“There are many ways of defining monstrosity, he thinks, but their common feature is the coexistence of possibilities among which a choice should have been made.” — Cesar Aira, Acts of Charity.
A thought occurred to me: Our mental model of bald eagles is a chimera. Real ones make a comical clicking sound but on screen that’s usually replaced with the screech of a red-tailed hawk. That way the audio matches the majesty of the visual. Real bald eagles have a higher contraption factor than our ideal.Most people don’t know this because they’ve never seen one in the wild.
surprised to read a whole essay about monsters without the most obvious historical referent: birth defects. iirc the word "monster" originally referred primarily to things like two-headed calves
“You might say that humans have always suspected that the path to divinity winds its way through monstrousness”
A defining characteristic of a hero is the ability to do monstrous things but in pursuit of protection rather than predation. Heroes often walk the line between the divine and the monstrous, and frequently succumb.
“There are many ways of defining monstrosity, he thinks, but their common feature is the coexistence of possibilities among which a choice should have been made.” — Cesar Aira, Acts of Charity.
A thought occurred to me: Our mental model of bald eagles is a chimera. Real ones make a comical clicking sound but on screen that’s usually replaced with the screech of a red-tailed hawk. That way the audio matches the majesty of the visual. Real bald eagles have a higher contraption factor than our ideal.Most people don’t know this because they’ve never seen one in the wild.
surprised to read a whole essay about monsters without the most obvious historical referent: birth defects. iirc the word "monster" originally referred primarily to things like two-headed calves
“You might say that humans have always suspected that the path to divinity winds its way through monstrousness”
A defining characteristic of a hero is the ability to do monstrous things but in pursuit of protection rather than predation. Heroes often walk the line between the divine and the monstrous, and frequently succumb.
Monster is used to qualify tornadoes and waves. Something dynamic, appears to have agency, is intent in doing damage to the observer / narrator.
Also, would there be no monsters if there were no mediocres?
I was reminded of Mothman :)