Do you think that if Pope Alexander VI or Lorenzo di Medici had commissioned a painting, he would expect the central figure to be Girolamo Savonarola?”

Fifty shades of tan

   [early March, mid-Atlantic]

Nothing yet budding;

a few dry leaves  from autumn last 

(papyrus-yellow  and paper-thin)

still clinging to their beech trees.

Leaf-litter, windthrow,

straw-stalks,  hay-mow:

all -- tan ochre beige wheat hazel 
fulvous fawn or tawny -- 

-- all as yet  the color of canvas,

for Spring  to paint upon.

Flames and inflammation

In principle, this site does not comment on local news.  Facebook already handles that, down to a granularity of minutes and inches.  But public rhetoric does fall within our brief, as a linguist.  And as the city burns, it is hard not to notice these wingèd words of an elected official, destined to pass into legend.

Mayor of Baltimore, sounding like a French socialo:

Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake held a press conference Saturday alongside community and religious leaders and asked for peace as hundreds marched in Baltimore in honor of Freddie Gray.

But when one reporter asked to comment on how Baltimore police responded to the protestors she said she instructed officers to allow protestors to express themselves and that “we also gave those who wished to destroy   space to do that as well.”

http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2015/04/25/baltimore-mayor-gave-those-who-wished-to-destroy-space-to-do-that/

Such, indeed, is the covert policy of administrations that send cops unprotected, in short sleeves, to face swarms of assailants, knowing they will be attacked;  and secretly hoping that the sight of injured officers  will pacify the mob.  But, Madame Mayor -- you're not supposed to say that out loud.  -- Anyhow, she got her wish.

Police say 15 officers have been injured in the Baltimore riots and two are still in the hospital.

More than two dozen people have been arrested after people looted stores, set cars on fire and threw bricks at police.

As police moved away from the mall into a nearby neighborhood, the mall became unprotected and people started carrying clothes and other items away.

Cars have been burned, other stores have been looted and a pharmacy caught fire during the mayhem.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2015/04/27/us/ap-us-suspect-dies-baltimore-the-latest.html

Fire sale

Smoke billowed from the broken windows of the pharmacy. Police said via Twitter that rioters cut a hose firefighters were using to battle the blaze.

Police said on Twitter that looters were "continuing to break into businesses and set cars on fire'' in the area, and that they were responding to reports of looting inside Mondawmin Mall.

http://www.wfmynews2.com/story/news/nation/2015/04/27/baltimore-police-protests/26470867/

Shop till you drop!

The mayor’s remark may be the most ill-starred executive intervention  since Dubya’s “Bring it on!”, which indeed helped bring it on, to the discomfort of the guys who had to do the actual fighting.

Reader comments:

There's no walking it back. She said it and she meant it.

-

Hate to say it, but the residents of Baltimore have earned the reputation. I remember the 1978 snow storm, and the looting that followed.

~

[Update 28 April 2015]  The media have done a good job pointing out a most curious background of Monday’s rioting:  the flash-mob aspect, based on social-media propagation of an invitation to a “purge” at a certain mall.  
http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/baltimore-riots/bs-md-ci-freddie-gray-violence-chronology-20150427-story.html#navtype=outfit
 The reference -- and it is an essentially literary reference, not a tropism of the id -- is to a fairly schlocky but popularly successful movie called “The Purge”, depicting a controlling dystopian future  in which, however, annually, for a brief period  all law and morality are suspended.  That might strike you as a weird futuristic wrinkle on the standard post-apocalyptic flick, but actually the notion has roots in classical antiquity:  in the ancient Roman festival of the Saturnalia.  Since Wiki has a characteristically excellent article on that, I’ll not discuss that Fasching-like revelry further.

Gaudeamus  igitur

Wikipedia itself, however, in its article on “The Purge”, offers an even more recondite classical comparison, to the Crypteia -- q.v.

