Steve lists the consequences of fame:
reporters
interviews
tons of mail
Worthy Causes
autographer hunters
drunks
cranks
uninvited visitors
sycophants
We can learn not to be like that when we are in the presence of celebrities:
"Walkers cast glances at the three on the stairs, spoke to whatever companions they had, but didn't stop; they taught good manners on Dennitza."
-Poul Anderson, A Knight Of Ghosts And Shadows IN Anderson, Sir Dominic Flandry: The Last Knight Of Terra (Riverdale, NY, 2012), pp. 339-606 AT XVIII, p. 577.
The three are Bodin Miyatovich, his wife and Dominic Flandry.
The demon prisoner confesses. Demonic control of the Johannines is exposed and ended. The Adversary was right to intuit that the Matucheks would sabotage his scheme. He must fall back on merely tempting human beings but no longer has a bridgehead on Earth.
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
This blog piece is as good a place as any to comment on a few passages in OPERATION CHAOS which caught my eye. In Chapter XXV, we can find this: "I thought of stories told by certain apostates, who hadn't advanced far in their degrees when they experienced that which scared them off: nothing illegal, immoral, or otherwise titillating; merely ugly, hateful, sorrowful, and hence not very newsworthy; deniable or ignorable by thosae who didn't want to believe them."
And in Chapter XXVII we read: "The essence of Gnosticism in the ancient world had been a search for power through hidden knowledge, ultimately power over God Himself. Doubtless Marmiadon was sincere in denying his [Johannine] church had revived that particular concept. But he hadn't progressed to adept status; the final secrets had not been revealed to him. I thought, reluctantly, that he wasn't likely to make it, either, being at heart not a bad little guy."
What exactly were these ugly, hateful, and sorrowful things that disillusioned some ex-Johannines, causing them to leave that church? Was it the first intimations granted to the higher initiates of the diabolism underlying Johanninism? I can imagine Marmiadon possibly becoming one of those apostates if he had advanced that far.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
In THE FIRM by John Grisham, young, "hungry" lawyers are enticed into a law firm with high salaries and many benefits and then learn, when it is too late to (safely) back out, that the firm are the lawyers for the Mafia.
In one period of Superman comics, Lexcorp employed many people who were highly qualified and good at their jobs but were deemed by Human Resources not to be suitable for promotion to certain kinds of "inner circle" jobs, i.e., the employees in question were honest and had no suspicion that their ultimate employer was a master criminal and gun runner.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Both would be examples of institutions with rotten cores recruiting able and mostly decent persons good at their jobs. But most would not like what they would ultimately find out. The lower and middle ranks of the Johannine hierarchy would be examples of that.
Ad astra! Sean
I actually spoke with a mobbed-up lawyer once; he was at a party given by my then employer, another lawyer who wasn't mobbled up but was guilty of every other form of dishonesty known to humankind -- I was his "articling clerk", essentially an apprentice/intern in the Canadian system.
I asked him what it was like working for the Mafia, and he said: "Well, the money's good and the work's interesting -- but you can't quit."
Kaor, Mr. Stirling!
NOT a good situation to be in if you DON'T want to be a crook!
Ad astra! Sean
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