It is
always interesting to start a book that you have preconceived notions
about. Interesting to see how it
conforms to your prejudices. More
interestingly still to see how it diverges, becomes its own work: it winds down
its narrative path and carves into concrete, mapping over your pre-impressions.
As in
fiction, in life. Besides having a sweet
name, Drunvalo Melchizedek also has a
wild take on the world, albeit one that I am only glancingly familiar with. He has been interviewed for many an alt podcast
and has his own Q & A
series. His take on things draws
from historical antecedents and can be loosely (maybe comprehensively)
characterized as New Age.
In the
episode of his Q & A show hyperlinked above Drunvalo discusses his views of
a forthcoming, um, well, change in the world.
Yes, it is related to the Mayan calendar. Listening to his conception of change put me
in mind of another recent view of the end of the world, namely that provided by
one Cormac McCarthy.
Although
books are generally better than the movie, the recent re-creation of Cormac’s The Road does nearly complete
justice to the text. The story and feel are
the same in both but would still urge someone to read the novel over seeing the
film: McCarthy’s prose is unparalleled.
Poetic. Evocative of (his hero)
Melville and of the Bible. Read Blood
Meridian. Read Suttree. The Road approaches these previous works in
quality and provides a grim background in front of which he presents his bleak
tale.
For the
sake of comparison, let’s even the playing field. What if Drunvalo’s ideas where fictional. What if Cormac’s The Road willingly being
prophetic? What types of tales are
they? Which is more enjoyable? In which real or fictional incarnation?
An end of
light (Drunvalo) versus an end in nuclear winter-dark (The Road)? This is not quite a fair comparison – not all
will go unscathed in Drunvalo’s vision.
Indeed, significant numbers may meet their end. Have to say it is a little discomfiting to
hear this laid out by Drunvalo (I think it is as fun to type his name as it is
to say it). A sort of new age-elect will
be the ones to make it through.
The Road
delivers equal opportunity destruction.
I suppose I am making this assumption, but believe it right – this
future is a godless realm, no faith to protect anyone. Compared to the fiction of Stephen King’s The
Stand, The Road has no metaphysical elements except for contemplation of the
timeless (unanswerable) question as to how it is man is capable of such
acts. So far it hasn’t happened –
environmental degradation notwithstanding.
(Long-term environmental problems have a chronic character that
unfortunately slips by unseen in front of man’s acute-problem-only-seeing
eyes. In my opinion.)
In the end,
The Road is fiction – it does not seek to claim prescience, only tell a story. Drunvalo, though, does grant his listeners a
mapped future. There will be much travail,
he is sorry to report, but there will also be unimaginable transcendence. Comparing the two, the fiction is grim and
the revealed-to-Drunvalo truth is beautiful.
Does my reality have to make me happy and does my fiction have to make
me sad? In order to fact check: guess we
have to wait till the future to see which is right.
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