About this Episode

In his short story "Mrs. Rinaldi's Angel," contemporary horror author Thomas Ligotti contrasts the chaotic monstrosity of dreams with the cold, indifferent, and no less monstrous purity of angels. It is the story of a boy whose vivid dream life is sapping his vital force, and who resorts to esoteric measures to rectify the situation. In this episode, Phil and JF discuss the beauty and horror of dreams, the metaphysical signifiance of angels and demons, and the potential dangers of seeking the peace of absolute "purity" in the wondrous flux of lived experience.

REFERENCES

Thomas Ligotti, "Mrs. Rinaldi's Angel" (read by Jon Padgett)

Roger Scruton, The Face of God

Thomas Ligotti, Songs of a Dead Dreamer

Thomas Ligotti, "The Last Feast of Harlequin" in Grimscribe: His Lives and Works

Robert Aickman, English author

H. P. Lovecraft, American author

H. R. Giger, Swiss artist

Jean Giraud a.k.a. Moebius, French comic book artist

Donald Barthelme, American author

Pierre Soulages, French artist

Bruno Schulz, Polish author

Thomas Bernhard, Austrian author

Edgar Allan Poe, American author

J. F. Martel, "The Beautiful Madness: Primacy of Wonder in the Works of Thomas Ligotti" (Forthcoming in James Curcio (ed.), Masks: Bowie and the Artists of Artifice from Intellect Books)

Algernon Blackwood, "The Wendigo"

Thomas Ligotti, "The Dark Beauty of Unheard of Horrors" in The Thomas Ligotti Reader: Essays and Explorations

Dogen Zenji, Zen master

Manichaeism

Spencer Brown, The Laws of Form

Ramsey Dukes, Words Made Flesh: Information In Formation

Deleuze, Essays Critical and Clinical

Thomas Ligotti, "Purity," in Teatro Grottesco

James Joyce, Ulysses

Advaita Vedanta

Joshua Ramey, The Hermetic Deleuze: Philosophy and Spiritual Ordeal

Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass

James Hillman, The Dream and the Underworld

P. J. O’Rourke, political satirist