The Dead Media Notebook

by Bruce Sterling

“’Better to die like a soldier than to live a miserable dependent on the infidels on the list of their pensioned rajas and nabobs,’ Tipu said at his last military conference. Delicious irony: through the preservation of imperial spoils, albeit mute and frozen in the act of mauling within a glass case, the objectification of Tipu’s hatred endures.”

  Source: LES MEDECINES DE LA FOLIE by Dr. Pierre Morel and Claude Quetel Pluriel-Hachette Pub., from photocopy; date unknown translated by Francois Baschet

  Shadow theatre

  From Bruce Sterling

  “But the true center of the new Chat Noir was the Theatre d’Ombres, the shadow theatre, a brain child of Henri Riviere which put all the Paris beau monde into a state of wonder by the brilliance of its technique and artistic innovation.

  The Theatre d’Ombres was a discovery in the true cabaret spirit. It was a genre which could be used for a variety of effects and incorporated all genres into a small scale replica of Wagner’s ‘total art work’ (Gesamtkunstwerk).

  “Using an ingenious combination of shadow and light play, decor painted or superimposed on glass and paper, cut-outs and Japanese-style puppets, Riviere created unparalleled pre-cinematographic effects on the screen- stage. These were underlined by musical accompaniment, with a choir of sometimes up to twenty people backstage, piano or organ; by narration, either of the story-telling or satirical commentary kind; and by acting.

  The diversity of the shadow plays does credit to the eclectic black cat. One could pass without transition from the mysticism of Georges Fragerolle’s L’Enfant prodigue, to Maurice Donnay’s Athenian drama, Phryne, to the parodied naturalism of Louis Morin’s, Pierrot pornographe, to the heroic epic, Epopee, which put Paris once again into a Napoleonic mood of patriotic jubilation. Epopee, a military play in two acts and fifty tableaux, was created by Caran d’Ache, one of the epoch’s leading poster artists. Witnesses say that some of the shadow plays equalled in beauty Turner’s impressionistic effects.

  “One kind of shadow play consisted of a satirical montage of current events, piece bonemontee, a newsreel with a difference. Salis [Rodolphe Salis, impresario of the “Chat Noir” cabaret]. would improvise a commentary, drawing in references to any notables in the audience. He had respect for nothing and no one, and with an insolent loquacity, Salis would allow his sharp sense of the actual to demolish bankers and the treasury, politicians and parliamentarianism, ‘the grand monde, the demi-monde, tout le monde.’ In this room, with its profligacy of cats in diverse positions and styles, Salis cast the mould for what was to become the cabaret tradition of the conferencier.”

  [The Chat Noir cabaret was founded in 1881 and the shadow-play seems to have faded circa 1900]

  Source CABARET by Lisa Appignanesi. Grove Press, Inc. New York. Originally published in Great Britain in 1975 by Studio Vista. First published in the United States in 1976 by Universe Books. First Evergreen Edition 1984 ISBN 0-394-62177-8, LC 84-47500 pages 21-24

  the Kinora

  From Stephen Herbert

  The Kinora was a miniature mutoscope (“flip-book” principle viewer) intended for home use. While the Lumiere brothers were working flat out developing their Cinematographe camera/projector in 1895, they were also developing the Kinora. They had no way of knowing that they were “inventing” cinema (a bunch of people in a dark hall watching films projected on a screen), only that they were creating a moving picture machine.

  This technology could have taken off in a number of directions in terms of exhibition: (in arcades, or in the home). So the Lumiere brothers ‘hedged their bets’ with the Kinora home mutoscope viewing machine, patented in Feb 1896. The Kinora was a development of an idea already patented by Casler (of American Mutoscope & Biograph fame) in America.

  As it happened, their ‘cinema’ projections were very successful, and they didn’t bother with the Kinora. A few years later they passed on the idea to Gaumont, who marketed it in France around 1900, with approximately 100 reels available (subjects by Lumiere and others).

