The
shape was uncovered by a fuller named Spengler;
He
was a Beghard lay-preacher and a reader of Mechthild.
He
made his deduction in the Bavarian forest,
With
a weaver from Freiburg; and an apprentice named Hans.
Herr
Spengler was fated a grisly end;
He
was found in the year of thirteen fifty-two;
On
the dusty stone floor of a textile workshop,
Enswathed
with white linen turned carmine with blood.
The
flesh had been flayed from his entire body;
His
death had been bought with unthinkable pain.
His
skin was stretched out on the whiteworker's table,
Embroidered
with numbers and magical signs.
There
was no sign of Hans, nor explanation from the weaver,
Who
was said to have turned completely insane.
*
* *
Hans
made his way North to the city of Munster;
Riding
the back of an unsaddled pony;
With
his worldly belongings in a brown leather satchel;
With
a slice of ripe turnip; and a lump of black bread.
Among
his possessions were a number of papers,
Which
Hans had removed from Herr Spengler's estate.
They
detailed plans for the shape's reproduction;
A
task Hans now swore he would never repeat.
Hans
had been party to the initial discovery.
In
a small wood-built annex to Herr Spengler's cottage,
They
had sat at a table and worked through the night.
With
quill pen and dividers, they scribed on grey parchment,
Plotted
angles and vectors from arcane formulations,
And
eventually produced that pernicious design.
The
initial reaction was of utter bemusement.
"What
is this?" Spengler muttered. "This cannot be correct."
As
they beheld the unfathomable shape,
Their
surprise soon mutated to confusion and fear.
The
form was so ghastly; so unnaturally terrible;
It
seemed to refute geometrical laws.
For
these disciples of Euclid it was too much to contend with;
They
had unwittingly perpetrated an irredeemable sin.
As
the deviant nature of their doings became apparent,
A
hysterical fever took control of their minds.
They
frantically raved as if beset by some madness;
As
if gripped by a terror so unhinged and deranging
As
to banish them forever from rational thought.
The
unfolding horror, too lurid for retelling,
Became
a source of contention within the Beghard commune.
The
truth of the occurrence was forever the secret
Of
a Black Forest lunatic and the absentee Hans.
*
* *
On
arrival in Munster, Hans sought absolution.
He
visited the cathedral and made his confession.
The
priest was indulgent, although uncomprehending;
And
sent Hans on his way with some consoling words.
Hans
would always remember that Bavarian aberration,
But
nevertheless pursued a conventional life.
In
time he was married and went on to have children;
He
took work from a draper and was a well-thought-of man.
The
brown leather satchel, with its unspeakable secrets,
Was
stored in the attic of his half-timbered house.
When
Hans reached his dotage, at the ripe age of sixty,
His
thoughts turned again to the unthinkable shape.
One
winter's evening, he gathered his family,
And
proceeded to tell the events of his youth.
He
opened the satchel and removed Spengler's papers.
He
spread one flat on the table for his family to see.
"The
numbers writ here are a set of co-ordinates."
He
produced some more pages and furrowed his brow.
"When
plotted against the scale here outlined,
They
can be used in conjunction with a new type of maths.
The
notes for the system are in the second appendix,
The
first being comprised of geometric proofs."
He
looked around at his family and was suddenly serious.
"I
must severely forewarn you that the maths must be abstract.
This
is specialised knowledge and is not meant for games.
Under
no circumstances should it ever be attempted
To
manifest these equations in the sublunary world.
I
can sadly attest with my bitter experience
They
harbour latent potential to unharness one's mind."
Hans'
son was named Otto and took the man's words with reverence.
He
studied the numbers but did not dare draw the design.
A
back room was given entirely to his inquiry;
It
was duly denominated the Room of the Shape.
*
* *
The
family lived in that house for several generations.
Otto
begat Arthur; Arthur begat Jonas;
Jonas
begat Wolfgang in fifteen hundred and five.
Herr
Spengler's theorem was passed down with the genome;
Always
with the injunction that it must not be made real.
By
the time Jonas taught it to the fifteen year old Wolfgang,
The
idea had expanded to a system of thought.
But
understanding a principle will diminish its sanctity,
And
Wolfgang paid no heed to the ancestral command.
Wolfgang
grew to be a headstrong young man.
He
had little respect for traditional values.
