Összegzés

Karácsony után, a ferihegyen nagyon megörültem ennek a könyvnek – főleg annak, hogy egy egész fejezet szól rólam is, a külföldön élő magyarról. Nem olvastam ezelőtt az írótól, annyit tudtam róla, hogy régen volt valamilyen tévéműsora. A könyv motivációs funkciója mellett egy tucat érdekességet is találtam; például, hogy a jó baracklekvárhoz 20% zöld barack is kell, mert az ad neki egy kis pikáns, savanyú ízt. Első olvasásra ez a könyv is kicsit olyan volt mint egy lekvár, de inkább savanyú, mint érett. Aztán mivel Dr. Csernus többször ösztönzi a magyar embert, hogy szenvedélyesebb és bátrabb legyen, eleget tettem a kihívásnak, megírtam mit gondolok és igen, még mindig érzem: szóról szóra paprikásabb lett a szám széle.

Nos, elég hamar elkezdtem lassan, de biztosan kiábrándulni a költeményből, legfőképpen a következő okok miatt. Nem éreztem, hogy mély kutatás eredménye lenne. Inkább tűnt valamilyen gyorsan összetákolt narratívának, amivel az író – biztosan jó szándékkal – inspirálni szeretné a boldogtalan magyar embert, hogy igenis boldog lehet. Néha úgy éreztem, mintha egy általános önsegítő (self-help) könyvet olvasnék, például az Édesvíz Kiadótól, amelyekkel természetesen semmi baj nincs (én is olvastam rengeteget), csak itt most egy objektívebb, racionálisabb tanulmányszerű dologra vártam. Hiszen az író orvos (pszichiáter), és a könyv borítóján is szerepelteti a doktori titulusát. Hogy mást vártam valószínüleg nem az ő hibája, hanem az enyém.

A 23 fejezeten keresztül eljutunk valamiféle definícióhoz, hogy ki is az igazi magyar ember, és mit kell tennie annak, aki „nem igazi”, hogy „igazibb” legyen. De miért nem lehetett volna ezt a definíciót kerek perec megírni mindjárt a könyv elején? Amúgy a legtöbb dolog, amiket Dr. Csernus javasol, nemcsak a magyaroknak segíthet, hanem bármelyik nemzet emberének. Körülbelül ennyi a lényeg: nézz szembe a félelmeiddel, és vállalj egy kis kockázatot a fejlődés érdekében. Igen, ezt jó többször elmondani magunknak és másoknak is, mert tényleg fontos, de nem gondolom, hogy ezt az üzenetet a magyaroknak külön be kellene csomagolni egy olyan könyvbe, amiről néha úgy éreztem, hogy lekezelő és ellentmondásokkal teli is. Tehát amiket az író javasol azok univerzális pszichológiai alapigazságok, amelyek nemzetiségtől függetlenek. De aztán lehet igaza van, lehet tényleg kontextualizálni kell a dolgokat, hogy hatásosak legyenek, hmmm … majd gondolkodom még ezen egy kicsit.

Talán ami a legjobban zavart, hogy egy „olcsó prosti” kategóriába helyezi azokat, akik külföldre mentek mosogatni. (Én is mosogattam és takarítottam is.) De aztán, hogy jobban megértsem miért is ilyen az író stílusa, egy kicsit utánajártam az interneten, és ha jól értem Dr. Csernus módszerei tudatosan provokatívak. Ő a konfrontatív terápia híve. Úgy gondolja, hogy az embert csak egy erős érzelmi sokk (pl. a “gyáva” vagy “olcsó prosti” jelzők) készteti változásra? Nem tudom. De ha tényleg így van is, szerintem ezekkel a szavakkal sok embert eltávolít magától (a jó üzeneteitől). Persze azt is írja, hogy ő “magas ívben tojik” mások véleményére (tehát akkor az enyémre is), viszont közösségépítés fontosságáról is írt, aminek az egyik alapja akár lehetne az empátia és a visszacsatolás befogadása, azaz hogy meghallgatom a másikat.

Aztán néhány példája alapján arra is gondoltam, hogy ezt a könyvet azoknak a „még nem igazán magyaroknak” írta, akik megengedhetnék maguknak, hogy tanyát vegyenek, ahol kísérletezhetnek az egészséges, természethez közeli élettel. De nem hiszem, hogy sok ilyen (gazdag) ember van otthon, itthon, vagy akárhol.

Fent úgy kezdtem ezt az “értékelést”, hogy magyarabbnak érzem magam attól, hogy bátran megosztom mit is gondolok a könyvről, de ez hülyeség. Lehet bátor és szenvedélyes akárki, akárhonnan jött, akárhol él, akárhová tart.

Egyéb jegyzetek

p.52 Amit eddig írt, az mintha minden országra igaz lenne; mintha ez elsősorban egy motivációs könyv lenne, és nem kifejezetten a magyarságról szólna.

p.62 „Ha valaki annak idején nem tanult, és a könnyűnek látszó utat választotta, az belelép ebbe a csapdába, de ez az ő döntésének következménye.” Itt arról ír, hogy sokan nem szeretik a munkájukat, mert az nem jó munka. De ez azért egy kicsit bonyolultabb. Van sors, tehetség, segítség… nem mindenki ugyanarról a lépcsőfokról indul. Később (83. o.) is azt érzem, hogy nem tesz különbséget az emberek helyzete között: „Előtted is ott áll a lehetőség, drága!”

p.81 Mintha ütköznének az üzenetek. Egyszer azt írja, hogy amikor boldognak érzi magát: „…hogy irigyeljenek nyugodtan”. Aztán mindjárt utána: „Sajnos Magyarországon jellemzően kizárólag az eredményt nézzük, nem azt, hogy amögött mennyi munka rejlik. Emiatt ébred az emberekben irigység, féltékenység, holott mindkettő rettenetes, romboló érzés.”

p.95 Itt érzem, hogy elkezd belekötni a külföldre költöző magyarokba. Azt írja, hogy a Szózat az elkötelezettségről szól. Arról, hogy „nem fordítok hátat a hazámnak, ha rosszul érzem magam ott, és nem megyek el Angliába, mert ott jobban lehet élni, hanem itt maradok, megküzdök a helyzettel, és teszek azért, hogy jobb legyen. Mert ami nem működik, azon lehet változtatni.”

p.101 Arról ír, hogy legyen szenvedélyes a magyar ember. De miért ne legyen szenvedélyes mindenki? Megint olyan, mintha egy Édesvíz-könyvet olvasnék.

p.107 Példaként hoz egy holland főnököt, aki majdnem beleesik egy gödörbe, amit a munkásai ástak, de nem lesz mérges. Erről az jut az író eszébe, hogy a magyar főnök rögtön kiabálna. Attól, hogy neki ez jut eszébe, még nem kellene általánosítani. Nem hiszem, hogy minden (vagy a legtöbb) magyar főnök ilyen lenne.

p.113 Egyetértek, tényleg nem kell, hogy fontos legyen a Halloween vagy a Black Friday… de akkor ennyi erővel a karácsony meg a húsvét is más már, mint régen volt, nem?

p.115 Azt javasolja: ha egy külföldi nem tudja a különbséget Budapest és Bukarest között, ne racionálisan magyarázzunk neki, hanem legyünk bátran felháborodva, hogy az nyomot hagyjon. Most tényleg azt akarom, hogy a külföldi bunkónak gondoljon? Én is tévedtem már más országokkal kapcsolatban. Később viszont (122. o.), amikor orvossal beszélünk, azt mondja, ne viccelődjünk, legyünk racionálisak.

p.119 Itt megint mintha ránk (külföldön élőkre) neheztelne: „Csak azt nem szabad elfelejteni, hogy az okos ember mindig abból főz, ami van… akkor esetleg elmész Angliába mosogatni. És itt jön a lényeg: hogyha te ebben hiszel, akkor jó munkaerő leszel.” Majd arról ír, hogy a közösség hangulatát a „búvalbélelt, alkoholista” kritikus tömeg határozza meg, az átlagmagyar pedig szótlanul nézi a szemetelést.

p.138–144 Itt kezdődik a definíció. Magyarul kell kimondanunk, hogy magyarok vagyunk. Az identitás elemei: ételek (gulyás, halászlé), tájak, nyelv, irodalom. Később (143. o.) már az is fontos, mit mondok: „Mert hogyha én negatív töltetű állításokat mondok ki, akkor csak látszólag vagyok magyar, de nem vagyok olyan, mint az őseink.” Akkor az igazi magyar csak optimistán beszélhet magyarul? A megújulás is fontos. Ez akkor azt jelenti, hogy ehetünk vegán (itthon termett) új-zélandi spenótot is?

p.158 Az író szerint a külföldön élő magyar a helyiek szemében csak „gyüttment”. Lehet, de szerintem nem erre kellene koncentrálni. Szerinte bizonyos körökbe „soha nem teszed be a lábad”. Magyarországon is vannak ilyen körök. Aztán jön az „olcsó prosti” hasonlat azoknak, akik nem szeretik a munkájukat külföldön. Ez túl kemény. Aki otthon nem szereti a munkáját, az milyen kategória? Értem, hogy szívvel-lélekkel jó dolgozni, de néha el kell vállalni olyan munkát is, amit nem szeretünk, hogy elérjük a céljainkat.

p.164 Azt írja: „A sok Nobel-díjasunk is azt igazolja, hogy a problémás helyzeteket mindig agyból próbáljuk megoldani… vagyis az érzelmi konfliktusokat is racionális szempontból közelítjük meg”, és szerinte ez helytelen. Külföldiként erre a fejezetre vártam a legjobban, de csalódtam.

p.179 „Aki nem pusztította el az ellenségeit, az azt kockáztatta, hogy az ellenségei fogják elpusztítani őt.” A pusztítást a bátorsággal akarja összekapcsolni, de nem értem, nekem is pusztítanom kellene bátorsággal? Biztos nem erre gondol.

p.194–201 Jó, hogy a régi magyar bútorok ápolására serkent az IKEA bútorok helyett. De a multikulturalizmusról írt véleménye nem egészen igaz; a globalizációt és a fogyasztást mossa össze vele. A kézműves pékség példája szép, de ez Angliában is ugyanúgy létező jelenség.

p.216–217 Azt írja, „magas ívben tojik” arra, ki mit mond róla. De egy későbbi fejezetben a közösség építéséről ír – ez ellentmondásos. Szerintem igenis hallgassuk meg mások véleményét. Zavaró, hogy a magyarokat „gyáva népnek, opportunistának, irigynek” nevezi. Néha túlcsordul benne a magabiztosság. Petőfivel élve azt mondja, hallgassunk az érzéseinkre. De mindig? Kellene egy egyensúly az érzelem és a ráció között, nem?

p.276 A lényeg: fogadd el magad, kezdj új dolgokba, ne félj a kudarctól. Ez tök jó, de ez az útbaigazítás bármelyik nemzetnek segíthet. A megoldások univerzálisak.

p.282 Az ügyvéd barátja példája (tanyasi gazdálkodás) idilli, de nem mindenki engedheti meg magának. Néha úgy érzem, ez a könyv a gazdagoknak íródott. De a baracklekváros tipp (80% érett, 20% éretlen gyümölcs) tényleg jó! Ez a könyv milyen lekvár? Baszogatós.

