Notes from the Burning Age

by Claire North

On ancient tangles of dug-up thread and rotting polymer pulled from the landfill mines, on blue-yellow fishing lines scoured from the skeletal guts of calcified fish, suspended like bunting across the grove to create a second canopy between snow and moon, the memories of the past had been hung like offerings to star and sky.

a complete history of anarchic comedy with a specialisation in the style known as ‘laughter track’. It is a form of humour, you see, where the laughter is artificially added in, and you do not necessarily need to have traditional modes of comedy such as ‘jokes’. Very interesting.”

You believe that you deserve what you receive, that you alone are the hero of your story. And yes, sooner or later, the only way to prove this is by conquering your fellow humans, mastering them with your strength. And when that is done, when humans are cowed and there is only annihilation, the only thing left is to kill a god.

Your mistake is imagining that in understanding the size and majesty of creation, the wonder of this world and the richness within it, you become small. A tiny scuttling thing without centre, without identity and form. You fail to see how, in grasping your small place within this life, you become part of something that is so much bigger than you could ever be when you were being a hero alone.”

“There are some fascinating old-world texts. Girl meets boy, boy is a dickhead, girl falls for boy, girl meets different boy who isn’t a dickhead, but in her infatuation can’t see the merits of new boy because the first boy is pretty