The Beatles Red Album (1968).
Mainly inspired by John, who happened to be on acid while watching the Paris student riots in the summer of ’68, this collection was recorded in one night between dusk and dawn, in a “very collective” session (John speaking). Its release was blocked by Yoko One, who, being a Jap, doesn’t like Chinks. Main cuts: Love Mao Do, (Won’t You) Please Police Me, The Long and Winding Capitalist Roaders, Happiness Proceeds Out of the Barrel of a Warm Gun, Rice Paddies Forever.
—National Lampoon, the magazine, from a special “Beatles Edition”, October 1977.
a great black shadow
“At last the time came when her strength failed her; she lay in the hut unable to drag herself out to search for food. The fire in the corner that had smouldered so long between the three great stones was out. In the day the hot air eddied through the hut, hot with the breath of the wind blowing over the vast parched jungle; at night she shivered in the chill dew. She was dying, and the jungle knew it; it is always waiting; can scarcely wait for death. When the end was close upon her a great black shadow glided into the doorway. Two little eyes twinkled at her steadily, two immense white tusks curled up gleaming against the darkness.”
—Leonard Woolf, from The Village in the Jungle, 1935. As found in the newly revised and annotated edition edited by Yasmine Gooneraine, 2005.
evil eye.
Sinhala: aes-vaha, literally, “eye-poison”, the malevolent and destructive gaze which has the power to make a victim sicken and die. Children in particular are instructed to avoid the presence of those who are believed to possess either aes-vaha or kata-vaha (literally, “mouth-poison” or “evil tongue”).
—Yasmine Gooneraine, 2005, in the newly revised and annotated publication, of The Village in the Jungle by Leonard Woolf, 1935.
the American Dream turned belly up, turned green
“Thus did a handful of rapacious citizens come to control all that was worth controlling in America. . . . Thus the American Dream turned belly up, turned green, bobbed to the scummy surface of cupidity unlimited, filled with gas, went bang in the noonday sun.”
—Kurt Vonneget, Jr., from God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, 1965.
Everything went black
“Everything went black . . . , as black as what lay beyond the ultimate rim of the universe.”
—Kurt Vonneget, Jr., from God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, 1965.
the blackest of all human wishes
“My wife has been killed by a machine which should never have come into the hands of any human being. It is called a firearm. It makes the blackest of all human wishes come true at once, at a distance: that something die.”
—Kurt Vonneget, Jr., from Deadeye Dick, 1982.
that round red Coca-Cola sign
“If one says “Red” (the name of a color) and there are 50 people listening, it can be expected that there will be 50 reds in their minds. And one can be sure that all these reds will be very different.
Even when a certain color is specified which all listeners have seen innumerable times—such as the red of the Coca-Cola signs which is the same red all over country—they will still think of many different reds.
Even if all the listeners have hundreds of reds in front of them from which to choose the Coca-Cola red, they will again select quite different colors. And no one can be sure that he has found the precise red shade.
And even if that round red Coca-Cola sign with the white name in the middle is actually shown so that everyone focuses on the same red, each will receive the same projection on his retina, but no one can be sure whether each has the same perception.”
—Josef Albers, his great Interaction of Color, 1963. From the shiny new revised and expanded paperback edition, 2006.
preference for certain colors and prejudices against others
“As ‘gentlemen prefer blondes,’ so everyone has preference for certain colors and prejudices against others. This applies to color combinations as well. . . . We change, correct, or reverse our opinions about colors, and this change of opinion may shift forth and back.”
—Josef Albers, his great Interaction of Color, 1963. I found this in the shiny new revised and expanded paperback edition from Yale Press, 2006.
The shining water
“Every part of this earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every meadow, every humming insect. . . . The shining water that moves in the streams and rivers is not just water, but the blood of our ancestors. Each ghostly reflection in the clear water of the lakes tells of events and memories in the life of my people. The water’s murmur is the voice of my father’s father.”
—Chief Seattle, in 1855, as quoted by Joseph Campbell in The Way of the Animal Powers.
the galaxy that came to be called the Milky Way
“The flowing breast is the essential image of trust in the universe. Even the faintest pattern of stars was once seen as iridescent drops of milk streaming from the breast of the Mother Goddess: the galaxy that came to be called the Milky Way.”
—Anne Baring and Jules Cashford, from The Myth of the Goddess: Evolution of an Image, 2005.