WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.100 You know, there's this fantasy, I think almost 00:00:02.100 --> 00:00:04.080 everyone has had it at some point. It's like 00:00:04.080 --> 00:00:06.019 three in the morning, you can't sleep and you 00:00:06.019 --> 00:00:10.080 just think, what if I just left? And I don't 00:00:10.080 --> 00:00:12.140 just mean a vacation. I mean, you pack one bag, 00:00:12.339 --> 00:00:14.699 you walk out the door, you pick a direction and 00:00:14.699 --> 00:00:17.620 you just never look back. It's the geographical 00:00:17.620 --> 00:00:19.920 cure. It's a classic human delusion, really. 00:00:20.079 --> 00:00:21.920 Yeah, exactly. The idea that if you just put 00:00:21.920 --> 00:00:23.679 enough physical miles between you and your past, 00:00:23.780 --> 00:00:26.120 the past somehow, you know, loses its grip. We 00:00:26.120 --> 00:00:28.260 always forget that saying wherever you go, there 00:00:28.260 --> 00:00:30.359 you are. You think your problems are external, 00:00:30.519 --> 00:00:32.820 this house, this job, this city? You can't leave 00:00:32.820 --> 00:00:37.439 your own head behind. And that very concept is 00:00:37.439 --> 00:00:40.299 the absolute core of the story we're unpacking 00:00:40.299 --> 00:00:43.320 today. We're doing a deep dive into a piece of 00:00:43.320 --> 00:00:45.579 horror that takes that whole running away fantasy 00:00:45.579 --> 00:00:49.399 and just twists it into something honestly terrifying. 00:00:49.820 --> 00:00:52.619 We are talking about Clark Ashton Smith's A Night 00:00:52.619 --> 00:00:55.429 in Malnail. Oh, a fantastic choice. And for anyone 00:00:55.429 --> 00:00:57.890 who might only know, say, Lovecraft or Robert 00:00:57.890 --> 00:01:00.530 E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith is really the third 00:01:00.530 --> 00:01:02.729 pillar of that whole Weird Tales golden age. 00:01:02.909 --> 00:01:05.849 Right. From the 30s. Yeah. But where Lovecraft 00:01:05.849 --> 00:01:09.390 is all cosmic and kind of clinical and Howard 00:01:09.390 --> 00:01:12.689 is very visceral and action -packed, Smith is 00:01:12.689 --> 00:01:16.150 something else. He's a poet first. His horror 00:01:16.150 --> 00:01:20.870 is... It's lush. It's dreamlike. Incredibly atmospheric. 00:01:21.310 --> 00:01:22.890 That's a great way to put it. This story, which 00:01:22.890 --> 00:01:25.189 I think first came out in 33 and then later in 00:01:25.189 --> 00:01:28.129 Weird Tales in 1939, it doesn't rely on, you 00:01:28.129 --> 00:01:30.230 know, some monster from the deep. The monster 00:01:30.230 --> 00:01:32.709 here is memory. It's guilt. And it's set in a 00:01:32.709 --> 00:01:35.010 city that feels less like a real place and more 00:01:35.010 --> 00:01:37.390 like a fever dream. It's really a story about 00:01:37.390 --> 00:01:40.159 the architecture of guilt. how deep regret can 00:01:40.159 --> 00:01:42.379 actually reshape the world around you. So our 00:01:42.379 --> 00:01:45.180 mission today is to explore how Smith uses that 00:01:45.180 --> 00:01:48.219 setting, the city of Melnion, as a mirror for 00:01:48.219 --> 00:01:50.379 the main character's mind. We have a narrator 00:01:50.379 --> 00:01:52.980 who's running from a tragedy he caused, a city 00:01:52.980 --> 00:01:55.900 completely wrapped in fog, and a twist that forces 00:01:55.900 --> 00:01:58.060 him to face the one thing he swore he'd forget. 