A Voyage to Arcturus

by David Lindsay

But just because it was real, it couldn't have been Surtur, who has no connection with reality."

gnostic division between truth and reality

"I'm a fisherman," he said, after a minute or two. "I live by killing, and so does

everybody. This life seems to me all wrong. So maybe life of any kind is wrong, and Surtur's world is not life at all, but something else."

"So strong is my sense of the untruth of this present life, that it may come to my putting an end to myself."

He said that Crystalman tries to turn all things into one, and that whichever way his shapes march, in order to escape from him, they find themselves again face to face with Crystalman, and are changed into

new crystals. But that this marching of shapes (which we call 'forking') springs from the unconscious desire to find Surtur, but is in the opposite direction to the right one. For Surtur's world does not lie on this side of the one, which was the beginning of life, but on the other side; and to get to it we must repass through the one. But this can only be by renouncing our self-life, and reuniting ourselves to the whole of Crystalman's world. And when this has been done, it is only the first stage of the journey; though many good

men imagine it to be the whole...

"But what did he mean by our reuniting ourselves to Crystalman's world? If it is false, are we to make ourselves false as well?" "I didn't ask him that

question, and you are as well qualified to answer it as I am." "He must have meant that, as it is, we are each of us living in a false, private world of our own, a world of dreams and appetites and distorted perceptions. By embracing the great world we certainly lose nothing in truth and reality."

And the man that can play the instrument of Earthrid would be able to conjure up the most astonishing forms, which are not phantasms, but realities."

"But it's not your fault, and in Shaping's world the worst things happen."

"In place of a human heart, you have a wild harp, and that's all I know about you." "What was that you said to my husband about two

worlds?" "You heard." "Yes, I heard. And I also am conscious of two worlds. My husband and boys are real to me, and I love them fondly. But there is another world for me, as there is for you, Maskull, and it makes my real world appear all false and vulgar."

Lindsay hints again this isn't space travel but gnostic myth (other world)

"Perhaps we are seeking the same thing. But can it be right to satisfy our self-nature at the expense of other people?"

"No, it's not right. It is wrong, and base. But in that other wo...

no mea...

it—a spirit compounded of those vestiges of Muspel which Shaping did not know how to transform.

for he dogs Shaping's footsteps everywhere, and whatever the latter does, he undoes. To love he joins death; to sex, shame; to intellect, madness; to virtue, cruelty; and to fair exteriors, bloody entrails. These are Krag's actions, so the lovers of the world call him 'devil.' They don't understand, Maskull, that without him the world would lose its beauty."

"Even so. That same beauty which you and I are now voyagin...

beauty for whose sake I am renouncing husband, children, and happiness.... Did you imagi...

"That pleasant beauty is an insipid compound of Shaping. To see beauty in its terrible purity, you must t...

"That is for rhythm, which is what changes noise into music.

"Maskull thinks music reposes in the instrument," she said in her intense way. "But it is in the soul of the Master."

In Threal, where I was born and brought up, we learn the mystery of the Three in nature. This world, which lies extended before us, has three directions. Length is the line which shuts off what is, from what is not. Breadth is the surface which shows us in what manner one thing of what-is, lives with another thing. Depth is the path which leads from what-is, to our own body. In music it is not otherwise. Tone is existence, without which nothing at all can be. Symmetry and

Numbers are the manner in which tones exist, one with another. Emotion is the movement of our soul toward the wonderful world that is being created. Now, men when they make music are accustomed to build beautiful tones, because of the delight they cause. Therefore their music world is based on pleasure; its symmetry is regular and charming, its emotion is sweet and lovely.... But my music is founded on pai...

"Still, explain—why can't harsh tones have simple symmetry of form? And why must they necessarily cause more profound emotions in us who listen?" "Pleasures may harmonise. Pains must clash; and in the order of their clashing lies the symmetry. The emotions follow the music, which is rough and earnest." "You may call it music," remarked Maskull thoughtfully, "but to me it bears

closer resemblance to actual life." "If Shaping's plans had gone straight, life would have been like that other sort of music. He who seeks can find traces of that intention in the world of nature. But as it has turned out, real life resembles my music and mine is the true music."

Branchspell shone on the whole of it, but Alppain only on a part. The broad crescent that reflected Branchspell's rays alone was white and brilliant; but the part that was illuminated by both suns shone with a greenish radiance that had almost solar power, and yet was cold and cheerless. On gazing at that combined light, he felt the same sense of disintegration that the afterglow of Alppain had always

great description of moon in binary system

caused in him; but now the feeling was not physical, but merely aesthetic. The moon did not appear romantic to him, but disturbing and mystical.