Rule of thumb in Socialmedialand:  The rioters are calling for The Purge;  the Second-Amendment fundamentalists, for the Crypteia (in the Plutarchian sense).

(Incidentally -- purely from the standpoint of art criticism -- notice the similarity in the staffage of the painter’s vision, and the actual figures frolicking at the 7/11.

Uncanny.

Here is a cropping of the same painting that brings out the more classical aspect.  You could probably do the same thing with the photograph -- the youngster in the orange hoodie  corresponding to the young man seen full-face.)

[Update 30 April 2015]  This mayor continues to amaze.

BALTIMORE — With buildings ablaze and looters rampaging through city streets, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake faced television cameras Monday night and sternly denounced the rioters as “thugs.” The next day, with some black residents in an uproar over a word they call racially charged, she walked it back.

“There are no thugs in Baltimore,” the mayor, who is African-American, said at a church, where she met with members of the clergy.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/30/us/baltimore-mayor-treads-fine-line-in-divided-city.html?_r=0

So, we suddenly have a thug-free Baltimore!  That is very good news indeed.

[Update 3 May 2015]   Now, here’s a detail you probably haven’t heard:

Residents say arsonists singled out businesses owned by Asian-Americans during the rioting on Monday.

Try fitting that into The Narrative.

It actually does make sense, though at a level deeper than that in which the media deals.   We have glanced at the matter here.

~

Meanwhile in Tel Aviv, même jeu :

Une cinquantaine de personnes, en majorité des policiers, ont été blessées dans des heurts dimanche 3 mai au soir à Tel-Aviv après un rassemblement contre les violences policières et la discrimination dont sont victimes les Israéliens d'origine éthiopienne.

La police montée a tiré des grenades assourdissantes pour disperser la foule et l'empêcher de s'en prendre à la mairie de Tel-Aviv. Les manifestants ont lancé des pierres, des bouteilles et des chaises sur la police. Des canons à eau et des bombes lacrymogènes ont également été utilisés pour éloigner des manifestants des rues alentours, en vain.

Selon la police, 46 policiers et au moins sept manifestants ont été blessés

http://www.lemonde.fr/proche-orient/article/2015/05/03/a-tel-aviv-la-communaute-ethiopienne-manifeste-contre-la-violence-policiere_4626613_3218.html

That’s a lot of injured cops …

[Update 4 May 2015]  Oh, great;  thanx, Fox.

Baltimore police said on Monday that a Fox News report of a black man being shot by police in the city was not true, and the cable news network quickly issued an apology.

Baltimore police later tweeted that the report of a man being shot was not true and that a suspect had been arrested at the scene with a handgun.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/04/us-usa-police-baltimore-shooting-idUSKBN0NP1TJ20150504

That sort of premature-ejaculation on the part of reporters  could get buildings burned.

Ontological McNuggets for your Sunday Brunch

There is a reason why our principle ontological essay is titled “On What There Is” rather than “What the meaning of “Is” is”.

The Platonist position is Realism for mathematical truths, or patterns  if you prefer.   It is not committed to Objects in any well-defined sense.   We may, for convenience, speak of them casually, but if challenged, are happy to retreat.

The position known as Ontological Phenomenalism maintains that physical objects are nothing but bundles of sensations.  This leaves undetermined, what they were, before Ontological Phenomenalists  strolled into the café.

Perceivables existed prior to any preceivers, other than their Maker.  Whatever they were, they are yet (though we ourselves bring further matter to the table).  The nub of the problem (assuming that the Meaning of Being will remain forever impenetrable -- whether because of the nature of the case, or because the problem is ill-posed)  lies rather in that “they” -- the Roster of Things -- thus, on what there is, the 'is' part being largely presupposed and left unexamined.   For, what counts for us as a material object  is not predetermined in the total quantum equation of the cosmos, and their delineation does not produce bright outlines.   From the unquestionably existent, but in many respects unfathomable or indeterminate,  physical totality (the ἀπείρων of Anaximander),  we ourselves parcel out chunks for the convenience of our calculations and our everyday life.  For stock-keeping purposes, this item is a coffee-cup;  for the purposes of materials science, a mass of atoms.  For the chemist, this atom stands on its own, and enters into contracts with other atoms;  for the physicist, it is a complexus of nucleons and electrons.  And that nucleon is either a proton, or another complexus, of quarks.   Which in turn …

