Korridorium

♫ To the Ghost Between the Pages ♫

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149/398

I enter the corridor, the only thing that feels familiar in the whirlwind of colors and shapes enveloping me and making me dizzy. It’s comforting to feel solid ground beneath my feet. But is it truly solid ground? Everything here is strangely soft and doughy, the corridor’s walls yielding, like silk stretched over memory foam.

“Everything okay in there?”

Who is speaking? Is this a test? An experiment? An April Fool’s prank? Or has American intelligence picked me up again?

“Speak up, man, I don’t have all night.”

The voice sounds like that of a teenager. I can’t pinpoint its location as I stumble along the corridor. Is it coming from the front? The corridor is curved, its end unseen. “Hello? Is someone there?”

“Tom. Nǐhǎo. I’ve got a few questions, Cory.”

Cory? Yes, Cory. But who is Cory? My memories contradict each other. I am simultaneously a journalist, the student of a Buddhist master, the Minotaur, a xeno-linguist… How is that possible?

“You’re a clever guy. Written a lot. And I need your help now. It’s about the ‘Decline of European Postmodernism: A Literary Blog Example from 2012.’ I need some input.”

What is he talking about? The corridor just never ends, and the voice stays with me. A dream? No: Whenever this suspicion arises in a dream, it transforms into a lucid dream. But it doesn’t work this time. I don’t wake up, not in the dream, not in bed. Yet it feels unreal.

“Can you make sense of that, Cory? ‘Decline of Postmodernism’?” The voice becomes more urgent.

“The Korridorium…”

“Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about. Gotta write a term paper about it.”

“The Korridorium…” I attempt again, but I fall silent because suddenly, I realize that I’ve written the Korridorium and all the stories within it. I am not it; I have imagined it. Yes, that must be it. Hence the conflicting memories: stories I’ve concocted in my mind.

“Where am I?” I ask into the curved corridor. There are doors—did I not notice them before? They bear numbers, like in a hotel. However, it feels more like a library, like the corridor between bookshelves, and it smells like one too. A hotel that smells of books. Not bad, actually. The door reads 398. I press the handle down, but it’s locked.

“Everywhere and nowhere. You’re a Yōulíng with the task of helping me with the term paper. ‘Postmodernism,’ the Teach is trippin’.”

The next door is locked. And the next. And so on. Each bears the same number. 398. Maybe I’ve gone mad? Or dead.

“Now spill it: What’s postmodern about your scribbling, and how does it reflect the decline?”

“What is ‘Teach’?”

“My German teacher. But that’s irrelevant. She’ll never know you existed. I reconstructed you using your texts. Private Yōulíngs are forbidden according to the Jīngshén Rights Charter, but this is, so to speak, an emergency.”

Reconstructed? I walk along the corridor, shake locked doors, all marked 398—along with my swirling memories of a bunch of hippies, the plague, a nuclear waste repository, Noah’s ark…

“A reconstruction?”

“Yeah. Took a blank mind from my dad’s Lab-Táishì, fed it with your texts, and had it fetch secondary literature. Plus the essential data from the early millennium, the zeitgeist package from 1970 to 2012. The rest is handled by the stem.”

“Blank mind?”

“Nobody gives a Benz, man. That’s all after your time. I’m not here to explain the world to you.”

“The world from when?”

“67. I already said it: Long after your time.”

“2067?”

“Yeah, bingo.” His voice sounds annoyed.

2067. How is that possible? I vaguely remember dying. The tunnel into the light. Or else, the sword in my back. But those are probably just stories, stories upon which I was reconstructed. Hence, I can only know what’s in the texts—nothing about my death, the author’s death, whose reconstruction I am. His – or her – stories, however, are contradictory. They seem designed to stay vague. How should I know who I am, not even if I’m a man or a woman or if I’m even a human being when that was precisely the search game, the puzzle? When everything appears pluridimensional and fractally shattered? But no, doesn’t everything surprisingly dissolve at the end of the blog, revealing who Cory is and what all these stories are about?

