View source for Camp Concentration/Book One: June 16 to June 22

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{{SummaryCollapsed |
Sacchetti observes more of the fruits of Mordecai's genius: his apparently pointless research into alchemy, and a short story he has written on a Faustian theme. Louis's own creative writing has also gained new energy. Mordecai, assisted by the credulous Haast, presents a public enactment of a "Magnum Opus" that he claims will produce an elixir of life; instead it leaves him dead. Louis ends Book One with the realization that he too, for more than a month, has been infected with the disease Pallidine.
}}

== June 16 ==

=== ''Morituri te salutamus'' ===
Latin: "We who are about to die salute you"— allegedly a standard greeting to Roman emperors by gladiators entering the arena, although it is only documented in [[wikipedia:Ave Imperator, morituri te salutant|one case]].

=== ''Quid nunc?'' ===
Latin: "What now?"

=== A base of charity ... neutralizes the acids of self-doubt ===
Mordecai is using "base" in the sense of [[wikipedia:Alkalinity|alkaline]]. "Acids of self-doubt" seems to have become a cliché expression— the phrase appears without attribution from [https://www.google.com/search?q=%22acid+of+self-doubt%22 many authors]— but the original source, if any, is unclear.

=== Opsi! Mopsi! Cottontail! ===
Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cottontail were the sisters of [[wikipedia:Peter Rabbit|Peter Rabbit]].

=== Farmer MacGregor got to him ===
Peter Rabbit's nemesis.

=== ''Hasting's Encyclopaedia of Pathology'' ===
A joke on the [http://archive.org/details/EncyclopaediaOfReligionAndEthics.Hastings-selbie-gray.13Vols ''Encyclopaedia of Religion and Ethics''] (1908-1926).

=== oblivious to the low soma ===
The ''[[wikipedia:Somatic|soma]]'' is the body, as distinguished from the mind.

=== cud-blurbling ... a spoonerism, somewhat ===
An exact [http://wordsmith.org/words/spoonerism.html Spoonerism] for "blood-curdling" would be "cud-blurdling."

=== the Ghent altarpiece ===
A 15th-century Flemish painting in 12 panels. [[wikipedia:Ghent_Altarpiece|Wikipedia]]

[[File:Eyck.hubert.lamb.750pix.jpg|600px]]

=== Several books on alchemy ===
''Tabula smargdina'': [[wikipedia:Emerald Tablet|Wikipedia]], [http://www.crcsite.org/Tabula.htm Rosicrucian Archive]. ''A Golden and Blessed Casket of Nature's Marvels'': [http://www.alchemywebsite.com/figulus.html full text]. "Geber's ''Works''": either [[wikipedia:J%C4%81bir_ibn_Hayy%C4%81n|Jābir ibn Hayyān]] or the [[wikipedia:Pseudo-Geber|Pseudo-Geber]]. "Poisson's ''Nicolas Flamel''": by a [[wikipedia:Albert Poisson|19th-century occultist]], about a [[wikipedia:Nicolas Flamel|14th-century scribe]] who was later said to be an alchemist.

=== ''DNA Engineering'' ===
Fictional.

=== Raphael's ''School of Athens'' ===
Depicts a gathering of Classical philosophers; "recently interpreted as an exhortation to philosophy and, in a deeper way, as a visual representation of the role of Love in elevating people toward upper knowledge" ([[wikipedia:The School of Athens|Wikipedia]]).

[[File:Sanzio_01.jpg|600px]]

=== Durer's ''Melancholia'' ===
An allegorical print containing numerous mathematical and scientific references, whose possible interpretations include "the spiritual self-portrait of Dürer" ([[wikipedia:Melencolia I|Wikipedia]]).

[[File:Melencolia_I_(Durero).jpg|600px]]

=== what use Luther made of inkpots ===
[http://www.luther.de/en/tintenfass.html Throwing them at the Devil.]

=== Yarrowsticks ===
Dried stems sometimes used in consulting the [[wikipedia:I Ching divination|I Ching]]; slower than other methods of doing so.

=== ''comme il faut'' ===
French: "as it should be."