Raphael: Anaximander, striving to figure things out

Sed- sileo.   I won’t be diving down that bottomless rabbit-hole.  Yet rest content, to nurse this darkling java, its surface glinting with Cusp Catastrophes, steaming and swirling in this Ontological Coffee-Cup.   And to praise Him  who all this hath made.

A lost sonnet of St. Augustine

A Lost Sonnet of Saint Augustine

This fragment, never published, was found among the late Saint’s papers.

 It appears here for the first time,  translated by your servant  from the original Latin.
Remarkably for a medieval work, it treats of the topic -- a favorite of the ancients, but much neglected since -- of the place of the woodchuck, in God's scheme of things.

Sanctus Augustinus Cantuariensis

Instructed readers will immediately recognize this as the work of Saint Augustine of Canterbury, the Apostle of England, where woodchucks -- or something very like them -- wondrously abound;  and not that of his name-mate, late of Hippo,  where God’s humblest creature, the groundhog, is seldom to be found.

It treats of the thesis of the Scala naturae -- the Great Chain of Being  -- and indeed seems destined to become the definitive statement of that worthy doctrine.  Specifically it asserts the notion  later put thus by Pope:

            From Nature’s chain  whatever link you strike,

            tenth, or ten-thousandth, breaks the chain alike.

Or,  more analytically:

The chain of being … made vivid  the idea of a related universe  where no part was superfluous.  It enhanced the dignity of all creation, even of the meanest part.

-- E. Tillyard, The Elizabethan World Picture (1942)

Hi ma its me  down there at the bottom somewhere! -- Mr Bug

And so to the sonnet -- and the linguistic sensation of this century.

Not by Pride

‘Twas not by Pride he sank to ’s low Estate,

the Humble Woodchuck  lowly  hugs the ground,

not curs’d to limblessness for serpent’s sin,

for he was thus   since e’er the world began.

Not for him the proud cock’s rooftop crow,

nor raptor’s roar :  all mute  he chews the weeds.

No rainbow like the peacock's  bears our friend,

though he, like him, was once hand-crafted too.

From ants to angels  reacheth Nature’s scale.

Each creature decks the rung that him befits.

Aloft, the sounding choirs of Seraphim;

Beneath, the groundhog  creeps along the mold.

Yet this I say to you, and speak it true:

Not Solomon in all his glory  was e’er arrayed like one of these.

~

Testimonial:

“I have examined this sonnet in every detail, and concluded, without a doubt, that it is genuine.”

-- Prof. Ernest “Ern” Malley,  gentleman and scholar

Update:   The extraordinary scholarly controversy that has arisen over this remarkable poem  is given a judicious summary here.

[Update April, 2014]  Note:  The greatly overrated Appalachian poet J. Francis Shade  cribbed extensively, shamelessly, from St. Augustine’s unpublished works.  We won’t detail his many “borrowings” (larcenies, would be more like it);  we merely wish to set the record straight.

The Parable of the Samaritan

We read in chapter 10 of Luke:

A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.

 ³¹And by chance there came down a certain priest that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.

 ³²And likewise a Levite, when he was at the place, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side.

 ³³But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was: and when he saw him, he had compassion on him,

 ³⁴And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and took care of him.

 ³⁵And on the morrow when he departed, he took out two pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him, Take care of him; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come again, I will repay thee.

