Gormenghast revisited

Most curious. I find myself compelled to reread Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast "trilogy". I remain quite unshakeable in my view that the third lamentable book should never have been written, it is a mere excrescence on an otherwise worthy if pedestrian oeuvre. So I once mused. And yet, and yet...

In revisiting these texts last essayed in my impetuous teenage years, (when I even led myself to be impressed by Herman Hesse, alas) I find an unexpectedly rich textuality and philologic counterpoint that quite enthralls me. It is not just the juxtaposition of the gothic with the bureaucratic, more a grand meta-narrative of primogeniture and its discontents that quite unnerves me. It is fraught, simply fraught with significance and duality at its most raw. The Romanic names, the hierarchic certainties, the downright ignition and combustion of ritual; it leaves me gasping for air.

Eaten by owls indeed; the lunatic Count stands as a moral signpost for semiotic individualism. It is not, of course, Athena herself as symbolised by the owl that devours him as his library burns. It may in fact be the earlier avatar of Kali herself, replete in Indo-European syntax. While Steerpike climbs the chasm of doubt and ambition, mutilated yet certain in his proto-Germanic gutturalism. Ah me, the implications.

I shall withdraw and reread, lest rash exegesis blossom untoward. An evening should suffice.

Eden regained

I have now established my Chair in an altogether more salubrious location than that nest of vipers from which I am now departed. Believe me, I shall publish the full depths of their depravity in due course. Oh yes.

They attempted to hold some ceremonial benediction to mark my departure; of it I had nought. Red faces all round from the hypocritical assassins and fawning hierophants. 'Tis all they deserve.

My support staff have worked tirelessly to restore my office and papers, and my new apartment is more than sufficient. I am now in a condition of robust preparedness to launch into a new phase of path-breaking exegesis and analysis. I may drop a few tantalising crumbs here first so by all means study these 'pages' with due diligence.

Transience; tempora placet

I find myself 'in transit', and unable to respond to serious queries that require me to bend my mind upon a singular object that may repay attention, however weighty. You must understand this. I am simply unable to reply to conference calls etc - no matter how worthy and how much I may raise the prestige of such gatherings - until such a time as I find myself 'resettled'. This is my consuming distraction and, as such, I shall be off-limits (as they say) until such a time as to notify you otherwise. Exercise patience.

Tribulation ceases; Justice prevails

Of course it was simply a matter of time. I knew that once I 'put the word around' to the effect that I may be tempted by pastures new that the offers would come in full flood. And so it has proved, and I am now extricated from that pit of barbarism into which I had descended.

Of course it would be most unbecoming for me to trumpet the name of my 'savior', but suffice it to say that it is an ancient and mighty seat of learning that fully appreciates the value of traditional heavyweight scholarship. I must add that they were in no small way attracted to the lengthy list of upcoming publications accruing from my sabbatical on such critical issues as tonalism in factionalised archaeo-Thai and Khao/Kao fetishism in the upper Mekong basin. These shall now bear the name of my new position and post, to the savage loss of that heathen horde that failed to recognise high-level academic excellence.

Perhaps I may be permitted to 'crow' a little by revealing a tantalising glimpse in that I shall in effect be returning to my beloved Sweden. That provides enough clues to the learned in deductive reasoning.

Needless to say the fawning hierophants and toadies at my current (and soon to be ex-) appointment have learned of my imminent exit and adopt gruesome postures of feigned regret at my liberation. Of this I shall have naught, naught. Let them gnash and cringe while covertly jostling and manoeuvring to move into my 'niche'. I bequeath them it all, in full knowledge that it will turn to dust in their indolent and grimy hands. As Goethe put it, "and so the untermensch did leap and wither, clasping with clawed hands at that which was there not, yet falling finally back with woe unto that pit whence they came." Almost prescient, I do feel. Let them rot awhiles then repent at length the staggering loss they have surely provoked.

I am now prepared to receive the plaudits and congratulations of those loyal few who never doubted me. They at least may continue to visit these pages.

Treachery

Now we learn who our friends are. Now we discern the difference between fawning toadyism and genuine scholarship. I will remember, and respond.

Gaudete

And yet perhaps there is a glimmering of hope. These unsupportable and intolerable days of bondage may be close to termination. Has anyone experience of the Baptist University of Louisiana? Are they adept in philology? Do they retain tenured heavyweights?

Vomitose recidivism

I simply cannot call upon myself to speak witness to this catastrophe. I must in a very real sense withdraw and recoup.

