Holly Tannen's Practical Alchemy : Abomination



ABOMINATION

When you begin studying Yoruba religion, you have to make a shrine to your egun, your ancestors. Not only your genetic ancestors, but also anyone who has deeply influenced you. So I put up pictures of Emma Goldman, Margaret Mead, Marie LaVeau the Voodoo Queen, and Rimbaud.

     August 11th, 1998: Mendocino is socked in. I'm on the fourth day of a juice fast. I'm bored. I'll rent a movie. "Total Eclipse." A movie about Rimbaud! Directed by that English guy, Christopher Hampton. Rimbaud is played by....Leonardo di Caprio?!#!
     Di Caprio belches. He squints. He chews with his mouth open. He calls his lover "Vurlayne."
     The obligatory sex scene: There's Di Caprio, looking pained, humping something. The camera pulls back: it's "Vurlayne," eyes rolling in all directions...

     Then there's their last meeting, outside Stuttgart. Da Crapio says, "Here in the Black Forest, I offer you an archetypal choice: my body or my soul."
     "Archetypal"? This was 1875. Carl Jung was born in 1875!
     Besides, who would be stupid enough to offer his ex "my body or my soul"?

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Holly Tannen teaches folklore and anthropology, and has lectured on contemporary magic at U.C. Berkeley and at Yale University. Her recordings include "Invocation", "Between the Worlds", and "Rime of the Ancient Matriarch"

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updated 21 June 2001 : 9:29 Caspar (Pacific) time

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