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Utopyr, a.k.a. Grady Harris, rightly upbraids me for defending the ramblings of the Gnostic writings of late antiquity. Most of the world’s occult literature has always been dismal, which makes the few masterworks stand out by contrast.
But I have just (through that classic method of looking for something else entirely) come across “A Puzzling Text,” the translator’s commentary on an apparently unreadable alchemical tome, Three Dreams on Metallic Transmutation, by Giovanni Battista Nazari. (On its reputed unreadability, see the often astounding Giornale Nuovo site… http://www.spamula.net/blog/2003/04/on_books_that_are_too_wide.html …or start at http://www.spamula.net/blog/about.html and navigate your way in.)
Anyway, the translator, Doug Skinner, has written a summary so funny that I thought John Crowley at least would enjoy it, especially since Nazari steals entire passages of the Hypnerotomachia Polyphili for his own text. On the other hand, Crowley may feel that, having just gotten free of the topic after twenty years, he would rather not remember it exists.
Unlike some of the clever put-ons on nthposition.com, this one seems to check out as authentic.
After the LJ-Cut, here is Skinner, available, if I’ve done this right, as “Skinner” …if I haven’t done it right, then obviously I shall be embarrassed and my Friends' inboxes will be cluttered with a long quotation:
( ”Skinner” )
But I have just (through that classic method of looking for something else entirely) come across “A Puzzling Text,” the translator’s commentary on an apparently unreadable alchemical tome, Three Dreams on Metallic Transmutation, by Giovanni Battista Nazari. (On its reputed unreadability, see the often astounding Giornale Nuovo site… http://www.spamula.net/blog/2003/04/on_books_that_are_too_wide.html …or start at http://www.spamula.net/blog/about.html and navigate your way in.)
Anyway, the translator, Doug Skinner, has written a summary so funny that I thought John Crowley at least would enjoy it, especially since Nazari steals entire passages of the Hypnerotomachia Polyphili for his own text. On the other hand, Crowley may feel that, having just gotten free of the topic after twenty years, he would rather not remember it exists.
Unlike some of the clever put-ons on nthposition.com, this one seems to check out as authentic.
After the LJ-Cut, here is Skinner, available, if I’ve done this right, as “Skinner” …if I haven’t done it right, then obviously I shall be embarrassed and my Friends' inboxes will be cluttered with a long quotation:
( ”Skinner” )
