Steampunk
Alright! I always seem to be at the tail end of all these cool genres, or at least, I discover there are names associated with phenomena I observe/d and only later do I get the label! Steampunk is one of them! Before i looked it up i thought it might be connected with the Difference Engine which i thought was lots of fun, and this was the case along with lots of other alternative history and science fiction novels. It also seems to be a new genre in kids fantasy movies (e.g. Golden Compass), where you get to see neo victorian characters developing and using technologies that seem out of sych with their period yet with absolutely faboulous costumes and delightful supertecky yet ancient looking devices such as compasses, scales, sextets, and engines.
I came across the term today in the Globe & Mail:Zen and the art of scrapyard archeology
about Kaden Harris who is considered to be a steampunk artist that creates antiques from a parallel universe and earns a living at it via his company called Eccentric Genius. It looks like tons of fun, the guy is hilarious and his stuff is just awesome! There is even a book!
La Sfera Di Confuscione is a faithful recreation of Emilio Lizardo’s personal mindwarping machine from his undergraduate years at the University of Milan, c. 1938. You *did* watch the Buckaroo Banzai movie, didn’t you?
hmm! I wonder if; that guy that made me peel his clothes off at a bar, soz, well i could take pictures of his tatoos, was one of those! He most certainly had a victorian curved moustache, and great old school glasses that most certainly a savant scientist from the middle ages would wear; was referencing this genre? Hmm! I also wonder about that conversation I had outside the Aloha Room with a DJ about full bodied tattoes being a neo renaissance reference. Well the party at a speakeasy full of sweaty dancing full body tattoed people sure was interesting!
Obviously my research in bars is proving very insightfull indeed as is my morning ritual of reading random news as a procrastination technique and my latest form of escapism, science fiction! I wonder if there is a book club i could joing?