Upon
learning the theory of the ineffable pattern
He
immediately knew he would attempt reproduction.
He
spent hours alone with compass and straightedge,
Trying
his utmost to give the numbers a form.
One
day he emerged from the Room of the Shape;
His
eyes wide and staring and his face drained of blood.
He
had finally accomplished his ill-reckoned object:
He
had drafted the shape and perceived it in full.
His
jaw now hung slackly and was drooling saliva;
His
head twitched at random in involuntary spasms.
He
came down the staircase with unrepeatable language;
He
walked straight past his father and stepped out the front door.
He
would never return to that nurturing town-house,
But
instead walked the streets as a half-witted vagrant;
Sleeping
in doorways and begging from strangers;
Mumbling
incoherently in the opaquest of language
About
unknown dimensions and recondite maths.
One
day he encountered a transient Dutchman;
A
tailor's apprentice from the city of Leiden.
The
man was named Jan and seemed searching for guidance;
Wolfgang,
it seemed, had found a sympathetic friend.
The
two men shared lodgings, and Wolfgang shared his wisdom;
Eventually
revealing that terrible shape.
When
a secret is shared then the burden is lessened;
As
Jan's sanity wavered, Wolfgang's own was restored.
In
fifteen thirty-three he left the city of Munster.
In
want of some purpose, and lacking direction,
He
headed West in the wake of the sinking red sun.
*
* *
After
many adventures he arrived fourteen years later
At
a Mennonite meeting in the city of Amsterdam.
The
people he met were of similar mindsets;
They
were radical thinkers and invited ideas.
He
found conversation with two young men from Merindol;
They
were fugitive Huguenots and acolytes of Erasmus;
They
went by the names of Michel and Piers.
One
night, whilst discussing the teachings of Waldo,
Conversation
had turned to esoteric beliefs.
Wolfgang
was vehement in his long-held opinion
That
unmediated reality was inaccessible to minds.
"There
is a thing I have seen which defies explanation.
There
are parts to this life of which you could not conceive."
His
companions were sceptics and demanded elaboration.
They
said they could not credit his unverified claims.
"Very
well then," said Wolfgang. "I can give a demonstration.
Bring
me some parchment and a writing device."
Wolfgang
still carried the mathematical instruments
Which
would be required to produce the strange shape.
His
companions soon brought him an old roll of paper,
A
lamp with a handle, and a goose-feather pen.
Wolfgang
set about his heretical enterprise.
When
the task was completed his eyes seemed to shine.
He
stood back from the drawing and held the lamp up above it.
The
shape was imperfect, but conveyed the impression,
Of
that mind-twisting structure of impossible thought.
Michel
was dumbfounded, he held his hands up in horror.
"I
cannot believe it. How could this be real?"
Piers
was a pragmatist, and somewhat lacked imagination.
"This
is a clever illusion, but hardly convincing."
The
pair's nerves were shaken, but their wits were intact.
And
yet, many weeks later they had still not recovered;
They
could not relinquish that thing they had witnessed.
Their
perceptual fabric let in light at the seams.
They
had seen intimations of the foot on the treadle
Spinning
colourful marvels for their mental amazement;
The
paradoxical form dominated conversation;
It
was woven through every part of their lives.
Wolfgang
soon departed with an Ottoman trader.
They
had plans to import exotic plants from the East.
He
took with him the knowledge for the shape's reproduction,
But
left behind the design for the Frenchmen to use.
They
revealed the drawing to numerous Amsterdammers.
They
formed a society called the Fellowship of the Shape.
They
held clandestine meetings in a derelict windmill,
Where
they tried to ascertain the shape's hidden truths;
They
believed they could use it as a means to unravel
The
thread of order and logic from the loom of the world.
Michel
wrote a treatise on the shape's derivation:
Inquiry into the Origin of Non-Euclidean
Form.
It
was burned by a Spaniard when he learned of the topic.
He
said the work was satanic; they were bound for perdition.
Piers
knocked the man unconscious and threw him in a canal.
The
society disbanded after twenty-one years.
They
had made little progress in understanding the shape.
*
* *
Michel
travelled East with a seamstress named Gretel.
They
lived in Cologne and had a child named Brecht.
In
fifteen eighty-three, when Brecht reached adulthood,
Michel
thought he should see the inconceivable shape.