=== this post-Keynesian age ===
{{wp|John Maynard Keynes}} was influential in convincing European governments to abandon the gold standard in the 20th century.

=== Raymond Lully ===
{{wp|Ramon Llull}}, 14th-century theologian and mathematician. The warning that "if you reveal this, you shall be damned" is cited by several authors [http://www.occultopedia.com/a/alchemy_page_3.htm][http://books.google.com/books?id=1nhO28Gm0sAC&lpg=PA293&ots=tnfH2x6Pw_&dq=llull%20%22you%20shall%20be%20damned%22&pg=PA294#v=onepage&q=llull&f=false], but with no specific source, and may be apocryphal.

=== Whatever Isis is willing to unveil ===
A reference to ''{{wp|Isis Unveiled}}'' (1877) by the occultist Madame Blavatsky.

=== I keep thinking of Ben Jonson ===
Louis is referring to Jonson's ''[[wikipedia:The Alchemist (play)|The Alchemist]]'' (1610), in which the con artist Subtle baffles his marks with alchemical jargon. Sample:

<poem>
It is, of the one part,
A humid exhalation, which we call
Material liquida, or the unctuous water;
On the other part, a certain crass and vicious
Portion of earth; both which, concorporate,
Do make the elementary matter of gold;
Which is not yet propria materia,
But common to all metals and all stones;
For, where it is forsaken of that moisture,
And hath more driness, it becomes a stone:
Where it retains more of the humid fatness,
It turns to sulphur, or to quicksilver,
Who are the parents of all other metals.
</poem>

=== a fellow alchemist, Arthur Rimbaud—''Science est trop lente'' ===
French: "Science is too slow," from Rimbaud's poem ''{{wp|A Season in Hell}}''. Rimbaud was not literally an alchemist, but used mystical imagery to represent violent spiritual transformation. A phrase from his "Letter of the Seer" is particularly appropriate to ''Camp Concentration'': "The poet makes himself a seer by a long, rational, and immense disordering of all the senses."<ref>Rimbaud, Arthur. [http://www.poetryintranslation.com/PITBR/French/Rimbaud3.htm "Extract from the 'Voyant' Letter"]. Translated by A.S. Kline, [http://www.poetryintranslation.com/ Poetry in Translation]. 2008. Accessed July 17, 2016.</ref>

=== carrying coals to Newcastle ===
A British expression referring to any pointless or redundant action, since Newcastle was a major center of coal mining.

=== ''I'll Build a Stairway to Paradise'' ===
From the George Gershwin musical ''[[wikipedia:An American in Paris (film)|An American in Paris]]''.

== June 17 ==

=== Portrait of Pompanianus ===
Hugo van der Goes paints this fictional portrait in Mordecai's story after his own supposed death, in a magical effort "no longer to mirror reality but ... to ''compel'' it," thereby causing some event that Sacchetti describes only as a "catastrophe." This may be a reference to Tascius Pomponianus, who figures in Pliny the Younger's [http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/pompeii.htm account] of the eruption of Vesuvius: a friend of Pliny the Elder, he inadvertently causes the latter's death because, as Pliny is escaping the volcano by ship, he stops to pick up Pomponianus but stays too long on shore and suffocates. The fate of Pomponianus himself is unknown.

=== "A Lodging for the Night" ===
This story by Stevenson ([http://www.gutenberg.org/files/30700/30700-h/30700-h.htm#page227 full text]) consists mostly of a dialogue between the medieval poet/brigand {{wp|François Villon}} and an elderly nobleman who tries to convince him to mend his ways.

=== Bowdler confronted with a copy of ''Naked Lunch'' ===
{{wp|Thomas Bowdler}} was known for publishing expurgated works of Shakespeare, in which he removed not only words but also plot developments that he considered unsuitable for women and children. A Bowdlerization of ''{{wp|Naked Lunch}}'' would presumably retain no part of the novel.

=== Angels and ministers of grace ===
[http://www.gutenberg.org/files/27761/27761-h/27761-h.htm#sceneI_4 ''Hamlet'', I.iv]: Hamlet's exclamation when he first sees his father's ghost.

