Krishnamurti

This passage from J. Krishnamurti has moved me deeply.

 I maintain that truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect. That is my point of view, and I adhere to that absolutely and unconditionally. Truth, being limitless, unconditioned, unapproachable by any path whatsoever, cannot be organized; nor should any organization be formed to lead or coerce people along a particular path. ... This is no magnificent deed, because I do not want followers, and I mean this. The moment you follow someone you cease to follow Truth. I am not concerned whether you pay attention to what I say or not. I want to do a certain thing in the world and I am going to do it with unwavering concentration. I am concerning myself with only one essential thing: to set man free. I desire to free him from all cages, from all fears, and not to found religions, new sects, nor to establish new theories and new philosophies.

 I have questions and feel there are answers here, in me.

Danelys Valcarcel: Intuitive Living as a Spiritual Path

Danelys Valcarcel, an incredibly articulate woman, describes, through a theosophical lens, the usefulness of intuition towards living an artful life full of meaning. 

Neil Gaiman - 'Make Good Art'

Neil Gaiman's Inspirational Commencement Speech at Philadelphia’s University of the Arts is truly wonderful. Love this man.♡

Kim Jong Il Set to Publish Weird Horror Collection (repost)

This is a re-post of an April Fool's Day post over at the fantastic Grim Reviews. I can't stop laughing. I had to do it and I want to continue to amuse myself for days to come!

Friday, April 1, 2011

A bolt of lightening is set to rattle the literary horror community and world politics simultaneously from an unlikely source: North Korea. It seems the reclusive "Dear Leader," Kim Jong Il, is due to release a weird fiction collection entitled, Midnight in Pyongyang and Other Trodden Stories. Details are sketchy, but a Workers' Party of Korea source tells me it will be a book of eight stories with one novella length piece. Here's the contents:

• Starving Demons Beneath Juche Tower
• Imaginary Murals in the Metro
• King Tongmyong's Howling Resurrection
• Binding the Tentacle: An Unpublished Fragment from the Great Leader's Personal Diary
• A Shadow Engulfed Mount Paektu
• Midnight in Pyongyang
• The Sweeping Roar of Decay
• The Final Re-Education of a Wayward Marionette

Unknown to many, Kim has been a lifelong collector of weird literature, particularly stories by H.P. Lovecraft. He reportedly came upon the genre in the late 1960s, when an envoy recently returned from Japan presented him with an Arkham House edition of Lovecraft's Dagon and Other Macabre Tales. Since then, he has rapidly expanded his library of macabre works by well known masters and contemporaries. The forthcoming stories were conceived over the last few decades and "revised to heavenly perfection."


Midnight in Pyongyang hopes to communicate the "legendary terrors and triumphs which test the Juche idea." Judging by the brief summaries provided, one also wonders if the inner fears and secrets of the evasive head of state will leak, coiling up from the pages like the enormous Ryugyong Hotel. For instance, "Imaginary Murals in the Metro," offers a look at what happens when emaciated, hellish paintings begin inexplicably appearing next to the well known Socialist realist art in Pyongyang's metro. "The Sweeping Roar of Decay" chronicles the fevered dreams of a soldier who lives in two DPRKs: one filled with unimagined affluence, marvelous technologies, and golden tributes to the Party towering into the sky. The other is a broken place consumed with tears, deserted buildings, shabby denizens, and moldering monuments to Juche accomplishments everyone seems to have forgotten.

"Binding the Tentacle," which purports to be an unseen page from Kim Il Sung's diary, takes readers back to the elder Kim's days as a guerrilla leader during World War II. His warrior band aims to destroy a mysterious book bringing unspeakable terror to Koreans occupied by forces under a Japanese general with the "Innsmouth Look." This is clearly a Lovecraftian horror tale. "Midnight in Pyongyang" is the book's longest tale, and begins when a nameless successor to the Kim dynasty awakens in a pitch black capital to sounds of war. Thinking the "imperialists" have attacked, the Juche Prince rushes outside with his staff, but finds an impenetrable haze blanketing Pyongyang and a curious Buddhist temple no one has ever seen before.


