by Alex Kovacs
Act 8. Each player should write 1000 words about an important experience in their life, focusing on the way in which their understanding of its meaning has been shaped by the passage of time.
Rules
1. Players must move in straight lines only, i.e., forward and/or crosswise, but never diagonally.
2. No other players may enter the game once it has commenced, whether for reasons of comfort, elucidation, or divination.
3. Players may consult any number of texts of their choice whilst preparing for their turn, up to and including pamphlets, newspapers, manuals, and leaflets. Still, each such item must be accounted for and noted on paper.
4. A player may move towards any destination deemed necessary as soon as such a movement is deemed needful. If permission to enter a given destination is not immediately granted, an adjacent location may be used as a substitute (if considered adequate).
5. Players are strictly forbidden to transform themselves into other players during the course of the game.
6. No move may be repeated.
7. If a player remains stationary for a prolonged period, their subsequent turns will be shortened.
8. Dice may be thrown only at the beginning of the game.
9. All encounters with unfamiliar ideas must be dealt with on a solitary basis until the end of the game.
10. Mathematical diagrams may be drawn in order to compliment intuitions and guesses.
11. Each player will only be allowed to contradict him or herself a limited number of times when attempting to account for themselves. A precise limit must be agreed upon by all players before play commences.
12. Players may not rub sticks together during the course of play.
13. If a player demonstrates exceptional abilities at any early stage of the game, it is appropriate that they be awarded a majority of points.
14. Players are encouraged to be considerate when touching upon the concepts of age and aging.
How to Play
(a) Players must assemble at a given point, bringing along the relevant equipment and being ready to commence play.
(b) Each player will pick one card at random from the well-shuffled deck. This will determine their role throughout play.
(c) Measuring instruments should be deployed at a variety of locations in order to attain knowledge of a variety of different rhythms and fluctuations. When possible, patterns should be formed which would only be visible from the air.
(d) Having reached a “room,” a player may immediately make a “suggestion.” Such suggestions could, for example, involve other players, locations or objects, and any interactions between these elements. In order to prolong the duration of silences during play, “suggestions” should be made using as few words as possible.
(e) These “suggestions” having been made, the player immediately to the left of the suggesting player must examine her cards. She must show one of these to the player who is to her left. If the player on the left is unable to show the same card from his deck, the enquiry passes on to the next player and so on, until one of the cards has been shown to the player who made the “suggestion.” Once it has been shown, play passes on to the next player immediately to her left.
(f) Play continues to follow the movements of a spiral, circling inwards, moving towards a location that will remain concealed until it has been calculated and observed.
(g) When a player moves backwards, they must leave a trail of objects behind them—or, rather, in front of them—which can be used to follow them back to their starting/ending point. If discovered, the backwards-moving player may request an additional turn.
(h) If a player has provided significant evidence that her turn has been a success, they too may be awarded another turn.
(i) At irregular intervals, players may correspond with each other in a variety of insignificant ways provided that they have completed sufficient “suggestions” and turns.
(j) A player may formulate an “accusation” regarding the likely location of the point to be marked “X,” provided that there is enough evidence in hand with which to establish a legitimate “suspicion” of said location.
(k) If an “accusation” appears to be unsustainable, all cards must be placed in a tidy pile on the floor. Players will stand in a circle around this central point.
(l) Bluffing may be taken up by a player at this juncture if a certain number of clocks have been successfully deployed. This may involve “inward-looking” bluffs in which a player secretly examines their interior for the purposes of malicious domination.
(m) If it is discovered that a player is in possession of a card which she has failed to show whilst they were making “accusations,” she will be penalised by being denied any further turns, and will remain a player only in order to contradict the content of “suggestions.”
(n) Should a gang of elk appear at this juncture, a series of precautionary measures must be taken in order to ensure that the game may continue.
(o) When a desirable location has been reached, players must discover its centre and appropriate methods for excavation.
(p) If enough points have been scored then a player may proceed to act upon the information that they have attained a certain number of points.
(q) As soon as all potential lines of enquiry have been exhausted, players may consider any new temporal conditions that may have come to exist since the commencement of play.
Winning the Game
The winner is the first player to mark the spot agreed upon as the correct location of the origin of time.
All players must concur, absolutely and conclusively, as to this being the correct location. If a single player will not accept every element of the testimony of a supposed “winner,” then an ad hoc committee must be formed to resolve this difference.
Once assembled, the committee must scrutinize all the claims of the so-called “winner.” Magnifying glasses may be used to examine the evidence presented. Each piece of evidence should be considered in relation to every aspect of the movements of time.
Any claims to victory are to be doubted from the moment that the claim first emerges from the lips of the player-claimant. If necessary, this feeling of doubt should be dramatized in such a way as to establish an aura of mild resentment, if not malice.
