https://t.me/CodeMonkeyZ/1052
''A hideous plot uncovered.''
A HIDEOUS PLOT
Brings to mind C. S. Lewis' "That Hideous Strength," the 3rd novel of a trilogy about the battle of good and evil for the soul of man.
"That Hideous Strength" (1945) was the final novel in Lewis’ Space Trilogy, and the only one of the three to take place entirely on earth [not Mars or Venus]. The forces of evil are taking their last stand through the agency of the National Institute of Coordinated Experiments (N.I.C.E.), which serves as a symbol of the ultimate consequences of naturalistic science, and in particular the social sciences, in its application to man himself. One of the main characters is Elwin Ransom: "A philologist who had previously traveled to Mars and Venus, and now leads the forces arrayed against the evil seeking to dominate Earth. He is now going by the name of Mr. Fisher-King."
https://www.rcwalton.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/That-Hideous-Strength.pdf
In the Arthurian legends, the Fisher King is the Keeper of the Grail, but he is "wounded in the thigh and cannot stand" ( = impotent).
''The young knight Parsifal joins the Knights of the Round Table to seek the Holy Grail. ….When he reaches the Castle of the Holy Grail, he must ask, “Whom does the Grail serve?” As he travels, he sees all around him signs of suffering and disarray. But when Parsifal finally makes his way to the Grail Castle, he is utterly intoxicated by the court. He meets the wounded Fisher King and is offered a magical banquet that includes everything he could desire. He forgets his purpose and does not ask the essential question. The next morning the whole castle and kingdom disappear and Parsifal must wander and suffer for many years until by hard-won maturity he returns a second time. This time he remembers, “Whom does the Grail serve?” he asks. The Fisher King answers, “The Holy Grail serves the Grail King.” (God.) As soon as the Fisher King is reminded of this holy truth, he is healed, and in being healed, all that has rotted in the fields, all disharmony in his nation, all the sufferings of the kingdom are restored to peace and well-being.
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from “After the Ecstasy, the Laundry” by Jack Kornfeld.
George Orwellreviewed "That Hideous Strength" in August 1945.
THE SCIENTISTS TAKE OVER
Manchester Evening News, 16 August 1945. Reprinted in The Complete Works of George Orwell, ed. Peter Davison, Vol. XVII (1998), No. 2720 (first half), pp. 250–251
Intriguing Orwell Excerpts:
His book describes the struggle of a little group of sane people against a nightmare that nearly conquers the world. A company of mad scientists – or, perhaps, they are not mad, but have merely destroyed in themselves all human feeling, all notion of good and evil – are plotting to conquer Britain, then the whole planet, and then other planets, until they have brought the universe under their control.
All superfluous life is to be wiped out, all natural forces tamed, the common people are to be used as slaves and vivisection subjects by the ruling caste of scientists, who even see their way to conferring immortal life upon themselves. Man, in short, is to storm the heavens and overthrow the gods, or even to become a god himself.
There is nothing outrageously improbable in such a conspiracy….Plenty of people in our age do entertain the monstrous dreams of power that Mr. Lewis attributes to his characters, and we are within sight of the time when such dreams will be realisable.
His description of the N.I.C.E. (National Institute of Co-ordinated Experiments), with its world-wide ramifications, its private army, its secret torture chambers, and its inner ring of adepts ruled over by a mysterious personage known as The Head, is as exciting as any detective story.
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Interesting that the main character in the book is a PHILOLOGIST - an historian who studies WORDS. What better occupation for someone in an INFORMATION WAR!!