It

Stephen King's It and Ursula K. Le Guin's story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" both deal with a dark secrets. In the case of the LeGuin story, the secret is belied by the otherwise idyllic veneer of everyday life. But isn't it true that everyone has their own sanctum sanctorum, not of blessings and goodness, but evil. Men their man caves, women their imaginations of what it would like to have been born with this or that change in their bodily cosmetic, non-binary people, who object to speciation, might wish for a benign form of the otherness ie not the one Gregor Samsa achieved in his metamorphosis. But think about it. Beauty can be disconsonant with one's inner being. Everyone lives at the edge of an event horizon which tempts oblivion. Despite the awe inspiring vista, there's always the threat of the storm and that dreaded myocardial infarction which either slows down or brings traffic to a total halt.

listen to Joan Baum's review of The Kafka Studies Department on WSHU

and watch the trailer for the animation of Erotomania, selected for the Nihilist Film Festival, December 15th in Santa Monica