Summary

People who know much more about poetry than I do have reviewed this book on Goodreads as a bit opinionated. The average rating is 3.7, which is something I can agree with for two reasons.

First, I think the title is misleading; the book focuses on English poetry, e.g., there is no mention of Hungarian poetry at all (e.g., Petőfi or József), which might only be important to me since I have been trying to write poetry in Hungarian. I guess the book should really be titled something like A Little History of Poetry in English + Some Others Worth Mentioning. The current title would be okay, of course, if there was some kind of introduction that explains the narrative of the book – that there will be many poets and languages left out, and why.

The second reason is that while it’s written really well and is also quite enjoyable to read, I often felt there were not enough connections between the chapters or between the different schools (movements) of poetry. I would have preferred more signposting. I think what I really would have liked is some kind of diagram or a visual timeline in that missing introduction, on which we could see how the different schools of poetry coexisted with each other in different countries, with different historical events linked to political, religious, and economic changes.

Booknotes

p.1 I referenced Gilgamesh in one of my silly little poems for a poetry marathon. Why? Maybe I wanted people to think I know the history of poetry.

p.7 Skywalker was just studying the Greeks at school, we even watched the two-part The Odyssey (1997) TV film. We tried the TV series starting Kevin Sorbo as well – we started with Hercules and the Amazon Women (1994) – but it felt too sexist e.g. how the old Zeus seduced a young warrior girl in the first episode.

p.11 Homer’s work survived translation “partly because of the simplicity, speed and directness of his narrative technique”. Does this mean I have to write simple Hungarian poems if I want to easily translate them into English?

p.16 ‘Carpe diem’ comes from Horace who became the “poet laureate” of the Augustan age. This was mentioned in the film Dead Poet’s Society (1988).

p.24 Dante has a relationship with a dead woman’s spirit, whom he was in love with when they were children. But he never mentions his wife in his poetry, who gave him seven children. Why?

p.45 The name for mixed language poetry is ‘macaronic’. Maybe I could write something like this? Mix Hungarian and English… is this a niche in a niche?

p.59 The poem that argues with a women so as to have sex with her involves a flea in John Donne’s The Flea. The insect bit both of them, so their blood is mixed already, they can have sex. He is “celebrated as the greatest English love poet” (p.62).

p.65 “The seventeenth century was an age of astonishing diversity in English poetry. Donne dominated at the start, Milton towards the end. As poets they are different from each other in every possible way, and the poets who emerged in the intervening years are wholly and unmistakably individual too. This is a great change from the Elizabethan age, when one sonneteer or song-writer can easily be mistaken for another. Where did the new sense of individuality come from? One suggestion is Protestantism, which frees the individual believer from conformity and encourages self-examination. Another suggestion is London. It was the first metropolitan culture England had known, and city life, which surrounds you with strangers, intensifies your sense of difference.” … “The individual differences encouraged by Protestantism dominated seventeen-century Britain’s religious turmoil (p.75)” Now these are the parts I enjoyed them most in the book. Here we understand how poetry evolved and why.

p.82 John Milton, author of Paradise Lost, the books says is considered the second best English poet after Shakespeare.

p.90 The Augustan Poets often wrote in ‘heroic couplets’, which has ten-syllable lines, rhyming in pairs. How does this make the poem sound more heroic? The book doesn’t explain why these couplets sound heroic so I asked Gemini: “It’s because the structure is very stable, balanced, and “authoritative.” Because it clicks shut at the end of every two lines, it sounds like the poet is stating absolute truths.”

p.101 The first known African-American woman poet, who was also an ‘ex-slave’, was Phillis Wheatley. “No male poet can match Wheatley’s extraordinary story. But one who climbed through the barriers of the 18th century class structure was Stephen Duck.” Started as a farmer. The other ‘peasant poet’ was John Clare, who also wrote about work, nature. I liked when the book mentioned poets who weren’t born into rich families.

p.103 There are poets who became famous even though they only published 13 poems e.g. Thomas Gray.

p.120 John Keats was also coming from a poor background. He became a medical student. He was mocked by contemporary critics partly because of his social class. He was called a ‘cockney’ poet.

p.125 “Shelley advises meeting force with passive resistance (his idea of civil disobedience influenced Tolstoy and Gandhi).” This is probably not in line with with what my (now ex-) friend shared with me about the paradox of tolerance proposed by Karl Popper.

p.130 The romantic poet William Blake “distrusted pure reason, he also distrusted the Enlightenment and science, believing them hostile to the power imagination gives you.”

p.134 Another poet coming from a labouring (farmer) family was Robert Burns. “His great gift is authenticity. Other Romantics sympathised with the working class; he belonged to it.”

p.138 After reading Goethe’s The Sorrows of the Young Werther many people committed suicide and so the book was banned in many countries. I might have read a bit more about Faust since I don’t seem to understand why the angels rescue him from the demons.

p.145 Before Pushkin, “there was virtually no Russian literature”. How is this possible? “Upper-class Russians spoke French and despised their native language.” Is this true? This is probably an over-simplification by Carey, right? Pushkin’s works influenced Dostoevsky.

p.155 The books says that “Many, including it seems Tennyson, found that their Christian faith could not survive such knowledge” e.g. “that the earth was millions of years older than the Bible suggested.” On p.159 we read about Matthew Arnold’s poetry, which e.g. in Dover Beach “contemplates the 19th century’s gradual loss of religious faith”.

p.155 There have been many poets who came from prosperity e.g. Robert Browning. He didn’t need a job.

p.160 Elizabeth Barrett Browning, although coming from a rich family linked to sugar plantations, campaigned against slavery. When slavery was abolished the family’s money was severely affected. Her last poem, A Musical Instrument feels like an apology for her more cruel and violent poetry, in favour of her gentler one. When people are dying do they want to make sure they didn’t upset anyone? Probably not in line with the “Do not go gentle into that good night…” lines I will quote soon.

p.163 The Bronte sisters used male pseudonyms to publish poems. Emily apparently was raging sometimes e.g. hurting her dog.

p.165 Christina Rossetti, in her later years volunteered at a former prostitutes refuge. Her most famous poem Goblin Market is excellent work. It’s a feminist poem that teaches “how love between women can save them from the wicked temptations of men.” The poem is likely inspired by the stories she heard at the refuge.

p.169 You can sometimes read that poets had relationships with younger people e.g. the bisexual Walt Whitman, who “formed intense relationships with men and boys…”. There were other, heterosexual, examples earlier in the book as well and I wonder how people today judge these relationships e.g. do we separate the art from the artist and then celebrate the art but not the artist who (likely) did something unethical? Later (p.181) we read about Lewis Carroll’s “weakness for scantily clad little girls”, which has been an ongoing argument since between scholars and now layman on the internet. Carey’s seems to be a very controversial claim and as far as I know most biographers cite Carroll’s fascination with the “little girls” a motif and not a “weakness.” I looked for feedback online and was suggested to check out “presentism” which is something like the act of judging historical figures by modern moral standards. It’s a huge debate in literary circles.

Regarding Whitman, the book seems to suggest that he didn’t care much about what other people thought of him:

I do not trouble my spirit to vindicate itself or be understood,
I see that the elementary laws never apologize.

Another quote:

Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)

Whitman also wrote the poem O Captain! My Captain! which was featured in the film with Robin Williams, the Dead Poet’s Society (1988). I really liked that film… maybe I should write about it later.

p.177 “In the closing decades of the 19th century European culture began to fragment. There were various reasons. In 1871 that shattering defeat of France in the Franco-Prussian War ominously redrew the power-map of Europe. Throughout the century, industry and commerce had transformed life in cities, and it seemed to many that the arts were being side-lined. Europe’s population more than doubled, and people began to complain of crowds and their power. Another development was the spread of education. By 1900, state-sponsored elementary education created mass literacy, which brought with it mass-circulation newspapers and magazines. Writers’ reactions varied. Some welcomed the new market for their work. Others despised it.” Baudelaire didn’t really like other people, or maybe he didn’t like poor people, I am not sure. He liked his luxury, although his parents didn’t give him much money. He rebelled against his parents, drunk, smoked weed, etc. Carey says his work is full of self-pity.

p.179 The Symbolist poets followed – I guess the technical inventions – of Baudelaire. These poets use symbols e.g. the bird in Baudelaire’s poem titled The Albatross is the poet (so it’s a metaphor), but the book says their main goal was to “break away from all previous poetry.” Arthur Rimbaud’s aim with his poetry was “to reach a new kind of truth”. He wrote:

The idea is to reach the unknown by the derangement of all the senses.

I wonder, is this connected to shamanism or how shamans ‘derange the senses’ to access an altered state?

His work then is also linked to synesthesia. “He also abandoned coherent meaning, so that his poems can read like the result of free associations - which Freud was developing in Vienna, around the same time, for psychoanalytic purposes.”

Paul Valéry Ars Poetica suggests to be incoherent – as a poetic principle:

Let your verse be aimless chance.

