Pursued and entrapped by Biblical omen?
No black dog, but a recurring architectural motif is trailing my steps across Europe.
It began innocently enough with Bruegel's foggy corkscrew in Vienna.
Then in Freiburg a particular Weinberg (vineyards on mountains) forms a twisting, grape-y slope that pushes into the clouds in a disturbingly similar manner.
More. In Berlin's Pergamon, we saw archeological remnants and this god-awful miniture of the historical city.
Strike three.
Then today, if the coincidences weren't damning enough, I watched Lang's Metropolis. The supression of the subterranean workers is here symbolised by the ever-domineering specter of the Babel Turm (which seems to have nicked Liberty's crown):
And today directly after the film, I went to a record shop where, what was playing but "Der Schacht Von Babel" from the Einstürzende Neubauten which describes how instead of building the Tower of Babel skywards, it is dug deep into the earth as a shaft or tunnel.
Always eager to eek out my own meaningful symbolic framework (ha), I initially felt sure that it was a call to the great cities of Europe. Why be damned in Freiburg when one can experience God's wrath first hand in Berlin or, say, Istanbul?
But now, ever floundering with my german, and today beginning french, I feel I have struck upon the deeper resonance of this dogged omen.
The biblical story of Babel (as I understand it) decribes how humans obsessed with their own grand endeavour neglected their even grander maker. To frustrate their every effort he sent down a plague of communication problems. The builders were scattered across the world contained and constrained within their various languages.
I have started uni and am thrilled by the wonderful courses all at my disposal. But will my endeavour be quashed by an insummountable language barrier? Has Breugel ordained it thus?
_____________________________________________________
Later:
Oh fuck it. Being scattered to the four corners of the world would be great, I'll take my strebsam punishment.Travel is quite the thing, I find. Did I mention Berlin and Istanbul? That I'm hop, skipping and jumping to Paris next week? Wrath me up.
No black dog, but a recurring architectural motif is trailing my steps across Europe.
It began innocently enough with Bruegel's foggy corkscrew in Vienna.
Then in Freiburg a particular Weinberg (vineyards on mountains) forms a twisting, grape-y slope that pushes into the clouds in a disturbingly similar manner.
More. In Berlin's Pergamon, we saw archeological remnants and this god-awful miniture of the historical city.
Strike three.
Then today, if the coincidences weren't damning enough, I watched Lang's Metropolis. The supression of the subterranean workers is here symbolised by the ever-domineering specter of the Babel Turm (which seems to have nicked Liberty's crown):
And today directly after the film, I went to a record shop where, what was playing but "Der Schacht Von Babel" from the Einstürzende Neubauten which describes how instead of building the Tower of Babel skywards, it is dug deep into the earth as a shaft or tunnel.
Always eager to eek out my own meaningful symbolic framework (ha), I initially felt sure that it was a call to the great cities of Europe. Why be damned in Freiburg when one can experience God's wrath first hand in Berlin or, say, Istanbul?
But now, ever floundering with my german, and today beginning french, I feel I have struck upon the deeper resonance of this dogged omen.
The biblical story of Babel (as I understand it) decribes how humans obsessed with their own grand endeavour neglected their even grander maker. To frustrate their every effort he sent down a plague of communication problems. The builders were scattered across the world contained and constrained within their various languages.
I have started uni and am thrilled by the wonderful courses all at my disposal. But will my endeavour be quashed by an insummountable language barrier? Has Breugel ordained it thus?
_____________________________________________________
Later:
Oh fuck it. Being scattered to the four corners of the world would be great, I'll take my strebsam punishment.Travel is quite the thing, I find. Did I mention Berlin and Istanbul? That I'm hop, skipping and jumping to Paris next week? Wrath me up.
posted by Harriet at 5:33 am
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