Rune Soup
History
Are You Calling Upon The Right Money Gods?
Even accounting for wars and famine and such our understanding of wealth has been reasonably stable since the development of agriculture. It wasn’t ever really all that mysterious. There were a small number of haves and then the rest of us are the have-nots. Wealth -or other system capacity- was accumulated in a more or [...]
Superheroism Begins In The Home
There is a certain amount of cognitive dissonance that comes from an exclusively psychological vision of how magic works. It’s not that it loses its explanatory efficacy when it comes to understanding gross physical results of enchantment, it doesn’t. It’s just that the efficacy becomes a litte inelegant. We are forced into saying that “the [...]
Real Life Magic Artefacts: Saint Paul’s Cathedral
Brunch is definitely a New World thing. We can hazard a few speculations as to why: Firstly there’s the climate. Not for nothing are Sydney and LA front runners for brunch capital of the world. Also, here in the UK, brunch is drowned out by the grim ubiquity of the ‘all day breakfast’. The fact that [...]
Collect The Little Victories Along The Way
Collecting the little victories along the way is good advice for any reasonably complex goal, of course, because the universe has an irritating habit of actually making you earn anything worth having. However it’s especially important for the Big Things like coping with grief or recovering from addiction. Spiritual illumination? Definitely a Big Thing. And [...]
Real Life Magic Artefacts: The Lothar Crystal
It sounds like a Buffy prop, doesn’t it? But no, it’s real, just like the Warren Cup. However it’s considerably younger. It was made in the mid-800s in Germany (which may explain its craftsmanship and longevity?) No one knows precisely why it was made but we can make an educated guess as to for whom. [...]
How Iona Works: Seven Stories From A Holy Island
Here is how a small guidebook I bought on the ferry to the Isle of Mull opens: A traveller was asked by an old Highland gardener where she had been. When she told him he said “Ay! Iona is a very thin place”. What did he mean, she asked? “There’s no’ much between Iona and [...]
Review: Filthy Cities – Medieval London
Well, my particular forest is quite disgusting. To be honest, that’s one of the things I adore about it. Only a couple of places in the world have a continuous, multi-thousand-year history of dog-eat-dog hustle that can hold a candle to London’s particular mercantile chaos. London. The original, the template for that particular foul-smelling, winner-take-all [...]
DON’T Give To Japan: Weekend Reading
Told you I was feeling contrary. But the first two articles strike me as an excellent example of why magical target selection takes guts. Or, to borrow Jason’s terminology: “Emergency Magic”. Giving to Japan is like lighting a candle to pay your rent this month. Giving strategically to MSF is enchanting for wealth. Check it: [...]
How Christmas Is Like Sound Immigration Policy
Got up, went outside to take photos of the snowy sunrise, came back down to breakfast, exchanged gifts, agreed to meet for lunch and then went back for a walk through the snow, chatting to complete strangers along the way. Which got me thinking… Humans are weird. It’s extremely unlikely anyone who reads this is [...]
How Important Is Authenticity In Magic?
Chaos magic has a complex relationship with authenticity. It was born out of the postmodern rejection of metanarratives, it has a love of simulacra, of proxy. It was midwived into existence by Maggie’s Harrowing of The North. From cities like Leeds it first emerged as a big, psychic middle finger to a society that had [...]
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