8) Summer Fluff: Calvino/Arthur Rackham

This volume when it first generated, I found quite jarring. This video is the synopis of the 275-page novel generated in the style of Italian writer Italo Calvino, with voiceover by a familiar deep-voiced friend, and illustrated with Gothic grotesques by Arthur Rackham. This is the 8th volume of 50, completely generated - text, images, anecdotes, synopsis by AI, and generated by software written by AI - the book, the images, typesetting and video software was courtesy OpenAI. This group of videos is a kind of sampler, or palimpsest. There are only so many ways to got the beach on Fire Island in the summer, and have different stories during the 50-year span, so in a way, the story gets scraped clean and retold with variations over the series.

The year 1983 was quite a strange one, it was the beginning of the tidal wave of death that AIDS brought to the gay community. At that point, I had a boyfriend whom I would be with for 9 years, living with him at the beach in the summer, at Caltech during the school year on-Campus (Lloyd House). We both knew he had swollen lymph nodes, at the back of his head, and at times, fairly intense night sweats which we attributed to hot weather. At that time it wasn’t clear that that was a sign of an active HIV infection. Men I had had sex with disappeared. I started knowing men with Kapsi Sarcoma. Outside of the ivory towers, I would begin seeing ill men everywhere.

When I first allowed the images by Rackham, I was shocked. But they looked strangely familiar. I think quite a bit of contemporary goth illustration comes from Rackham, and I think of the realization the imagery by Guillermo del Toro. I decided OK, this is not a fun sexy escapade on the beach like the prior volumes, but fascinating nevertheless. This is one of the few books (as with the Speedo Volume) which the AI dictated the specifics of clothing, so naturally it became Leather Goblin Summer. Do look at his works on fairies sometime, and you’ll see the origin of perhaps Fodo and Bilbo, but also Orcs, in Arthur Rackham.

There are so many oddities in the rendering, I didn’t remove anomalous images for the most part. While you can see through the bodies at times, they generally are good for five fingers and five toes. They did get to kissing, and definitely like to get down and boogie.

I’m always hesitant about writing in translation, and Calvino (you can tell my taste, the prior chapter was Borges, the very last chapter is Nabokov) I felt would be tricky. The result was fine:

In the year of 1983, a film emerged from the shadows into the light of living rooms across the world, its very essence imbued with the vivid tapestry of love between men. 'Making Love,' as it was titled, unfolded a story that defied the conventions of its time. Each frame whispered a defiant truth, painting scenes of tender emotion and unspoken connection. The television screen became a window into a world where love transcended the ordinary, casting its spell on all who dared to gaze upon it.

The Calvino doesn’t jump out at me, it’s one of the weaker style impressions perhaps. I will have to get If on a Winter Night’s a Traveler and do a closer reading (my god, that was 40 years ago) and see if this works as Calvino in substance, and not just language. My reading in the 80’s had many story-in-a-story narratives (“postmodern”), which I tried to replicate in a later volume of the series, the “Meta” summer.

At least the text never gets too intense in it’s Leather Saturnalia:

As the moon boldly swells, the beach becomes an arena of lust. Tyler Adams, our Costume Maestro, entangles with Evan Parker, the fresh face on the sands, their bodies a dance of desires against the ocean's song. In the throes of this spectacle, Jamal Sykes, our Fashion Maestro, joins Mason Knight, the stalwart Leather Enthusiast, plunging into a masked orgy, their climaxes echoed by salty sea whispers. The night's lustful tales peak when a playful dolphin leaps among the leather-draped models, setting off a cascade of laughter and charm.

When in doubt, drop a Dolphin in.

Enjoy.