In the event that the ad hoc committee is unable to reach a unanimous verdict, another committee should be formed (by the same players) in order to examine the motives and attitudes of the first committee. If this committee is also unsuccessful, then another committee should be formed (by the same players) to examine the motives and actions of this committee.
If a definite conclusion is reached and a “winner” is unanimously agreed upon, then the game may be declared finished. All players should remember to withdraw any materials that have been placed within the public domain at any point during the period of play. The “X” should remain permanently inscribed within its correct position.
The Pleasures of Examining Ice
(1988–1989)
Much to his own surprise, for a couple of years Maximilian took to regularly visiting an ice rink. It began one afternoon whilst he was engaged in one of his customarily aimless explorations of the city. Without having a discernible reason to do so, he chose to venture through the doors of an “Ice Centre,” perhaps because it was a species of institution which he had never paid any attention to before. In retrospect it would seem strange to him that he had never previously been inside one of London’s numerous ice rinks, particularly as the one which he was to become attached to lay only fifteen minutes walk away from his abode.
When he first passed through the doors that day he was to find the ticket booth empty. Hesitant for a moment, he spent some time scanning the walls surrounding him, discovering framed photographs of curling teams. Trophies topped with gold-coloured pairs of skates moulded from plastic were displayed inside a glass cabinet. Deciding to move further inwards, he passed through the turnstile and heard a song from the ra
dio reverberating against the walls of the palatial room that lay beyond. He tiptoed around the locker room, which was also empty, with its black rubber floor composed of small circles, and looked in interest at more photographs of local achievements in the realm of ice sports. He immediately noticed the wave of coldness surrounding everything and found it strangely inviting. A cluster of voices sounded, incoherently, from another part of the complex.
Shuffling towards the small cafe placed in a corner of the building, he found it to be open and functioning. He ordered a polystyrene cup of tea and a slice of sponge cake. As it was a week day, he was the cafe’s only customer, and he looked out upon the expanse of ice before him to find it absolutely empty of human activity. For some reason he felt compelled to keep returning to this exact location, sitting in precisely the same chair, with his back turned away from the woman who served him tea, staring at the ice until he was lost in contemplations and daydreams. On average he would do this every fortnight for the next year and a half, fearing that if he were to come any more frequently the staff would consider him insane. They did anyway, looking upon him with pity, although to his relief they would always leave him to his own devices, a practice which began after they realised that when verbally approached he would barely speak at all.
He came to cherish the sense of inactivity which took over the space for some hours at a time. Entering the ice rink once more he would feel as if he were stepping into an entirely foreign jurisdiction, removing himself from London for somewhere that possessed slightly more glamour. Privately, so many details of this environment became strangely significant to him. He often liked to take note of the many frequently empty rows of blue plastic seats for spectators; the small shop which sold pairs of ice skates, sequined costumes and energy drinks; the weathered face of the woman who mopped the floors; the weekly appearance of the ice hockey goalkeepers who were so absurdly overladen with padded layers that they appeared to waddle obesely across the ice; the faces of children who would circle in the rink in imprecise circles on Saturdays, all of them equally thrilled and terrified by the prospect of falling.
On his second visit to the rink Maximilian was to find himself captivated by the pairs of figure skaters whom he watched training. In his many visits he never tired of following their intricate stances and movements acted out upon the ice. He would find himself marvelling at their virtuosity, as they formed long wavering patterns, breaking into catch-foot spirals, loop jumps, triple lutzes, or corkscrew spins. The pairs who had developed the most advanced techniques seemed as if they were attached to each other by invisible wires, making Maximilian wonder what proportion of the pairs were romantically involved with each other in one way or another. The possibility of romance seemed to be proposed, even necessitated, by all of their movements.
Maximilian loved to watch the many flourishes and exertions of the skaters, their extraordinary capacity for acting in parallel, commingling with tenderness, before separating and roaming through empty solitary spaces in which gestures that could not otherwise be given voice were played out through their limbs. He loved to see their supple, fluid movements, as they would glide over the rink, seemingly effortlessly, defying the harshness of both the ice and the blades pressed upon it. The skaters seemed so fragile to him, constantly on the brink of collapse, particularly when their manoeuvres took on very complicated forms, but it was reasonably rare for him to see anyone fall.
In the beginning, whenever he watched, all Maximilian could see was an array of abstract motions, impressive in their execution, but containing to his eyes only a confusion of jostling bodies. He wanted to be able to follow all that he encountered, to have insights into the skater’s developments, understanding their faults and strengths with a clarity comparable to that of a trainer. So it was not long before he took to his usual thorough reading, examining diagrams and photographs, learning a range of specialist terminology and attending a number of competitions, finally deciding to write one of his last essays on the subject. In the end he acquired much of the knowledge that he desired.