He said that the musicality of the poem is more important than its meaning. Is this in any way in line with what visual artists were doing at the time? What was the philosophy, the historical change at this time?

p.181 Dylan Thomas wrote:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light…

Yes, I have heard this before and it reminded me of a Petőfi poem:

Egy gondolat bánt engemet:
Ágyban, párnák közt halni meg!

One thought keeps going round my head:
The thought of dying in my bed! (source)

The last part of this chapter (Shaking the Foundations) mentions Théophile Gautier who is famous for “art for art’s sake”. Wikipedia says that it means “that ‘true’ art is utterly independent of all social values and utilitarian functions, be they didactic, moral, or political.” Is this a bit like absolute music? Does this allow Hitler’s works to be celebrated i.e. by separating the art from the artist? Crazy.

p.189 The book also says that A.E. Housman believed that “Meaning is of the intellect, poetry is not”, and that “Poetry is not that thing said but a way of saying it.”, however the way of saying poetry is often inseparable from meaning or is it not? I kind of understand what is meant here, but would be interested in further clarification. The books also says that he didn’t find a publisher which damaged his confidence. I can understand that. I think many can. Keep grinding!

p.193 When the book talks about the Georgian Poets, it says that Edward Thomas and Robert Frost “wanted poetry to be less ‘poetical’, and to follow the cadence of ordinary speech. Frost suggested the best place to hear it was behind a door where you could not distinguish the words but only the stresses and intonations.”

Ezra Pound had an interesting life e.g. he was linked to fascism, apparently comparing Hitler to a saint like Joan of Arc. On p.219 we also learn that his child Mary – I can’t remember how many he had or with how many women – was given to a peasant woman to bring up. And then they had another child, a boy named Omar, who was also given away to his first partner/wife, Dorothy. Why? Is this normal? He had interesting views on capitalism e.g. that it made money out of money, and that this money should be replaced with a currency that cannot be hoarded e.g. vegetables. His Cantos is long but seems to be his most ‘important’ work. Some critics dismissed it, e.g. Robert Graves, with contempt.

p.239 In the Getting Over Modernism chapter, we get to know Marianne Moore. The story of Moore’s poem titled Poetry is very interesting. Its length changed over time, it became shorter. It also seems to be a good argument for writing poetry. Being okay with a poem changing over time I think was also part of modernism. She also wrote about nature and is famous for her poems about animals. I somewhere else read or saw (maybe YouTube) that she never married but perhaps was waiting for T.S. Eliot to ask for her hand. She was respected in her community and was also famous for being the editor of a famous journal called The Dial.

p.269 We get to know the English ‘Movement’ poets who ‘believed poetry should make sense, and should communicate with ordinary people, not just highbrows. They reject modernism. “Movement poetry is capable of argument because it employs reason, whereas for some theorists and practitioners of modernism reason and logic inherently unpoetic.” This reminded my of the musical with Hugh Jackman titled The Greatest Showman (2017).

p.283 In the chapter called Poets in Politics, we learn that in Russia, in the first half of the last century, Anna Akhmatova found it too dangerous to keep written copies of her poetry, so she memorized them and burnt the papers.

In the last chapter of the book (p.289), we get to know the Irish Seamus Heaney, who refused to write political poetry and as a ‘peacemaker’ won a Nobel Prize. We also get to know the American Maya Angelou, “a spokesperson for black women, and civil rights activist alongside Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, … she earned her living as a cook, nightclub dancer, sex worker, singer and actress.” She was also abused as a child and later in a poem says that she cannot write without resentment. We also get to know Mary Oliver, who according the the New York Times was a best-selling poet. She was also abused as a child. Cary wrote that “She believes that humans are alienated by reason and culture from the natural joy of birds and animals, and her delight in nature is not diminished by a realisation that it is a world of predators and prey.” Food for thought.

I will start with the other book in the photo above, John Lennard’s The Poetry Handbook soon.

Oh, a big house full of magic, like the one in Barker’s earlier book The Thief of Always? No, not quite. The house and the story here are bigger, and no, don’t give this book to your children. So where do I begin my review? How do I narrate it? Hmm… I guess this is something writers often struggle with, even Barker. In Galilee, through his metafictional experiment using Maddox, a demigod writer living in the house, Barker shares his writing process, which is the best part of the story.

Barker = Maddox;

Literature review

First, let me share some knowledge so you understand my perspective. I read Weaveworld around 20 years ago in Hungarian and it mesmerized me. I couldn’t put it down. It was a book that I picked up from a shelf without even reading the blurb. (I don’t like trailers; they spoil too much.) After that, I read the Abarat series and loved it too. I even bought the hardcover versions recently, complete with all of Barker’s brilliant paintings. A few years later, I read the first two in the Books of the Art series in English, but since my English wasn’t really good, I couldn’t fully immerse myself in the world. However, I still enjoyed them and should probably reread them once the third book in this series is published. Oh, and this year I watched some of Barker’s films (Hellraiser, Midnight Meat Train, and Nightbreed) but didn’t like them much. I do really enjoy watching his A-Z of Horror series; they are educational! I also watched some interviews with him online, and he is very charming. I remember someone describing the young Barker as beautiful, the middle-aged one as buff, and what we have now… I can’t remember. Unfortunately, his illness took away a few of those previous characteristics. It makes me sad to see him in a wheelchair. Anyway, let’s go back to the books.

Last year, I thought my English was good enough to read more of his works, so I (re)started with The Thief of Always. I loved it but am still puzzled by the drawing where a man looks at another’s backside. I don’t know how that drawing got in there. All the other drawings in this book are linked to the story; this one doesn’t seem to be. Any ideas?

I read somewhere that Galilee isn’t a typical Barker book, so I thought let’s try it because I like when artists experiment and don’t stick to their established methods. I enjoy seeing them try new things to discover more about themselves because this is something I do to in my practice. And I guess this is what I found in Galilee, an experiment. After finishing this hefty book, I also read the relevant page on Barker’s site (clivebarker.info), the corresponding chapter in The Dark Fantastic (Winter 2002), and reviews on the Goodreads website. Let’s start with a quick summary of these reviews.

Goodreads reviews

Many 1- and 2-star reviewers gave up on finishing the book because they found it boring or too long, with unnecessary characters and too much focus on rich snobs. They disliked the narrator (Maddox) and expected more horror/paranormal elements. Some thought the ending didn’t climax enough, while others found parts too weird, for example the two brothers talking about their dad’s massive penis or Rachel worshipping Galilee’s. I wasn’t too keen on some of the sex nor Rachel’s worship either, possibly because I am a heterosexual male, but these parts didn’t bother me much. However, the pedophilic elements did; one where a daughter might be allowed to play with her father’s penis when she gets older and another involving a young girl having sex with a water spirit. I still don’t understand this latter story. Okay, Galilee is the water spirit I guess, but then who is Jerushka? Rachel? I’ll have to read Gabriella Kristjanson’s work on the predatory realms in Barker’s works to understand more about this theme. Looking at her publication list, she seems to be the expert.

The 3-star reviews are more realistic; they point out both the good and the bad. They liked that Barker writes through Maddox and that the book is well-written but often didn’t like Rachel’s relationship with Galilee. They wrote, “it felt forced,” and also that the characters weren’t really interesting either. Someone noted: “There was also an excessive preoccupation with sex and licentiousness, which was needlessly thrown into the narrative as a shock tactic and didn’t connect with the greater story or convey any deeper purpose.” I’m still on the fence about this. As mentioned above, apart from the pedophilic images, the rest didn’t bother me. Well, maybe the necrophilia a bit too. By the way, how Garrison’s character evolves is very interesting: how he gradually allows himself to become someone he really wants to be.

The 4- and 5-star reviewers are those I agree with most. They often wrote that you understand more upon rereading the book and that it’s a challenging novel. Some appreciated Barker’s research into both magical and historical aspects, e.g., the Civil War. Some agreed that Rachel and Galilee were the least interesting characters, resonating with previously mentioned 2-star reviews and my own feelings. Someone wrote that Rachel was irritating. Also, some still say the book is too long, and I somewhat agree but would need to reread it to be sure. There’s so much in this novel; maybe it’s not meant to be read once only?! By the way, I like the family trees at the start of the book. They help, but unfortunately can also spoil some developments because they foreshadow when someone dies.

The most liked review says: “Clive Barker writes fantasy like a person who lives in that world (because I believe he does).” Yes, I felt that too, especially after watching the video interview linked to his paintings for Abarat. He is able to immerse himself in his worlds while creating them. You can find this video on YouTube; it’s called The Artist’s Passion. See embedded below.

Personal reflections and questions

“You must write fearlessly!” (p.20) Maddox tells himself at the start of the book, which is likely something Barker is telling himself when he writes as well, for example when he’s unsure what to do with the characters or the narrative. As mentioned earlier, the metafiction - Barker talking to us through Maddox - is my favorite part of the book: the record of a storyteller’s struggle with his work and how he keeps himself motivated, for instance, by asking the question “Why do we write?” One of his answers in the book is that “We write to educate people, to pass on knowledge.” And it’s not just Maddox that Barker uses to encourage writers to write; it’s through Zelim as well, who is another storyteller in the book. Zelim educates people to make sure they don’t hurt or get hurt like he did.

And let’s talk a bit about the romantic element between Rachel and Galilee, inspired by Barker’s relationship with David Armstrong (Winter, 2001). For me, this is one of the least interesting parts of the story. But this book is worth rereading, and when I do, I might believe in Rachel’s love for Galilee. Currently, their love isn’t convincing to me; it doesn’t feel real… But wait! Now that I am thinking about it, I remember falling in love quickly and deeply a few times in my life and I did feel happily lost and probably a bit crazy too. So maybe Rachel’s love is more understandable for readers who are in love when reading the book. Somewhere Barker said that he was in love while writing. So there you have it. Read it when you are in love, and you might love the book even more!

I look at my notes and see a few other things:

There seems to be a discussion about determinism, particularly the notion of being “enslaved by gods,” which touches on an existential theme I think central to the story. How much free will did the characters truly possess? At times, I even questioned whether all of it is happening simply because Maddox wrote it down. Look, on p. 429, we read:

I suspect, by the way, that in the creation of divinities we see the most revealing work of the human imagination. And of course, in the life of that imagination, the most compelling evidence of the divine in man. Each of these other’s most illuminating labor.

