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Some Assembly Required
The Truth of the Deconstruction
This is the fifth and final scroll you will read in the Library of Myths
The final time the world ended, it didn’t end at all - you did. This is not actually a myth -it is a truth, but then, what are the myths of humankind if they are not true?
This is the tale of a young boy who wanted to see everything. He filled notebooks with doodles of spaceships and trains, scratched ghosts into the surface of his desk at school, and played at being Yuri Gagarin in a cardboard box on the roof of the garden shed. He spent his Saturdays at the library, gorging on atlases and encyclopaedias, or scribbling covert plans on the corners of maps until he was caught and removed from the premises. This boy’s name was Dill Golding.
In spite of these childhood ambitions, however, Dill Golding did not begin his journey towards the kingdom of everything until well into adulthood. Settle down, he was told, and be content with what you have, for exploration is the preserve of the ruffians and the mad. For all his thoughts of freedom, Dill obeyed these instructions. He took a job in a bank, got married, bought a house and went to the pub every Thursday for the quiz. Life crept on for Dill, and it happened that his quest did not begin until the eve of his fortieth birthday, when he caught his wife in bed with her boss. That very same night he packed a single rucksack and took to the road.
Over the next five years Dill Golding travelled over land and sea, from city to farmhouse, to waterfalls and forests to fields of snow. He stayed in houses and hostels, among ruins and thieves. He spent four months in a hammock in an unidentified jungle and another six with a travelling circus. One thing remained consistent in his travels, however - every time Dill moved on, he left a note; a ‘thank-you’ note, or a ‘fuck-you’ note, or a simple ‘I was here’ note. Every scribbled letter he left ended with the same six words:
I have not seen everything yet.
Dill Golding first came to the Graveyard on a Thursday afternoon. Like all visitors he stumbled upon it quite by accident, for the Graveyard has a peculiar way of being found only when it wants to be found. He had, in fact, been looking for a pub, for even the adventurous like to keep their dates with the barrel. It was in the Graveyard that Dill met the man-who-was-not-a-man, who called himself the Keeper of the Dead.
The Keeper of the Dead showed Dill the Graveyard, and told him stories - such stories as Dill had never heard before, of female highwaywomen and girls in trees and the flying men.
Dill told the Keeper of the Dead that he wanted to see everything.
The Keeper of the Dead laughed at Dill, and then took him to the place that hides in every corner of every graveyard - the Library of Myths. Here, Dill was presented with four scrolls, each telling of a time when the world met its end. Dill sat upon a dry stone wall, in the shadow of a yew, to read about boys and gods and cats and the repeated demise of the Earth. When he was done, the Keeper of the Dead handed him the fifth scroll. This was the strangest of them all, for it was the tale of a man who stumbled upon the very same Graveyard in which Dill now sat, whilst searching for his lost daughter in the woods. In the story, the man was taken by the Keeper of the Dead into the Library of Myths where he committed his own story to paper and in doing so became himself the Keeper.
When Dill finished reading he looked upon the strange man-who-was-not-a-man.
“Is this you?” He asked, holding up the fifth scroll. “Are you David Marling?”
“I was once,” replied the Keeper of the Dead. “But I am dead now.”
“I don’t want to die.” Dill was suddenly petulant. He dropped the scroll and let it float down into the mud beneath his feet. “I want to see everything.”
“All things die,” said the Keeper of the Dead. “Even I have reached an end.”
Dill confessed that he did not understand.
“Do you not?” asked the Keeper of the Dead. “Or are you just afraid of what comes next?”
Dill jumped off the wall and landed on the scroll in the mud. “Do I have a choice?” he asked. “Could I flee now and forget this as one might forget a bad dream?”
“Yes,” said the Keeper of the Dead, even as he handed Dill a scroll and a pen. “But that would be ungrateful.”
“Why?”
“You are being given a chance to live after death as more than dust and bones - to know that which the human race can never know. It is not ‘seeing everything’, for that would be impossible, but it is a great deal more than the nothingness that awaits the rest of the human race.”
Dill was taken, then, by an impulse deep in his heart, stronger even than the urge to leap from the branches of a high tree, or shout an inappropriate phrase in a place of quiet. Dill Golding was helpless against the compulsion of his heart, and he was terrified, but here, in the Library of Myths, he began to write:
“The final time the world ended, it didn’t end at all - you did. This is not actually a myth -it is a truth, but then, what are the myths of humankind if they are not true?
I have not seen everything yet, but for the sake of the voiceless dead, I shall try.”
You cease your reading here and look up, to gaze upon my face. There is a dark silence, and it feels as though you have stolen the very essence of the air. I wait for you to speak (your mouth opens, but closes, and then opens again).
You ask me whether I, the Keeper of the Dead, am also Dill Golding.
I was, once, I tell you, but I am dead now.
You are beginning to piece this story together. I have handed it to you in fragments. Hidden down here in the Library of Myths you begin to understand. I am the Keeper of the Dead and you are the traveller. You know what must come next.
I hand you a scroll and a pen.
It is time for you to write.
Go on.
