The Anatomy of Melancholy1999

What can consummate the 20th century and all its disasters? An opening in blood and terror, the gnashing of teeth and cracking bones, air as heavy as the burden of our souls in our throats; snap snap and all's well that ends in a second act to mirror the first. This short century, punctuated by the grandest catastrophes, waits patiently for its proper third and final act – the players have lost their taste for soliloquy, but the gestures may yet come easily, and with the facility of one who no longer must watch that his hands do as told. Hence this "entr'acte"; a bowed head as a chariot approaches, the Sun King, waiting still for the moment when he might again assume his throne. Yea, for though they lament, the passion is theirs alone, the knife they hold to their own throats, waiting for that terrible voice which speaks in thunder and fire...