When he questioned himself it seemed strange to him that he should have developed this new interest, because sport had never been one of his major preoccupations, interesting him only occasionally as an unknown realm set apart from his usual concerns. At times he could feel very negatively about it. But figure skating was different, and in large part this was because it was perhaps more of an art than a sport, being almost like a kitsch form of ballet, or perhaps a curious branch of show business. This was an art which claimed to be absolutely sincere in its earnest devotion to romanticism, a fact which did not lessen its beauty or attraction for Maximilian, but indeed only strengthened his convictions about its importance. He really believed that these people were unsung heroes, even the less successful ones. They seemed to him so much more than “athletes,” although this was one aspect of their craft. He felt there was an expressive element at work here which meant that figure skating should be placed in an immensely appealing category—that of the forgotten art form. Considered as such, he believed that ice skaters ought to be placed beside puppeteers, stage magicians, and trapeze artists.
Maximilian would project himself into the role of the figure skater. He would imagine himself wearing a red silk shirt with florid white ruffs cascading down its centre, or a sleek purple spandex body suit for greater dexterity. In such clothes he would be accompanying a beautiful young woman to the rink, holding her firmly around the waist, raising her above his head with only one hand, or stretching her out upon the ground and spinning in charged, erotic circles. Unfortunately, he felt certain that he was now too old for such behaviour. Dolefully, he came to the conclusion that he should have taken to the ice many years ago.
Of course he did attempt to skate himself, and could hardly keep away from his desire to do so. Never having tried this as a child, 1988 saw what was to be his first and only effort to skate on ice. Unsteady, he just managed to keep his balance for long enough to form a complete circuit of the rink, but during his attempt at a second he was destined to fall onto his buttocks. (In the weeks that followed a small bruise developed there and he would eagerly follow its progress in the bathroom mirror.) He did not want to be dissuaded from continuing, so, despite being in a little pain, he went on and before retiring from the scene managed to complete a few more circuits without falling. However he did so wearing a face of pronounced anxiety, with his mouth left permanently ajar in an expression that was unintentionally redolent of an actor performing a slapstick routine. Afterwards, he vowed to confine himself entirely to the role of a dedicated spectator.
He was to discover that perhaps the most perversely pleasurable time to visit the rink was during an extremely hot day in summer. The feeling of having escaped his surroundings was then accentuated tenfold. Taking in slow, precisely measured breaths, he would relax into a deeply satisfying kingdom of fantasy composed of innumerable elements of ice, snow, and the cold. Much of his satisfaction with this could simply be explained by his delight at having created such an incongruous juxtaposition with the environment outside. He enjoyed discovering traces of the same sentiment in the faces of others who had chosen to come to the ice rink for the same reason. During this period Maximilian loved to watch the figure skaters train, but his principle reason for coming to the rink was always to flee from his life for an hour or so. In a number of ways this was more fully achieved when there was no one in sight. Even if all of his artistic projects were undertaken entirely due to his own volition, he nevertheless needed to escape from their maddening demands now and then, just as anyone needs breaks in their routine. Visiting the ice rink was to prove the finest method he ever found for doing this.
Occasional Wardrobe Combinations Discovered
(1989–1990)
(After many years of preserving his anonymity wearing very ordinary clothes, for the first and indeed only time in his life, Maximilian began to experiment with fashion, perusing the racks of second-hand shops for unus
ual items and fusing together a series of previously disparate styles in his own idiosyncratic way. Only rarely would any of these outfits be maintained for longer than a single afternoon.)
Brown flat cap. Sleeveless puffer jacket. Belt adorned with little metal spikes. Flares covered in graffiti scrawlings. Large black steel toe-capped boots.
OR
Sombrero. Blue-and-red cravat. Pinstripe suit jacket. Green-andyellow striped t-shirt. Belt of white cowrie shells. Neon-pink plastic trousers. Sparkly silver glitter-coated slippers.
OR
Scarlet fedora. Purple cape. Yellow stars painted over forehead and cheeks. Tambourine, banjo, harmonica, and bells attached around body. Shirt made from pages torn out of comic books. No trousers. White Y-fronts. Large clown shoes.
OR
Long green hair. Swimming goggles. Purple lipstick. Cigarette dangling from left corner of mouth. Jumper depicting a canal boat scene. See-through clear plastic trousers. Flip flops.
OR
Rigid Mohican. Fake diamond necklace. Light blue shirt savaged with rips and holes. Purple leggings. A goldfish in a small round plastic tank attached to waist. Burgundy-and-white chequered bowling shoes.
OR
Deerstalker with long flapping ears. Aviator shades. Thin muslin scarf. Tweed blazer with camel-coloured elbow pads. White vest. Green corduroy trousers. Bare feet.