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The Last Word


Bazza

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Re: The Last Word

 

"A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value - you can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapours; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a mini raft down the slow heavy river Moth; wet it for use in hand-to- hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or to avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (a mindboggingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can't see it, it can't see you - daft as a bush, but very ravenous); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

 

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have "lost". What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with."

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Re: The Last Word

 

The more I find out about Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite the more this person intrigues me. We have here a Christian Platonist* mystic straddling two ages, the last of "The Classical Era" and the beginnings of the Middle Ages. Both scholars and the current RCC Pope has written about him, each from their worldview. On the side of the scholars I like this book: Theophany-The Neoplatonic Philosophy of Dionysius the Areopagite (published by SUNY), and Pope Benedict XVI:

 

"Nevertheless, if his theology is cosmic, ecclesial and liturgical, it is also profoundly personal. I think it is the first great mystic theology. Moreover, the word "mystic" acquires with him a new meaning. Until this epoch, for Christians, this word was equivalent to the word "sacramental," that is, that which pertains to the "mysterion," sacrament. With him, the word "mystic" becomes more personal, more intimate: It expresses the path of the soul toward God."

 

As I said above, the more I find out about him the more he intrigues me, a person who is both Christian, and Pagan (Neoplatonist) and lauded by both camps.

 

However I think St Augustine might have said it best, converting from Neoplatonism to Christianity:

-- ST. AUGUSTINE

 

*description of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite as "Christian Platonist" is from Catholic Encyclopedia, and from John Bussanich (author of The One and Its Relation to Intellect in Plotinus: A Commentary on Selected Texts)

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Re: The Last Word

 

posting here as to not interrupt the original thread:

 

Empire of the Petal Throne had great maps' date=' including a city map I really wish I still had. And it was a remarkably rich (and alien) game-world, the first wholly made-up game world I encountered. [/quote'] Empire of the Petal Throne WAS the first published campaign setting. ;)

 

Game mechanics weren't the greatest, but seeing what another mind could do with a its own background and world-flavor was ... mind-expanding.
And it still has fans, diehard fans.
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Re: The Last Word

 

Empire of the Petal Throne WAS the first published campaign setting. ;)

 

That I had heard before, but what I no longer remember is if it was the only one on the market at the time we got it. I don't think so, but the summers during my undergraduate days, with one exception, sort of blend into a timeless lotus-eating nothing.

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