The
young man turned wild, as you might have predicted;
He
went to the cathedral with a piece of white chalk.
On
the paving outside, with a maniac cackle,
He
reproduced the design for a public display.
Brecht
never returned to his family residence;
He
roamed across Europe, in those volatile years.
In
each place he arrived, he would find a bare wall or pavement,
And
would recklessly render that accursed shape.
*
* *
Piers
in the meantime took a different direction;
He
travelled to Paris with a performing troupe.
He
wore costumes and make up, and danced like a jester;
He
learned to walk the high wire and fly the trapeze.
But
these tricks did not serve for his entire income.
When
the show was completed, for a handful of livre,
Folk
would be admitted to his small tented home.
In
the candlelit gloom, with theatrical gestures,
He
would give them full sight of the impossible shape.
Word
spread across Paris of this dubious honour.
There
were whispers in churches, in brothels, at the scaffold:
"The
shape has the power to bestow election!"
"There
is a man from the circus who can open your mind!"
"One
look at his shape will change you forever!"
Piers
was reputed an emissary of God.
In
fifteen seventy-two he had a particular visitor.
He
was named Edmond Auger and was a famous orator.
He
was a Jesuit man from the township of Troyes.
He
paid his admittance and entered Piers' shelter,
Whereupon
he bore witness to the terrible sight.
He
took the paper from Piers and examined it closely.
With
a trembling finger he tried to trace the design.
"I
do not understand," said the Jesuit. "The lines are straight, yet
they bend."
The
man's eye began to flicker. A vein throbbed in his head.
"The
circumference seems bounded...yet the thing has no edge!"
The
drawing fell from his hands and he started to shudder
His
face had turned pale and he spoke in a whisper.
"What
fiendish thing is this you have conjured?
But
that I could unsee the abomination. My God."
Piers
picked up the drawing and laughed like a demon.
"You've
seen what you came for. Now go tell your friends."
"I
certainly shall," replied Edmond, coldly.
"I
will denounce you for sorcery, you heretical brute."
*
* *
Those
were difficult times for Parisian freethinkers.
Piers
soon left the city for a more welcoming place.
In
Cherbourg he boarded a boat bound for Portsmouth.
He
decided that England was to be his new home.
In
Portsmouth he encountered a maiden named Eliza.
Within
a year of their meeting, she gave birth to a son.
Piers
was willing to take his responsibilities seriously.
He
made Eliza his wife and found work at the docks.
When
Piers returned home from a hard day of labour
He
was chiefly concerned with his child's tutelage.
The
boy's name was Luke, and before he reached manhood,
He
was fully acquainted with that anomalous shape.
Piers
taught that the shape was a way to earn money.
They
took specie from sailors in return for a look.
Reputation
soon spread all the way up to Scotland.
They
became known through the land as the Men of the Shape.
*
* *
Luke
reached the age of thirty at the turn of the century.
In
that year he married a needleworker named Bess.
She
bore him a son and they christened him Amos.
[Enter yet one more player in our long-winded
yarn.]
He
was mad from the outset; discontented and seething.
At
the baptismal font he roared with unholy fury,
As
if heralding news of the destruction to come.
Luke
passed on what was now a family tradition.
At
the age of sixteen, although already unstable,
Amos
was initiated into the sect of the shape.
His
reaction to the image was shockingly violent.
His
eyes became wide and he howled like a dog.
He
flailed his arms as if fighting with phantoms.
He
gurned, spat and snorted as if poisoned or rabid;
He
stamped around like a bedlamite set loose from his chains.
His
fragile mind had been fatally fractured;
Permanently
warped by those recursive lines.
The
braid of his life would be hopelessly tangled
With
the infinite pattern of that nefarious design.
He
sat day and night reading King James' Bible
And
could see the shape's stitching through every verse.
He
raved about Ahab, Ahaziah and Jehoram.
He
claimed to have visions of Jonah and Judith,
And
long conversations with David and Saul.
He
took to the road as a mechanick preacher.
He
wandered the country and begged strangers for food.
He
stood alone at signposts to recite St John's Apocalypse.
He
sat on farmyard fences and preached gospel to pigs.
He
slept in fields and hedgerows;
He
kept company with sheep.
He
fell in with a crew of scribbling dissenters.
They
were educated men and had access to money.
