Oct 27 20
We were watching a show of which ghosts and hauntings were the theme. We’re not interested in naming the series, as overall we found it mostly meh, and we’d rather not get into criticism. However within it are quite a few moving metaphors involving haunting and repetition — one of which we’d like to touch upon here. We have no truck with scares that are cheap or horror for horror’s sake, but we do believe that the horror or weird tale genre can speak as deeply to our general human circumstance as any other cinematic or literary zone. If made to account the following would comprise our headspring for the genre, Thomas Ligotti, Henry James, Shirley Jackson, Algernon Blackwood, Patricia Highsmith, Robert Aickman, and Kiyoshi Kurosawa. The latter (Kurosawa) is worth noting, in the present context, as proffering (for us) in his film Kairo, the most plausible proposition of an afterlife — or whatever his disturbingly ambiguous continuance would be called.
In the series of our initial mention, there is a particular ghost referred to as the lady in the lake. Each night, the apparition walks from out of the depths of a lake on the grounds of a manor house, where she died, to her death room, where she left behind her beloved daughter. The ghost’s jealous wrath is spurred by the betrayal of her sister. In the story she died in the late 17th century, and has been walking every single night through to the 1980s — the moment in which the series takes place. The ghost traversed her baleful route for over 300 years, ostensibly over 100,000 strolls. By the time the characters of the contemporaneous end of the story, come in contact with her, she has almost no facial features, and seems to have lost the specificity of her purpose. She no longer seeks a daughter or knows of her sister’s treachery; her search evolved into a simple motion of desolate rage. She became a creature beyond appeal; and anyone unfortunate enough to cross her way is dragged into the lake — a co-prisoner doomed to their own endless, eldritch recapitulation.
Personally, we come from a family of which there were dark and focused secrets. We saw close relations repeat themselves into creatures of outline only, with untreated pain felt constantly and acutely. Their eventual personalities became highly impersonal and terrifying to those close to them — and to strangers transparent. Familiarity breeds contempt but if a repetition continues reductio ad absurdum it fosters an overdetermination of bearing to rival any wraith of lore. (Add an alcohol addiction and watch out Pazuzu!)
This leads us to a denouement perhaps too self-helpy or plain sounding — yet nevertheless it is the best method for self exorcism we have come upon. F_____T found it whilst researching methods for better meditation: simply, when an unwanted thought enters your head, give it scant regard and drop it. If it comes back, drop it again. It gets easier and easier; but it does take practice. (We’ve even been able to utilize it on harrowing psychedelic up-ramps.) So yes, for us when thoughts creep and try to seduce us with their grotesque familiarity and pull us towards their self centered vortex of anxiety — we just drop them. We don’t let them stay.
In the series of our initial mention, there is a particular ghost referred to as the lady in the lake. Each night, the apparition walks from out of the depths of a lake on the grounds of a manor house, where she died, to her death room, where she left behind her beloved daughter. The ghost’s jealous wrath is spurred by the betrayal of her sister. In the story she died in the late 17th century, and has been walking every single night through to the 1980s — the moment in which the series takes place. The ghost traversed her baleful route for over 300 years, ostensibly over 100,000 strolls. By the time the characters of the contemporaneous end of the story, come in contact with her, she has almost no facial features, and seems to have lost the specificity of her purpose. She no longer seeks a daughter or knows of her sister’s treachery; her search evolved into a simple motion of desolate rage. She became a creature beyond appeal; and anyone unfortunate enough to cross her way is dragged into the lake — a co-prisoner doomed to their own endless, eldritch recapitulation.
Personally, we come from a family of which there were dark and focused secrets. We saw close relations repeat themselves into creatures of outline only, with untreated pain felt constantly and acutely. Their eventual personalities became highly impersonal and terrifying to those close to them — and to strangers transparent. Familiarity breeds contempt but if a repetition continues reductio ad absurdum it fosters an overdetermination of bearing to rival any wraith of lore. (Add an alcohol addiction and watch out Pazuzu!)
This leads us to a denouement perhaps too self-helpy or plain sounding — yet nevertheless it is the best method for self exorcism we have come upon. F_____T found it whilst researching methods for better meditation: simply, when an unwanted thought enters your head, give it scant regard and drop it. If it comes back, drop it again. It gets easier and easier; but it does take practice. (We’ve even been able to utilize it on harrowing psychedelic up-ramps.) So yes, for us when thoughts creep and try to seduce us with their grotesque familiarity and pull us towards their self centered vortex of anxiety — we just drop them. We don’t let them stay.