… Or not:

The Parable of the Chinese toddler:  or, Garbage in the road

~

Viewing that chilling video, certain features recall the classic poem of A.E. Houseman, a meditation on the medieval painting "The Fall of Icarus":

"De val van Icarus", long attributed to Pieter Brueghel

About suffering they were never wrong,

The Old Masters; how well, they understood

Its human position; how it takes place

While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;

How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting

For the miraculous birth, there always must be

Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating

On a pond at the edge of the wood:

They never forgot

That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course

Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot

Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse

Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away

Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may

Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,

But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone

As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green

Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen

Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,

had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

For -- the scene, as it unfolded -- and it  unfolded slowly -- was not at all what I had conjured up in imagination, reading the brief press account.  I had pictured a thronged urban street, pedestrians bicycles rickshaws cages of pigeons  cheek by wing by jowl, not an inch to squeeze by, vehicles speeding; and somewhere -- spot Waldo -- in the general crush, a tiny figure, little more than a shadow, accidentally jostled -- she falls -- is struck by a bumper -;  while the truck, oblivious in the general hullaballo, speeds on; and the passersby  either cannot make out the crumpled form half-hidden by vegetable crates, or, noticing, with visible bad conscience  avert their gaze and hurry on -- fearing, perhaps, involvement in some affair of the Tongs.

But not a bit of it.  An almost deserted Utrillo street;  the silhouette of a girl, quite unmistakable.  No traffic, no distractions;  the truck implacably bears down on her,  though there is even room to go around; crushes her like a bug. 

The truck pauses, you expect the driver to tumble out wailing -- or at least to loot her pinafore;  but no.  He has not crushed her quite enough, for her still partially solid body is peskily blocking his back wheel.  He backs up a bit, for greater traction, puts ‘er in gear; the mighty juggernaut strains -- visibly rises, and finally makes it over the defeated meat-mound.

Again, the way is clear.  The girl lies, not to the side out of sight, but right in the thoroughfare, in plain view.  Then strolling, quite leisurely, a certain ploughman of the modern day, as though licking an ice-cream cone…   Then a bicycle, going slowly, casually maneuvering around that thing in the road.  And another pedestrian -- none of these either staring in fascinated horror, or averting their gaze;  what lies bleeding there is only mildly interesting.  And then another juggernaut, expensive but not so delicate:  it too had somewhere to get to and, squushing what was left of her, rolled calmly on.

~     ~     ~

A thoughtful article that puts things into an unexpected perspective

(basically, it's even worse than it looks):

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/an-injured-toddler-is-ignored-and-chinese-ask-why/2011/10/19/gIQAxhnpxL_story.html

Good lord, it just gets worse and worse:

-->

http://www.whatsonxiamen.com/news16675.html

" A fallen man pleads in vain for help in Hefei”

And China's  the future?  Lord preserve us.

[Update 7 April 2012] ... and worse, and worse:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/chinese-teenager-sells-kidney-to-buy-iphone-ipad-authorities-charge-5-for-intentional-injury/2012/04/07/gIQAtcjs0S_story.html?hpid=z3

[Update 8 May 2102]  Rest assured, though, that that toddler's body will be recycled and put to profitable use:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/world_now/2012/05/south-koreans-confiscated-pills-human-remains.html

~     ~     ~

Driving home from work the other day, I happened upon quite a different scene.

It was in the warehouse district  near where I live.  A small flock of Canada geese was venturing slowly across the road.   And all the guys in trucks were just … waiting for them, patiently.   There weren’t even any goslings to cuten up the scene:  just the awkward dignity of the adults, who seem uncomfortable as land-animals, and quite out of their element on asphalt.  Nobody honked; no-one inched forwards to hasten their hesitant gait.  We all just sat there and watched, and counted our blessings.   For yes, we each had somewhere to get to:  but so did the geese.  They needed to get to the other side.

~     ~     ~

Note:  If you benefitted from this post, you might wish to contemplate this video:

 ~ The Penitent and the Impenitent Thief ~

[Update 24 July 2012]

A walk, down to the dock: en route to which, amid the lower pond,  a tragedy  involving a duck.  Some subaqueous creature (presumably a turtle) had got hold of the leg of one, which was frantically ‘flying’, as though migrating to Canada, minute after minute, not budging an inch.  This could only end badly.