Are we co-creating the story while reading? Okay, let’s not go down this rabbit hole today.

We also learn about Barker’s perspectives on societal norms, marriage, and power dynamics, and I wonder how these relate to this quote from the book:

[In a country] where the rich were kind and the poor had God.

The Gearys weren’t very kind. Neither were the Barbarossas. So, what is this country? Did the rich give God to the poor so they would stay quiet?

Other questions I still have:

• I remember two horses: the resurrected dark one and Holt’s. Was the latter white? If so, would that be a Taoist symbol?
• Why did Maddox lose his wife on the same night Galilee came back with Holt and Nub?
• Not sure why, but after a while, Rachel felt like Anne Hathaway, and Maddox as Tenzin in The Legend of Korra. I saw her face and heard his voice. Why?
• On page 443, when Cesaria says that the painting on the Gearys’ wall is “very male”, that “it’s trying too hard”, and she (a female archetype?) likes this, is she longing for Nicodemus? Very likely.

So yes, I should reread this book.

One thing that annoyed me at the end was the big reveal about why all this is happening - that is, why does Galilee sleep with the Geary women? If you read the book, you know why. But can you believe it? Are all super-rich people so occupied with money and power that they can’t satisfy their wives sexually or romantically? Or did only Nub think this would help because he couldn’t do it himself and then created a backup plan for his offspring in case they don’t fall far from the tree? And what about poor or middle-class people who might not be able to hire gods of lust? Should we hire less expensive prostitutes to make our partners happy if we can’t? Or should we try talking, communicating, and evolving together? I guess that’s what Galilee and Rachel are doing now, right? Talking.

Finally, allow me to finish with one of my favorite parts from Maddox (p. 536):

Nobody knows the whole story, of course, nobody can. Perhaps there is no thing entire; only that rubble that Heraclitus celebrates. At the beginning of this book I boasted that I’d tell everything, and I failed. Now Galilee promises to do the same thing, and he’s fated to fail the same way. But I’ve come to see that as nothing can be made that isn’t flawed, the challenge is twofold: first, not to berate oneself for what is, after all, inevitable; and second, to see in our failed perfection a different thing; a truer thing, perhaps, because it contains both our ambitions and the spoiling of that ambition; the exhaustion of order, and the discovery – in the mids of despair – that the beast doffing the heels of beauty has a beauty all of its own.

Reference

• Winter, Douglas 2002, Clive Barker, The Dark Fantastic. (The Authorized Biography), Harper Collins

Let’s start with a recap of what Enhanced Audio Description (EAD) is. EAD is an alternative to traditional audio description (AD) in which sound design is used to provide access to film and television for visually impaired audiences by working on layering sound elements and remixing others to provide an immersive and accessible soundtrack which can be experienced by both visually impaired and sighted audiences. The development of EAD dates back to Mariana’s 2009 research, in which she developed a new sonic format named ‘audio film’ which used sound, sound processing and spatialisation to tell a story without the need for visuals or a narrator. This then developed further, through her collaboration with Gavin Kearney, and turned into what is now EAD. You can find all our papers on the Publication page.

In the last few years, I have been investigating how EAD could be further developed to convey cinematographic techniques such as shot types, camera angles and movements. This exploration has taken us through an extensive literature review, a set of interviews with audio professionals on their practice (more on this at some other time), my drafting of a theoretical framework and then a set of listening tests.

The listening tests involved 43 participants and were carried out at the University of York, using a 5.1 surround sound setup. The experiment examined how specific cinematographic techniques could be conveyed through different film sound techniques using spatialisation, sound effects and music. Participants experienced different versions of film sound and needed to indicate which of them conveyed a specified visual element (which was explained to them) more successfully. For example, the same forward tracking shot from Notes on Blindness (Peter Middleton and James Spinney, 2016), in which a blind man walks towards an underpass exit with his cane as the camera tracks him from behind, was played with four different soundtracks.

1. One version used an increase in traffic sound volume as a sound effect to convey the tracking shot.
2. Another version used an increase in music volume to convey it.
3. A third combined both an increase in traffic sound and music volumes to convey the tracking shot.
4. Finally, we had one version without any additional sound attempted to convey the forward tracking shot, serving as the baseline condition.

We are really grateful to have been able to use audio-visual material for our work from ITV’s Emmerdale, Dimitar Kutmanov’s Ecce Homo and Notes On Blindness.

The study’s preliminary findings suggest that conveying cinematography with sound is feasible and beneficial for visually impaired audiences, though it may not suit everyone - which is something we commonly find in research in accessibility and provides further justification for the need for work on personalising the film and television accessibility experience.

We are currently preparing a paper with our full findings.

Artistic vs. Scientific Orientation

How do you balance the artistic and scientific elements in your work? Do you feel more comfortable with one than the other?

OK… maybe let’s look at what I think about the relationship between art and science for a bit. For me, they are like the two ends of a spectrum. Like yin and yang. They can’t seem to live without each other. I have certainly been more comfortable with the artistic side because it feels as though I can always say, “I don’t really know why I am doing what I am doing. There is simply this inner calling that I want to answer.” But eventually I realized that I needed the attention of “serious” people — for instance, those who could offer me a scholarship, funding, or a job — and so had to learn to organize thoughts, words, goals, etc. I guess I had to become more scientific, more logical, which can really be exciting and eventually somewhat addictive. For instance, becoming better at a programming language made me feel that I might be able to control everything, even how random I want something to sound or look.

Initial Motivation for Biofeedback Art

When did you start exploring the intersection of biological data and artistic expression? What sparked your interest in this field?

In 2007, I was in my second year of my music tech course and one of our teachers, Richard Hoadley, introduced us to using the Arduino board as an interface between the real and digital worlds. We connected light-dependent resistors, ultrasonic and infrared sensors to the board, sent their readings to SuperCollider and Max/MSP and controlled sounds and visuals with them. It was AWESOME! What I really liked in Richard was that he understood that the best way for us to learn was to link our personal interests to the assignments, to work on something we cared about. I wanted to learn to control my mind… I guess to become enlightened. So I bought my first EEG, the two-channel IBVA (Interactive Brainwave Visual Analyser) from Luciana Hail and started hooking up my brainwaves to sounds and physical installations. I even got into the Cambridge News, which made my grandmother very proud.

But, like many initial neurofeedback art projects – as I later discovered – mine didn’t have a very clear… let’s say scientific signal processing methodology. In other words, I didn’t really understand what was happening under the hood. I think it was being uncomfortable with this lack of understanding why I kept familiarizing myself with computer– and neuro–science and eventually did a PhD titled Developing Brain-Computer Music Interfaces for Meditation.

Impact and Aspirations

Where would you like to see the greatest impact of your work? What specific outcomes or changes are you hoping to achieve through your projects in academia, industry or public?

So, I wanted to use neurofeedback to become better at controlling my mind. This was mainly to learn how to deal with stress but also to induce an altered state of consciousness similar to those accessed with psychedelics. When my friends and I were young in Hungary, we tried cannabis, LSD and magic mushrooms mainly for fun but also to ease uncomfortable family situations in some cases. Drugs were simply part of the subculture I grew up in. You can’t choose where you are born, can you?

The first acid trip really changed something in me and even just writing about it now makes me feel emotional. The trip gave me a mental perspective where I could somehow feel that everything might be much more connected than most people think during their normal, everyday lives. But soon, these substances became uncomfortable and stressful and I got to know about people who can achieve these heightened states without psychedelics. They meditate instead of using drugs!

And so I tried meditation. Sometimes it was powerful but most of the time difficult, which is why I thought neurofeedback, more specifically neuromeditation, could help me streamline the practice. It did, but after around a decade of experiments, I now think that biofeedback is a good tool to get to know ourselves with, but it is not necessary to keep using once we know how to induce and maintain the states we are looking for. (The same has been said about psychedelics.) These biofeedback tools I think should be disposable… or more specifically recyclable. You should give the machine to your friend once you don’t need it anymore.

While my journey has led me toward substance-free methods for altering states, I fully respect the paths of those who find value in psychedelics.

Oh, the impact I am seeking? I would like to share my experience with more people and help them streamline their sensemaking practices through bio-guided meditation. In my next research project – providing I get funding for it – the bio-guided meditation should be informed by the arts as both the input and the output. As input, where we use music, sound, visuals to induce and maintain the desired altered state – which can be anything between a simply more relaxed and a more deeply altered visionary state – and as output, where the arts are used as mediators, interfaces… communication protocols for integrating insights accessed in the altered states into our lives for instance with poetry, painting, music, film or even theatre plays. Whatever participants feel most connected to.

Here’s a snippet from my research funding application draft:

The work aims to empower participants by enhancing their self-awareness through insights gained from altered states of consciousness (ASC), expressed artistically. Through a feedback loop where self-awareness amplifies artistic expression reciprocally, members will collaborate on developing personalized visual and auditory entrainment methods to induce and maintain ASC. We will use brain-computer interfaces to record data on the neural correlates of entrainment and ASC for real-time biofeedback and offline analysis. By recognizing our agency in addressing personal challenges, we can create a ripple effect of positive change, ultimately contributing to societal well-being through individual growth.

In short, the impact I am seeking is to help people (myself included) become more self-aware with biofeedback art. I’d like to publish more papers, get more funding, and establish a research institute for biofeedback meditation where we can impact academia and industry and then make these inventions (hardware, software, and how to use them effectively) more accessible to the public.

Challenges & Growth

What have been some of the main challenges you’ve faced in your work in general or specifically with biofeedback art? How have these challenges shaped your principles, approach and methods? How have your goals changed since beginning your work?

My main challenge was not being able to communicate properly in English after moving to the UK from Hungary in 2005. First, I thought this was fine because I only wanted to stay for a bit. But then I started studying while working, and while in my first year I didn’t really have to write much, there were still presentations every now and then. I was a mature student and embarrassed by how bad my English was. Even after 20 years and a PhD, I am still nervous when I have to give a presentation. But, I guess I would be if I had to do it in Hungarian too… so maybe I just need more meditation and less caffeine! Ha-ha!