Read the rest of Cemetaria:
Part One: One | Two | Three | Four | Five
The Library of Myths: The First Myth | The Second Myth | The Third Myth | The Fourth Myth | The Fifth Myth
The Truth of the Deconstruction
This is the fifth and final scroll you will read in the Library of Myths
The final time the world ended, it didn’t end at all - you did. This is not actually a myth -it is a truth, but then, what are the myths of humankind if they are not true?
This is the tale of a young boy who wanted to see everything. He filled notebooks with doodles of spaceships and trains, scratched ghosts into the surface of his desk at school, and played at being Yuri Gagarin in a cardboard box on the roof of the garden shed. He spent his Saturdays at the library, gorging on atlases and encyclopaedias, or scribbling covert plans on the corners of maps until he was caught and removed from the premises. This boy’s name was Dill Golding.
In spite of these childhood ambitions, however, Dill Golding did not begin his journey towards the kingdom of everything until well into adulthood. Settle down, he was told, and be content with what you have, for exploration is the preserve of the ruffians and the mad. For all his thoughts of freedom, Dill obeyed these instructions. He took a job in a bank, got married, bought a house and went to the pub every Thursday for the quiz. Life crept on for Dill, and it happened that his quest did not begin until the eve of his fortieth birthday, when he caught his wife in bed with her boss. That very same night he packed a single rucksack and took to the road.
Over the next five years Dill Golding travelled over land and sea, from city to farmhouse, to waterfalls and forests to fields of snow. He stayed in houses and hostels, among ruins and thieves. He spent four months in a hammock in an unidentified jungle and another six with a travelling circus. One thing remained consistent in his travels, however - every time Dill moved on, he left a note; a ‘thank-you’ note, or a ‘fuck-you’ note, or a simple ‘I was here’ note. Every scribbled letter he left ended with the same six words:
I have not seen everything yet.
Dill Golding first came to the Graveyard on a Thursday afternoon. Like all visitors he stumbled upon it quite by accident, for the Graveyard has a peculiar way of being found only when it wants to be found. He had, in fact, been looking for a pub, for even the adventurous like to keep their dates with the barrel. It was in the Graveyard that Dill met the man-who-was-not-a-man, who called himself the Keeper of the Dead.
The Keeper of the Dead showed Dill the Graveyard, and told him stories - such stories as Dill had never heard before, of female highwaywomen and girls in trees and the flying men.
Dill told the Keeper of the Dead that he wanted to see everything.
The Keeper of the Dead laughed at Dill, and then took him to the place that hides in every corner of every graveyard - the Library of Myths. Here, Dill was presented with four scrolls, each telling of a time when the world met its end. Dill sat upon a dry stone wall, in the shadow of a yew, to read about boys and gods and cats and the repeated demise of the Earth. When he was done, the Keeper of the Dead handed him the fifth scroll. This was the strangest of them all, for it was the tale of a man who stumbled upon the very same Graveyard in which Dill now sat, whilst searching for his lost daughter in the woods. In the story, the man was taken by the Keeper of the Dead into the Library of Myths where he committed his own story to paper and in doing so became himself the Keeper.
When Dill finished reading he looked upon the strange man-who-was-not-a-man.
“Is this you?” He asked, holding up the fifth scroll. “Are you David Marling?”
“I was once,” replied the Keeper of the Dead. “But I am dead now.”
“I don’t want to die.” Dill was suddenly petulant. He dropped the scroll and let it float down into the mud beneath his feet. “I want to see everything.”
“All things die,” said the Keeper of the Dead. “Even I have reached an end.”
Dill confessed that he did not understand.
“Do you not?” asked the Keeper of the Dead. “Or are you just afraid of what comes next?”
Dill jumped off the wall and landed on the scroll in the mud. “Do I have a choice?” he asked. “Could I flee now and forget this as one might forget a bad dream?”
“Yes,” said the Keeper of the Dead, even as he handed Dill a scroll and a pen. “But that would be ungrateful.”
“Why?”
“You are being given a chance to live after death as more than dust and bones - to know that which the human race can never know. It is not ‘seeing everything’, for that would be impossible, but it is a great deal more than the nothingness that awaits the rest of the human race.”
Dill was taken, then, by an impulse deep in his heart, stronger even than the urge to leap from the branches of a high tree, or shout an inappropriate phrase in a place of quiet. Dill Golding was helpless against the compulsion of his heart, and he was terrified, but here, in the Library of Myths, he began to write:
“The final time the world ended, it didn’t end at all - you did. This is not actually a myth -it is a truth, but then, what are the myths of humankind if they are not true?
I have not seen everything yet, but for the sake of the voiceless dead, I shall try.”
You cease your reading here and look up, to gaze upon my face. There is a dark silence, and it feels as though you have stolen the very essence of the air. I wait for you to speak (your mouth opens, but closes, and then opens again).
You ask me whether I, the Keeper of the Dead, am also Dill Golding.
I was, once, I tell you, but I am dead now.
You are beginning to piece this story together. I have handed it to you in fragments. Hidden down here in the Library of Myths you begin to understand. I am the Keeper of the Dead and you are the traveller. You know what must come next.
I hand you a scroll and a pen.
It is time for you to write.
Go on.
Read the rest of Cemetaria:
Part One: One | Two | Three | Four | Five
The Library of Myths: The First Myth | The Second Myth | The Third Myth | The Fourth Myth | The Fifth Myth