all knowledge is contained....
So I'm trying to recall a work of SF, but it's driving me nuts, because I remember almost nothing about it other than that it involved ancestor reverence. I can't remember if the context was more science fictional or fantastic, or if it was a short story or a novel, or how long ago I read it, or if it treated the subject respectfully or was full of stereotypes. Or if the characters were human beings or not.
What I *think* I remember is that the culture wasn't a direct, obvious rip-off of any one real culture -- it was at least a synthesis of a few different sources. (The culture might have been nomadic?) Families retained either the remains or the possessions of their ancestors (I think it was remains) for many generations, and people had fairly profound spiritual experiences in communion with their ancestors. I'm almost sure that the story treated this as a natural phenomenon -- that deceased beings really *did* move on to another mode of existence that was closely connected to mundane life, not some distant spiritual afterlife.
For some reason I keep pinging on The Orphan's Tales: In The Night Garden. I'm almost certain that's not it, but I'm going to go down to the basement to double check. But I think what's causing the link there is that the Witch's connection to her family and their history has something of the kind of strangeness and intensity of the story I'm trying to remember.
Also, isn't there a community for this kind of question? Could someone remind me of its name? Thanks!
This entry was originally posted at http://loligo.dreamwidth.org/394139.html.
comments on that entry. Please comment there using OpenID.
What I *think* I remember is that the culture wasn't a direct, obvious rip-off of any one real culture -- it was at least a synthesis of a few different sources. (The culture might have been nomadic?) Families retained either the remains or the possessions of their ancestors (I think it was remains) for many generations, and people had fairly profound spiritual experiences in communion with their ancestors. I'm almost sure that the story treated this as a natural phenomenon -- that deceased beings really *did* move on to another mode of existence that was closely connected to mundane life, not some distant spiritual afterlife.
For some reason I keep pinging on The Orphan's Tales: In The Night Garden. I'm almost certain that's not it, but I'm going to go down to the basement to double check. But I think what's causing the link there is that the Witch's connection to her family and their history has something of the kind of strangeness and intensity of the story I'm trying to remember.
Also, isn't there a community for this kind of question? Could someone remind me of its name? Thanks!
This entry was originally posted at http://loligo.dreamwidth.org/394139.html.
comments on that entry. Please comment there using OpenID.