Its fellow ducks kept their distance, but seemingly unconcerned.  None of the passers-by  paused to take in the spectacle, nor were they curious, what we were staring at, my wife and I.

[Update 10 October 2012]
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/11/world/asia/xian-beating-becomes-symbol-of-nationalism-gone-awry.html?hpw&pagewanted=print
"What happened to Mr. Li, 51, was the ugliest known episode among anti-Japanese protests that convulsed cities in China last month after a longstanding dispute over an island chain erupted into fury. Mr. Li’s only offense, apparently, was driving a Japanese car. He ended up the victim of a mob..."
Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjfFFdT0cZU&noredirect=1

[Update 26 Dec 2012]  The denizens of the Middle Kingdom can be rather  casual when handling little kids:

In announcing the rescue of 89 abducted Chinese children on Christmas Eve, a senior police official said baby boys could now be purchased in China’s interior for less than $5,000 — and then resold for three times that amount in the wealthier coastal provinces.

The nationwide scourge of child abductions and baby selling in China first came prominently to light 10 years ago, when the police in Guangxi Province discovered 28 baby girls in the back of a long-distance bus.  The babies, all younger than 3 months, had been drugged to keep them quiet. News reports said they had been stuffed into tote bags. One baby died of suffocation.

http://rendezvous.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/26/buy-sell-adopt-child-trafficking-in-china/

[Update 4 Jan 2013] Likewise on the subcontinent, life is cheap:

Friend of India rape victim: Passersby stared, police delayed help

The man who was beaten alongside the New Delhi gang rape victim said the two lay naked and bleeding while people idly passed by and police debated which police station was responsible, with more than two hours elapsing before they arrived at a hospital.

The young woman later died of severe internal injuries.

[Update 5 Jan]  A quite interesting "Freakonomics"-style contribution, from Erika Christakis:
http://ideas.time.com/2013/01/04/rape-in-india-a-result-of-sex-selection/
Predicably, the readers' comments reflect a refusal to even consider the relevance of such factors.
(Homework assignment:  Consider the effects on either gender, of Mormon polygamy.  [Hint:  It is not what you will read in the P.C. press.])

[Pour davantage sur l’Inde et les viols, dans le contexte-comparaison des flingueries américaines, consultez ceci:

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2012/12/mental-health-and-gun-control.html  ]

*

Pour d’autres friandises

de la confiserie 

du docteur Justice,

consultez:

http://www.linguasacrapublishing.com/justice.html

*

[Update 27 April 2013]

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/25/world/asia/25iht-letter25.html?src=rechp

The people of New Delhi have become increasingly better at street protests, even though it is a new experience for most of them. The Indian government, on the other hand, continues to bumble about with no talent for cooling down enraged citizens.

Over the past few days, faced with public outrage yet again, the government was unable to produce officials who were articulate or knew how to employ the language of tactical humility or could at least say the right things in the right manner. Nor was it able to ensure that the minister of home affairs did not doze off in Parliament as a female legislator was talking about yet another rape that has been at the heart of protests in the capital.

Last week, news broke that a 5-year-old girl had been raped and left to die, held captive in a small room for two days with no food or water. A doctor who treated her said that she had several injuries and that pieces of candle and a bottle had been inserted into her. The girl’s father told the news media that the police had offered him 2,000 rupees, or about $37, to keep quiet about the affair, and that he must be grateful she was alive.

Enraged crowds began to gather in various parts of New Delhi including outside the police headquarters. They demanded the resignation of the minister of home affairs and the police commissioner. Women waved cash at the faces of police officers to taunt them for having offered money to the child’s father. Meanwhile, a senior police officer was caught on camera slapping a young female protester.