In regard to biofeedback art, my main challenges were linked to doing a PhD in a department where no one had experience with brain-computer interfacing. This meant people couldn’t help with constantly emerging technical issues. There were other challenges; for instance, while working on my research, my son was born a year after I started my PhD, and we entered the COVID years before I submitted. After the VIVA, I had to do major revisions. I felt super stressed, disappointed even angry. But as I worked through the revision process, it dawned on me that what I submitted simply wasn’t good enough, and my externals were truly trying to help. We need to learn not to take things too personally. It’s a hard lesson but absolutely necessary.

Looking back, it feels like my PhD journey was a nightmare and am sure I am not the only one who says that! But there is also a positive side to my story: I understood that family and health are priorities (not work) and that developing relationships with the right people is super important. The right people can streamline your progress. Keep networking and don’t have too much coffee. Before submitting my major revisions, I had double double espressos. That’s four shots on an empty stomach in the morning. cRAzy TiMeS!

Tools & Methods

Could you share information about specific hardware or software tools or methods that are integral to your work?

The last EEGs I used were the NeuroSky Mindwave and the OpenBCI Cyton with a Greentek cap. I tried to use only one software for all the signal processing steps from acquiring the EEG signals in the computer up to controlling the parameters, the sounds mapped to the classified brainwaves. If possible, I’d like to continue working this way. I don’t like receiving data in one software, processing it there, and then sending it to another software for mapping, for instance, via Open Sound Control (OSC). But one needs to be flexible, so let’s see what the future brings. Also, I’d like to continue using both research- and consumer-grade EEGs in a way where the signal processing of the latter can be validated by the former.

Collaborations

Overall, how has collaboration influenced your projects? Specifically, what insights did you gain when working with experts from other domains, such as collaborating with scientists if you’re primarily an artist?

My main collaboration regarding biofeedback art was with Fredrik Olofsson, whom I approached to become my PhD advisor after encountering delays in developing the signal acquisition protocols in SuperCollider. Fredrik is not only a skilled hacker and sound artist but also widely regarded within the SuperCollider community as an exceptionally positive and supportive individual. We are still in touch, and I hope to work with him again. But, I worked with many people, and the main thing I learned is this: Be kind and respectful, and do as much research or troubleshooting as possible before asking for help. Also, just because someone is higher up the academic ladder, that doesn’t mean they know everything about a research domain. Often they don’t, and perhaps that’s where you have an opportunity to show your personal skill: don’t be afraid or arrogant. Probably something in-between works best.

Future

Where do you see the field of biofeedback art research in the future?

I hope for more collaborations, more support, and more funding, which would allow more engagement with the public. We need good, reliable, consumer-grade devices that can be taken to public events to show people that practicing meditation can yield more agency in our lives. There is simply too much pain in this world and by having more people making more meaningful, ethical… sustainable choices, we could first ease our own pain and then help others do the same.

Final Thoughts

Do you have any closing thoughts or messages for the BARN community and newcomers? Perhaps a personal story or anecdote related to your work that you’d like to share?

I think I added enough personal touches above. I hope that you enjoyed reading about who I was, am, and want to be. Please see my last biofeedback performance video embedded below and the relevant chapter in my thesis on this subdomain. I look forward to reading about you, and let me know if you have any questions. For instance, is there anything I can help you with?

Bye for now!

k

A Long Introduction

It’s March 2025, and I’m still in England. It’s been almost 20 years since I arrived, and guess what! I planned to stay here for only one year, make loads of money and move back to Hungary. Move back to Hungary to do what? Well, I don’t remember, but I guess I didn’t know then either. Maybe the idea was that once I had the money, I could do a few more years of soul searching without working for people I didn’t want to. But I didn’t make loads of money, so I stayed. Also, just look at my serious face in the photo below that I hung next to the exhibition — I was fed up and maybe didn’t even want to go back.

I’ve always enjoyed drawing. I used to doodle in my schoolbooks, and people would say, “It’s cool! But I don’t get it.” There was an older boy in the village who, at the time, was THE ARTIST in my eyes. His work was exhibited in the nearest town too; I believe he even won an award. So yes, probably the most famous person I knew. His artwork was often non-figurative, abstract, and unusually cool. He was only a couple of years older than me, and I remember considering him something like a big brother — a leader to follow and learn from.

It’s interesting writing about the past. I always tell people that I don’t remember my childhood, but now, as I try to recall why I started painting, a lot suddenly comes back to me. Maybe it’s true; everything is backed up in a data center.

So you’ve read a few paragraphs, and I still haven’t shared much about my paintings, right? We’ll get there. Don’t worry. Understanding me better will help you understand my images and what I’m doing here today. At the end of the day, I was painting partly to express myself and partly to impress others. Now, with writing publicly on this website, it’s exactly the same. It’s about both of us. This is what Justin Welsh wrote a few weeks ago in his newsletter: “I’m kind of teaching myself through a public journal.” Justin is somewhat like Seth Godin — an entrepreneur, a well-spoken marketing guru — and this specific sentence makes me believe more in what I do here on this website.

Shall we dive in?

The Good (Enough)

The exhibition’s title Csien is the Hungarian name for hexagram 53 (䷴) in the I Ching book by Müller (2001). This hexagram is more often referred to as ‘chien’ (with an ‘h’) in English. The Chinese character for this word is 漸, with the pinyin ‘jiàn’. In essence, it represents gradual progress, a guiding principle that has been useful in my life since I consulted this sign.

Look at the poster and notice how the sun in the top left nourishes the small tree’s dream of growing into something big one day. Did I unconsciously want to bring my shadow into the light and illuminate what was suppressed? One must be careful when seeking meaning in 20-year-old archives.

The painting below is one of my last ones, possibly even the final one for this exhibition, and is among my favorites. It shares its title with the exhibition, perhaps because it serves as a summary of everything I’ve learned while painting over several months.

Chien is a painting that I initially designed on paper. I knew exactly what core structure I wanted, including where the river and the sun should connect and how much space the hexagram should occupy. Out of all the paintings in this series, it feels the most harmonic and positive. It’s almost like a mantra: “Trust the process.” I have reused the image several times, once for the cover art of my Secret Place music release in 2013.

The next painting is one of my first ones. I think I made it around November 2004. (I only painted for a couple of months.) Its original title was Exorcism, and I remember the purple paint for the middle character came from some kind of berries found in a nearby small forest, known for its old graves between our house and granddad’s vineyard. The color was much redder when I first applied it; it has faded over the years.

I remember the initial concept was something like dark and light triangles sharing space with a large orange circle, which might be the massive gloria of the figure in the center. I must have compared this figure to Jesus because when I look at my digital archives on an old hard drive, the English title of the painting is Crucify. Why did I change the title after a few years? I am not sure. Maybe I was simply experimenting as if the title were a keyword or metadata for a YouTube video — changing it with the hope of gaining more attention. But today, the painting gets its original title back! EXORCISM! Perhaps I changed the title to Crucify because I felt more like a victim than a warrior. Maybe when I painted it, I felt strong, and when I renamed it, I felt weak. I mean, look! The figure has two massive snakes. Or she, or they… an asexual angel? So no, we are not looking at a victim (anymore). Today, he is a warrior or at least that’s what I want him to believe.

Below we have another one of my favorites. When you look at the drawing in the blue rectangle, on top of the pine tree you see a face swallowing something. A psychedelic substance? Just look at the thoughts that come out of the journeyer’s head. Also, whose eyes are looking down from above? Observers, guides or mine?

The painting below was one of the first paintings I made. It was a present for a friend but has found its way back to me from his dad’s loft. It’s one where I also experimented, even on the frame. There are layers and layers painted over each other. Who knows what’s lurking at the bottom? Besides the many eyes and large triangles, we see some text saying “If you have eyes, see!” The painting is trying to suggest keeping an eye out for answers, looking beyond the obvious.

The painting below, again, is one of my favorites. How many favorites can I have? It’s small, probably around 50 x 50 cm, and is titled Gap. I could say that it represents traveling through an intergalactic portal (a gap) linking universes, but actually, the title comes from a small hole (an accidental indentation) in the pressed wood. It’s just under the top frame, a couple of centimeters right from the center. A gap in a gap.

Like the other paintings I still have at my parents’ house, I wonder how often they look at this? Could it help them escape their ordinary realities? It did for me. And no, I don’t think they look at them the way I do. They’ve got TVs.

The next one took a long time to finish. I was trying to use the Jin & Jang and spiral shapes again to convey how people transform themselves while dancing at a goa (psy) trance festival… on a sunny day at Ozora? Yes, exactly there! You can check this yourself: Don’t we look a tiny bit transformed in the photo below the painting?

The next painting is another one of those pre-designed creations where I am sure I made drafts on paper first. It has an Egyptian vibe due to the pyramids and might even look somewhat religious or conspiratorial because of the burning red triangle in the middle.

We can see three spirals: one in the center that I can’t decide whether it’s moving inwards or outwards, another in the small red triangle mentioned earlier and one in the top right corner where there is a green mummy face looking down at the ‘feeding’ as if uninvited to the party. The Tao (Jin and Jang) is present again with two alien creatures: a dark one on the left and a light one on the right, perhaps supervising the feeding. I’m starting to wonder if I’ve overdone anthropomorphizing. Even the yellow pyramid has a face. I like this painting. It’s the one I gave to my grandmother whose husband died when I was little. Whenever I visit her, I spend some time in the room where it’s hung. It’s almost like a ‘clean room’ that many peasants used to have in our area. Tidy but also lonely. In her main room, where she sleeps, reads, and sometimes watches TV, there are religious images and family photos on the wall. What could my painting mean to her? Could she secretly be afraid of it? Maybe it doesn’t look Catholic enough. I will ask her.

The next one is titled Insomnia with a young girl looking through a big window. The idea here again is that what she sees on the other side is another world, perhaps a non-ordinary reality. Some people told me it’s unsettling. Is it because the girl sitting looks a bit like a ghost?