00:01:58.239 --> 00:02:00.769 So let's start with him. Our guy. We don't get 00:02:00.769 --> 00:02:02.989 a name, do we? He's just the narrator. No, no 00:02:02.989 --> 00:02:04.790 name. And he's definitely not on a leisure trip. 00:02:04.849 --> 00:02:07.709 When we first meet him, he's described as weary 00:02:07.709 --> 00:02:10.370 and just doing this aimless wandering. Aimless 00:02:10.370 --> 00:02:12.909 wandering? Yeah. Through the remote cities and 00:02:12.909 --> 00:02:15.610 roads of the old world. And Smith is probably 00:02:15.610 --> 00:02:18.409 pinching of his fictional version of medieval 00:02:18.409 --> 00:02:21.490 France, Averon, or somewhere like that. A place 00:02:21.490 --> 00:02:24.050 sort of out of time. But the key is he isn't 00:02:24.050 --> 00:02:26.870 moving towards something. He's moving away. And 00:02:26.870 --> 00:02:29.520 he's exhausted. Right. But the story doesn't 00:02:29.520 --> 00:02:32.879 really hide why he's running. It drops the reason 00:02:32.879 --> 00:02:35.280 pretty early. It all comes back to his wife, 00:02:35.460 --> 00:02:37.900 Lady Mariel. It does. And this is where it gets 00:02:37.900 --> 00:02:39.780 really dark. Lady Mariel isn't just dead. She 00:02:39.780 --> 00:02:43.419 committed suicide. And Smith gives us a very 00:02:43.419 --> 00:02:46.379 specific and very damning detail about why. It 00:02:46.379 --> 00:02:49.379 wasn't just some sudden madness. The text explicitly 00:02:49.379 --> 00:02:52.080 links her death. to the narrator's own behavior. 00:02:52.280 --> 00:02:54.639 Yeah, the phrase is his cruel and vicious temper. 00:02:54.840 --> 00:02:56.520 And we have to pause on that because that just 00:02:56.520 --> 00:02:58.560 changes everything about how we see this guy. 00:02:58.639 --> 00:03:01.240 He's not some tragic widower. No. He's an abuser. 00:03:01.400 --> 00:03:03.719 He broke his wife's spear until she just couldn't 00:03:03.719 --> 00:03:05.860 take it anymore. Precisely. That distinction 00:03:05.860 --> 00:03:08.080 is everything. If he were just grieving, this 00:03:08.080 --> 00:03:10.300 would be a tragedy. But because he's the cause, 00:03:10.580 --> 00:03:13.580 it becomes a story about guilt. Culpability. 00:03:13.919 --> 00:03:16.039 He's fleeing the scene of the crime. Exactly. 00:03:16.039 --> 00:03:18.449 Even if the law can't touch him. His wandering 00:03:18.449 --> 00:03:20.610 is just a desperate attempt to outrun his own 00:03:20.610 --> 00:03:23.349 conscience. He thinks if he just keeps moving, 00:03:23.569 --> 00:03:26.469 the guilt can't catch up. So he's dragging this 00:03:26.469 --> 00:03:28.949 with him across the countryside. And then as 00:03:28.949 --> 00:03:32.090 evening is falling, he stumbles upon Malnais. 00:03:32.210 --> 00:03:34.650 I want to talk about that name, Malnais. I mean, 00:03:34.669 --> 00:03:37.110 I took French in high school and my brain immediately 00:03:37.110 --> 00:03:41.060 starts picking it apart. Mal is bad. Or sick. 00:03:41.199 --> 00:03:43.639 You're spot on. It's a wordsmith basically made 00:03:43.639 --> 00:03:47.319 up to pack a punch. Yeah. Mal implies evil, sickness, 00:03:47.520 --> 00:03:51.680 something wrong. And nil, that translates to 00:03:51.680 --> 00:03:54.419 nothingness, the void. So he literally walks 00:03:54.419 --> 00:03:57.159 into the city of evil nothingness. Or bad void, 00:03:57.340 --> 00:03:59.479 yeah. That is not a welcoming sign. If I saw 00:03:59.479 --> 00:04:01.560 that on a map, I would pull a U -turn so fast. 00:04:01.960 --> 00:04:04.500 It creates this sense of dread before he even 00:04:04.500 --> 00:04:07.060 gets inside the gates. It suggests a place that 00:04:07.060 --> 00:04:09.719 is, you know. morally bankrupt or maybe a place 00:04:09.719 --> 00:04:11.740 that just shouldn't exist at all. Yeah. A little 00:04:11.740 --> 00:04:14.240 pocket of negation in the real world. And the 00:04:14.240 --> 00:04:16.639 physical description, it matches the name perfectly. 