The Great and Secret Knowledge
Beverly Crusher challenges the universe
We wrap up the final chapter and then talk about the entire book. Then we look at One Star Goodreads reviews!
Next time on: X-Files! Watch the pilot and join us with your ears!
Please join our Discord server and get to know the fam!
Below you'll find our plugs, links, recommendations, and links to stuff from this week's episode! Lindsey's podcasts The Kurt Locker Cool Breeze over the Mountains Historical Hotties Jeff's podcasts Shattered Worlds RPG Everything is Awesome with Jeff and ? Omniversal Escapades
James Lark (composer, podcaster) wrote the theme song for the show Licensed for show use, copyright 2024 Here’s James website for all his activities: Recommendations Dropout TV Game Changer Make Some Noise Bookburners (podcast) Oh Boy! A Time Travel Podcast James Lark (composer, podcaster) The Bartimaeus Trilogy
Social Media Lindsey Nelsen Instagram - LindseyCameronNelsen Tiktok - Noctisfilia (Darkness's Daughter) Jeff Richardson @eljefetacoma on Facebook, Twitter, Bluesky, Instagram, and Mastadon
Links
Star Trek: The Next Generation “Remember Me”
The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle
Extended Notes
Part 7: Matthew Rose Sorensen
Ketterley missing
cops trying to find him
no one remembers him being a boat guy
Officer Askill thinks its related to the reappearance of Matthew Rose Sorenson
Askill thinks he held Sorenson to manufacture evidence of the other world
he killed himself out of shame or because they were onto him
"Undeterred, Askill has questioned me twice. He is a young man with a pleasant, good-natured face, little brown curls all over his head and an intelligent expression. He wears a dark blue suit and a grey shirt and speaks with a Yorkshire accent"
"And where were you?’ he asks. ‘While you were gone?’
‘I was in a house with many rooms. The sea sweeps through the house. Sometimes it swept over me, but always I was saved.’
Askill pauses and frowns."
Askill asks if he's getting treatment
he is seeing a therapist
but no meds
Askill wonders if Ketterley kept him anywhere, he says no, he was free to travel
P feels bad that he cant tell Askill more
Askill says Raphael is amazing. P agrees
Askill tells the story of Pinny Wheeler
"She sat down with Pinny Wheeller and she got him to stop throwing flaming newspaper everywhere and she got him to come down. Pretty brave, don’t you think?’
‘Braver than you think. She doesn’t like heights.’"
Piranesi meets his family, theyre all very happy to see him
they hold on to the idea that the house is a metaphor
"This love of clothes was something he shared with Piranesi. Piranesi frequently wrote about Dr Ketterley’s clothes in his journal and lamented the contrast with his own ragged garments"
Ps new personality doesnt care much about clothes
"Piranesi cannot bear to have so many possessions. I do not need this! is his constant refrain"
P uses the journals to help him learn who MRS was
"Piranesi has a strong dislike of money. Piranesi wants to say: But I need the thing you have, so why don’t you just give it to me? And then when I have something you need, I will just give it to you. This would be a simpler system and much better!"
he decides to write a book about Arne-Sayles
Raphael teaches him how to find the path to the labyrinth
he goes to Manchester, finds James Ritter, and offers to take him back to the house.
Ritter wants to stay but P wont let him. he doesnt know how to care for himself
he finds Ketterleys body and lys it at the feet of a man surrounded by snakes. here it will be picked clean by birds, then he'll move it next to the Biscuit-Box Man
he continues to look to statues for guidance and strength. He thinks of one in particular
"It is the statue of a man kneeling on his plinth; a sword lies at his side, its blade broken in five pieces. Roundabout lie other broken pieces, the remains of a sphere. The man has used his sword to shatter the sphere because he wanted to understand it, but now he finds that he has destroyed both sphere and sword. This puzzles him, but at the same time part of him refuses to accept that the sphere is broken and worthless. He has picked up some of the fragments and stares at them intently in the hope that they will eventually bring him new knowledge."
then he think of LAS
"This statue represents a heretical pope seated on a throne. He is fat and bloated. He lolls on his throne, a shapeless mass. The throne is magnificent, but the sheer bulk of the figure threatens to split it in two. He knows that he is repulsive, but you can see by his face that the idea pleases him. He revels in the thought that he is somehow shocking. In his face there is mingled laughter and triumph. Look at me, he seems to say. Look at me!"
he thinks of one for Raphael
"In my mind Raphael is better represented by a statue in an antechamber that lies between the forty-fifth and the sixty-second northern halls. This statue shows a figure walking forward, holding a lantern. It is hard to determine with any certainty the gender of the figure; it is androgynous in appearance. From the way she (or he) holds up the lantern and peers at whatever is ahead, one gets the sense of a huge darkness surrounding her; above all I get the sense that she is alone, perhaps by choice or perhaps because no one else was courageous enough to follow her into the darkness."
he loves Raphael more than anyone
the two of them return to the house often, sometimes together, sometimes apart
"Don’t disappear,’ I tell her sternly. ‘Do not disappear.’
She makes a rueful, amused face. ‘I won’t,’ she says.
‘We can’t keep rescuing each other,’ I say. ‘It’s ridiculous.’
She smiles. It is a smile with a little sadness in it.
But she still wears the perfume – the first thing I ever knew of her – and it still makes me think of Sunlight and Happiness."
when he's stressed he thinks about the house, remembering the exact shape and turns
he dreams of the gorilla statue leaving its plinth and coming toward him. P hugs him and says how happy he is to be home
"It began to snow. The low clouds made a grey ceiling for the city; the snow muffled the noise of the cars until it became almost rhythmical; a steady, shushing noise, like the sound of tides beating endlessly on marble walls."
he walks the park until he sees an old man. He recognizes him!
"He is shown as a king with a little model of a walled city in one hand while the other hand he raises in blessing. I wanted to seize hold of him and say to him: In another world you are a king, noble and good! I have seen it!"
last he sees a hotel
"Paper lanterns were hanging from the wires, spheres of vivid orange that blew and trembled in the snow and the thin wind; the sea-grey clouds raced across the sky and the orange lanterns shivered against them.
The Beauty of the House is immeasurable; its Kindness infinite."
thats it!