A first consideration of Palingenesia.

In her idiosyncratic nun-training, Veracitude was schooled in the ideas of the psychologist, G. Stanley Hall who (in his studies on adolescent girls) was much taken with Van Rensselaer’s observation that 'women are prone... to desire what they have not, and for that reason alone they particularly need absorbing occupations, and are spoiled by idleness and vacuity of mind, which makes them lazy, phlegmatic, and unambitious'. Veracitude applies these ideas to her scheme to 'improve' Prigentia Colswain. She asks Ruham Alif, the electrician, to offer Prigentia a work experience placement. Alif doubts if a precocious twelve year old 'princess' could do much in the way of electrical repairs, but agrees, provided Ethel will supervise the girl. Ethel declines the offer.

String Theory

The oldest written records of puppetry can be found in the writings of Herodotus and Xenophon (the Greek word translated as "puppet" is "νευρόσπαστος" which literally means "drawn by strings"). Aristotle (who was a very Big Egg in Ancient Greece) discusses puppets in his work ‘On the Motion of Animals.’

"The movements of animals may be compared with those of automatic puppets, which are set going on the occasion of a tiny movement; the levers are released, and strike the twisted strings against one another."

Talking of twisted strings, Prigentia and Veracitude are struggling in their different approaches to acceptable language utterances. Prigentia leaves the session with what Maslow called ‘a sense of self-actualization’.  Veracitude leaves with a black eye.

Norwegian Wood

Today comes the news that Malvolio Claxendell is collaborating with Yevgeny Huxtable by writing the libretto for his colleague's opera based on Ibsen's newly discovered comedy 'The Wild Enemy of Count Arthur Strong, Masterbuilder'. The musical extravaganza promoted by the Director of Global Brickworks, Lucien Jung, is expected to be the centrepiece of this year's Seven Dials Festival. Ibsen wrote the play when his wife, Suzannah Thoresen,  suffered exogenous depression after losing twenty kroner at Valhalla Bingo. To cheer her up he then performed the piece with a specially constructed puppet theatre. In the 1960s Ingmar Bergman adapted it for the big screen, turning it into a searing existential tragedy on the theme of death, misdirected metempsychosis and eternal virginity.

O you who turn the wheel and look to windward...

Gilgul (Heb. גלגול הנשמות) describes a Kabbalistic concept of reincarnation (rather like Metempsychosis). Souls are seen to "cycle" through "lives" being attached to different human bodies over time. Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle was born at Lons-le-Saunier on market day.  He later wrote the words to the Marseillaise in a fit of post-prandial patriotic excitement. As a royalist he narrowly escaped the guillotine, but died in poverty on 26 June 1836, his spirit passing on to Suzannah Thoresen who was born that day in Herøy, Norway. She married Henrik Ibsen and their only son Sigurd Ibsen became Prime Minister of Norway and died on April 14, 1930 the day that Kaviyoor Revamma the Carnatic vocalist was born in Kaviyoor, India.

Metempsychosis

Until the barbarian depredations, the City of Mediomatrix was one of the principal towns of Gaul. It was the birthplace of Freda Weekly (born Emma Maria Frieda Johanna Freiin, Baroness von Richthofen.)  She was an inveterate walker, translator and novelist. For a time she lived at the Tinner’s Arms in the village of Zennor in Cornwall, not far from St Senara's Church where she saw a carved bench-end depicting a mermaid.  Her lover, the radical psychoanalyst Otto Gross, championed an early form of anti-psychiatry, sexual liberation and depth psychology all of which have influenced Ferabdurus Lotus, Reikarial Therapist, and part-owner of Zangwill’s Bazaar of Curiosities. Freda Weekly died in Taos in 1956. (She was also a friend of David Eder).

Such stuff as dreams are made of…

Years ago Rev. Lanzarotte invested all the church funds of St. Scruples (C-of-E) in a high interest speculation which offered a massive rate of return. In the early years he eagerly watched the funds grow, offering dreams of repairing the church roof, landscaping the subsiding graveyard and taking the local wrinklies on day-trips to Bournemouth. However just when he planned to withdraw the money, the Bernie Madoff scandal broke. Suddenly there was no money left in the church funds. Ever since he has pedantically reminded those who misquote Prospero in The Tempest that Shakespeare was no friend of the swindling financier and would not have written about the dreams of Madoff. 

‘We are such stuff as dreams are made on.’