00:04:16.879 --> 00:04:19.160 He arrives and the very first thing he notices 00:04:19.160 --> 00:04:21.779 is the fog. Oh, yeah. And it's not just a little 00:04:21.779 --> 00:04:24.759 mist. It's this heavy, suffocating shroud that 00:04:24.759 --> 00:04:27.199 just wraps around everything. Smith is a master 00:04:27.199 --> 00:04:29.939 of this kind of texture. The fog does two things 00:04:29.939 --> 00:04:32.620 here. Visually, it isolates him. It cuts him 00:04:32.620 --> 00:04:35.220 off from the rest of the world, traps him. But... 00:04:36.539 --> 00:04:38.980 Psychologically, fog is confusion, right? The 00:04:38.980 --> 00:04:41.459 inability to see clearly. Which is exactly what 00:04:41.459 --> 00:04:43.600 he's doing in his own head. It mirrors his denial 00:04:43.600 --> 00:04:47.339 perfectly. But even more than the fog, there's 00:04:47.339 --> 00:04:50.600 the sound. The bells. The bells. And they are 00:04:50.600 --> 00:04:53.360 not happy wedding bells. Smith describes them 00:04:53.360 --> 00:04:56.040 as sepulchral. tolling constantly. A mortuary 00:04:56.040 --> 00:04:58.540 toll, yeah. It's this heavy, rhythmic, metallic 00:04:58.540 --> 00:05:01.100 sound that just gets into every inch of the city. 00:05:01.300 --> 00:05:03.240 I mean, just imagine that. You're tired, you're 00:05:03.240 --> 00:05:05.139 guilty, you're lost in the fog, and all you can 00:05:05.139 --> 00:05:09.439 hear is this ceaseless B -O -Y, B -O -Y, B -O 00:05:09.439 --> 00:05:11.560 -Y. It's like the heartbeat of the city is a 00:05:11.560 --> 00:05:13.740 dying heartbeat. It's psychological warfare. 00:05:14.139 --> 00:05:16.639 The bells are a constant reminder of death. You 00:05:16.639 --> 00:05:18.220 can close your eyes, you know, block out the 00:05:18.220 --> 00:05:20.379 fog, but you can't close your ears to the bells. 00:05:20.480 --> 00:05:22.949 They're wearing him down. Right. He enters the 00:05:22.949 --> 00:05:25.870 city wanting to just sleep, wanting oblivion. 00:05:26.029 --> 00:05:28.329 But the city is just screaming at him to stay 00:05:28.329 --> 00:05:30.810 awake and pay attention. So he tries to find 00:05:30.810 --> 00:05:33.709 a place to stay, goes to a tavern, then an inn. 00:05:33.790 --> 00:05:36.189 He just wants a bed. And this is where things 00:05:36.189 --> 00:05:39.769 ramp up from just like creepy atmosphere to full 00:05:39.769 --> 00:05:42.269 on nightmare logic. Right. Because in a normal 00:05:42.269 --> 00:05:44.490 city, maybe things are booked up for a big event. 00:05:44.569 --> 00:05:48.050 But here he's rejected with this very specific, 00:05:48.230 --> 00:05:51.569 almost bureaucratic explanation. He's told that 00:05:51.569 --> 00:05:53.889 all accommodations, every room, every service 00:05:53.889 --> 00:05:57.350 has been appropriated. Appropriated. That is 00:05:57.350 --> 00:05:59.810 such a cold word. It implies a total takeover. 00:05:59.870 --> 00:06:01.709 Yeah. And when he asks why, they tell him it's 00:06:01.709 --> 00:06:03.750 for a funeral. And not just any funeral. No, 00:06:03.750 --> 00:06:06.449 they explicitly say it's for the funeral of Lady 00:06:06.449 --> 00:06:08.589 Mariel. Okay, freeze frame. This is the moment. 