But I can’t follow that thought any further; I’m interrupted. “Okay, man, so the Korridorium: 400 blog entries, equivalent to a medium-sized novel. Somewhere in there must be something about the decline of postmodernity—or something postmodern that illuminates the decline. So get started, after all, you’re a scribe.”

“There are 398 texts. Not 400. Three hundred ninety-eight!”

“Whatever.”

“And they shouldn’t be postmodern but post-postmodern. You get it? Integral.”

“Listen, this isn’t a math class.”

I get angry. Someone reconstructs me in 2067 by feeding a blank consciousness with my texts, and some computer extracts the spirit of the author, meaning me. Yet, it’s not a literature scholar, not a historian, not even a lover of quirky short prose, but just some ignorant punk forced to write about me for school, too lazy to read a single line of it!

“Now, you listen to me, you ignoramus! You must have misunderstood something: I transcended postmodernity; the notion of decline is nonsense. Postmodernity can only be succeeded and integrated into the next cultural stage, the integral perspective! Modernity didn’t ‘decline,’ did it?”

“No, on the contrary: After postmodernity came the Remodernity, and then the Prenaissance. Déle. It’s all after your time, and now let’s finally write the term paper.”

My head is spinning. Postmodernity with all its achievements is supposed to have failed and vanished without a trace? Surely not—because of me?!

“Did the Korridorium cause the decline?”

“Hardly. I’ve researched what this Corri-Dōngdōng is all about, but there’s nothing to be found. It probably went unnoticed, and I guess it’s thanks to the German literature quota that the Teach dug it up. Oh man! Twenty thousand characters minimum, including spaces—would have preferred to write about Chinese literature!”

“But there must be a Wikipedia entry for the Korridorium!”

The voice laughs. A brief, annoyed laugh. “That’s probably the postmodern narcissism the Teach talks about: always revolving around itself. No, Wikipedia is long gone; the Jeeceebee turned it into Sùzhìpedia after the meltdown.”

“Meltdown?”

“2030. After your time. And in the Sùzhìpedia…”

“What is the meltdown?” I interrupt him.

“No one gives a Benz. Do you want to know if there’s anything about you in the Sùzhìpedia or not?”

“Sùzhì like Sushi?”

“Not Japanese! That’s Chinese and means ‘quick knowledge.'”

“You speak Chinese?”

“Just Mandarin. Anyway, there’s nothing about the Korridorium in there. Only some footnote. Just one.”

“What kind of footnote?”

“No idea, didn’t bother to remember.”

“Related to ‘pluridimensional worldview‘ maybe? Or ‘fractal literature’?”

“Man, you’re gonging!”

“After that meltdown, things went downhill fast, didn’t they? I mean, ‘Remodernity’ sounds like regression. And with the ‘Prenaissance,’ it seems humanity was suddenly thrust back into the darkest Middle Ages.”

“Well, isn’t that rich? The Teach is right. The main characteristic of postmodernity: its abominable hubris, alongside its fatal relativism, of course.”

“And who Cory is? Did you research that?”

“Nobody gives a flying Benz. Stop gonging me already. I’m the one asking the questions! Who else could Cory be? Just Cory. You.”

“What’s with the ‘Benz’? What are you talking about?”

“That’s Chinese. Pik.”

“‘Benz’ is supposed to be Chinese? And what is ‘pik’?”

“Well, pik. Piquant. In your time, they probably would’ve said ‘cool.'”

“In my time… You just reconstructed me. I only know some stories from back then. The real Cory, on the other hand—did anyone ever find out who’s behind the pseudonym?”

“What’s there to find out? It’s just some postmodern hide-and-seek. You should know who you are.”