Elocution and Grammar

Ethel's sister, Grapella, is concerned about little Prigentia, her twelve year old princess who is emotionally immature but behaviourally precocious. The main problem however is her high rising terminals. When Ethel tells her of Sister Veracitude's Cruxicogentian Elocution and Grammar centre, she leaps at the chance to address Prigentia's estuary tendencies. Despite Grapella’s fervent atheism, she is prepared to put aside her principles provided Sister Veracitude can cure the filial delinquency. She visits Sister Veracitude’s new establishment and together they kneel and pray (the essential prerequisite of linguistic success, according to the erstwhile Mother Superior). When Grapella brings the cantankerous teenager to the centre, Prigentia is wearing disturbingly inappropriate minimalistic attire, and Sister Veracitude’s mouth drops open. OMG she thinks.

Tomasi's Mother and the Analyst

In this week's Nordic Cultural Newsletter, Jorvik Stilten, is reviewing the Psychoanalytic writings of Alexandra Wolff von Stomersee. After growing up in the court of Czar Nicolas the Second in St. Petersburg, Alexandra married the Sicilian Prince of Lampedusa and Duke of Palma di Montechiaro in 1932 (though she didn’t like his mother). After much procrastination the Prince (Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa) wrote his masterpiece 'Il Gattopardo' (in English this is known as The Leopard, though in fact the word means Ocelot). After di Lampedusa’s death Alexandra became a key figure in the Italian Psychoanalytic Society. The Ocelot is similar in appearance to a domestic cat, and Yevgeny Huxtable’s late Ukrainian Levkoy cat, Charisma, was once mistaken for a Leopard.

Goldberg Variations

While the residents of Seven Dials begin to recover from the weather, it falls on the Rev. Lanzarotte to intercede in order to stop the Claxendell-Huxtable confrontation. He visits each in turn and explores, cajoles and explores.  No, the cat is still alive – just a little shorn. Yes – the ladies from Featheral Upholstering will replace the damaged drapes. Maybe a conversation is possible. Luckily water damage from the leak at the Regency Pile is attracting most of Claxendell’s attention and he is prepared to yield. Lanzarotte invites Huxtable to perform the Goldberg Variations before the church Music Society, if he would find himself able to scribble a short note of apology. Sadly the next day the cat is run over.

Honour and Courtesy

A voice rings out across McGonagal’s Writers Café. ‘It’s the cat stupid.’

Malvolio Claxendell hurls this accusation at Yevgeny Huxtable who is morosely finishing his macchiato.  

In the middle ages the duel arrived in Britain with the influx of Italian honour and courtesy literature (notably Book of the Courtier by Baldassare Castiglione). This stressed the need to protect one's reputation and social mask and prescribed the circumstances under which an insulted party should issue a challenge. However it is rare today, even in Seven Dials. Nevertheless, Claxendell throws down his gauntlet, and Huxtable does not hesitate to pick it up. ‘If you’ve touched a hair on the head on my Charisma you’re a dead man.’  Claxendell smiles grimly. ‘Too late!’

Number Theory

There is a problem at Landora, the huge Regency pile that Malvolio Claxendell is currently pouring a fortune into restoring to its former state. The ladies from Featheral Upholstering, Loretta and Rosetta, have created, embroidered, and now hung the new silk damask curtains. But over the weekend long tears and shreds have appeared in the lower regions of the drapes. Claxendell prints out a warning notice which he hangs on the lamppost outside Moudi’s. Below it is a lost cat poster put up by Yevgeny Huxtable. His pregnant Ukrainian Levkoy cat, Charisma, named after Abū ʿAbdallāh Muḥammad ibn Mūsā al-Khwārizmī (the Persian mathematician who lived during the Abbasid Empire) has gone missing.  Even Claxendell can put two and two together.

Accroche Publicitaire

Ruham Alif, the handsome plumber and electricity fixer, has a powerful build and nature. Amongst the housewives and househusbands of Seven Dials he is known as the Ox. His accroche publicitaire is 'Pipes and Wires'. Since he has employed Ethel and Freda his business has expanded, and he has more leisure time. On Tueday it is his birthday, and he meets with Hedre and Tom Purdue at the Local Coffee House.  They are waiting for the arrival of the fourth member of the quartet, Telemachus, who dramatically arrives by hang-glider, landing on the roof of St. Scruples. He then crosses above the new roundabout by tightrope. When he descends clutching his birthday gift there is a loud roar of applause.

Recombination

On Sunday Felix wakes with a hangover. He recalls the drunken conversation of the previous evening, when he explained the biochemical details of double crossover recombination events to Huxtable’s very pregnant Ukrainian Levkoy cat. The cat was more interested in licking crumbs of smoked salmon bagel from Kugarita’s chin as she fell asleep behind the leather upholstered armchair. Other than the raunchy music recital from Ethel and Hedre, little is remembered of the rest of the evening, so today no-one notices the disappearance of cat. When their boss calls, Ethel and Freda, who also slept in Huxtable’s lounge, hurry off, while Frab and Tabitha help tidy the place up. Ukrainian Levkoy cats exhibit phenotypic sexual dimorphism, especially around the ears.