00:06:08.610 --> 00:06:11.350 He is miles and miles away from home. He hears 00:06:11.350 --> 00:06:13.540 the name of his dead wife. The wife he drove 00:06:13.540 --> 00:06:16.180 to suicide? Right. He hears that the entire city 00:06:16.180 --> 00:06:18.519 is shut down for her funeral. A rational person 00:06:18.519 --> 00:06:20.899 would scream. A rational person would run. What 00:06:20.899 --> 00:06:23.939 does our narrator do? He just, he completely 00:06:23.939 --> 00:06:26.100 checks out. He rationalizes it. He tells himself 00:06:26.100 --> 00:06:29.139 it's an uncanny coincidence. An uncanny coincidence. 00:06:29.959 --> 00:06:33.180 That is. Wow. That is some heavy lifting for 00:06:33.180 --> 00:06:35.920 the human brain. Must be another Lady Mariel 00:06:35.920 --> 00:06:38.439 having a massive state funeral in this random 00:06:38.439 --> 00:06:41.279 foggy town I just walked into. It seems totally 00:06:41.279 --> 00:06:44.100 absurd to us reading it. Yeah. But this is actually 00:06:44.100 --> 00:06:46.600 a pretty realistic depiction of how the mind 00:06:46.600 --> 00:06:49.879 protects itself from trauma or extreme guilt. 00:06:50.000 --> 00:06:53.319 How so? Well. If he admits that it's his Lady 00:06:53.319 --> 00:06:56.120 Mariel, his entire reality just collapses. He 00:06:56.120 --> 00:06:57.980 has to admit he hasn't escaped a thing. So his 00:06:57.980 --> 00:07:01.120 brain, it builds a wall. He decides it's a coincidence 00:07:01.120 --> 00:07:03.360 because the alternative is just. It's madness. 00:07:03.639 --> 00:07:06.160 It is. So he's wearing these blinders. He's walking 00:07:06.160 --> 00:07:07.720 through the streets. Everyone is preparing for 00:07:07.720 --> 00:07:10.279 this funeral. The people aren't, you know. Living 00:07:10.279 --> 00:07:12.720 their lives, they're all somber, carrying wreaths, 00:07:12.720 --> 00:07:15.079 sewing black cloth. The whole town is like a 00:07:15.079 --> 00:07:17.319 stage crew setting up for a tragedy. And notice 00:07:17.319 --> 00:07:19.300 how they're described. They barely register. 00:07:19.319 --> 00:07:21.620 They're like ants working for the colony. Their 00:07:21.620 --> 00:07:25.759 only purpose is this ritual. It adds to the feeling 00:07:25.759 --> 00:07:28.709 that Malnais isn't a real functioning city. It's 00:07:28.709 --> 00:07:30.850 a machine built for one thing. This funeral. 00:07:31.129 --> 00:07:33.189 And the narrator's just walking through it feeling 00:07:33.189 --> 00:07:35.709 like an outsider. But we, the readers, we know 00:07:35.709 --> 00:07:38.009 he's the guest of honor or maybe the prisoner. 00:07:38.209 --> 00:07:40.550 He's the center of it all. And he's just refusing 00:07:40.550 --> 00:07:42.470 to look at the center. Eventually, he just kind 00:07:42.470 --> 00:07:44.550 of gets swept up in the crowd, right? He can't 00:07:44.550 --> 00:07:46.629 ignore the flow. The bells are getting louder. 00:07:46.790 --> 00:07:49.290 The crowd is moving. And he ends up at the cathedral. 00:07:49.689 --> 00:07:53.050 And Smith's description of the cathedral, it's 00:07:53.050 --> 00:07:55.910 not a place of sanctuary. It sounds heavy, oppressive. 00:07:56.170 --> 00:07:58.250 It's the architectural heart of the bad void. 00:07:58.370 --> 00:08:00.949 Oh, no. Right. The bells are deafening here. 00:08:01.069 --> 00:08:03.829 The incense is thick. He enters the nave. And 00:08:03.829 --> 00:08:06.250 again, you can feel the pressure building. He 00:08:06.250 --> 00:08:08.209 is physically moving closer and closer to the 00:08:08.209 --> 00:08:10.350 truth he's been running from. He walks up to 00:08:10.350 --> 00:08:12.870 the coffin, the open coffin. Yeah. And this is 00:08:12.870 --> 00:08:15.490 the moment the blinders are just ripped off. 00:08:15.569 --> 00:08:18.329 He looks down. And Smith doesn't play any games 00:08:18.329 --> 00:08:20.750 here. It's not a skeleton. It's not some demon. 