Lockdown 2 - All Hallows' Eve and Visions of Atlantis

As we're going into second lockdown I thought I better record my thoughts. I feel much less foreboding than I did when we entered the first one. There was a slight quiver earlier, but I'm largely stoic. My main worry is for America. This year I've almost felt American. It's odd that you can feel so attached to a place you've never been to. That's far off across a wide ocean. However, these things in many ways are bigger than just geography..

Obviously we have the US election on Tuesday. Is it a coincidence that Europe is locking down on the eve of this incredibly important event? Probably not, but I'm sick of getting into politics and conspiracy, so I'll pretend I haven't noticed that. I just pray that it's peaceful whatever happens. I'll no doubt be watching it all unfold with eagle eyes over the coming week. Heart in mouth and helpless to intervene. Who knows what will happen.

Also, on a lighter note, I should mention my last post. A bit of an odd one that. It's kind of a well meant parody of those future predictions we often see about how we'll all be living our lives in ten or twenty years time. A Tomorrow's World type glimpse. When I was writing some of the orange economy posts I was thinking that it would probably be helpful to offer some kind of illustration for the future I was trying to put forward. Cringey though that is. So hopefully it'll at least be useful in that regard.

I couldn't help but think of Francis Bacon when I was finishing it up though. Penning his New Atlantis 400 odd years ago. Sadly I'm not quite in his league, but it's a recurring human endeavour. Trying to offer up some utopian vision of the future. A better world.

Of course, that work in many ways ties in with America. The supposed setting. The new world across the water. The Rosicrucian and Masonic visions and dreams.

I've discussed the name Atlantis elsewhere. Suggesting that it simply means the known world. Or the mapped world. In times gone by works of cartography would be titled names such as Atlantis Majoris - simply meaning the major atlas i.e. the great map collection. We also have Atlas holding up the known world, and likewise the Atlantic Ocean. Which to European explorers, heading out into the unknown seas for the first time, will have originally just been the world ocean.

So viewed through this lens New Atlantis would literally translate as New World. Perhaps a literal new world, or perhaps a revisioning of the old.

If we take Plato's Atlantis, another powerful visionary tale, to also mean "known world" then the flooding of Atlantis would be another variant of the world flood myth. Though Plato's version doesn't portray it as such. His Atlantis being just one separate kingdom, at war with another, the Athenians. Plunged beneath the waves for their sins. Still though, we have a similar theme. The destruction of a world. A Great Reset.

As we await on the precipice of this election I can't help but see things clouded by these spectres and visions.

I believe in America.

With Europe locked down it looks like freedom across the waves more than ever.