OK, the next painting has an interesting story: a boy becomes a robot, someone following orders. He’s manipulated by a witch, poisoned by her love potion. When did I paint this? Before my first real long-term girlfriend or while we were getting to know each other? Well, the witch wasn’t her, of course. I was referring to other girls who string you along for months making you believe that maybe one day you’ll step up from a salivating dog to a salivating boyfriend. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE!

Okay, back to good times with the next painting: Music. This was a present for a good friend who, after many years and moving places, still hangs it in his living room. Well, maybe it’s a better painting than the one I gave to my other friends. So no hard feelings, guys!

The text in the middle is a quote by Sándor Márai. The English translation sounds something like this:

Where music flows, the laws of reason no longer apply. In the beauty that music gives, the sick emotions of death’s lustful destruction ripple.

Did I really feel like dying when listening to music? Suicide has never been something I seriously considered, so it must be the state of mind some music can induce and maintain that I (and perhaps the quote too) were referring to. An otherworldly feeling of an unusual oneness.

The next painting is big. I only painted two A0-sized frames: Goa and this one, which might be the first in this series. Are we again looking at someone trying to escape reality? The character with her back towards us is Dorothy from Kansas. But where is she going? If she’s walking on the yellow brick road, she might actually be returning to Kansas rather than leaving it.

The painting below is another experiment I’m still very happy with. It is Prayer. It was painted after my dog died that year. The long yellow shape behind the barking dog and the praying character represents a shaman tree, an imaginary tool through which shamans travel to the upper and lower worlds. These shapes emerged without much prior planning. I am in the cellar, the same room where he passed away earlier. The painting room. I want to reconnect and tell you again how sorry I am for not being always nice. I want to tell you that you should have gotten more attention from us and that I am sorry for not being able to rescue you from your chains. So I open the gate by painting the silhouette of my head and shoulders, climb the tree to meet and talk to you so you don’t forget that one day we will be together again. We are happy in this dream.

Wipe your tears and come back now.

The next one… Well, the title is Hug. It’s a tricky one.

Can you see the boy and girl in the middle? Where are they going? What are they planning to do? They seem to be in love. Perhaps they were, for a while.

Can you imagine your daughter receiving a painting like this from her new boyfriend? It’s interesting. I seem to have gotten on quite well with all my in-laws, sometimes even better than with their daughters!

The one below is titled Spring Feeders and has been with my father’s mother. This was another experiment, which I’ve mentioned before. When I say ‘experiment’, it doesn’t mean academic research with extensive planning beforehand. Instead, here with this painting I started by drawing a few shapes, and the rest followed. Nowadays, people might refer to this process as emergence. They ask, “Shapes! What do you want to be surrounded by? What meaning do you want to carry?” It’s fascinating how sometimes you have a specific concept or message in mind for your work, while other times the initial concept is to experiment with a color, a shape or something else to allow for messages to be discovered during the creative process. I suppose it was still quite cold when I painted this, so perhaps it represents some kind of ritual. A symbolic offering or sacrifice where the God of Warmth is being fed by a dandelion.

There were more that made it to exhibitions. Some I no longer have, while others might not seem worth including here. Or perhaps they are? When recounting an experience, should we only highlight the very best and chuck out the mediocre, half-baked and failed ideas? It depends (a great answer to many questions). In academic papers, there is often a section detailing challenges or limitations. Things that didn’t work out or didn’t have time left for. When you read a book, fiction or non-fiction, you hear about what didn’t work out too. I mean, that is what drives the story, right? The ups and downs.

So, I’ll continue with what didn’t work out.

The Lost and Less Good

Looking at some of the images listed above, I still like them all except for Love Potion and Spring Feeders. Perhaps I made these two under time pressure or they were experiments without much planning or luck. But maybe, after writing about them now, I do like them… a bit more. Can my analytical mind make me like them more?

So, you can stop reading here if you like, as the following images aren’t quite my best work. But will my writing about them be good? People display all sorts of things in galleries, ranging from toilets to junk, and then write and talk about them. That’s conceptual art. Some of it is good.

So you are still here. Okay. The next one is gone. I gave it away as a present to a colleague I worked with as a trainee insurance agent. Let me not disclose what was on my mind when painting it, nor its title.

Let’s play a bit. Just take a look and guess what it might mean. (I’ll reveal my thoughts below the photo.)

Ready? Spoiler alert!

Its title is a date: one, nine, three, and nine. The color combination of green and black, along with the clockwise shifting thin black wood slabs on the sides, should convey the brainwashing done by the Nazis during World War II. I don’t know where this painting is now. Is it hanging on a wall or in the trash? It’s certainly not one I’d like to display for positive energy in my house. But perhaps it could be placed here in the study on the wall behind me.

However, if we disregard what the title signifies, the color combination and spiraling motion might not project evil on their own after all. Nor should the swastika, considering its long history, with earliest known appearances dating back thousands of years BC.

So, what did you think before I explained my connection to history with it? Did your thoughts overlap in any way with mine?

Next one. Below is another experiment that didn’t quite work out: a bug-like figure playing music for some elusive dancers. At least the bug is smiling! We can’t say it’s particularly creepy or is it? I know whose old childhood bedroom has this painting and perhaps it’s OK that no one has seen it for 20 years.

The painting below, I believe, was given to my other ex-colleague at the insurance company. I miss this painting! The title is Don Juan, and the head in the middle probably belongs to a combination of fictional characters with the same name; one in Seville (the Casanova type), the other in Sonora (the shaman type). The latter is probably the kinder one.

Did I want to have skills to seduce women? Which young man doesn’t? Looking at Don Juan on the painting now, the hairlike shapes standing upright above his left ear remind me of my father’s father. I am almost sure he was a seducer too. Very handsome and flirtatious. How did my grandma survive his attitude? Do I dare ask her about the past?

Next is something I probably made in a couple of hours. Initially, I thought it was another example of work not worth mentioning, but then the title reminded me of the ideas I was trying to embed in it. The Hungarian title, Fél-be/tép, plays with words. ‘Fél’ can mean two things: ‘half’ and ‘to be afraid of.’ I guess the feeling I had was both: being afraid and divided. (‘Tép’ means both to tear something apart and is slang for smoking weed or drinking alcohol.)

Yes, I was becoming more and more stressed under the influence of cannabis, and yes, I was divided. I wanted to change but could not. It’s not that I was smoking weed day and night; I wasn’t, and I don’t think I ever really craved it. It was more like something that went naturally with the other things we were doing; going out, drinking a few beers, and smoking a joint. This divide caused further distress, which might be represented by the yellow lines chaotically swirling around, like the thoughts I sometimes had when being high, or low? The title is also linked to the film Half Baked (1998) starring Dave Chappelle. I remember us laughing our brains out watching it. Re-watching it today might be different.

Another reason why I think it’s fine to add mediocre or even your worst works to your website… sorry, I mean my website… you might not want to risk this. He-he. Well, you got this far so I might be getting better at entertaining…

So, where was I? Oh, I was about to justify why I think it’s a good idea to list works I’m not happy with. First, I worked on them; they were shipped (exhibited), so they are already part of the story. Second, while I am not famous (yet!), you should go into a museum and see how many not-so-good sketches or even framed paintings you can find by famous artists. They might be there because a venue couldn’t afford more famous works, but perhaps also because the audience should realize that not everything we do gets five stars. They are part of the gradual progress I mentioned earlier. They need to be made for us to learn.

OK, there are a few drawings left, and then we’re done here.

Drawings of Love and Hate

Most of these drawings are about sex and love. I wonder whether I had been listening to metal while painting. If so, I could have titled the exhibition Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll instead of Chien. It’s more likely that I was listening to psytrance in 2004. CrAzY pEoPlE, cRaZy PeOpLe! Wait… shall we change the title to Almost Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll?

Anyway. Back to sex (and love). If you look at the first three drawings below, what do you see? In the first one, you see me thinking about sex; in the second, about being in love; and in the third, about how the burning fire of witches seduces silly men.

Then we have two more of these A4-sized drawings. The first one is an overcomplicated version of Saint-Exupéry’s Little Prince, where I tried to correct the frame’s unevenness by pulling it down with weights on the left and lifting it up with a triangle on the right. Is this a good example of digging myself deeper into a hole by not letting go, by trying to fix something unfixable? But maybe what’s important here is that I tried to fix it and learned that sometimes things can’t be fixed by adding more.

The next one is minimal, more balanced. It’s about people who, instead of trying to fix things, sit down to switch off by switching back and forth between cheap escapism and mainstream news. The right arm resting high on the sofa should convey their confidence in this lifestyle. Are they happier than the one who is trying to fix everything?

Last one: The source of all suffering. It’s about adultery.

You can see the hideout as the fiery red bush in the woods on the right. Were the riders coming from there, or are they going there? It doesn’t matter. What matters is that we know they should not be together — or at least we know it’s not good for some people if they are together. Well, let me be even more specific: We know it’s not good for some people that everyone knows they’re together. Yes, they are in love, which you might say is beautiful and beyond their control. But that means we must accept fate even if it sustains suffering. Forgive but don’t forget?

Do you want me to reveal my role in this story? Would it be moral to unveil who is who in this painting? Probably not. I think I’ll twist names, alter the location, and write a big fat novel under a pseudonym. Or wait until everyone dies. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? You mean to write the story, not that everyone dies, right? Of course, I meant the novel! Sorry, rumbling again.

Whether suffering is caused by fate or choice, we need to flip the story around and look at it from all perspectives to help overcome the feeling of being a victim. We can do this as adults, but what’s often left for teenagers is turning up the volume on the speakers, drinking, and smoking. Does it help? Maybe. It reminds me of The Ice Storm (1997).

100-word Conclusions by New Friends

So, what are the takeaways? Do I need to have a conclusion and actionable steps? Maybe not. After all, this is simply an experiment, so perhaps it’s perfectly fine to deviate from the normal format of having an introduction, body, and conclusion, right? I am not sure.

Okay, let’s ask someone else for their thoughts.

