Episodes 121 - 122 - "The Repairer of Reputations"

[Vulpine]

Hmm, Carcosans as the American Imperial Line...makes the bit where Tierney links Carcosa to his Simon of Gitta
stories in 'Drums of Chaos' a tad more curious. 

[Eibon]

This is off topic, but I agree 100% with Chad over Star Trek. It's a series about a military ship enforcing the will of the Federation, even though it pretends not to be. And it's not just in the original series. There is a TNG episode which really exposes the hypocrisy and arrogance. It's called, ironically, "Justice".

A planet has system where everyone on the planet is monitored at all times and so they are arrested the moment they commit a crime. Because it is a perfect legal system then miscarriages of justice are impossible. The Enterprise visits the planet and, fully aware of the culture of the planet, they beam a team down including Wesley Crusher, son of the ship's doctor. Wesley Crusher plays a ball game with some native children, and kicks the ball into a forbidden area. The children warn him not to enter the area and it is well signposted. He chooses to retrieve the ball and is arrested and sentenced to death, the only punishment available for breaking the law.

Now, what should happen, is the crew should honour the Prime Directive and accept that Wesley broke the law (he clearly did). But no, when threatening and cajoling fails, they concoct a plan to pervert the course of justice by injecting Wesley Crusher with a chemical which induces a death-like state, and thus escape. In the process they show their utter contempt for the indigenous culture and the rule of sovereign law, and show the Federation to be the bully-boy it so clearly is.

If a decent writer had been working on the show then maybe the planet's justice machine would have spotted the Enterprise crew perverting the course of justice and arrest them too! Or they could have faced the moral consequences of their actions (surely as Crusher becomes famous the government of the planet will notice he's not, in fact, dead?). But no, TNG usually copped out of any moral dilemma that it set up.

There was, in the Seventies, a socialist critique comparing Doctor Who (a renegade who hates totalitarianism) and Star Trek (the original - a military battle ship that engages in espionage and double dealing actions against other non-human power structures like the Romulans [read Russians] and the Klingons [read South American communists, like Cuba]). While I don't agree with all it's politics its interesting and does show that unknown to the producers, the Star Trek always reflected American culture at the time of it's production. This proved to be true of TNG too.

Back on subject: "The Repairer of Reputations" reminds me a lot of Gogol's "The Diary of A Madman" which also involves a mad narrator who thinks he's heir to a throne, in that case the throne of Spain! Only the cats are after him! If you've not read it, it's well worth a read.

[Genus Unknown]

It's up! Go listen!

[RedRetroRobot]

It's Thursday! Glorious, glorious Thursday!

[old book]

Yeah, I thought that Vance guy in Waite's kitchen was a shadow person or something chimeral. I guess he couldn't both be the cat and commit suicide in human form, so my familiar theory probably doesn't work. I'm not quite clear on the concept of the "time safe" either. I thought in banks a time-safe opens automatically at 9 AM when the bank opens, or something like that. Waiting three and three-quarters minutes, and then having to put the contents back within that time to avoid the alaram, doesn't quite make sense to me. Why?

[old book]

Yeah, I'm sure there were agents of the British Empire out there civilising the heathens blissfully unaware they were largely just forcing their cultural values on others. I sort of see Star Trek that way, unintentional colonialism, with most of the colonists inspired by what they think are the best intentions.

What about the empire set to emerge virally and fully formed from the King in Yellow play? Is the author playing with the idea that empire itself is a mental aberration, a mass psychosis? Is he hinting that the mental construct called "the State" is an infectious pathology? We could assume the Lethal Chamber starts out as purely voluntary but then becomes enforced by the state as a means to rid itself of aberrant members. So does Chambers' Chamber prefigure the Nazi concentration camps and eugenics programs? Does the empire of the King in Yellow lurking in the minds of men offer an alternative?

[T. Kelly Lee]

A question - are we sure Mr. Wilde is even a real person or a manifestation of the madness?  I was never clear on whether or not the characters as portrayed are all real people.

I think we'll come to this again with the Yellow Wallpaper. 

[Eibon]

Yeah, I'm sure there were agents of the British Empire out there civilising the heathens blissfully unaware they were largely just forcing their cultural values on others. I sort of see Star Trek that way, unintentional colonialism, with most of the colonists inspired by what they think are the best intentions. [edit] Does the empire of the King in Yellow lurking in the minds of men offer an alternative?

I'm not sure it was unknowingly forced on others. Within living memory school children in Wales were penalised if they spoke the Welsh language rather than English, quite knowingly. No, one of the faults of Empire builders is they believe their culture to be better than everyone else, so why would it not be a good thing to force people to adopt their culture. The British Empire called it civilising the world! America is interesting because it had/has and "empire" and behaves like it, but it doesn't formally acknowledge it, beyond accepting that it was/is a "Super Power".

