priest about to officiate at a profane marriage.
A History of Nothing . Narrative elements: a week of hunting the overpasses, the exploration of countless apartments. With stove and sleeping-bag, they camped like explorers on the sitting-room floors. ‘They’re exhibits, Karen - this conception will be immaculate.’ Later they raced around the city, examining a dozen architectures. Talbert pushed her against walls and parapets, draped her along balustrades. In the rear seat the textbooks of erotica formed an encyclopedia of postures - blueprints for her own imminent marriage with a seventh-floor balcony unit of the Hilton Hotel.
Amatory elements: nil. The act of love became a vector in an applied geometry. She could barely touch his shoulders without galvanizing him into a spasm of activity. Some scanning device in his brain had lost a bolt. Later, in the dashboard locker she found a set of maps of the Pripet Marshes, a contour photogram of an armpit, and a hundred publicity stills of the screen actress.
Landscapes of the Dream . Various landscapes preoccupied Talbert during this period: (1) The melancholy back of the Yangtse, a boom of sunken freighters off the Shanghai Bund. As a child he rowed out to the rusting ships, waded through saloons awash with water. Through the portholes, a regatta of corpses sailed past Woosung Pier. (2) The contours of his mother’s body, landscape of so many psychic capitulations. (3) His son’s face at the moment of birth, its phantom-like profile older than Pharaoh. (4) The death-rictus of a young woman. (5) The breasts of the screen actress. In these landscapes lay a key.
Baby Dolls . Catherine Austin stared at the objects on Talbert’s desk. These flaccid globes, like the obscene sculptures of Bellmer, reminded her of elements of her own body transformed into a series of imaginary sexual organs. She touched the pallid neoprene, marking the vents and folds with a broken nail. In some weird way they would coalesce, giving birth to deformed sections of her lips and armpit, the junction of thigh and perineum.
A Nervous Bride . At the gates of the film studio Dr Nathan handed his pass to the guard. ‘Stage H,’ he said to Koester. ‘Apparently it was rented by someone at the Institute three months ago. At a nominal charge, fortunately - most of the studio is disused now.’ Koester parked the car outside the empty production offices. They walked through into the stage. An enormous geometric construction filled the hangar-like building, a maze of white plastic convolutions. Two painters were spraying pink lacquer over the bulbous curves. ‘What is this?’ Koester asked with irritation. ‘A model of SQRT(-1)?’ Dr Nathan hummed to himself. ‘Almost,’ he replied coolly. ‘In fact, you’re looking at a famous face and body, an extension of Miss Taylor into a private dimension. The most tender act of love will take place in this bridal suite, the celebration of a unique nuptial occasion. And why not? Duchamp’s nude shivered her way downstairs, far more desirable to us than the Rokeby Venus, and for good reason.’
Auto-Zoomar . Talbert knelt in the a tergo posture, his palms touching the wing-like shoulder blades of the young woman. A conceptual flight. At ten-second intervals the Polaroid projected a photograph on to the screen beside the bed. He watched the auto-zoom close in on the union of their thighs and hips. Details of the face and body of the film actress appeared on the screen, mimetized elements of the planetarium they had visited that morning. Soon the parallax would close, establishing the equivalent geometry of the sexual act with the junctions of this wall and ceiling.
‘Not in the Literal Sense.’ Conscious of Catherine Austin’s nervous hips as she stood beside him, Dr Nathan studied the photograph of the young woman. ‘Karen Novotny,’ he read off the caption. ‘Dr Austin, may I assure you that the prognosis is hardly favourable for Miss Novotny. As
A History of Nothing . Narrative elements: a week of hunting the overpasses, the exploration of countless apartments. With stove and sleeping-bag, they camped like explorers on the sitting-room floors. ‘They’re exhibits, Karen - this conception will be immaculate.’ Later they raced around the city, examining a dozen architectures. Talbert pushed her against walls and parapets, draped her along balustrades. In the rear seat the textbooks of erotica formed an encyclopedia of postures - blueprints for her own imminent marriage with a seventh-floor balcony unit of the Hilton Hotel.
Amatory elements: nil. The act of love became a vector in an applied geometry. She could barely touch his shoulders without galvanizing him into a spasm of activity. Some scanning device in his brain had lost a bolt. Later, in the dashboard locker she found a set of maps of the Pripet Marshes, a contour photogram of an armpit, and a hundred publicity stills of the screen actress.
Landscapes of the Dream . Various landscapes preoccupied Talbert during this period: (1) The melancholy back of the Yangtse, a boom of sunken freighters off the Shanghai Bund. As a child he rowed out to the rusting ships, waded through saloons awash with water. Through the portholes, a regatta of corpses sailed past Woosung Pier. (2) The contours of his mother’s body, landscape of so many psychic capitulations. (3) His son’s face at the moment of birth, its phantom-like profile older than Pharaoh. (4) The death-rictus of a young woman. (5) The breasts of the screen actress. In these landscapes lay a key.
Baby Dolls . Catherine Austin stared at the objects on Talbert’s desk. These flaccid globes, like the obscene sculptures of Bellmer, reminded her of elements of her own body transformed into a series of imaginary sexual organs. She touched the pallid neoprene, marking the vents and folds with a broken nail. In some weird way they would coalesce, giving birth to deformed sections of her lips and armpit, the junction of thigh and perineum.
A Nervous Bride . At the gates of the film studio Dr Nathan handed his pass to the guard. ‘Stage H,’ he said to Koester. ‘Apparently it was rented by someone at the Institute three months ago. At a nominal charge, fortunately - most of the studio is disused now.’ Koester parked the car outside the empty production offices. They walked through into the stage. An enormous geometric construction filled the hangar-like building, a maze of white plastic convolutions. Two painters were spraying pink lacquer over the bulbous curves. ‘What is this?’ Koester asked with irritation. ‘A model of SQRT(-1)?’ Dr Nathan hummed to himself. ‘Almost,’ he replied coolly. ‘In fact, you’re looking at a famous face and body, an extension of Miss Taylor into a private dimension. The most tender act of love will take place in this bridal suite, the celebration of a unique nuptial occasion. And why not? Duchamp’s nude shivered her way downstairs, far more desirable to us than the Rokeby Venus, and for good reason.’
Auto-Zoomar . Talbert knelt in the a tergo posture, his palms touching the wing-like shoulder blades of the young woman. A conceptual flight. At ten-second intervals the Polaroid projected a photograph on to the screen beside the bed. He watched the auto-zoom close in on the union of their thighs and hips. Details of the face and body of the film actress appeared on the screen, mimetized elements of the planetarium they had visited that morning. Soon the parallax would close, establishing the equivalent geometry of the sexual act with the junctions of this wall and ceiling.
‘Not in the Literal Sense.’ Conscious of Catherine Austin’s nervous hips as she stood beside him, Dr Nathan studied the photograph of the young woman. ‘Karen Novotny,’ he read off the caption. ‘Dr Austin, may I assure you that the prognosis is hardly favourable for Miss Novotny. As
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