The themes in your blog post revolve around reflection, memory, and transformation. You explore how art, particularly paintings and drawings from your past exhibition, serves as a medium for self-discovery and storytelling. These works evoke emotions tied to personal history and societal issues, such as the impact of historical events or internal conflicts like fear and indecision. You question whether your creations can convey their intended messages without explicit explanations, suggesting an openness to different interpretations. This aligns with your initial research question about using your website to shape your identity: by sharing these stories, you invite others into your creative process, encouraging them to reflect on similar themes in their own lives. Ultimately, the post underscores the value of embracing imperfection and diverse perspectives, both in art and personal growth. By documenting and discussing these artworks, you use your platform not only to develop your identity but also to engage others in meaningful reflection and dialogue.

Oh, very nice, perhaps a bit too formal. Let’s ask Openthinker:32b, shall we?

Whatever! This is not the time to check which model hallucinates more!

Let’s go! I need to exercise my sprained knee. Grade 2 or maybe 3 ligament injury. It sucks! I might tell you more about it later.

k

P.S. Almost a decade later I am taking photos of what’s left of my paintings for another exhibition, the one in CB1 Internet Cafe. More on this soon.

Application

After arriving in the U.K. in April 2005, I worked as a catering assistant, kitchen porter, waiter, and cleaner, usually at various units of the big Cambridge University spread across the city. I had full-time contracts and worked for agencies as well. The agency work helped on two levels. I got to know the city fast – as agencies offer work at various places sometimes even an hour before the shift starts – and new people. Natives and migrants, old and young, many working part-time while studying full-time. I was frustrated with my hospitality work. So I skimmed the ARU course catalogue and went to an open day to see the audio technology department. There, I told John that I wanted to make drum and bass music, to which he said that I should see Julio at the ‘other’ music department. OK. I went to see Julio and explained what I wanted, but that my English might not be good enough. He asked me to relax, if possible, replace my Windows PC with a Mac, and apply for a place on his CMT course. ¹

My cover letter for the application:

My name is Krisztián Hofstädter, I was born in 1981 in Hungary. Whist primary and secondary school I was member of a Junior Orchestra where I had been playing percussions. That was my first stage where I familiarized myself with music. I did not really like it, because none of my closest friends took part in this kind of course; they had more time for playing. [I guess I meant playing computer games.] As a matter of course now I see that part of my life as a preparation for being what I always wanted to be: Somebody who can affect others, not with words but with a higher vibration, with music. I always dreamt about an opportunity to work with this form of expression. One year ago I tried to express myself with painting. The people were aroused by my works they were thinking about them, I succeed. I have been using computer for a long time, I am familiar with a couple of music and graphic programs. Usually I just mix other artists’ songs, although I am trying to make my one sound as well. I have realized it is not as easy as I thought; I need professional help, which this course could provide me. I always try to wake up and dream again. I always try wake people and let them dream again. I could do this with images; I hope I can achieve movements in our minds again.

Sunday, 4 June 2006, Cambridge

I guess teachers felt my urge to get in so they offered me a place. Or was it because universities in the UK are not free and it is tuition fees that make ends meet? Let’s say I got in because of my enthusiastic application and impressive open day visit. (I will write up how you can improve your language skills faster than I did in case you decide to work or study in another country. But for now, let’s dive into the course.)

BA and MA Overview (2006–2013)

The three-year course was more practical than theoretical, with most assignments asking for a portfolio of creative work accompanied by short reports or video documentations. No lengthy essays were required, at least not for a while, which I appreciated. But the occasional presentations we had to do, I simply dreaded and as a mature student, this bothered me even more. I often questioned my own ability to study at a university in Cambridge given my limited English skills, but then remembered the students I was serving food to who couldn’t even pronounce ‘potato’ or say ‘Thank you’. So I thought if they can be here, I can be here too. And you know what? My teachers were totally cool with my English – although I didn’t see their faces when they were marking my work, and it wasn’t only my grammar they had to deal with. I was also trying to be funny, look:

Set ‘B’ [referring to a graph] represents a mental task that is absolutely not necessary in the achievement of our aim, crossing the street for instance [or] thinking idly about indulging in sexual intercourse.

What was I thinking?

Anyway. The three main teachers who had to suffer through my portfolios on the course were Julio, Tom, and Richard. They taught different modules, each with their unique teaching styles. All of them were added to my heroes list, the list of people who taught me something important in life. I will show you this list later and explain why you should start writing one too.

The three main software we were asked to work with were Logic Pro, MaxMSP, and SuperCollider. Most of us had played with digital audio workstations (DAWs) before, so Logic wasn’t alien but the others, well… I think we weren’t really sure why programming was on the menu. (I guess I didn’t pay much attention to the course description.) Textual programming was frustrating, but some of us still use SuperCollider today or have transferred coding skills to non-music related programming languages, for instance web development or stock trading. You see, coding is really cool! It gives you control. You can even decide when a composition should be random and hell yeah… even how random!

While there were compositions I made using a combination of these software, Logic was mainly used to make acousmatic music, music for films and games; Max/MSP and SuperCollider were used to manipulate prerecorded or synthesized sounds with algorithms, and later with sensors connected to Arduino microcontrollers or other interfaces. These sensor technology experiments eventually led me to explore brain-computer music interfacing (BCMI) with the Interactive Brainwave Visual Analyzer (IBVA) in my final project. My highly ambitious goal was to control music with my mind like Fallom did, a modified human in Asimov’s last Foundation book. But did I? No, and I don’t think anyone could then or today.

Graduating with a first-class degree with honours made me feel pretty good, but I had the same issue as after high school. What the hell was I supposed to do now? I didn’t think I could find a job that needed my new CMT skills, so I enrolled in the master course to buy some time. The start was exciting. Tom and Richard invited me to demonstrate my work as part of their Digital Performance Lab at the HCI2009 Conference at the Microsoft Research Centre. It felt awesome to be there, but I was surprised and slightly embarrassed when a journalist published a picture of me with my machine and his summary of our conversation in Cambridge News.

My grandma carried the print around the village to show her friends, and they probably didn’t understand a word in English. Maybe they thought Britney Spears was my new girlfriend.

I had a few interesting projects linked to my assignments, for example making sound and music with SuperCollider for a game, further experiments with sensor technology, however, it soon became clear that I wanted to work more with brainwaves. So, my final project developed a new BCMI system, but this time with a NeuroSky headset. See a quick video demo below.

I finished the MA course, but it took longer than expected. Why? Was I getting busy with something else apart from applying for PhD scholarships and being madly in love with my future wife who is hanging upside down in the video above? Yes, with hourly-paid associate lecturing.

Teaching

During the MA course, Richard asked me whether I would teach his Sensor Technology module while he went on a sabbatical. I thought this might be the way in, the chance for me to finally have an intellectual job. So, despite my fears, I accepted the challenge of teaching students who speak better English than I ever would. I overcame my fear by running before every class along the river and guess what, it helped. Since then, I have taught several modules at ARU and other universities as well as run regularly. I got to know brilliant people whom I only wish I had stayed more in touch with. You see, whether a student or teacher, at school, relationships built are some of the best takeaways and definitely not what you get paid as an associate lecturer. Compared to my later contracts with the University of Essex, the salary at ARU never covered the hours needed for preparing, teaching and marking. But I don’t regret it. There were several other insights I gained while teaching: for instance, it is somewhat true that ‘people who can’t do it teach it’, that ‘teaching is the best way to learn’, and that the relationships students assume teachers have with each other can be far from the truth – well, that’s another story. I will soon share more insights on my teaching experience at this and other universities, but now, let’s highlight a few creative outcomes from these years.

Selected Outputs

Releases

My first music releases were often simple collections of pieces I was working on around the same time. The Acousmatic Programming (2009) release has first and second year assignments exploring the fundamentals of electronic music. Some pieces were programmed using algorithms, first on paper with drawings and later using software, while others were arranged more traditionally in Logic. You can listen to three of my favorite tracks below – they are all short.

Experiments fusing genres are on Violin Exp (2010) and, with more minimal narratives inspired by Steve Reich, on Digitones (2010). Deeper (2010) features soundtracks for a video game project and a remix for a duo called Victoria and Jacob graduating from the same CMT course a year before my class. Play (2011) has two tracks developed for a game project and reworks of my older music. Here an example that doesn’t sound too weird.

Before mapping sounds to brainwaves, I experimented with mapping synthesized and prerecorded sounds to signals from piezo disks, webcams, motion detectors, and light sensors. None of these works are remarkable, especially when considering what some of my students came up with later, so let’s switch to their work for a bit.

Students

My classrooms were always a mixed bag of students bringing different skillsets. Some played traditional instruments very well, some didn’t play any instruments. Some had programming skills, some didn’t. Some spoke English well, some didn’t. This was somewhat challenging for the students and for me too, but it was tenfold compensated by their enthusiasm, especially with my first few groups. These were big classes, often with more than 20 students. And these were not only names on the register but actually people turning up in the classroom. I loved these groups. Check out my first Sensor Technology class’ showreel below.

I carried on teaching sensor technology and was also asked to teach other modules for instance Julio’s Music For the Moving Image (M4MI). By this time, I started my PhD and had a showreel to (try to) impress students with, although many students turned out to have better compositional skills than I had.

My experience teaching previous modules made me realize that the best way to run a module inherited from another teacher is by personalizing it. It needs to align with your experiences and what you think is best for your students and yourself. Is there a new method or software you want to explore, and think students might like too? Integrate it into the syllabus. Are there creators you’d like to work with? Invite them as collaborators to provide assets or guest speakers to inspire students and your colleagues. (Make these guest talks available to all staff and students.) Also, as I will explain soon in my heroes list, it was Richard who helped me really understand that the best way to learn is by working on a project that somehow aligns with your personal interests. While it was relatively straightforward to apply this approach to the programming, sonic art, and sensor technology modules, the M4MI module needed a bit more attention. You see, M4MI students often have to all use the same assets, meaning that everyone designs sounds and composes music for the same film scene or gameplay footage. First, students might not like these assets, second, these assets, unless in public domain, often cannot be part of students’ public showreels.