The future "Imperial" America in Repairer is interesting because it's so difficult to work out how solid it is. Is it all just madness and nothing is real, or is it a distorted version of the real world? The empire of the King in Yellow is even more nebulous, possibly a fantasy within a fantasy. It could be like the "Empire of Crime" proposed by Doctor Mabuse in Fritz Lang's 1932 film "The Testament of Doctor Mabuse", a vast criminal network that will take over by undermining the institutions of the state, with Wilde or Hildred as Mabuse (Lang's film is another example where you can't fully trust what you see and hear). It could be more mystical -- a state of mind as much as a physical organisation.

A question - are we sure Mr. Wilde is even a real person or a manifestation of the madness?

Again, tough to say. I'd guess that Wilde is real because other, apparently sane, characters reference him. But if they are not real too, then that doesn't help. Regardless of this Hildred believes he's real, so in terms of the story he represents something, even if it's only another aspect of Hildred himself (Hildred knows about the armour because he is Wilde, so he knows what Wilde knows, but not consciously -- when his plans go awry, the "beast" in the form of a cat, another facet of Hildred, kills Wilde). There are just so many ways of reading this story.

Incidentally, Karl Edward Wagner's story "The River of Night's Dreaming" is inspired by Chamber's King In Yellow and gets pretty close to reproducing the insane narrative style of this story (it does have sexual content). Recommended.

[old book]

I'm not sure it was unknowingly forced on others. Within living memory school children in Wales were penalised if they spoke the Welsh language rather than English, quite knowingly. No, one of the faults of Empire builders is they believe their culture to be better than everyone else, so why would it not be a good thing to force people to adopt their culture. The British Empire called it civilising the world! America is interesting because it had/has and "empire" and behaves like it, but it doesn't formally acknowledge it, beyond accepting that it was/is a "Super Power".

The future "Imperial" America in Repairer is interesting because it's so difficult to work out how solid it is. Is it all just madness and nothing is real, or is it a distorted version of the real world? The empire of the King in Yellow is even more nebulous, possibly a fantasy within a fantasy. It could be like the "Empire of Crime" proposed by Doctor Mabuse in Fritz Lang's 1932 film "The Testament of Doctor Mabuse", a vast criminal network that will take over by undermining the institutions of the state, with Wilde or Hildred as Mabuse (Lang's film is another example where you can't fully trust what you see and hear). It could be more mystical -- a state of mind as much as a physical organisation.

The same thing happened in Canada in living memory regarding native languages, and United States too I'm sure. The wheels of empire are greased by the lives of naive do-gooders who don't recognize their cultural imperialism.

What you say in the second paragraph above reminds me of the goals of Adam Weishaupt's Bavarian Illuminati, which might be a good guide to what is going on in United States today. A fantasy within a fantasy is another way of saying A Dream within a Dream, a la Poe, but my starting point was that all states are imaginary and only exist in the minds of the cultists who believe in them, giving rise to "physical organization" as the cultists act out their roles as they perceive them in their madness.

I haven't seen that Fritz Lang film, but thank you for mentioning it, I will keep an eye out for it. "Metropolis" was very interesting, even as a prelude to Hitler, and it might be interesting to note that John Dee, the architect of British imperialism, I believe, was the first to use the term "cosmopolitan,"--about himself--in the English language, but check the OED to be certain of that.

[BeerClark]

As much as I miss the Lovecraft content, I'm happy to be branching out! And this was a great story to start with.

The whole idea of 'legions' of these people didn't occur to me while I was reading it but it definitely makes sense as a possibility.

I did think Vance was a real person. I imagined that basically people of similar interests flock together and that Vance was just as much a loon as Hildred and Mr. Wilde. And that he was under Mr. Wilde's influence like Hildred was. Only Vance was more a soldier than a sub-King

What was amazing to me was the level of detail in the story. Not so much that you know all the hairs on their heads... but enough to understand the picture then your own mind just fills in the rest. I thought that was a similar method to how Lovecraft does it and why his stories are so fun. Your looking at a picture that you half painted without knowing it. Like monsters that feed on peoples fears! They don't do anything except draw out your own imagination... well, writers DO give the canvas and a start!

[BeerClark]

Yeah, I thought that Vance guy in Waite's kitchen was a shadow person or something chimeral. I guess he couldn't both be the cat and commit suicide in human form, so my familiar theory probably doesn't work. I'm not quite clear on the concept of the "time safe" either. I thought in banks a time-safe opens automatically at 9 AM when the bank opens, or something like that. Waiting three and three-quarters minutes, and then having to put the contents back within that time to avoid the alaram, doesn't quite make sense to me. Why?

I meant to reply to this too.... since the box was partly imagined, I think it was a subconscious way to inspire awe into the crown. Not only is it so special it needs a special safe that takes 3 minutes to open... you can only hold it for a few minutes!

[Eibon]

What you say in the second paragraph above reminds me of the goals of Adam Weishaupt's Bavarian Illuminati, which might be a good guide to what is going on in United States today. A fantasy within a fantasy is another way of saying A Dream within a Dream, a la Poe, but my starting point was that all states are imaginary and only exist in the minds of the cultists who believe in them, giving rise to "physical organization" as the cultists act out their roles as they perceive them in their madness.

I haven't seen that Fritz Lang film, but thank you for mentioning it, I will keep an eye out for it. "Metropolis" was very interesting, even as a prelude to Hitler, and it might be interesting to note that John Dee, the architect of British imperialism, I believe, was the first to use the term "cosmopolitan,"--about himself--in the English language, but check the OED to be certain of that.

I was actually thinking of a metaphysical "realm" like the "Kingdom of Heaven" of Christian belief, but I didn't want to offend anyone by associating an "evil" or "mad" empire with that term. Maybe simply being aware of the King in Yellow places you within society of the Empire of the Yellow King? But yes, all creations start as ideas. Peter Gabriel expresses it rather well in his song "Mercy Street": "All of the buildings, all of those cars/Were once just a dream/In somebody's head".

As a fan of Fritz Lang I would strongly recommend "Testament" (although be careful to see the full restored version, there are a number of iterations, such as the public domain "The Crimes of Doctor Mabuse", which are good, but not as rewarding as the full film as Lang intended it). It was his second sound film, after "M", and a sequel both to "M" and the original "Doctor Mabuse, The Gambler" (you don't need to have seen either to follow it). It was banned by the Nazis for being too close to the knuckle (a mad criminal ruling an Empire of Crime from his asylum cell... who could that be?). Lang left for Germany after that and did not return until the end of his life, when he made a third Mabuse film, "The Thousand Eyes of Doctor Mabuse". It's as slippery a film as you can come by. It's part thriller, part police procedural, a serial melodrama shot through with the supernatural and psychological aspects that mean it could almost be called a proto-noir film, oh, and there's social comment in there too! It possibly falls half way between "Metropolis" and his American films like "Fury" and "The Big Heat".

I wouldn't be surprised to find that Doctor Dee invented "cosmopolitan" as a word. He did coin several phrases. "Christian Kabbalist" being one of my favourites -- a phrase invented to avoid him being accused as a heretic! "It's not sorcery, it's got the word Christian in there!"

[T. Kelly Lee]

I think you've hit on something there.  The kind of "madness" Chambers is describing is actually a form of what we now know as dissociative disorder.  It's normally caused by trauma and, in this case, the trauma is presumably the reading of the play.  My interpretation is that when you "loose it" by reading the play, you become a denizen of the empire of the King in Yellow. 

I think this concept was well-borrowed for the film At the Mouth of Madness - in which reading a book either physically or intellectually transports your to a kind of metaphysical dystopia. 

Here's a question - if you were presented with a book that would drive you mad to read it...would you read it?  I probably would.  Sometimes I think I probably have. 

[T. Kelly Lee]

Actually, such times safes used to be common - it was to discourage bank robbers.  Bank robbers didn't want to hit a bank if they had to stand around waiting for five minutes for a safe to open after the combo had been entered.  Believe it or not, that's real technology.   

[Graf von Altenberg Ehrenstein]

A question - are we sure Mr. Wilde is even a real person or a manifestation of the madness?  I was never clear on whether or not the characters as portrayed are all real people.

I think we'll come to this again with the Yellow Wallpaper. 

I had that suspicion when the narrator-I-can `t-help-calling-Mildred first checks out that dynasty book. It is stored at Wilde `s place, but Hildred says it `s worn out only by his own hands. So Wilde owns it and never reads it? That was one of the many Wait A Minute moments in the story.
The other - sane - characters refer to Wilde as a real person, right. But always in a reserved and caucious way, trying to convince Hildred that this guy is bad for him and that he shouldn `t hang out with him so much. So maybe instead of talking him directly out of his madness they make some concession and try to alienate him from his made up friend.
Another possibility would be that Wilde is merely some weird looking excentric, on whom the straight persons have their opinion - and Hildred s messed up mimd does the rest.