Does death have a future?

Well that brought you to a stop didn’t it!

There’s nothing like a slash across the belly

To bring you to your knees!

‘A few years before the October Revolution, one of the most distinguished authors of bio political Utopianism in the early Soviet Union, the poet Alexander Svyatogor (1899-after 1937), had founded a group whose programme included the abolition of death, the scientifically achieved resurrection of the dead and the technological domination of the cosmos; the group called itself the “Verticalists”.’*

Following the recent surgery I underwent I have spent more time horizontal than I am used to. The vertical becoming by definition even more of a challenge than usual. I don’t think the Verticalists had walking in mind, but that must be where it starts: the changing relationship with the ground as primates and early humans reached towards the fruit and the sky. Old Adam scratching his head and scratching his arse and stretching up to that delicious looking fruit. And thence able to put two and two together connecting possible lines of logic. And while he’s about it why bother with crouching, just walk and be proud with his head scraping the heavens.

‘Whoever wishes to eliminate the final cause of harmful privacy in human existence must do away with the enclosure of each individual in their own little piece of lifetime. This is where the renewed common task must begin. The true commune can only be formed by immortals.’*

The question is begged: who are we? Human on the road to becoming gods of the universe. We work on ourselves, in the gyms, in the yoga studios, sign up for PhDs and naturally offer ourselves up for a lifetime of psychoanalysis. Do I hope to find the way to the top of Mount Olympus? Why not? If George Clooney can do it, why not me!

*i continue to find nourishment in Peter Sloterdijk’s You Must Change Your Life.


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