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Then Suddenly War Ended.

July 1, 2015 by Exangel

by Robert Markland Smith.

Nobody really knew why nor how, but this is what happened.There was no election or change of the guard. There was no revolutionary leader influencing others to lay down their weapons. But here and there across the world, like an epidemic, like lightning shining from East to West, one government after another decided to pull their troops out of the war. And within a few weeks, the business pages of local newspapers announced that one arms maker after another, one arms trader after another was converting its armaments factories to peaceful purposes. Was it because the world was tired of fighting? Were the armies out of breath? Not really. But on the front pages of newspapers and in the evening news on TV, people could see one general after another resigning and taking retirement. The good news was that finally, the nuclear powers were showing the will to dismantle their bombs. Had all the world leaders gone mad? What about the enemy? What about the economy, which had relied so much on manufacturing weapons? And yet, the presidents and prime ministers were calmly announcing a new policy worldwide. At some level, it didn’t make sense. And those who should be in favour of world peace were the most upset about the new policy of abolishing war. The radicals who used to demonstrate against war now had to find another cause. But the populations of the world just expressed a big sigh of relief. A truce! Finally, a truce! So many thousands of people who used to work in the arms industry had to find new jobs in the new peaceful sector. And yet governments were laying off all the folks who used to manufacture guns and tanks. The new economics books no longer discussed a guns and butter economy. It was now entirely a butter economy. And yet the stock market didn’t crash, there were no food riots. It was as though peace spread from one household to another, from one human heart to another. There was no more need for intelligence agencies or spying. There was a new atmosphere of trust in the air. And gradually people began to dance and sing on the streets, in Jerusalem, in New York, in Madrid and Melbourne; suddenly, the oppression of war was replaced with overall joy. People who had invested in the arms business seemed relieved and went on vacation. Instead of soldiers marching through public places, there were tourists and picnics and festivals. Children began carrying flowers. I don’t know, I couldn’t explain it or understand why, but benevolence now reigned where malice and cynicism had before. Nevertheless it was business as usual – people stopped taking drugs and pushers flushed their heroin down the toilets. Had the world gone mad? Yet everything was peaceful, crime rates dwindled, there was no more need for police. People began cleaning up land mines from war zones and many who used to be militant began helping handicapped victims of war. Suddenly, there were funds released for veterans and rehabilitation programs were created for former soldiers. In areas where war was not visible, the news came out that local businessmen used to invest in arms and banks shut down any investment which wasn’t green. Parks were built slowly but surely in areas where there had been gunfire. There was gradual reconciliation between conflicting nationalities and religions. This process had begun suddenly, but snowballed until peace reigned in every heart. Little boys stopped playing with toy guns and war videos. In schools, teachers ceased to teach about the enemy out there. People started realizing that Russians and Chinese people were just like us, and the propaganda machine ground to a halt. Happiness started to spread all over the world. Fear and paranoia were now a thing of the past. And love was no longer a dirty word.

Filed Under: EAP: The Magazine, Summer 2015: This May Be The Last Time.

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In This Issue.

  • Who Was Dorothy?
  • Those Evil Spirits.
  • The Screaming Baboon.
  • Her.
  • A Tale of Persistence.
  • A Conversation with Steve Hugh Westenra.
  • Person Number Twelve.
  • Dream Shapes.
  • Cannon Beach.
  • The Muse.
  • Spring.
  • The Greatness that was Greece.
  • 1966, NYC; nothing like it.
  • Sun Shower.
  • The Withering Weight of Being Perceived.
  • Broken Clock.
  • Confession.
  • Francis Coppola’s Apocalypse.
  • Sometimes you die, I mean that people do.
  • True (from “My Life with Dogs”).
  • Fragmentary musings on birds and bees.
  • 12 Baking Essentials to Always Have in Your Poetry.
  • Broad Street.
  • A Death in Alexandria.
  • My Forked Tongue.
  • Swan Lake.
  • Long Division.
  • Singing against the muses.
  • Aphorisms from “What Remains to Be Said”.

In The News.

That cult classic pirate/sci fi mash up GREENBEARD, by Richard James Bentley, is now a rollicking audiobook, available from Audible.com. Narrated and acted by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio, you’ll be overwhelmed by the riches and hilarity within.

“Captain Sylvestre de Greybagges is your typical seventeenth-century Cambridge-educated lawyer turned Caribbean pirate, as comfortable debating the virtues of William Shakespeare, Isaac Newton, and compound interest as he is wielding a cutlass, needling archrival Henry Morgan, and parsing rum-soaked gossip for his next target. When a pepper monger’s loose tongue lets out a rumor about a fleet loaded with silver, the Captain sets sail only to find himself in a close encounter of a very different kind.

After escaping with his sanity barely intact and his beard transformed an alarming bright green, Greybagges rallies The Ark de Triomphe crew for a revenge-fueled, thrill-a-minute adventure to the ends of the earth and beyond.

This frolicsome tale of skullduggery, jiggery-pokery, and chicanery upon Ye High Seas is brimming with hilarious puns, masterful historical allusions, and nonstop literary hijinks. Including sly references to Thomas Pynchon, Treasure Island, 1940s cinema, and notable historical figures, this mélange of delights will captivate readers with its rollicking adventure, rich descriptions of food and fashion, and learned asides into scientific, philosophical, and colonial history.”

THE SUPERGIRLS is back, revised and updated!

supergirls-take-1

In The News.

Newport Public Library hosted a three part Zoom series on Visionary Fiction, led by Tod.  

And we love them for it, too.

The first discussion was a lively blast. You can watch it here. The second, Looking Back to Look Forward can be seen here.

The third was the best of all. Visions of the Future, with a cast of characters including poets, audiobook artists, historians, Starhawk, and Mary Shelley. Among others. Link is here.

In the News.

SNOTTY SAVES THE DAY is now an audiobook, narrated by Last Word Audio’s mellifluous Colby Elliott. It launched May 10th, but for a limited time, you can listen for free with an Audible trial membership. So what are you waiting for? Start listening to the wonders of how Arcadia was born from the worst section of the worst neighborhood in the worst empire of all the worlds since the universe began.

In The News.

If you love audio books, don’t miss the new release of REPORT TO MEGALOPOLIS, by Tod Davies, narrated by Colby Elliott of Last Word Audio. The tortured Aspern Grayling tries to rise above the truth of his own story, fighting with reality every step of the way, and Colby’s voice is the perfect match for our modern day Dr. Frankenstein.

In The News.

Mike Madrid dishes on Miss Fury to the BBC . . .

Tod on the Importance of Visionary Fiction

Check out this video of “Beyond Utopia: The Importance of Fantasy,” Tod’s recent talk at the tenth World-Ecology Research Network Conference, June 2019, in San Francisco. She covers everything from Wind in the Willows to the work of Kim Stanley Robinson, with a look at The History of Arcadia along the way. As usual, she’s going on about how visionary fiction has an important place in the formation of a world we want and need to have.

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