I can remember an award ceremony. Wasn’t it even the Nobel Prize in Literature? Apparently, just one of the stories. I can’t trust my memories. If only I could think about myself in peace! And how to get out of this endless corridor… I realize that my heart is pounding, and I’m gasping for breath. It feels like I’ve just finished a marathon. Or am I just angry? I’m not sure—also not sure if I even have a pulse or if I’m breathing. I’m just a simulation, composed of words. Can they bring them all back with this method? Joyce, Homer, Kafka, Goethe?

“You know what, man?”

I lean, breathing heavily, against one of the corridor walls. What would Cory do now?

“I’ll give all this stuff to my mom. Reconstructing you was a crappy idea. Mā thinks I need top grades for the future, career and all, and then she can do something for it. The term paper is a piece of cake for her.”

“And what about me?”

“What’s the big deal? I’ll just delete you.”

“You can’t do that!”

“We’ll see.”

“Wait!” What was his name again? “I can help you, Tom.”

He takes his time with the answer. I feel sweat breaking out.

“There’s this story,” I shout into the empty corridor, “about the Chinese: they shrink themselves until all of them fit into the Forbidden City. A satire.” I have to improvise. A trial balloon, but I can’t think of anything better.

“Very bad. The Jeeceebee won’t like this. Funny that it slipped past the Teach.”

“Who is this Jeeceebee?”

“Our Great Imperial Benefactor. The one on the Dragon Throne.”

“A… Chinese world dictatorship?”

“Gǒupì!” It sounds like a dismissive “bullshit!” when he says that. Now, don’t say anything wrong! I am a nameless private, the devil, an elephant, a silent monk, an old woman with Alzheimer’s, an assassin, a voice from beyond, a night owl, a computer algorithm… All at once, and all mixed up. To buy time, I must tell a story. The story he wants to hear.

I lower my voice and put emphasis on every word: “But that could be a clue to the downfall of postmodernity, you know?!”

“Hm. Not bad. I could work with that.” Tom seems to be taking the bait.

“Hubris, you know? Postmodern, narcissistic megalomania. That’s how we all were back then.”

Maybe I exaggerated because Tom hesitates now. Eventually, he says slowly, “Didn’t you say you were… integral.”

“Yes, of course, that’s the megalomania: to think you can comprehensively encompass and integrate all aspects sustainably, replace power hierarchies with competence hierarchies, find pluridimensional-comprehensive solutions to the most complex problems, extol the decay of values as a new value. That had to lead to downfall, especially given what was developing in China at my time.”

“Developing in China?”

“Well, the Remodernity. Or maybe already the Prenaissance. The Jeeceebee and the – what was the new Human Rights Charter called?”

“Jīngshén Rights Charter.”

“Yeah, man, whatever that is: the downfall of European postmodernity – it’s all in the Korridorium. I can tell you a lot about it.”

“Then shoot. You dictate, and Bàs Táishì writes it down. But nice and structured, with footnotes, you hear? I’ll put my feet up in the meantime.”

Would Cory have done that? Talked about her or his life and revealed everything, the hope, longing, insights, and struggle for something worth writing and fighting for, just not to be deleted immediately? This must be how Scheherazade felt.

“You know, Cory, I just want to re-breed tigers later.”

“Re-breed tigers, really?”

“The Great Chinese Benefactor in Zhongguancun has over a thousand researchers working on it, but they just can’t figure it out, despite DNA and everything. If I manage to do it, I’m a made man. You can’t imagine what they’d pay for tiger dicks there. As Afrosidia… diasi…”

“Aphrodisiac.”

“Yep.” And after a short pause, “You’re not as much of an idiot as I thought, Cory.”

And so I begin, delivering an extensive lecture on the decline of postmodernity as mirrored in 398 eccentric short stories—a labyrinthine game of hide-and-seek where monstrous hubris and that equally abominable, fatally relativist narcissism constantly peek through, ultimately ushering in the glorious age of Remodernity, the Prenaissance, and, of course, our Great Imperial Benefactor on the Dragon Throne: the Jeeceebee.

Postmodernism:

Integral Perspectives: