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Evan Shively (Perseus271)

Alien Life-formsLanark, on the face of it, is a complex fantasy of a sort of Glaswegian student-Bohemia experienced by the eponymous hero (alias Thaw). There are intriguing allusions and dense metaphysical comments on almost every page. I don’t think it is prudent, or even possible, to summarize its narrative or its meaning. But a key to both might be found in what I think is its philosophical, and therefore essentially literary, context.According to some, the most serious impediment to explaining the world isn’t the absence of a unified physical theory or the inadequacy of human language. It is the presence of what can only be called a pervasive evil. Evil is an irrationality, an inherent contradiction, which clearly exists - in nature everywhere and especially in people - but which defies explanation. Yet consciousness demands one. How can such an absurd universe produce beings who question its very absurdity? This is the premise and issue of an ancient style of thinking called Gnosticism, the essential presumption of which is that we thinking, reflective beings actually don’t belong here. We have been exiled from elsewhere and are condemned to wander aimlessly in this universe of hopelessness, pain, disease, death, and... well evil until we are rescued from it and returned to whence we came. This view is expressed in too many diverse ways to be called a philosophy; but it does have an historical continuity that reflects its intellectual and emotional power.Christianity, and consequently Christian culture, is tinged with gnostic influences from its inception; but has always rejected the gnostic mode of thinking as unbiblical in its presumption of the essential evil of the world we inhabit. Christianity does, however, maintain somewhat paradoxically the idea that there is a ‘better place’ which is our true home. This it calls Paradise, a realm close to God with no pain, no disease, and no death; that is a place without evil. Gnosticism has been suppressed by Christianity (and also by Islam) as a heresy. But it reappears frequently in European history in various forms - usually among those who take the problem of evil seriously. The early Desert Fathers and strange stylites, sitters on poles, and other ‘martyrs to the flesh’ are examples; as are the medieval Cathars and Bogomils and their spiritual heirs, the strict Calvinists, and the even more enthusiastic adherents of the Republican Party in the United States. Each of these groups has their own version of a spiritual theory of the world in which escape from the tribulations of living is not only possible but constitutes the real goal of living at all.The historical originators of Gnosticism were the Manichaeans, Persian followers of the sage Mani, who developed a rather elaborate, and empirically based, theory of human existence. Look up in the night sky, they said, and you will see clearly that there is another world beyond that enclosed by the solid vault of heaven. Those points of light we call stars are actually holes, imperfections, in that vault, the casing of our world, through which we can see bits of the world beyond. That is the realm of light whence we came and to which we are meant, according to cosmic logic, to return. The real mission and spiritual duty of all human beings is to seek the knowledge by which such a home-going can be achieved.As proof that such a re-unification with the domain of light is possible, the Manichaeans again pointed to the night sky. In addition to the fixed points of light there were several wandering objects called planets. The function of these objects is to patrol our world on the lookout for the sparks of light, that is to say human souls, which have managed to detach themselves through secret knowledge from the evil bonds of the Earth. These sparks are scooped up by the roving planets as the sparks emerge from their earthly prison.And as further proof, if proof were necessary, the planets then deposit their luminous cargo periodically onto that other celestial body we call the Moon. Thus the monthly waxing of the Moon as these sparks are added to it. And also the monthly discharge of these from the Moon, its waning, through the vault of heaven as they are merged with the infinite light beyond. As far as spiritual theories of the world go this is relatively plausible. Little wonder then that its principle tropes - Light and Freedom - appear periodically in European literature. Lanark is an example. Its characters are obsessed with light, either finding it or avoiding it. Lanark‘s goal is to escape from the realm of artificial light into that of pure ‘heavenly’ light. Others, Lanark observes, have obviously succeeded; they have “disappeared when the lights go out.” This is a risky business. On the one hand, “the only cure for these—personal—diseases is sunlight.” On the other hand, “When people leave without a companion their diseases return after a while.” So the problem of reunification is not just cosmic as the Manichaeans thought; it is also personal and involves relationships with others. We’re in it together. Therefore Lanark’s plan is simple: “‘I’m leaving when I find a suitable companion.’‘Why?’‘I want the sun.’”Of course the extended metaphor of Lanark communicates the secret gnostic knowledge of the light, but such knowledge is in itself insufficient: “Metaphor is one of thought’s most essential tools. It illuminates what would otherwise be totally obscure. But the illumination is sometimes so bright that it dazzles instead of revealing,” as one of the characters points out. Lanark knows that what’s necessary above all is a very specific sort of courage: “‘Admit!’ he told himself, ‘You watched the sky because you were too cowardly to know people.’” I doubt anything can explain Lanark satisfactorily except Lanark. But I do think its gnostic pedigree might add something significant to the comprehensibility of its otherwise alien life-forms.

Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch (1990) is a World Fantasy Award-nominated novel written as a collaboration between the English authors Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman.The book is a comedy about the birth of the son of Satan and the coming of the End Times. There are attempts by the angel Aziraphale and the demon Crowley to sabotage the coming of the end times, having grown accustomed to their comfortable surroundings in England. One subplot features a mixup at the small country hospital on the day of birth and the growth of the Antichrist, Adam, who grows up with the wrong family, in the wrong country village. Another subplot concerns the summoning of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, each a big personality in their own right. In 2003, the novel was listed at number 68 on the BBC's survey The Big Read.

Other children get given xylophones. Susan just had to ask her grandfather to take his vest off. Yes. There's a Death in the family.It's hard to grow up normally when Grandfather rides a white horse and wields a scythe – especially when you have to take over the family business, and everyone mistakes you for the Tooth Fairy.And especially when you have to face the new and addictive music that has entered Discworld.It's lawless. It changes people.It's called Music With Rocks In.It's got a beat and you can dance to it, but...It's alive.And it won't fade away.

From the creators of the wildly popular Welcome to Night Vale podcast comes an imaginative mystery of appearances and disappearances that is also a poignant look at the ways in which we all struggle to find ourselves...no matter where we live.Located in a nameless desert somewhere in the great American Southwest, Night Vale is a small town where ghosts, angels, aliens, and government conspiracies are all commonplace parts of everyday life. It is here that the lives of two women, with two mysteries, will converge.Nineteen-year-old Night Vale pawn shop owner Jackie Fierro is given a paper marked "King City" by a mysterious man in a tan jacket holding a deer skin suitcase. Everything about him and his paper unsettles her, especially the fact that she can't seem to get the paper to leave her hand, and that no one who meets this man can remember anything about him. Jackie is determined to uncover the mystery of King City and the man in the tan jacket before she herself unravels.Night Vale PTA treasurer Diane Crayton's son, Josh, is moody and also a shape shifter. And lately Diane's started to see her son's father everywhere she goes, looking the same as the day he left years earlier, when they were both teenagers. Josh, looking different every time Diane sees him, shows a stronger and stronger interest in his estranged father, leading to a disaster Diane can see coming, even as she is helpless to prevent it.Diane's search to reconnect with her son and Jackie's search for her former routine life collide as they find themselves coming back to two words: "King City". It is King City that holds the key to both of their mysteries, and their futures...if they can ever find it.

This daring literary thriller, rich with eroticism and suspense, is one of John Fowles's best-loved and bestselling novels and has contributed significantly to his international reputation as a writer of the first degree. At the center of The Magus is Nicholas Urfe, a young Englishman who accepts a teaching position on a remote Greek island, where he befriends a local millionaire. The friendship soon evolves into a deadly game, in which reality and fantasy are deliberately manipulated, and Nicholas finds that he must fight not only for his sanity but for his very survival.

Episode One is an all-new episode created by Valve that extends the Half-Life 2 single player adventure. The player reprises his role of Dr. Gordon...