  Around 1902, versions of the viewer were launched in Britain and it eventually became successful; over a dozen different models of the viewer were made, and something like 600 different reels were available. The apparatus was cheap, easy to use, and non-flammable. A studio was set up to take private motion portraits in London, and eventually home movie cameras (using unperforated paper negatives) were sold. The Kinora allowed the middle classes to see motion pictures at home, before it was socially acceptable to visit the cinema.

  In 1914, the factory burnt down and the system died. The number of surviving machines and reels indicate the popularity of the Kinora in Europe for around 15 years before World War One, and yet there is no public consciousness of this medium at all. Viewing a reel in one of these machines is extraordinary, the mechanism is so simple it is almost non-existent, and yet the result is the same as watching an ordinary movie or miniature TV.

  Source: The Kinora, motion pictures in the home 1896-1914 by Barry Anthony (The Projection Box, 1996).

  The Wilcox-Gay Recordio

  From Bill Burns

  Here with the salient points: The Wilcox-Gay Recordio was available nearly 50 years ago, and could record either to tape or “hard disc.” The “discs” in question were not digital, but hard wax or lacquer phonograph records. During the late 1940’s the Wilcox-Gay Corp. of Charlotte, Michigan, manufactured the Recordio 1C10.

  This was a unique device, part tape recorder and part disc cutter. Originally intended for music students, it was equally functional for touring pro musicians or in the home.

  Disc recorders of the day could only cut audio directly to disc, but the Recordio allowed recording to tape first, then a transfer to a 10-inch, 78 rpm record blank. The tape could be erased and re-used, but it was also possible to make and edit a tape recording before committing it to wax, all inside one machine.

  Advertising copy for the Wilcox-Gay Recordio hyped the device as having “full-range, hi-fidelity reproduction,” although it most likely topped off at 5 to 7 kHz at best. To compare, the professional “broadcast quality” RCA 73-B disc lathe had 10 kHz response.

  The ad copy went on to boast a full hour of recording time on one slow-moving five-inch reel. The Recordio could be used as a phonograph or PA system, and could record from microphone or telephone.

  The icing on the cake was its transportability. The 27-pound unit could be taken anywhere.

  [Apparently there was also a coin- driven public version, “the Wilcox-Gay Coin Recordio.”]

  Source: Alan R. Peterson, Radio World for September 4, 1996 In the column called A Look Back.

  The Velvet Revolution in the Magic Lantern

  From Bruce Sterling

  [I suspect that this little Czech theatre’s aging combination of film, theater and ballet classifies as “dead media,” even if the Laterna Magika theater is not quite so dead as its namesake the magic lantern. If your country has been through forty years of deep-frozen cold war and is being revolutionized by a surrealist playwright, perhaps a theater full of not- quite-dead media makes a very sensible headquarters.]

  “Laterna Magika: Civic Forum was looking for a space where they could take shelter. The visual artists offered the U Recickych Gallery, where Civic Forum was in fact headquartered for the first few days, but it was a small space, and suddenly someone came up with the Laterna Magika (the Magic Lantern theater).

  The Prague theater that uses a multiscene format, a combination of film, theater, and ballet. The theater was a great success at the 1958 World’s Fair in Brussels and again at Expo 67 in Montreal.” “I had never been in the dressing room at the Laterna Magika. It was a hot labyrinth with no air. There was practically no ventilation, and everyone smoked like chimneys.

  When we went there nine months later with the president of Brazil, who had asked to see the place that had been the headquarters of the revolution, I could not understand how we had managed to survive there. In the largest dressi
ng room, about three by four yards, the staff, about ten people, held its meetings. Costumes, ballet tutus, and quaint monsters were hanging everywhere. It smelled like make-up, and there were mirrors on all sides.

  I could not get used to seeing myself everywhere, and I started to feel a little paranoid.

  “The ballet dancers buttered bread, sliced salami, and boiled coffee. The whole Laterna Magika was working for the revolution. Everything was flurried and feverish, but people were unbelievably kind and decent to each other.