00:08:20.810 --> 00:08:23.209 It's not a blank face. The narrator looks down 00:08:23.209 --> 00:08:26.430 and sees, with no doubt, the face of his wife, 00:08:26.589 --> 00:08:28.850 Lady Mariel. The shock of that. I mean, it breaks 00:08:28.850 --> 00:08:31.129 the laws of physics. She died back home. She 00:08:31.129 --> 00:08:34.230 was buried. And yet here she is in a city he's 00:08:34.230 --> 00:08:36.809 never even been to. The whole coincidence defense 00:08:36.809 --> 00:08:40.539 just shatters instantly. He is forced to confront 00:08:40.539 --> 00:08:43.259 this impossible reality. He ran away from her 00:08:43.259 --> 00:08:46.019 death. Only to walk right into a city that's 00:08:46.019 --> 00:08:48.460 eternally reenacting it for him. It's the ultimate 00:08:48.460 --> 00:08:51.679 irony. By running, he didn't escape. He took 00:08:51.679 --> 00:08:54.360 a shortcut straight to the confrontation. It's 00:08:54.360 --> 00:08:56.870 like the universe itself said, no. You don't 00:08:56.870 --> 00:08:58.529 get to just walk away from this. His cruelty 00:08:58.529 --> 00:09:00.870 was so potent, it actually stained the fabric 00:09:00.870 --> 00:09:04.289 of reality and created this city, this funeral, 00:09:04.389 --> 00:09:07.590 these bells just for him. So he sees her face. 00:09:07.629 --> 00:09:09.690 He knows it's her. Does he fall to his knees? 00:09:09.870 --> 00:09:12.389 Does he confess his sins? No. He does the only 00:09:12.389 --> 00:09:15.070 thing he knows how to do. He runs. Again. Flight 00:09:15.070 --> 00:09:17.909 is his only coping mechanism. He turns and he 00:09:17.909 --> 00:09:20.629 flees the cathedral. But this is where the environment 00:09:20.629 --> 00:09:23.529 shifts again. When he first entered, the city 00:09:23.529 --> 00:09:26.480 was just foggy and confusing. Now, Smith describes 00:09:26.480 --> 00:09:29.179 the streets as becoming labyrinthine. I love 00:09:29.179 --> 00:09:31.279 that shush. A labyrinth isn't just a maze. It's 00:09:31.279 --> 00:09:33.899 a trap. It feels like the city is now actively 00:09:33.899 --> 00:09:36.460 trying to keep him there. The geometry of the 00:09:36.460 --> 00:09:39.200 city itself seems to be conspiring against him. 00:09:39.639 --> 00:09:42.860 He runs for hours. Think about that. Yeah. Hours 00:09:42.860 --> 00:09:46.159 of pure panic running through these identical 00:09:46.159 --> 00:09:50.259 foggy cobblestone streets with those bells still 00:09:50.259 --> 00:09:53.340 just. hammering away in his ears. He's a rat 00:09:53.340 --> 00:09:55.700 in a maze that he built himself? It's a perfect 00:09:55.700 --> 00:09:58.240 manifestation of his internal state. His mind 00:09:58.240 --> 00:10:00.799 is a mess of guilt and panic, so the city becomes 00:10:00.799 --> 00:10:03.500 a mess of winding streets. He's literally loft 00:10:03.500 --> 00:10:05.679 in his own head. And the terror is that there 00:10:05.679 --> 00:10:07.919 might not be an exit because, as we said, he 00:10:07.919 --> 00:10:10.580 is the source of the horror. You can't find the 00:10:10.580 --> 00:10:12.580 exit to a building you're carrying on your own 00:10:12.580 --> 00:10:15.460 back. But the story says he does eventually find 00:10:15.460 --> 00:10:17.360 the road. He stumbles out of the city limits. 00:10:17.539 --> 00:10:20.320 The fog things out. Maybe the bells fade a bit. 00:10:20.360 --> 00:10:23.159 He's back in the old world countryside. He physically 00:10:23.159 --> 00:10:26.019 escapes, yes. But the real question is, has he 00:10:26.019 --> 00:10:28.700 actually escaped anything? I would argue absolutely 00:10:28.700 --> 00:10:31.279 not. I mean, before he was running from a memory, 00:10:31.399 --> 00:10:33.799 a regret. Now, now he's running from a reality. 