Staring into the abyss

I am beset if not besieged upon all sides. The ancien regime has been swept away in an eye blink and a hideous mutation triumphantly gorges upon its carcase. I must be cautious, there is no knowing what spies lurk in whatever recess. They are everywhere.

I have been informed that I must actually teach students next 'semester'. While perfectly aware of the Latin roots of this frightful term (sex menses - 6 months) I am appalled to learn that this period is unaccountably reduced to 13 weeks. But I digress. I have not endured the degradation and humiliation of 'teaching' for over a decade now, preferring instead to pursue my own high-level interests as I will. But no longer.

I am to be issued with something called a 'timetable' which, I am informed, will direct me to various rooms to conduct classes at certain brutal times. I will need to 'read up' on certain undisclosed 'modules' and 'assessment schemes'. Since when were these excrescences required for senior academics in a mighty seat of learning?

My wheel is turned full circle, for sackcloth and ashes shall be my garb. I must exercise full caution for informants and lackeys will not hesitate to claim their 3o pieces of silver and report me to the neo-Stasi apparatchiks now in charge. Mayhap I have spoken too much and must need conduct a judicious halt. My attempts to raise the banner of revolt come to naught. All is withered and rotten upon the bough.

As Dante put it: "For all around the third circle they did shriek and wail but none could escape the blight and retribution of their humilation. Yet respite came there none, only further and yet further." It is a very vision of hell, and cannot fall further.

The angst of return; the return of angst.

And so I am returned to my Chair in Heidelburg after a most fruitful and in no small manner stimulating sabbatical in the 'far east'. I am anxious to commence my path breaking exegesis in all due haste so as to shatter the published walls of academe with yet more brilliant articles that will rewrite the laws of linguistic process if not procedure. But what, pray, do I find upon returning to my hallowed oak-lined office?

I am stunned beyond revulsion to discover that my inner sanctum has been occupied by not just one but two junior academics, even lowly assistant professors! I suspected that all was amiss when old Gerhardt the janitor guided me to my door with even more cringing perspiration than was his wont. Upon opening said portal I was afflicted with a vision beyond the wildest infernal depictions of Hieronymus Bosch himself.

My bookshelves had been dishevelled and disrupted beyond repair. And there, inside my antique Duisburg porcelain sink lay stacks of my coveted Caporelli dinner service stained with what I am informed is something called Pizza, but rotted beyond hygiene. One untermensch sat with his filthy boot-clad feet upon the veneer of my precious Vermaelen desk, studiously tearing up my meticulously prepared index cards and rolling them for insertion into the extremity of what I can only describe as home-made cigarillos. His lank, greasy hair barely stirred across a battered leatherette jacket as I spluttered in righteous incandescence. But this was nothing as compared to his totally inappropriate greeting. "Chill, man" was all he uttered before returning to his hideously vandalistic task, as if I was not even therein present.

But it was the second troglodyte that sent me into spasms of cataclysmic apoplexy. This languid baboon had opened all my private mail and had scattered it hither and yon 'twixt the Grundfeld meeting table, the Qubakh carpeting and the De Lorette shelves. "You aint missed much" he opined "and since you wuzzn't here we accepted your invitations to conferences and said we wuz you. Laugh eh? Nobody noticed and we published a shedload. All on expenses, man, cool". Fearing lockjaw and cardiac arrest I turned on my heel and departed forthwith from these heinous scenes of wanton destruction and vile impertinence, marching immediately to the offices of highest authority to demand immediate explanation, satisfaction and rectification.

Imagine, if you will, my utter bewilderment upon reaching the Directorate suite of offices to find an entire change of personnel. A personage with green hair sat at a desk filing her nails and could only say "Yeah?" as if I was some menial underlaborer instead of the most eminent professor in this mighty seat of learning. Upon demanding to see the Rector I was stunned to be ushered into the presence of my nemesis, Dr Egbert von Grollingen, the fanatical schismatic and bane of my career.

Smiling his demonic and triumphant smirk, he rapidly briefed me on developments. It was he who arranged my sabbatical to ensure my absence at the time of his coup d'etat. Rector Pumpfeisten had been retired on 'health grounds' engineered by von Grollingen's fawning toadies (since when did erratic whimsy ever disbar revered academic from senior administrative duty?). von Grollingen then rapidly mobilised his forces and the coup was complete as he settled himself into the Rector's weighty chair.