== June 19 ==

=== Fellini's ''Commedia'' ===
Fictional, apparently a future work of Fellini (who was only 47 when ''Camp Concentration'' was written).

=== Griffith's film of Ibsen's ''Ghosts'' ===
Fictional film adaptation of the 1881 [[wikipedia:Ghosts (play)|play]]; one of the leading characters is a young artist who was born with syphilis due to his father's infidelities.

=== croquet (based partly on Lewis Carroll's game) ===
The croquet game overseen by the Queen of Hearts in ''[http://www.gutenberg.org/files/28885/28885-h/28885-h.htm#Page_96 Alice's Adventures in Wonderland]'' has no particular rules, but is played using live flamingoes, hedgehogs, and soldiers in place of mallets, balls, and hoops.

== June 21 ==

=== the supplicant invoked another in the place of the one he intended ===
Louis refers to this passage as if it is describing a demonic conjuration, but in context, Augustine is saying that someone who lacks religious guidance can nevertheless call on God: "...for he that knoweth Thee not, may call on Thee as other than Thou art."<ref>Augustine. [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/3296/3296-h/3296-h.htm#link2H_4_0001 ''Confessions of St. Augustine'']. Translated by E.B. Pusey. Oxford: J.H. Parker, 1848.</ref>

=== the hypogeal daedal of corridors ... its minotaur ... Haast ===
''Hypogeal'', below ground; ''daedal'', any intricate construction, referring to [[wikipedia:Daedalus|Daedalus]] who built the Labyrinth of Crete to imprison the Minotaur.

=== People made fun of Isaac Newton ... because he studied astrology ===
As usual, Haast misunderstands the history of the people he admires. Newton never wrote about astrology, and his alleged remark to Edmond Halley ("I have studied the matter, you have not!") was in fact about theology, not astrology.<ref>Van Gent, Robert H. [http://web.archive.org/web/20080629021908/http://www.skepticreport.com/predictions/newton.htm "Isaac Newton and Astrology"]. [http://www.skepticreport.com/ ''SkepticReport'']. 2004. Accessed July 17, 2016 (Internet Archive).</ref> Although Haast surprisingly fails to mention it, Newton ''was'' extremely interested in alchemy; however, he published little about it during his lifetime and was not "made fun of" for this.

=== the first act of ''Tosca'' at the Amato Opera ===
The {{wp|Amato Opera}} was a small opera company located about a mile from Disch's home in Manhattan. The opening of ''{{wp|Tosca}}'' takes place in the Church of {{wp|Sant'Andrea della Valle}}; the Amato's small stage would have required a scaled-down depiction of this setting.

=== Spirits to enforce, art to enchant ===
From the end of ''The Tempest'', Prospero's parting words after he has renounced magic:<ref>Shakespeare, William. [http://www.gutenberg.org/files/23042/23042-h/23042-h.htm#sceneV_1 ''The Tempest''] (epilogue).</ref>

<poem>
Now my charms are all o'erthrown,
And what strength I have's mine own,
Which is most faint ....
... Now I want
Spirits to enforce, art to enchant;
And my ending is despair,
Unless I be relieved by prayer,
Which pierces so, that it assaults
Mercy itself, and frees all faults.
As you from crimes would pardon'd be,
Let your indulgence set me free.
</poem>

=== the dura mater, the arachnoid, and the pia mater ===
The three layers of the {{wp|meninges}} that surround the brain.

=== the Carmot ===
Alchemical name for the substance of which the Philosopher's Stone was composed.

=== Aquinas' Eucharistic hymn ===
[http://www.hymnary.org/text/o_esca_viatorum_o_panis_angelorum "O esca viatorum"] is sometimes attributed to Aquinas, but may instead be the work of an unknown 17th-century writer. The Bishop's English translation ("O food of wayfarers!") is similar to that in [http://cyberhymnal.org/htm/o/f/ofood2mn.htm ''The English Hymnal''].