Episode Two is the second in a trilogy of new games created by Valve that extends the award-winning and best-selling Half-Life adventure. As Dr. Go...

A delusional young man strikes up an unconventional relationship with a doll he finds on the Internet.

The Guardians struggle to keep together as a team while dealing with their personal family issues, notably Star-Lord's encounter with his father the ambitious celestial being Ego.

2017 superhero film produced by Marvel Studios

In a coma, a cartoonist finds himself trapped within his own underground creation and must find a way to get back, while racing against his popular but treacherous character, Monkeybone.

While home sick in bed, a young boy's grandfather reads him the story of a farmboy-turned-pirate who encounters numerous obstacles, enemies and allies in his quest to be reunited with his true love.

A young girl institutionalized by her abusive stepfather retreats to an alternative reality as a coping strategy and envisions a plan to help her escape.

A family looks to prevent evil spirits from trapping their comatose child in a realm called The Further.

While on a journey of physical and spiritual healing, a brilliant neurosurgeon is drawn into the world of the mystic arts.

2016 superhero film produced by Marvel Studios

A wrongfully convicted boy is sent to a brutal desert detention camp where he joins the job of digging holes for some mysterious reason.

A young man learns that he has to find a hidden Earth ship before an enemy alien species does in order to secure the survival of humanity.

Storks have moved on from delivering babies to packages. But when an order for a baby appears, the best delivery stork must scramble to fix the error by delivering the baby.

A little girl lives in a very grown-up world with her mother, who tries to prepare her for it. Her neighbor, the Aviator, introduces the girl to an extraordinary world where anything is possible, the world of the Little Prince.

2015 fantasy drama film distributed by Paramount Pictures and Netflix

Due to 12 y.o. Anna's asthma, she's sent to stay with relatives of her guardian in the Japanese countryside. She likes to be alone, sketching. She befriends Marnie. Who is the mysterious, blonde Marnie.

2014 Japanese animated film directed by Hiromasa Yonebayashi

Found inside a shining stalk of bamboo by an old bamboo cutter and his wife, a tiny girl grows rapidly into an exquisite young lady. The mysterious young princess enthralls all who encounter her, but ultimately she must confront her 

2013 Japanese animated film directed by Isao Takahata

After her werewolf lover unexpectedly dies in an accident while hunting for food for their children, a young woman must find ways to raise the werewolf son and daughter that she had with him while keeping their trait hidden from soci

2012 animated film directed by Mamoru Hosoda

Ben, a young Irish boy, and his little sister Saoirse, a girl who can turn into a seal, go on an adventure to free the fairies and save the spirit world.

2014 Irish animated film directed by Tomm Moore

An insomniac office worker and a devil-may-care soap maker form an underground fight club that evolves into much more.

A clinically depressed teenager gets a new start after he checks himself into an adult psychiatric ward.

A broke, jobless actor and a broke, jobless screenwriter set out to make a movie and then find that life starts imitating art.

A clerk in a government agency finds his unenviable life takes a turn for the horrific with the arrival of a new co-worker who is both his exact physical double and his opposite - confident, charismatic and seductive with women.

2013 British film directed by Richard Ayoade

Post-apocalyptic surrealist black comedy about the landlord of an apartment building who occasionally prepares a delicacy for his odd tenants.

1991 film by Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Marc Caro

Rebecca Rea Sugar is an American animator and screenwriter. She is best known for being the creator of the Cartoon Network series Steven Universe, making her the first non-binary person to independently create a series for the network. Until 2013, Sugar was a writer and storyboard artist on the animated television series Adventure Time. Her work on the two series has earned her seven Primetime Emmy Award nominations. Sugar is bisexual, non-binary, and genderqueer, using both she/her and they/them pronouns. Sugar's queerness has served as the inspiration for her to stress the importance of LGBT representation in the arts, especially in children's entertainment.

