“The Mask is The World” is a book of short stories. 33 reflections on different cultural symbols and an exploration of collective identities and common world-creating meanings. They are also a peek at how the material reflects the social, cultural, and even the spiritual (and vice versa).
Culture, Symbols, and Understanding
Where is meaning born?
Where do creators bring beauty from?
The 33 stories in this book travel the world to imaginatively reflect on art, beauty, work, culture, creativity, and the group… among other things. Each story is a reflection on one – or more – cultural symbols and the deeper meanings embedded in them.
Culture is the mind of the group, it carries history, and the accumulation of creative work throughout many ages. Culture’s symbols carry what some researchers call “excess meaning”, which doesn’t show clearly, yet we carry it and mold it into many thoughts… We fashion it into identities that might become us without us feeling.
Culture always runs, like passing clouds that carry many possibilities… like golden braids that permeate the fabric of the world. It is constantly being created and re-imagined by people, and what spreads survives.
Did you think that the tree was – only – a tree? That the bridge was a bridge, and that the fish, the map, the pomegranate, and the shell, were mere things?
Did you think music was beautiful because it flowed between air and our feelings?
Symbols intersect and their dance creates new symbols with every thoughtful gaze.
The stories of this book are an exploration of culture, of the world’s symbols, of the meanings that make the personalities of its different peoples, and of their adventures enriched by people’s souls and contemplation.
From east Asia to the great plains of America, from Europe and its great intellectual movements to the near-east with its heritage stretching through antiquity, to the hills of Eurasia and its steppes, to the mysteries of India and Africa, I’ve collected (unmethodically) symbols that shaped the memories of nations, their ideas, and their perception of beauty, and I’ve reinterpreted them in search of a look at what’s beyond…
The Stories
The 33 Stories in this collection have no particular order or methodology, except an attempt to gather them from different places and to model important cultural movements and collective characteristics.
They are (their titles in the book are different) about these topics and cultural themes / symbols:
- The Mask-maker (no particular region)
- Wabi-Sabi & Mono No Aware (Japan)
- Salvation (On priesthood, religion, and Spirituality. No particular region)
- Processions of grief (Near East)
- Khamsa & the Evil Eye (Near East)
- The Mask of the Shaman (Africa)
- Stickers (Europe)
- Making Maps (no particular region)
- The Face in the Mirror (Middle East & Central Asia)
- Ashes to Ashes (India)
- Us (Europe)
- The Master & The Wooden Screen (China)
- Judgement Day (Egypt)
- Guns and Swords (Japan & The Middle East)
- Escaping Prison (Arabia)
- The Blues! (Africa & America)
- The Web of Earth & Heaven (Mediterranean)
- Superstition & Great Movements (Middle East, South-east Asia, Japan)
- El Camino de Santiago (Europe)
- Totem Poles (America)
- Matriarchy / Patriarchy (Mythology / General)
- The Symphony & The Church (Germany)
- The Bridge (Turkey)
- Fractions (Tibet & Byzantium)
- The Witch & The Maze (Europe)
- Chains of People & Gods (Africa)
- The Enchantress (Greece, Persia, and the Middle East)
- The Buffalo and The Sacred (America & Europe)
- The Melting Pot (America)
- Flowing Glory (Belgium)
- The Opera and Love (Italy & Greece)
- My Last Sculpture (Sculpture / Global Symbols)
- Graffiti Box (Global Symbols)
On Meditative Writing (Reading)
The stories are short (a few pages each) reflections… Give them time.
If you have enough time (and resolve) read the stories first, then read the ‘Guide and Directions’ section and do some research, then re-read the group as it gains new meanings that result from the revealed interconnections and the changes in your perspective.
The book has 33 symbolic images (one per story). Some reflect (some of) the essence of the stories. The printed versions of the book have them in full color… and they are beautiful to look at and contemplate. They are all AI-generated.