== June 22 ==

=== I can float. Often to the height of a cubit ===
Aquinas never claimed himself to be able to levitate or perform any other miracles, but others later claimed to have seen this; G.K. Chesterton's essay on Aquinas confused the matter, saying that "[h]is experiences included well-attested cases of levitation in ecstasy"<ref>Chesterton, G.K. [http://www.chesterton.org/discover-chesterton/selected-works/the-theologian/st-thomas-aquinas/ "St. Thomas Aquinas"]. ''The Spectator'', February 27, 1932.</ref>, although Chesterton's later book amended this to say only that "somebody" claimed to have seen such an event.

=== ''Quantam sufficit'' ===
Latin: "A sufficient quantity"; abbreviated as ''q.s.'' in pharmaceutical prescriptions.

=== Why did the hyperdulia pray to the Pia Mater? ===
''Hyperdulia'', a Catholic term for the proper degree of devotion to give to the Virgin Mary; from the Greek for "higher servitude." ''Pia mater'', one of the meningeal layers (see above), but whose literal meaning in Latin is "gentle mother."

=== Why is a raven like a writing desk? ===
A riddle asked by the Mad Hatter, and never answered, in [http://www.alice-in-wonderland.net/alice9.html ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'']. Lewis Carroll, in a preface to a later edition, said he originally had no particular answer in mind but offered two possible ones.

Disch's friend John Sladek, in his 1980 novel ''[[Roderick]]'', used the same riddle as [[Roderick/Book One#There a like because they both sound like they begin with R|a test of an artificial intelligence's creativity]].

=== Abbot Suger was especially keen on Dionysius ===
This refers not to the historical [[wikipedia:Dionysius the Areopagite|Dionysius]] who was the first Bishop of Athens, but to Pseudo-Dionysius, the unknown author of mystical texts that were wrongly attributed to Dionysius (similarly, Haast [[Camp Concentration/Book One: June 2 to June 15#June 10|earlier]] referred to Albertus Magnus when he really meant Pseudo-Albertus). {{wp|Abbot Suger}} was said to have based the architecture of the Abbey of Saint-Denis on Pseudo-Dionysius's writings, but this theory is controversial.<ref>Schloeder, Steven J. [http://www.academia.edu/2562478/Per_Lumina_Vera_ad_Verum_Lumen_The_Anagogical_Intention_of_Abbot_Suger "Per Lumina Vera ad Verum Lumen: The Anagogical Intention of Abbot Suger"]. ''Symmeikta'', ed. Ivan Stevović. University of Belgrade, 2012.</ref>

=== I died from eating miraculous herrings ===
The alleged "miracle of the herrings"— in which, as described here, a barrel of sardines turned into the herrings that Aquinas preferred— would have been of no consequence except that it just barely met the Church's criteria for granting Aquinas sainthood. As described in the canonization testimony, contrary to what the dream-Aquinas says here, "when the herrings were brought to Thomas, he would not eat them."<ref>[http://www.sedevacantist.com/stthomas/stcanonise.html "The Sanctity and Miracles of St. Thomas Aquinas, From the First Canonisation Enquiry"]. ''Bellarmine Forums''. Accessed July 17, 2016.</ref>

The cause of his death is unknown, but he was already ill when he stopped at Maenza where the herring incident was said to have happened. Disch's notion that he was killed by the herrings may be a joke on Dante's unsubstantiated allegation, in the ''Inferno'', that Aquinas was poisoned by the King of Sicily.

=== a thin white host covered with indecipherable script ===
Similar to the "little scroll" in the book of Revelation:<ref>[http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/r/rsv/rsv-idx?type=DIV1&byte=5534755 Revelation, Chapter 10, Revised Standard Version]</ref>
<poem>
...the voice which I had heard from heaven spoke to me again, saying, "Go, take the scroll which is open in the hand of the angel who is standing on the sea and on the land."
So I went to the angel and told him to give me the little scroll; and he said to me, "Take it and eat; it will be bitter to your stomach, but sweet as honey in your mouth."
And I took the little scroll from the hand of the angel and ate it; it was sweet as honey in my mouth, but when I had eaten it my stomach was made bitter. 
</poem>

== Footnotes ==
<references/>
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