A Catalogue of Chrononauts, by Sir Frederick Chook
Originally penned upon the 20th of September, 2012 and featured on Frilly Shirt The collected Works
of Frederick Chook, a Gentleman (www.frillyshirt.org)
I have theorised before, here and elsewhere, about the
possibilities of time travel. Time is a slippery fish indeed, and its very
definition is difficult to pin down… assuming one pins down a fish. Perhaps we
ought to hook it. Or perhaps, rather than a fish, time is a fearsome moth… but,
fish or moth, we can be certain (possibly) that time is a perceived sequence of
events, light meeting retina, cause meting effect, thermodynamics rolling
relentlessly on like so much cosmic brie down the hill of entropy. Perhaps time
travel is no more than a curiously persistent folie à deux shaped by
internalised social conceptions of reality, like religious crazes, or the
prevalence of Dickenskin*. Perhaps it’s an allergic reaction to the varnish
used in police-boxes. Whatever its origins, there are, shall we say, more than
a couple of societies dedicated to the exploration of past and future, and they
differ considerably in their means, motives and marmalades of choice.
The League of Temporal Voyagers, of course, favours travel
for non-interventionist observation purposes, typically utilising small groups
of scholars. To this end, they have been at the forefront of development of
grandfather-proof technology, which allows a one-way transfer of knowledge but
leaves the historical record unchanged. The engines to facilitate these jaunts
have a high power draw, but early experiments succeeded in sending a
drawing-room back a number of decades, and the League was recently able to send
a moving tram-car to the turn of the century with minimal disruption to the
schedule.
The Chronological Ramblers Uniting Millennial Paradox
Engineers & Temporal Specialists – originally the Time-Men’s Society of
Ramblers – began as a Communist-affiliated labour union for time-machine
operators, working in the notoriously capital-friendly time-machining industry.
Following a general strike, the occupation of the Mesozoic Era by armed
workers, and a series of First World Wars, most time-factories were
nationalised and heavily regulated – all at once a victory and a death sentence
for the militant wing of the Ramblers Continuing amalgamations softened its
edge, and its calendar is now largely dedicated to hosting leisure hikes and
picnics in the eighteenth century.
Ordo Tempi Pangolinis is an esoteric society, largely comprising
past, present, and predicted future members of the Hermetic Order of the Gilded
Pangolin. Shrouded in mysticism, arcane ritual, and a number of deliberately
misleading pamphlets, the Order’s true purpose is the practice of cliomancy and
retroprophecy – the divination of coming events through the observation of past
time travellers. Cautious to a fault, the Order rather suffers from a
non-existent central leadership and its headquartering in the entirely
fictional Ninth Circle of the Labyrinth of the Society for Farcical Research.
The Council of Yesterday are the most active and perhaps the
most sinister of the major time powers. Born of the machinations of the
continental Great Game, it now serves as an extension of every spy operation
with the wherewithal to clothe and equip an epoch-agent. Members are typically
armed and always dangerous, and employ a number of tricks to expose fellow
travellers while remaining inconspicuous to natives – for instance, whistling
to imitate a phone’s ring, or the opening of a future popular song, and
observing the reactions of the crowd.
I don’t tell you these things to alarm you, but simply that
you will be aware of the risks, and able to distinguish a sinister
future-assassin from a harmless Rip van Winkle or an Urashima Tarō in need of a
hug. Be not afraid but vigilant, and remember that the past is another country
– you can’t get there without a valid passport or if you’ve recently been in
contact with livestock. One sound piece of advice for the historical layperson
is that any past figure you can recognise has already had their allotted time
in controlled circumstances, and shouldn’t be tootling about the present day –
or, as they say in China, if you see the Buddha, kill him, because he’s
probably a dastardly impostor!
* Dickenskin: Those suffering under the perception that they
are secretly a character from the works of Charles Dickens; usually Mr Guppy,
but sometimes Mr F’s Aunt. There is no known cure for Dickenskinism, but
leaving two Mrs F’s Aunts in a room together is recommended by doctors as “a
galloping good wheeze.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Sir Frederick Chook is a foppish,
transcendentalistic historian who lives variously by his wits, hand to mouth,
la vie bohème, and in Melbourne with his wife, Lady Tanah Merah.
When not reading Milton and eating Stilton, he writes,
ponders, models, delves into dusty archives, and gads about town. He has
dabbled in student radio and in national politics, and is presently studying
the ways of the shirt-sleeved archivist. He is a longhair, aspiring to one day
be a greybeard. He has, once or twice, been described as “as mad as a bicycle.”
FrillyShirt is a compilation of articles, essays, reviews,
photographs, artworks, question-and-answers, promotions, travelogues, diatribes,
spirit journeys, cartoons, ululations and celebrations by Sir Frederick, his
friends and contributing readers. Irregularly regular features include Teacup
in a Storm, an etiquette column, and How to be Lovely, advanced speculations on
the aesthetics of the self.
Other topics that pop up include fun things in and around
Melbourne, art, nature, history, politics and schnauzers. Sir Frederick’s
favorite color is all of them. Enjoy his writing? Drop him a telegram at fredchook@frillyshirt.org.
No comments:
Post a Comment