But she died very easily. She did not wait for the beauty she spoke about. She heard nothing of the passion, nor even of the rhythm. Neither have you."

He knew neither how to set about producing his music, nor what would come of it. But audacious projects entered his brain and he willed to create physical shapes—and, above all, one shape, that of Surtur.

"What themes are in common music, shapes are in this music. The composer does not find his theme by picking out single notes; but the whole theme flashes into his mind by inspiration. So it

must be with shapes. When I start playing, if I am worth anything, the undivided ideas will pass from my unconscious mind to this lake, and then, reflected back in the dimensions of reality, I shall be for the first time made acquainted with them. So it must be."

He realised that the ideas passing from him did not arise in his intellect, but had their source in the fathomless depths of his will.

eye chaos.

A delightful, springlike sense of rising sap, of quickening pulses of love, adventure, mystery, beauty, femininity—took possession of his being, and, strangely enough, he identified it with the monster. Why that invisible brute should cause him to feel young, sexual, and audacious, he did not ask himself, for he was fully

occupied with the effect. But it was as if flesh, bones, and blood had been discarded, and he were face to face with naked Life itself, which slowly passed into his own body.

He thought that the unseen power—whether it was called Nature, Life, Will, or God—that was so frantic to rush forward and occupy this small, vulgar, contemptible world, could not possess very high aims and was not worth much. How this sordid struggle for an hour or two of physical existence could ever be

regarded as a deeply earnest and important business was beyond his comprehension

Then he witnessed an astonishing sight. A large and

fully developed plant-animal appeared suddenly in front of him, out of empty space. He could not believe his eyes, but stared at the creature for a long time in amazement. It went on calmly moving and burrowing before him, as thought it had been there all its life. Giving up the puzzle, Maskull resumed his striding from rock to rock up the gorge, and then, quietly and without warning, the same phenomenon occurred again. No longer could he doubt than he was seeing miracles—that Nature was precipitating its

shapes into the world without making use of the medium of parentage.... No solution of th...

his forehead sprouted out into a galaxy of new eyes.

his vision altered and he came to an automatic standstill. He was perceiving two worlds simultaneously. With his own eyes he saw the gorge as before, with its rocks, brook, plant-animals, sunshine, and shadows. But with his acquired eyes he saw differently. All the details of the valley were visible, but the light seemed turned down, and everything appeared faint, hard, and uncoloured. The sun was obscured by masses of cloud which filled the whole

sky. This vapour was in violent and almost living motion. It was thick in extension, but thin in texture; some parts, however, were far denser than others, as the particles were crushed together or swept apart by the motion. The green sparks from the brook, when closely watched, could be distinguished individually, each one wavering up toward the clouds, but the moment they got within them a fearful struggle seemed to begin. The spark endeavoured to escape through to the upper air, while the clouds concentrated

around it whichever way it darted, trying to create so dense a prison that further movement would be impossible. As far as Maskull could detect, most of the sparks succeeded eventually in finding their way out after frantic efforts; but one that he was looking at was caught, and what happened was this. A complete ring of cloud surrounded it, and, in spite of its furious leaps and flashes in all directions—...

"That was exactly like the birth of a thought," he said to himself, "but who was the thinker? Some great Living Mind is at work in this spot. He has intelligence, for all his shapes are different, and he has character, for all belong to the same general type.... If I'm not wrong, and if it's the force called Shaping or Crystalman, I've seen enough to make me want to find out something more about him....

for this person, although clearly a human being, was neither man nor woman, nor anything between the two, but was unmistakably of a third positive sex, which was remarkable to behold and difficult to understand. In order to translate into words the sexual impression produced in Maskull's mind by the stranger's physical aspect, it is necessary to coin a new pronoun, for none in earthly use would be applicable. Instead of "he," "she," or "it," therefore "ae" will be used.

Body, face, and eyes were absolutely neither male nor female, but something quite different. Just as one can distinguish a man from a woman at the first glance by some indefinable difference of expression and atmospheres altogether apart from the contour of the figure, so the stranger was separated in appearance from both. As with

men and women, the whole person expressed a latent sensuality, which gave body and face alike their peculiar character.... Maskull decided that it was love—but what love—love for whom? it was neither the shame-carrying passion of a male, nor the deep-rooted instinct of a female to obey her destiny. It was as real and irresistible as these, but quite different.