He'd made some changes, he smirked, "long overdue". We were now running courses in something called 'media studies' and 'business studies', not to mention 'computing'. Enrollment had tripled, as had income. I enquired about the presence of the loathsome pond life in my office and demanded their immediate expulsion. "Ah, O'Hara and Canello, brilliant young academics, fabulous publishing record" he grimaced. "Under our new Proactive Staff Development Initiative we are now nurturing and mentoring the bright young stars by placing them in direct contact with our most eminent professors. I think they'll learn a lot from you".

Feeling faint and pleading jetlag I fled the scene, heading post-haste to the Senior Common Room which - is nothing sacred? - was now a Burger King! Huddled in the corner, nursing a 'Whoppa' and 'Big Gulp' was old Professor J.L.B. Kamala, stout fellow, champion of romanticism and all-round decent chap. Needless to say he was delighted to see me, and, furtive glances aside, a natural ally. But imagine my disdain when he made his apologies and swept from the scene, gown flapping like a demented bat. It was then I noticed his clumsy attempts to conceal himself from ubiquitous close-circuit TV cameras. What the deuce?

Clearly all is not well, and I must regroup and consider tactical if not strategic options. A counter-coup seems almost a duty but I must not be hasty. Nay, I shall be the very imitator of Quintus Fabius Cunctator himself. Victory is assured.

The clamour unending

I am receiving an entirely untoward number of 'e-mails' pleading for me to script a new 'post'. Since I am urgently required in the maturation of several high-level projects I am unable to comply. So I find myself in the situation of urging my devotees to seek patience and fortitude, secure in the hope that I shall someday return to lead this forum of cognoscenti, at such a time that my burdens allow. But not before, I insist.

Proust defended against the barbarians

I am appalled to see a bilious, vomitose and utterly intemperate assault upon Proust by Germaine Greer. By her reading A la recherche du temps perdu is too long, too obscure, grammatically otiose and incomplete. Therefore it is, in her view, 'a waste of time' to ever embark upon reading it.

While it may be true that one may read several pages before encountering any punctuation marks this, surely, marks Proust's genius in innovation. Furthermore Proust so so famously fastidious that extant editions are so heavily over-written as to be virtually illegible. His punctiliousness in the search of perfection in no small way explains the incompleteness of his oeuvre: it was only the Grim Reaper himself that interrupted this process of endless redaction.

But it really is her scurrilous slight of the series being 'too long' and 'too obscure' that draws my near-incandescent wrath. Since when has 'length' been a deterrent to the robust and muscular reader? It reminds me of the fatuous critique of Mozart by the Austrian emperor - 'too many notes'. This point must immediately be dismissed as vapid meaninglessness though, like the Emperor, I am sure that Greer has her sycophantic assenters.

And as for obscurity? What on earth is possibly condemnable about being willingly obscure? Must we have sound-bite clarity in all aspects of this vulgar monochromatic visualisation of correct writing? After all, one man's obscurity (or should that be woman's?) is an epicurean feast to another; possibly, we might add, to one with the intellect to mine nuggets of challenging apercus.

No, Proust is the unchallenged colossus of the literary world in the last century and we cannot countenance these garrulous snipings from our Antipodean harpy. Let time be the judge: will we in the next century be discussing Proust or The Female Eunuch? I rest my case.

Pestilence, I am discommoded.

I am afflicted by a tropical malady of the gravest nature. It had always been my considered view that such pestilences restricted their visitations to uncouth or unwashed personages, but it seems that I may be in error. It would appear that these microbial parasites are utterly undiscerning and may even choose to afflict the fastidious and morally upright.

I have never had to make so many urgent and non-negotiable appointments with la salle du bain, spending not inconsiderable time periods in the most disturbing if not explosive evacuations. It is most fortunate that I had the foresight to install quality porcelain, but then 'forward planning' has always been a passion of mine.

I have urgently consulted with various medical 'types' who have tried to reassure me that my malady is a typical if not low-level food infection but I simply will not be patronised or fobbed off by these uncultured persons. Such is the gravity of my confinement that I have been forced to contract an auxiliary nurse so that I may delegate ablutionary and cleansing duties to one more skilled in these distasteful duties. Meanwhile I must endure the most excruciating headaches (migraine for sure) and cramps that would gratify the most sadistic henchman of Torquemada himself.

Needless to say, I shall be hors de combat for the foreseeable future, but may snatch such pitifully fleeting moments of tranquility that I am allotted to continue with my most pressing duties at the cutting edge of the academic endeavor.