א גוט וועטשערע

Huxtable's meal begins with a bang when the lights fuse. Felix, who is not practical, attempts a repair which blows the mains. They eat in darkness and Sister Veracitude tells them of her decision. She is to establish the Cruxicogentian Elocution and Grammar centre, for children whose parents are distressed about the epidemic of High Rising Terminals (AQI). Frab protests that this is unwarranted interference in  people's language choice. The others disagree, but aren't sure if he isn't asking a question (except Hedre who thinks they are talking about Hormone Replacement Therapy). When Ethel and Frida arrive to mend the electricity meter, everyone relaxes and the evening progresses well, with much drinking of vodka (and strangely Marsala Vergine e/o Soleras).

Silken mushrooms

Every year on January 11^th, to commemorate the death in 1874 of Gail Borden who developed condensed milk (to which he is addicted) Yvegeny Huxtable, noted pianist, holds a formal dinner party for eight people.  This year he has invited Felix and Frab, Samuel Quinine (owner-manager of Yifitsin Print Bookshop), Kugarita Zinfandel (daughter of Rabbi Oud Ramonides) who is writing a biography of Borden, Tabitha and Hedre, and Sister Veracitude – ex- Mother Superior of the Cruxicogentes Convent of Theodora. He is preparing an ethnic Lithuanian meal featuring three varieties of mushroom soup, and potato monstrosities called Cepelinai. The ritual involves all the participants giving an account of themselves whilst downing shots of iced vodka. He spends today preparing the soup.

Frabjous day!

Having established the obvious connection between the ischial tuberosities and Kyi (the Slav leader who founded Kiev) we look around and take stock of daily life in Seven Dials now that the festive season and extreme conflagrations are over. The residents have mostly survived the unusual weather, and the localised flooding has subsided. The proprietors of Moudi's and McGonagal's are eying up the empty plot of land where the ruins of the old convent have been cleared for development. Both plan to put in a bid, as does Lucien Jung from the Old Chapel Arts Centre. Life has returned to normal, and the doctor's surgery is again heaving with complaint-ridden hypochondriacs for whom Christmas is the worst of times.

Nestor the Chronicler was buried in the Near Caves (Ближні печери)

This week Stilten’s Nordic Cultural Newsletter publishes an old research paper by Malvolio Claxendell about Kiev.

According to Nestor the chronicler, ‘Kiovia’ was founded by a Slavic tribe leader Kyi, together with his sister Lybid, and brothers Shchek and Khoryv. Nestor who died in 1114, based his writings on Byliny (били́ни) - traditional East Slavic epic narratives.  Claxendell has discovered a Bylina that tells of a hero taking leave of his mother, galloping off to brag before the council of elders, before leaping over the city walls, to charge into battle and taunt his enemy, and then begging for mercy. The stuff of every day life.

The other article in the newsletter was about the price of cheese at Waitrose.

Nordic Dendromania

Jorvik Stilten is looking for a clinic where he can practic his chiropractic. As he passes the Old Chapel  Arts Centre, he notices Lucien Jung who is planting a small sapling. The Residents Assembly has decided that last year’s traumatic threat to the Great Elm should be commemorated with a new tree. New elm saplings are being planted around the main roads that lead from the Seven Dials. Lucien tells Jorvik (who takes notes for his Nordic cultural newsletter) that thousands of new elms have been planted as part of the Great British Elm Experiment (GBEE). He also tells him that Frab (part-owner of Zangwill’s Bazaar of Curiosities) the local Reikarial Therapist, is renting out clinic space at his studio.

CoXiX - עד מאה ועשרים - tails worth telling: the new 120 by 120 word blog.

In many ways Jorvik Stilten could be a veteran resident of Seven Dials, but in fact he only arrived recently - as editor of the Nordic cultural newsletter. He is also a practicing chiropractic, and researches the coccyx. In humans and other tailless primate (since Nacholapithecus) the coccyx is the remnant of a vestigial tail, but it’s not entirely useless. Together with the the ischial tuberosities and inferior rami of the ischium it  is  part of the weight-bearing tripod structure which acts as a support for a sitting person. The ischial tuberosities will play an important part in our story, but meanwhile events start on New Year’s Day, when the Residents assemble for the annual Winter Trek across the Downs.