Welcome to Night Vale is a podcast presented as a radio show for the fictional town of Night Vale, reporting on the strange events that occur within it. The series was created in 2012 by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor. Published by Night Vale Presents since March 15, 2015, the podcast was previously published by Commonplace Books. Cecil Gershwin Palmer—the host, main character, and narrator—is voiced by Cecil Baldwin, while secondary characters are sometimes voiced by guest stars—such as Dylan Marron, who voices Carlos. The podcast typically airs on the first and fifteenth of every month, and consists of "news, announcements and advertisements" from the desert town, located "somewhere in the Southwestern United States." In an interview with NPR, Joseph Fink said that he "came up with this idea of a town in that desert where all conspiracy theories were real, and we would just go from there with that understood."

American recording artist; musician, singer, songwriter

An antisocial maverick doctor who specializes in diagnostic medicine does whatever it takes to solve puzzling cases that come his way using his crack team of doctors and his wits.

A 12-year old boy named Naota one day meets a strange woman, riding a Vespa and wielding a big guitar. As soon as she appears, mysterious things start happening.

Adventure Time is an American fantasy animated television series created by Pendleton Ward for Cartoon Network and distributed by Warner Bros. Domestic Television. The series follows the adventures of a boy named Finn (Jeremy Shada) and his best friend and adoptive brother Jake (John DiMaggio)—a dog with the magical power to change size and shape at will. Finn and Jake live in the post-apocalyptic Land of Ooo, where they interact with Princess Bubblegum (Hynden Walch), the Ice King (Tom Kenny), Marceline (Olivia Olson), BMO (Niki Yang), and others. The series is based on a 2007 short film that aired on Nicktoons. After the short became a viral hit on the Internet, Nickelodeon's executives passed on its option before Cartoon Network commissioned a full-length series from Fred Seibert and Ward, which was previewed on March 11, 2010. The same year, the series premiered on Cartoon Network on April 5, and ended its eight-year run on September 3, 2018.

A recently released ex-convict named Shadow meets a mysterious man who calls himself "Wednesday" and who knows more than he first seems to about Shadow's life and past.

Watch as Tim finds himself in several awkward situations in this HBO cartoon comedy.

An exploration of our discovery of the laws of nature and coordinates in space and time.

2014 American science documentary television series presented by Neil deGrasse Tyson

After a group of people, who meet online, discover a bizarre graphic novel which seems to hold mysterious answers, they find themselves being tracked down by a merciless organization known merely as 'The Network'.

The greatest minds of the world have been cloned, and are now attending high school together.

American adult animated television series

This parody series is an unearthed 80s horror/drama, complete with poor production values, awful dialogue and hilarious violence. The series is set in a Hospital in Romford, which is situated over the gates of Hell.

The random escapades of Stan Smith, a conservative C.I.A. Agent dealing with family life, and keeping America safe, all in the most absurd way possible.

Comedy series following the exploits of Det. Jake Peralta and his diverse, lovable colleagues as they police the NYPD's 99th Precinct.

Holistic detective Gently relies on the universe to unravel mysteries based on the 'interconnectedness of all things'.

A therapist struggles with problems of his patients, while dealing with the ones in his personal life.

The story of a depressed man who inexplicably is the only one who can see his neighbor's dog as a full grown man in a dog suit.

The rambunctious human and alien duo must hunt down Dr. Jumba Jookiba's 625 other experimental creatures infesting Hawaii.

2003 animated TV sequel spin-off of Lilo & Stitch

Covert black ops and espionage take a back seat to zany personalities and relationships between secret agents and drones.

The futuristic misadventures and tragedies of an easygoing bounty hunter and his partners.

1998-1999 Japanese anime television series

The life of a twelve-year-old boy who happens to be a blue cat as he lives with his family and other strange creatures.

British-American children's animated television series

Two brothers find themselves lost in a mysterious land and try to find their way home.

BoJack Horseman was the star of the hit television show "Horsin' Around" in the '80s and '90s, but now he's washed up, living in Hollywood, complaining about everything, and wearing colorful sweaters.

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