They
owned an underground print-shop in Grub Street of London,
And
printed pamphlets proclaiming the coming of Christ.
Amos
gave them instruction on the shape's strange dimensions;
He
said the shape was a prophecy of the millennium at hand.
He
said the truth of the world was a numerical tapestry;
And
taught them ways to bind numbers to produce solid forms.
They
took him for an expert in the mysteries of nature;
They
named him Meister Amos, Adept of the Shape.
They
were visited by a certain Thomas of Malmesbury,
A
timid translator of classical texts.
Thomas
considered himself a mathematical thinker,
He
hoped to master the method of constructing the shape.
But
the full explication left poor Thomas shaken;
That
weird wayward logic had unbalanced his mind.
The
implicit suggestion pressed his faint-hearted theories,
And
troubled the scholar to the end of his life.
A
pamphlet was produced to present that vile pattern.
It
was extensively annotated with Biblical lore.
It
advocated violent political action;
It
portrayed ecclesiastics as devotees of the Worm.
Often
seen in the print-shop was a surly physician,
Sometimes
in the company of a long-haired young man.
They
spent hours with Amos in complex discussion,
Perplexed
by the properties of the impenetrable shape.
One
day they departed with a case full of pamphlets.
They
promised to distribute them wherever they could.
The
pamphlets passed through the hands of a diversity of people;
The
shape was seen by Naylor, Winstanley, and Coppe.
Of
the thousand pamphlets printed there is but one still surviving,
And
not a living person knows or suspects it exists.
(Secreted
as it is in a leather-bound edition of Twining's translation of Aristotle's Poetics;
Second
shelf down in a locked glass cabinet, room forty-seven of the British Museum.)
In
sixteen forty-two the land was riven by warfare.
A
number of Amos' friends took up arms.
Amos
himself had no such inclinations
He
had acquired quiescence with the passing of years.
He
packed his meagre possessions and took the road North from London,
In
search of a quieter life somewhere else.
Amos
wandered for years in that war-ravaged country,
Taking
refuge and charity wherever he could.
He
discoursed on the shape to those who would listen;
Whilst
evading impressment by Fairfax's mob.
In
sixteen fifty-one he was seized in an ale-house;
He
was branded a vagrant and left in a cell.
He
was put on a ship filled with malnourished Scotsmen.
It
was bound for the colony at Massachusetts Bay.
*
* *
Word
of the shape had now crossed the Atlantic.
It
was soon known from Kentucky to the Prussian frontier.
John
Adams offered land to the man who could draw one;
Rousseau
had the pattern tattooed on his chest.
By
the end of that century the whole of France was in uproar;
Speculation
on the nature of the shape was now rife.
But
the knowledge and technical skills to produce one
Seemed
to have vanished with the turning of time.
Many
was the dreamer who undertook the commission;
Shapes
were forthcoming from every city and town.
They
worked from memories, rumours, and informed speculation.
They
worked with drafting machines; and at easels with magnifiers.
They
used protractor and set square; beam compass and French curve.
But
whilst many of the myriad productions could inspire,
They
lacked the maddening purity first evoked by Herr Spengler;
They
were substandard copies of the original form.
Indeed,
each iteration of the shape had degraded.
First
by Wolfgang, then Michel; Brecht, Piers, Luke and Amos;
None
of their attempts had so perfectly rendered
The
sheer flawless insanity as that of Spengler and Hans.
These
ersatz imitations replicated like a virus.
They
were displayed and debated in drawing-rooms and lectures,
In
every decade across the eighteen-hundreds and beyond.
They
were witnessed by people of all kinds of persuasions,
From
a Corsican braggart to a British-born Jew;
By
a destitute German and a Russian named Nechayev;
By
tale-spinning fantasists and pretenders to truth.
They
were seen in the cities of Moscow and Petersburg;
In
the riotous ferment of Munich and Rome;
And
in frostbitten places built with iron and clapboard,
Where
laws had no meaning, and bears walked the streets.
Shapes
spread over mountains, and through the steppes of the Tartars,
To
the sun-whitened places in which Mani had taught;
And
at last infiltrated the great land of China;
Infecting
every province with improbable thoughts.
In
these quickening times, and with quantum computers,
It
is certain the shape will be discovered again.
The
infernal design lies malignant and silent,
And determines the course of our rush to the end.