00:10:33.960 --> 00:10:37.379 He saw her. Exactly. The denial is gone. He can 00:10:37.379 --> 00:10:39.460 no longer pretend it was just a bad temper or 00:10:39.460 --> 00:10:43.039 a tragic accident. He has seen the funeral. He 00:10:43.039 --> 00:10:45.200 knows the universe holds him responsible. So 00:10:45.200 --> 00:10:46.960 he might be walking down a quiet country road 00:10:46.960 --> 00:10:49.639 again, but he's haunted now in a way that is 00:10:49.639 --> 00:10:53.000 just total and absolute. Which makes you wonder 00:10:53.000 --> 00:10:55.220 about Melnion itself. We talked about the name 00:10:55.220 --> 00:10:58.279 Bad Void. Do you think if you or I walk down 00:10:58.279 --> 00:11:00.720 that same road, we would find a city with funeral 00:11:00.720 --> 00:11:03.279 bells? Or would we just find an empty field? 00:11:03.460 --> 00:11:05.360 That's the most fascinating question Smith leaves 00:11:05.360 --> 00:11:07.759 us with. It suggests that Melaniel might not 00:11:07.759 --> 00:11:12.679 be a fixed location on a map. It could be a subjective 00:11:12.679 --> 00:11:15.480 trap, a phenomenon that only rises from the fog 00:11:15.480 --> 00:11:17.919 for those who have a certain weight of guilt 00:11:17.919 --> 00:11:21.000 on their soul. Like a magnet for a guilty conscience 00:11:21.000 --> 00:11:23.639 that just pulls you in. Or, and this is maybe 00:11:23.639 --> 00:11:26.200 more disturbing, the city exists, but it changes 00:11:26.200 --> 00:11:28.220 its face for every traveler. Maybe for someone 00:11:28.220 --> 00:11:30.679 else it's a city celebrating a wedding or a city 00:11:30.679 --> 00:11:34.000 of total silence. But for our narrator, it became 00:11:34.000 --> 00:11:36.000 the funeral city. Because that's what he needed 00:11:36.000 --> 00:11:39.059 to see. That's what he brought with him. Smith 00:11:39.059 --> 00:11:41.840 takes that psychological truth, that we project 00:11:41.840 --> 00:11:44.179 our internal states onto the world, and he just 00:11:44.179 --> 00:11:47.679 makes it literal. The narrator's guilt is so 00:11:47.679 --> 00:11:50.899 powerful, it literally built the walls and summoned 00:11:50.899 --> 00:11:53.720 the fog. It weaponizes that idea. The environment 00:11:53.720 --> 00:11:56.120 doesn't just match his mood, it attacks him with 00:11:56.120 --> 00:11:58.559 it. Right. It's also interesting that he's completely 00:11:58.559 --> 00:12:00.460 isolated. I mean, he gets turned away at the 00:12:00.460 --> 00:12:02.360 end, but he never really has a conversation with 00:12:02.360 --> 00:12:04.200 anyone. And that isolation is key to the punishment. 00:12:04.659 --> 00:12:06.919 He's forced to be an observer of his own tragedy. 00:12:07.000 --> 00:12:09.419 He can't stop the funeral. He can't apologize 00:12:09.419 --> 00:12:11.580 to the corpse. He can only watch. It's a hell 00:12:11.580 --> 00:12:13.759 of his own making. Quite literally. You know, 00:12:13.799 --> 00:12:16.320 we often talk about horror in terms of jump scares 00:12:16.320 --> 00:12:20.340 or gore, but this story hits on a much deeper 00:12:20.340 --> 00:12:23.639 fear, the fear that we are known, that our secrets 00:12:23.639 --> 00:12:26.440 aren't actually secret, that the universe keeps 00:12:26.440 --> 00:12:29.419 a ledger and eventually the bill comes due. That 00:12:29.419 --> 00:12:32.059 is what makes this story endure. It strips away 00:12:32.059 --> 00:12:34.879 the comfort of