There is nothing about the appearance of the New Delhi police, the most visible face of authority in the capital, that commands respect. Most of the young police officers look impoverished and undernourished. Many of the older ones are obese. They often stand in a languid way in their cheap, ill-fitting uniforms, and face angry protesters with chuckles or rustic curiosity. It is not unusual to see female officers amble through a demonstration, holding hands and chatting. A majority of those who are posted to control the crowds do not wear any protective gear. In fact, it is a wonder that it is not the police who flee during street protests.

Vade retro, Satana !

Spirit:   What! have you let the false enchanter scape?

    O ye mistook; ye should have snatched his wand,

    And bound him fast. Without his rod reversed,

    And backward mutters of dissevering power,

    We cannot free the Lady that sits here

    In stony fetters fixed and motionless.

-- from Comus, Milton’s masque in praise of chastity

William Blake: Comus

We  noted earlier that the world of the New York Times Magazine, and especially its Style Section, is largely devoted to spelunking the undercrofts of inversion.  Less commonly realized is the fact that their agenda is crypto-misogynist -- an assault on normal womanhood, in the name of misgendered things.   Today’s Magazine scrapes bottom.

Notoriously, the world of haute couture is in the hands of paraphiliacs.  In itself this is of little moment, since it is its own hothouse subculture, far from the lives of the ordinary working woman -- she, that is, that lets the sun shine on the world, while the night-creatures writhe in the shadows.  The problem comes in when, innocently subscribing to the New York Times -- a source of much good and important reporting, let us give them that -- she happens upon such a monstrosity as this:

http://tmagazine.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/07/08/scorecard-azzedine-alaia-wins/
.

I once lived next to a girl whose arms looked like that:  the result of polio;  very sad.  But the key point to notice is the head:  it appears to be on backwards.   Possibly photo-shopped, as a sick joke;  possibly the model is possessed, and has yet to meet her exorcist.   A still more disturbing possibility is that she is actually (so far) a normal woman, but the couturier has so slyly set awry the natural lines that should properly complement her innocent womanhood, that she appears deformed.

(For the full horror, scroll down the photograph until the neckline is at the upper margin, and the head is out of sight.   Take in the image.  Now slowly scroll up.)

The worker, wife and mother, stares aghast.   Yet the whole authority of the New York Times, and the Paris fashion world, is telling her:   For shame, your hands chafed with the world’s work;  for shame, your bosom sagging from having nursed your babe.   Don’t you wish that you could Look Like Her, with your pretty head on backwards ?

*

Nota Bene:

I am not entirely funning, in connecting such things with the Satanic.  Central rituals of the Black Mass include reciting the Lord’s Prayer backwards, and hanging the Cross upside-down.

I once wrote a book called The Semantics of Form.  There is also such a thing as the morality of form; for which the locus classicus is Chesterton’s story, “The Wrong Shape”.

Once Murphy, the noted two-fisted Private Eye, was up against that dark prince ... and he couldn't handle it, not alone ... He had to Call In a Specialist:

Summary and purchase options here:
http://www.linguasacrapublishing.com/justice.html

[Update 5 Aug 2011:]
 Cf. now also this.  The SPCA needs to rescue those bunnies before they wind up like the Gadarene swine.
[Update 16 March 2013]  Too late!  The Illuminati have censored that LATimes story from the Web.  But you can find it if you go to Cached Content.

[Update 15 Aug 2011]:
We have modified the title of this post, towards a more chaste Latin.  You will often see the phrase written "Vade retro Satanas";  but cf. this, from the rite of exorcism:

Crux sancta sit mihi lux / Non draco sit mihi dux

Vade retro satana / Numquam suade mihi vana

Sunt mala quae libas / Ipse venena bibas

Here the form without -s is (as we say in the business) "guaranteed by the rhyme".

For a deep and brooding story on this theme -- the one case that Murphy could not crack alone -- cf. this:  Murphy Calls In a Specialist.