[dream] the self-made men
Performers who had tremendously altered themselves: gigantic heads with single, enormous eyes or nostrils, supported by filigrees of brass. Round apertures like portals, set with swinging, spinning doors leading into the laryngeal space like bellows, or lenses of water-clear quartz protecting a fist-sized, carefully bioengineered eye. They prided themselves on their skills at telling stories: how they could produce from within themselves the deep boom of a submarine hatch swinging shut, the susurration of crowds, the distant ticking of a great mechanism. Their sonorous voices, from stretched-open throats lined with living metals, could be heard by entire audience halls, down long greenswards, and for blocks amid the stone streets.
We interviewed them on a small stage of red velvet, filming as they told their stories, unwound the histories of the old books we brought them. They were a treasure trove: librarians, historians, and storytellers in one, but my companion and workmate seemed unimpressed. One told us how he had paid twenty thousand dollars just for the lens and installation of his eye, and my companion said, "Well, it's just ground glass, isn't it?" He seemed to regard them as strange, hokey, outdated, though with grudging respect for their dedication and ingenuity of form.
We interviewed them on a small stage of red velvet, filming as they told their stories, unwound the histories of the old books we brought them. They were a treasure trove: librarians, historians, and storytellers in one, but my companion and workmate seemed unimpressed. One told us how he had paid twenty thousand dollars just for the lens and installation of his eye, and my companion said, "Well, it's just ground glass, isn't it?" He seemed to regard them as strange, hokey, outdated, though with grudging respect for their dedication and ingenuity of form.