anonymity. We all like to think 00:12:34.879 --> 00:12:36.860 that if we move to a new town, hey, nobody knows 00:12:36.860 --> 00:12:38.960 what we did. This story says, you know, here, 00:12:39.019 --> 00:12:42.230 and that is enough. And that cruel and vicious 00:12:42.230 --> 00:12:45.970 temper, it comes right back to bite him. It's 00:12:45.970 --> 00:12:48.809 a cautionary tale about character. His character 00:12:48.809 --> 00:12:52.690 flaw. His cruelty. That was the seed. Malnail 00:12:52.690 --> 00:12:55.190 was just the tree that grew from it. A poisonous 00:12:55.190 --> 00:12:57.529 tree indeed. Yeah. And it kind of forces you 00:12:57.529 --> 00:13:00.110 to ask yourself, what cities are we building 00:13:00.110 --> 00:13:02.769 with our own actions? If you walked into a city 00:13:02.769 --> 00:13:05.330 built entirely of your own past behaviors, would 00:13:05.330 --> 00:13:07.309 it be a place you'd want to visit? That is... 00:13:07.799 --> 00:13:09.899 That is a terrifying thought. I'd hope for a 00:13:09.899 --> 00:13:11.759 city of pleasant brunch spots, but, you know, 00:13:11.759 --> 00:13:13.879 you never know. Let's hope so. So before we wrap, 00:13:14.039 --> 00:13:15.679 I want to circle back to the end one more time. 00:13:15.879 --> 00:13:18.159 He leaves, he's back on the road, and we assume 00:13:18.159 --> 00:13:20.460 he just, what, keeps walking forever. That's 00:13:20.460 --> 00:13:22.899 the implication. He's like the ancient mariner 00:13:22.899 --> 00:13:25.899 or the wandering Jew. He's cursed to Rome, carrying 00:13:25.899 --> 00:13:27.720 this knowledge with him. But here's a thought 00:13:27.720 --> 00:13:29.720 that really kept me up after this reading. We 00:13:29.720 --> 00:13:32.080 talk about whether the city was real or a hallucination. 00:13:32.220 --> 00:13:35.740 What if? What if Melnion was entirely a manifestation 00:13:35.740 --> 00:13:39.039 of his mind? A hallucination brought on by guilt 00:13:39.039 --> 00:13:41.580 and exhaustion. Well, if the city was in his 00:13:41.580 --> 00:13:43.740 head, then leaving the city is just another part 00:13:43.740 --> 00:13:46.919 of the delusion. He never actually escaped the 00:13:46.919 --> 00:13:49.539 labyrinth. He might still be sitting in that 00:13:49.539 --> 00:13:52.940 cathedral or wandering that maze. And this is 00:13:52.940 --> 00:13:55.539 the worst one. He might never have even left 00:13:55.539 --> 00:13:57.580 his home. So he's sitting in the room where his 00:13:57.580 --> 00:14:00.980 wife died. Yes. Completely catatonic. Hallucinating 00:14:00.980 --> 00:14:03.539 this entire journey to the old world while just... 00:14:04.399 --> 00:14:06.600 staring at a wall. That is a chilling interpretation. 00:14:06.960 --> 00:14:09.419 Yeah. It would mean the entire story, the travel, 00:14:09.600 --> 00:14:12.799 the city, the escape. It's all just the firing 00:14:12.799 --> 00:14:16.279 of a broken mind trying to process the unprocessable. 00:14:16.460 --> 00:14:18.860 He's trapped in a loop. He can never exit. And 00:14:18.860 --> 00:14:21.259 that, my friends, is why Clark Ashton Smith is 00:14:21.259 --> 00:14:23.580 a master. He leaves you with a map that leads 00:14:23.580 --> 00:14:26.039 nowhere. A map to a place you definitely do not 00:14:26.039 --> 00:14:27.870 want to go. Well, thank you for taking this trip 00:14:27.870 --> 00:14:30.289 to Melneont with us. Maybe check your own conscience 00:14:30.289 --> 00:14:32.110 before you go to sleep tonight, just in case 00:14:32.110 --> 00:14:34.009 you hear bells ringing in the distance? Indeed. 00:14:34.470 --> 00:14:35.549 Until next time.