The book's exact purpose and where it will appear are unknowns at this point. Is it a product of Kim's obsessions, ready to pour onto a Korean society that may struggle with strange concepts they have never before encountered? It's hard to see Midnight in Pyongyang gaining a large Western distribution either. Despite fascination with the introverted DPRK regime, Kim Jong Il is reviled by Westerners, by far the largest weird fiction audience. Still, the collection should gain serious interest when it does appear, barring a change of heart by the ailing Kim or his successors, if only due to its bizarre origins.


-Grim Blogger

Freaks, Monsters, Fairies, Devils, and Fantasy TOUR

This is the way to discover Florence, Italy in a Study Abroad course being offered this fall.



Must I even say how I lament passing on such an opportunity?
It would certainly advance my stature and understanding in the Cult of the Moon.
Now if only they had a Heathen version of this being held in Oslo.

What Do You Want?

Someone once asked me "What do you want?"

At the time I thought it was a strange question with too broad a context.

I searched for an answer regardless, intending to say something humourous about a knight in shining armour or vast sum of money but I remained silent for some time as my brain repeated the statement over and over in my mind coming up with next to nothing until it finally reached through the mire of useless gibberish in my consciousness to the cobwebs and dusty thoughts of my childhood. The only thing I saw there was a dead squirrel laying in the dirt beside the tall chain link fence separating the grade school I attended with the neighbouring homes. I was eleven years old. I knelt down beside it. I mourned for it. I wished I could give it life again. Eventually I covered it with dried leaves and walked on.

It was an answer, although lucid, distant, and not terribly useful but it was all I could come up with.

For the next 18 months I squirmed my way through the rest of my brain looking for a more meaningful answer. I only let go of the need to find it when I realized the only thing I truly wanted was amusement. I guess that is my way of feeling happiness.

Yes, I spent 18 months trying to find an answer to the stupid question.

Roll forward another several years of living for the sole purpose of amusement and we come to....

Now I think this stupid question is paramount and must be answered. If the question cannot be answered, then the point to life, and death, is lost.

God I'm full of shit.  I have no idea what I am talking about and people should really not listen to me.... but do what you want.

Whatever. Point made.

This is why I made the Darkling Child Storybook:

I'm in love with a little kid.

Bah Humbug

Watched A Christmas Carol last night on the telly. I love the ghostly references and the complete 'film noir' experience of this film. Never gets old. Given how I feel about X-mas (barely tolerable), I even enjoy the fluff that is in opposition to Ebenezer's darkness. Such innocence and 'goodness' in the face of tiny Tim is hardly believable anyway, so moot, I allow myself enjoyment of this classic.

X-mas pretty makes me want to kill all the happy people who through their ignorance are damning the world to hell. I'm not going to offer an in-depth political or philosophical explanation of this statement at the moment, but if you think about it, I'm sure you'll be able come up with an explanation on your own.

I tolerate X-mas only because it makes my family happy. I DO enjoy spending time with them but I resent that this is the only time of year that that ever happens naturally and gracefully. I know this attitude darkens the atmosphere a little, or perhaps a lot, but that's what I'm about. At least I do it with a smile. And I'll do it again next year.

So here's what I have to say about Christmas on the eve of the big day:

I won't normally post images that are not my own but this is too good for me to pass up. I don't even know who did it but it states exactly how I feel without any words at all!

So if you enjoy Christmas, I wish you the merry best and if you don't I wish you tolerance and perseverance... if I can get through it you probably can too.

Sorcery In India

First reported in the Romanian tabloid Libertatea is a tale of an Indian sorcerer beheading children in a black magic ritual to gain personal power.

I found it in the Korea Times under the headline Indian Sorcerer Sacrifices 2 Kids To Raise Magic Power.

It's a pretty tall tale if you ask me. I've been unable to find anything to corroborate the story in the Indian media and the image reeks of fabrication...
But a cool tale nonetheless. Great fodder for some fictitious inspiration!

To see an English translation of the original article in Libertatea go here.

My Beautiful Daughter

This is my beautiful daughter.

And these are the words that have meaning for her:

"Long live the rose that grew from the concrete when no one else ever cared." - Tupac Shakur

I never meant for this blog to be about family. I can't help myself. I'm too proud of her. It was and is supposed to be a place for me to explore the dark side of everything that is NOT currently a part of my life. My life is in fact simple and domestic. But in my mind a virulent fantasy swirls with intense passion. I struggle to express myself. To her. To the world. For now, I send her my blessing, my strength and my love.