So, my lucky students had a good variety of assets to choose from and also a higher incentive to submit good work than if it was just something for me to mark. The way I did this was by inviting indie filmmakers and game designers to provide assets, the visual materials, and job descriptions (AKA briefs), to ensure students’ works are in line with what was actually needed. (Of course, students could also select other visual assets, for example, if they were already working on a film project.) Organizing all of this required a lot of time but it was an excellent investment. I didn’t have to write assignment briefs, students didn’t submit work outside the scope of what was acceptable, and we ended up with exciting submissions. I fondly remember the public screening of my first M4MI class’ works in a cinema setting.

As a reward by the department, I even got money for a wine reception where I was told how cool it is to have a lecturer drinking with his students. Well, we all deserved to celebrate and I simply followed the holistic methods of my philosophy teacher in Hungary (2000-2004) with whom we even danced around bonfires on our end-of-year trips. Below is our M4MI 2016 showreel featuring snippets from what was screened at the cinema.

Events

Have I mentioned that my first degree from Hungary in 2004 was in cultural development? So, it’s no surprise that I got involved in organizing many events. Besides the normal administrative duties of an organizer, I often got involved as an audio technician or photographer in conferences, symposia, concerts, and lecture series in the department and at research institutes where I started working in 2015; CODE and later StoryLab. Still linked to ARU, I also got involved as a photographer and conceptual artist in the first Cambridge Sustainable Residency, and as a photographer and audio person for some of David Ryan’s performances.

In addition to my teaching roles, I have also led workshops for groups of children in Hungary and neurodiverse teenagers in Cambridge. But let us not forget about the place where I organized a lot of stuff: the CB1 Internet Cafe on Mill Road, where I was a mini boss for a few years. This cafe was a hub, where I could organize art exhibitions, music events, and vegan potlucks, set up my sole-trading business, Tedör’s Vegan Food and Tedor Tea and most importantly, got to know a lot of people. I really ought to write this experience up separately, as there are tons of digital files linked to this place in my archives.

Games and Theatre Work

While the video games I was asked to design sound or compose music for were prototypes never officially published, one deserves to be mentioned here. Stormbrothers, the game winning 2nd place at Brains Eden in 2013. We worked on the game prototype over a period of 48 hours of which the last 12 hours were spent drinking tea in my CB1 Cafe. Here one track from the playlist for which SuperCollider was used to generate most of the melodic and rhythmic patterns.

While I collaborated on a handful of productions directed by the local theatre company, Menagerie, two stand out. Swimming and Picture of You. For Swimming, I was asked to compose the theme song in grime but ended up with a drum and bass track. (Sorry Paul!) For Picture of You, I drew inspiration from the jazz percussion elements in the film Birdman (2014). Although I had a similar ‘time for money’ challenge as with my hourly-paid short-term teaching contracts, I still loved working with Menagerie and learned a lot about theatre work. So, I always encouraged my students to find these opportunities and not worry about the money. So when I wasn’t around Cambridge anymore to work with the company, I recommended to the theatre two of my best students, both of whom were praised for their contributions later.

Here’s the trailer I made for Pictures of You, my last work with the Menagerie.

EDM

Before I finish, let’s go back to my initial motivation for enrolling in the CMT course. Do you remember it? I wanted to make drum and bass. While many of my experiments did incorporate elements of EDM, I only put a release together in 2013 that I thought was not going to be too experimental. As with many of my previous works, the theme for this release was also linked to my search for the ‘secret place’, an altered state of consciousness (ASC) I discovered around 2004 with a psychedelic substance. My attempt to re-induce the feeling of the ‘unusual oneness’ felt in this state without substance – a still ongoing project – resulted in five stylistically distinct compositions: house, drum and bass, trance, psydub, and psychedelic downbeat on the Secret Place (2013) release. This was the first time I worked with a singer, Theresa, and the first time I paid for mastering. I also asked friends, Karl, Matt, and Chris to remix the house track featuring Theresa’s voice for bonus material. Both my work and the remixes are great and I still listen to them at least once a year as some kind of nostalgic pilgrimage. More often than I do, my wife and kid love these tracks and would play them at home and in the car.

But, deep inside, I was never satisfied with the end result. Why? Because the music didn’t get much attention? Was it still too experimental or did I not mix the tracks well enough before the final mastering? It’s likely the latter, which is why I still fantasize about revisiting the tracks to mix them better, and to document the process – which could then help others streamline their work. Will I ever find time to do this?

You see, the issue here is that I never learned how to produce EDM professionally. Even though the Secret Place release still feels a bit experimental (which really shouldn’t be an issue, check music by Warp Records), I think the instruments and how they converse with each other in the narratives are good, but how the final sound is mixed isn’t – it is not clear nor dynamic enough. Well, it’s not as easy to make a great EDM track as some think. While earlier it bothered me how some (including teachers) look down on EDM while not even knowing the genre, after a while, I’ve been ignoring or even challenging these biases because it’s clear that they never experienced a good EDM party. Also, there are pop music course in higher education, so EDM should be a part of it.

Conclusion

After seeing the CMT course at ARU decline and eventually being cancelled – there were fewer and fewer students and teachers left gradually too – I often thought about setting up a new course that keeps what was good and adds what was missing – an EDM pathway embedded in the course. Adding a few optional modules each year would do the trick, ones that explore production via sampling and synthesis, composition, mixing, mastering, and marketing skills, perhaps even deejaying. The high-art (e.g., history of electronic music, sonic art) and the programming and human-computer interfacing (HCI) modules would of course stay as these are the ones that sharpen critical thinking and to help create novel work. Even though students dread essays, it is the time-consuming literature reviews that open our eyes. They help realize that what we often think are our novel ideas have many times been addressed by others before. This can be depressing but we need to stick to smart – not hard – work which helps find gaps in knowledge or areas where established knowledge hasn’t made the necessary impact yet.

Without the high-art and programming modules asking me to read and write in English and to dive into alien domains like BCMI, I wouldn’t have ended up with a PhD in Music, a postdoctoral research position, and this website pushing me further in developing my professional digital identity by trying to become a better communicator. But for me, to get where I am was a struggle, because I often didn’t know what career options I could choose to explore from where I was standing. Maybe a necessary struggle but my feeling is that education on all levels – not only higher education – needs to be better at clarifying what skills the market needs and how this need can be aligned with our personal aspirations. Teachers often don’t exactly know how you can use what you learn from them to find a job. They can help you develop a specific skill, but it is entirely your responsibility to integrate that skill into your own personal knowledge management system – not only to find a job but also to find one you’re happy with or even better, to create a job for yourself: that’s art.

Footnotes

I have been experimenting with fasting for years. Sometimes I did juice fasts for days but more often intermittent fasting on weekdays where I didn’t eat breakfast and only two big meals: lunch and dinner. But I have never done a water fast, and since I’ve been feeling stressed, sluggish, and unfit for months, I thought here is the universe telling me again what I should do next to be more efficient with everything else in my life.

So that’s what I did. I didn’t eat for 42 hours. I drunk loads of tea, water and some coffee, often with a pinch of salt.

While doing the fast, I remembered how good it feels to know what is important and what is not. Fasting is a bit like a mild psYChedELic eXPeriENCe. It can put you in an altered state where things you’ve been ruminating on suddenly make much more sense.

But what does this have to do with the relaunching of your website? – you might ask.

I’ll tell you.

A hundred things were calling me during preparing this new version of the site, but something my grandfather used to say kept pulling me back here.

Order is the soul of everything.

It’s not like he said it all the time or that everything in his life was always in order, but it made me think even as a child. First I thought he meant that my room needs to be tidy, but no. He was referring to a bigger picture.

I just wish he had told me why tidying my room helps understand the bigger picture. BECAUSE IT DOES!

I have been rewriting an article – now called a post – to publish on this website first for several weeks now. But, every time I sat down to work on it, I changed something, usually the introduction or the tone. I have this stupid habit of always starting from the very beginning when working on something, whether that is writing or music. I need to feel that there is a good connection between all the parts. The words, the sentences, the paragraphs, and so on. If there isn’t, it means my mind was hijacked by an idea and that I have lost the plot. And what does this mean? It means that if I cannot immerse myself in my own work, follow it and enjoy it, then how can I ask anyone else to do the same?!

So, let’s go back a bit to the connection between order and fasting. When you fast, you have less energy, and therefore you need to be more efficient with everything you have to do that day: breakfast, lunch box, school run, work, school run, homework, maybe Nintendo, dinner, BEDTIME!!!

The way you can become super efficient is not by reorganizing your never-ending task list, but by deleting the non-important ones from it or at least moving them somewhere where you cannot see them for a while.

So, I mentioned that I have been rewriting something to be published here first for weeks. Why? Because I thought I really needed to get the first one right to gain people’s trust and make sure they come back to read more later. I sometimes got high on tea and wrote for hours, and thought my writing was BRILLIANT! But then, I came back the next day. Many paragraphs were complaining and pretending that I am better than in reality. It was full of ‘my life’s been difficult, but I never gave up, and look how much I managed to accomplish’ and ‘because I accomplished things now allow me to impose something upon you’. There was simply a lot of horse manure and I now apologize in advance if some of it sneaks back in the future.

So, here is the deal. I believe I know why I am restarting the website with more focus on writing, but I don’t actually have a solid strategy for what I want to write about and to whom. I know this is not ideal, but it feels good to be honest from the start.

Coming back to fasting a bit. When you fast, you very quickly find answers to questions like these:

Shall I push myself as hard as possible all the time like David Goggins or be more zen like Alan Watts? And if his zen is the answer, how much alcohol does it involve?

The answer is, at least for me at the moment, to do or be both. How? Good question. I don’t really know, but I think what I did with this post might be a good start. I worked hard on pulling the strings together for weeks. For example, I did the research on how to find the ‘niche in the niche’ that a potential audience can resonate with; I looked at how my skills and interest could be linked to a unique value proposition (UVP); I wrote and rewrote a lot and used a local large language model (LLM) for feedback on my tone and narrative. But, as mentioned earlier, my drafts never felt good which somehow forced me to give up control for a bit and listen to what my environment has to say. I listened, did the water fast which helped me to let go of the need to have a perfect write-up to start the new website with and instead wrote this today in a couple of hours. Perhaps from a more zen like state.

If I had to have a research question, it would sound like this:

How can I use my personal website as a public platform to develop my identity and make sure the process benefits others too?

School run! Must dash!

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