  In the Laterna Magika, everyone moved quickly and purposefully. If someone frowned, he saw it instantly in the mirror. They worked long into the night, laughing often. From time to time, it was as if Havel had written an absurdist play that he starred in and directed. I will never forget that he took me with them and I was part of almost everything that happened. Once again I had the exhilirating feeling that I was in the right place at the right time, that this was the best place in the world, and that I did not want to be anywhere else.”

  “On Sunday, December 3, Vaclav went outside for the first time in fourteen days. He and Olga went for a walk in Pruhonice park. When he returned to the Laterna Magika underground, he said, ‘At last, outside under the high and wide heavens, I realized that this is for real and it is definitely not a dream.’

  “For a while, time settled down, it slowed down to a realistic pace, only to run ahead again, still faster. I thought that, to a certain extent, the atmosphere of unreality was the fault of the underground labyrinth, of the Laterna Magika where amid artificial light, mirrors, and a limited air supply, everything took on a magic, brand-new form. We only saw the light of day on city squares and Letna Plain. Otherwise we did not crawl out from underground.

  “At one of the first meetings with the authorities, Vaclav asked about allocating a building for Civic Forum. In the end, they alloted us the building that had belonged to the Union of Czechoslovak-Soviet Friendship on the corner of Wenceslas and Jungmann Square, the Spalicek building. Here, everything seemed to be more real.”

  Source VACLAV HAVEL: THE AUTHORIZED BIOGRAPHY by Eda Kriseova. Translated by Caleb Crain. St Martin’s Press, 1993. ISBN 0-312-10317-4

  Native American Smoke Signals

  From Bill Crawford

  A description of smoke signals among the Karankawa.

  “They are very sagacious and cautious; and they send messages by smoke signals, some signals calling them together, others warning them to flee, others giving notice of anything new. The proper Smoke for each being given, as soon as one gets the message he passes it to another; and he, in turn, gives it to those who follow; and, in a very short time, whatever news there is has been made known and forwarned in the province. More on the Karankawa.

  “On clear days, generally at noon, they signalled news by columns of Smoke from their camp Fires which were started from small pits in the ground, every Indian having a Fire in front of his lodge. The column of Smoke was made to ascend in more than twenty different ways, sometimes diverging or curling in spirals, sometimes rising up in parallel lines. Some looked like the letters V and Y others resembled spiral lines, or two parallel zigzag lines moving upward, or twin columns standing close to each other.

  Smoke signals and the Apache.

  “Smokes are of various kinds, each one significant of a particular object. A sudden puff, rising into a graceful column from the mountain heights, and almost as suddenly losing its identity by dissolving into the rarified atmosphere of those heights, simply indicates the presence of a strange party upon the plains below; but if those columns are rapidly multiplied and repeated, they serve as a warning to show that the travelers are well armed and numerous. If a steady Smoke is maintained for some time, the object is to collect the scattered bands of savages at some designated point, with hostile intentions, should it be practicable. These signals are made at night, in the same order, by the use of Fires, which being kindled, are either alternately exposed and shrouded from view, or suffered to burn steadily as occasion may require.”

  Source: Diary of a Visit of Inspection of the Texas Missions Made by Fray Gaspar Jose de Solis in the Year

  fraudulent media of the Spirit world

  From Bill Wallace

  SLATE WRITING

  “Slates, prepared and unprepared, have played an important part in the spiritualistic racket. An unprepared slate against the under surface of a table by the medium’s fingers, his thumb resting on the top of the table. Yet the slate will be handed to you in a few moments with scrawled writing on it. The medium uses a thimble arrangement with a piece of slate pencil attached to write the message with one of his fingers.”

  “Again, a slate and a piece of chalk may be placed on the floor under the table. Although the subject may hold the medium’s hands across the top of the table and place his feet on the medium’s feet under the table, writing appears. The medium has simply slipped his foot out of the loose-fitting shoe which has a steel toe—leaving the subject with the impression that he still has the foot under control—and written the message with his toes, the front of his sock being cut out to permit their free use.”

  “A false, paper-thin flap of silicate has been used to cover writing on a slate. Held under the table, the flap is slipped onto a shelf and the slate produced with the message written on it.”

  THE REACHING ROD

  “An indispensible tool of the medium is the reaching rod. It is used to pick up spirit trumpets and tambourines, to float ghosts about the room and to aid in the production of countless other phenomena. Constructed on the fishing- rod telescope principle, it can be folded into the size and form of a thick fountain pen. Extended, it may reach as far as ten feet. The end is generally equipped with a small hook or pincers device to be used in picking up objects.”

  SPIRIT MUSIC

  “To cause spirit music, one medium used an old style Swiss music box fastened under the table.”

  “Still other methods of getting music from the air are the concealed musician method and the radio phonograph method.”

  TRUMPET SEANCES

  “When the mediums learn that spirits could be made to whisper through trumpets or megaphones instead of dumbly rapping out “yes” and “no” on a table or wall panel, psychic communication took a vast step forward.”

  “Sometimes a small trumpet not over eight inches in length stands in the middle of the table. A circle is formed about the table, with hands clasped and the medium’s feet under control. When the lights go out, spirits speak through the trumpet. The medium has merely leaned forward and picked it up with his teeth by the suitably constructed mouthpiece, whispering his messages through it.”

  “At times a length of garden hose is put into the trumpet, by which it can then be elevated; and the medium, talking through the hose, produces whispers at a greater distance.”

  “Sometimes a medium dares to give a light seance, though this is not often as it is too risky. In such cases the principle of radio is used, coils being secreted under rugs and elsewhere.”

  SPIRIT PHOTOGRAPHS

  “Double exposure is the method mostly used, the spirit being previously photographed against a black background of velvet or some similar material that will not reflect light. Instead of a complete double exposure however, some are made by exposing one-half of the plate for the spirit and the other half for the sitter. A trick slide is used with such a method.”

  “Figures are sometimes painted with sulphate of quinine on the back screen. While such figures are not visible to the eye, they appear on the photograph directly behind the sitter.”

  “A medium may lay the plates you bring on an innocent- looking table top and print the spirit on them before placing them in the camera. A ghost face is painted in lead on the undersurface of the tabletop, and it is printed on the plate by X-rays. Often the plates thus treated are not even exposed, the face appearing merely through the medium’s having prayed over them.”

  “Ano
ther method . . . is one in which the medium palms a much reduced copy of the photograph of the spirit. This picture, painted with luminous paint, is transfered to the plate by the medium simply bringing the two into contact for a moment.”

  “ . . . a special flashlight with the message written on the lens may be pressed secretly against the plate at an opportune moment, thus giving the appearance of a photographed spirit message.”

  SPIRIT READINGS

  One of the tricks of the medium is to answer sealed questions.” (Several paragraphs describe methods for reading answers using sleight-of-hand.)

  “The same principle is employed when the subject places the card upon which he has written his question between the leaves of a Bible. The center of the back and most of the pages have been cut out, permitting the medium to read the question as he did through the opening in the card in the above trick. But this trick becomes more effective when performed in the following manner. The question is written on a piece of paper and slipped into an envelope. The Bible, hollowed out as above, has two batteries and two three- volt lamps in it, and a piece of glass cemented into the opening in the back binding. Under the pretext of writing a birth date or a name on it, the medium places the envelope on the Bible, which he has been reading, for more solid support. Having actually placed it on the glass window, he switches on the lamps and reads the question through the envelope.”

  Source: An Exposure of Mediums’ Tricks and Rackets, by C. Samuel Campbell. LITTLE BLUE BOOK NO. 1746. (Edited

  the Edison Wax Cylinder

  From Manoj Kasichainula

  The They Might Be Giants album, Factory Showroom, has a track entitled I Can Hear You which was recorded at the Edison Historic Site on a wax cylinder phonograph without any electricity. Here is the what the members of the band (John and John) say about the song.