[UA] The End of the World, and so on.

[Tim Toner]

----- Original Message -----
From: Nick Wedig <mrteapot at disinfo.net>
To: <ua at lists.uchicago.edu>
Sent: Friday, June 08, 2001 9:05 AM
Subject: Re:[UA] The End of the World, and so on.


> >John Crowley's _Ægypt_ has gotten me thinking about the end of the
world --
> >or at least the end of the UA world.
>
> >History shifted into new patterns, the laws of nature changed, certain
> >people, places, and things disappeared (while others simultaneously
> >appeared) or became suddenly fictional, and so on...
>
> I like this bit.  Before the change, there was no America, there was (at
best)
> a single large island on which you found purgatory, as described in Dante.
> After the change, we got Native Americans.

This was a hidden strength of Mage that never got developed well, IMO.  As I
saw it, there was a group that splintered into several groups, and each went
its seperate way.  The distance between these groups was never spatial as
much as ideological.  They roamed the "soft Earth" (stealing an idea from
Gaiman), eventually finding a place that suited them, which was more like
Amber's shadow walking ability than anything else.  The longer they stayed
here, the more firm things became, until their worlds were as real as real
could be, but venture too far out, and you couldn't rely on things working
as you always accepted them.  As two cultures developed commonalities, the
distance gradually grew shorter, until finally one could 'map' the space
between, and what was once soft grew stable.  Then the age of exploration
hit, and Columbus, working on a really good idea, set out west, into the
land of Death.  He knew that there was something out there, and he knew that
if he traveled far enough west, he'd emerge in China.  Somehow he got his
charts wrong, and broke through to the Americas, creating a passage there
that soon stabilized.  After that, it didn't take the Cartographers long to
solidify the world into its spherical configuration, which best explained
this phenomena of "head in a given direction, and either you'll find what
you're looking for, or end up where you started."  The Native Americans were
always there.

>
> >(I figure that most of the old schools of magick would have died right
then
> >and there, in favor of more "scientific" schools.
>
> I imagine many of the older schools died out due to changes in society.  A
school
> in medieval times could have been focused on paradoxes of believing what
> you're doing (trafficking with demons and the like) was evil, but after
the church
> lost control, this was no longer necessarily so.  (similarly I don't think
modern
> schools like dipsomancy could have existed before the modern conception of
> alcohol and alcoholism, although alcohol itself is very old).

This fits well with nonsensical paradoxical notions, such as Xeno's Paradox
and various koans, which are better left as thought exercises, but which are
really no less valid than Einstein's Twin Paradox or time travel.  It's all
a matter of perspective. There's also the wonderful stuff you can do with
'madness as a gift from the divine,' which pretty much got crapped on in the
18th and 19th Century.

>
> >In the present day, as the campaign start off, the world is on the verge
of
> >the next recreation.  The transition this time will be to the "Age of
> >Uncertainty", exemplified by fuzzy logic, quantum physics, and suchlike.
> >Dermot Arkane's aspiration to ascend as the "Heisenberg Messenger" were
what
> >got me started on this way of thinking.  What I'm looking for now is some
> >other archetypes, or interpretations of traditional archetypes, that
would
> >have a similar feel.  Any ideas or suggestions?
>
> I'm uncertain how it fits, but I've been imagining (I'm afraid I forgot it
during the thread
> requesting archetypes) an archetype about hidden potential.  Specifically,
it comes from
> various stories (fictional, i know) about kings dressing as commoners to
go out into the land.
> More modern versions would be geniuses who don't publish their work or
celebrities hiding
> their identity from the media.  Historical avatars would be difficult to
name, because being
> recognized as such would be breaking taboo.  The way it connects in is
that the truth of the
> situation is hidden from the observer.  Exact channels and the like are up
to you to determine,
> but would involve hiding things literally or figuratively (oo... how about
bonuses if you flip-flop
> your roll to be worse?)

William Sidis is a good example from more recent memory, as would be Emily
Dickinson and Franz Kafka, both of whom left major works behind, published
after their deaths (in Kafka's case, he asked that they be burned).  There
are a few--all you need to do is find someone who gained their fame
posthumously.

>
> Mr. Teapot
> hidden king
>
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