Good afternoon, Pastor David. Hey, John. Welcome, everybody, to Unfiltered. Pastor, you know, I'm getting a lot of feedback on different people from one of the unfilters that we have done, love and lust. And so, you know, it went from if I'm in love, then why can't we be intimate to if I'm in love, then why can't we be married? And there's a lot of the what ifs if I'm in love. This is an interesting one because it came in and it kind of hit a little bit of what we've been speaking about already. Now, what is your feedback as a senior pastor in response to this? So, the gist of the question is, well, if I'm in love and God is a God of love, then why would a God of love send me to hell for loving somebody of the same sex? Yeah, that's interesting. You know, as if love permits you to do anything that you want to do, including things that harm you or including things that would be specifically stated as being inappropriate and even sinful. So, it's very sad that we have this muddled understanding or definition of the word love. John, I have to begin first and foremost with that.  It should be allowed because love allows that. And a person who says that most certainly doesn't live a life like that. They don't live a life like that. There have always been rules, regulations, there's order, there are commands. There are things that we live under all of our lives and we know that some things we should do, some things we shouldn't. And so if my mom says to me, which she did, son, don't go near fire, well, what kind of love is that? To tell me not to go, if I want to touch fire, why can't I do that? So love actually gives commands that will restrict my behavior that will end up in my being injured, harmed in some way that may be even irreparable or sometimes even leading to death. And so the broad brushing of our behaviors with the word love and saying that God loves and therefore whatever I want to do would have to be permitted because after all, love would allow me to do that is simply biblically wrong. Because the Lord loves us, He gives us commands. He commands us because He wants to bless us as it says in Deuteronomy that you would obey my commands that it may go well with you and with your children forever. So the commands of God are not grievous, they're not burdensome, but they're intended by God to put us in a path that our life can be blessed and enriched and that the society we live in might be benefited by our presence.  And so for the person who says I'm attracted to a person of the same sex and God should allow that because after all, I have these feelings is a person who doesn't know God and certainly doesn't know His word. I would even go so far as to say very often it's a person who care less about God and care less about His word. So if somebody is a professing Christian, they need to understand that God has declared certain things to be right and some things to be wrong. And same sex, relationships and all from the very beginning are referred to in scripture as being wrong. Whether it's called sodomites or whether it's called perverted persons, there are words in scripture that denote that the behavior is a behavior God has stated is to be incorrect, why is that? Well, because two men can't produce a baby, two women can't produce a baby. God didn't create man to have affection in that way with another man because he intends us to be fruitful and multiply. And so somebody's saying that God is loved therefore what I want to do, he's gonna allow me to cause he's love is somebody who doesn't read their Bible. We were just talking a moment ago and we're looking at the book of Romans. And so Paul in his first chapter begins to outline certain things related to who he is, what he's called to do, what his purposes are, how he desires to see the Romans. And then he, in verses 16 and 17, he goes on after those introductory comments and he says that he's not ashamed of the gospel. You know, it's the way that people can have a righteousness that comes from God, that just shall live by faith. So after speaking those things, he goes into the first thing which is interesting is the wrath of God. In verse 18 he says, for the wrath of God is revealed and then he begins to share concerning those things that provoke God to wrath. And so included in that is men having burning lust for other men, women having a desire for other women. And he says that they're burning in their passions in this way and he says, and this goes against nature.  Women have certain things about them that a man cannot produce. And the same is true, vice versa. And so, you know, anybody who says they're in love therefore they should be allowed to not read the Bible. Also when they put another qualifier in, if God is loved then why would he send me to hell?    That's why Christ came so that he could save you. God so loved the world he gave his son. Why so that he might save us in order that we might not go to hell? Amen. Well, Pastor, thank you for your perspective on that. It's interesting because we're getting these questions that are coming from the initial unfiltered. Just a couple of reminders that for anybody who serves in our fellowship, in any capacity, we have a servants ministry or ministry morning with Pastor David on Saturday, February 25th, 9 a.m. in the banquet hall. For anybody who serves at our church, it gives you a chance to come here from our pastor. We worship and he gives us a devotion. This Sunday we have our Sunday services at 8.30 and 10.45 a.m. And it's gonna be a pretty fruitful study. I was moved to tears as I was studying. Yes. Just studying it, just something I believe that the Lord, I really do, I believe that this is one of those messages that help us to see him more clearly. And so we look forward to having you come join us. It's gonna be a very good study. I look forward to it. Invite your friends and family to come join us. And thank you for tuning in, Pastor. Thank you so much for taking the time to answer these questions. And we look forward to seeing you guys on Sunday. God bless you. Amen.


The first one was in my cereal. I was sprawled on the couch, absentmindedly chewing a mouthful of stale frosted flakes, when I suddenly bit down on something hard. My stomach lurched. Was it a rock? A piece of plastic? I spat it out and looked at it. There, glistening in my hand, was a small white tooth. A wave of nausea sent me dashing to my toilet. After a few painful minutes of dry heaving, I was in the kitchen sifting through the box of cereal, looking to see if there were any other disgusting surprises waiting inside for me. I didn't find any, but that didn't stop me from throwing the box in the garbage. I considered calling the company's number and screaming at a customer service rep, but honestly I couldn't be bothered. I ended up resuming my morning routine and vowing never to eat a Kellogg's product again. However, that was far from the end of it. Over the next week, I began finding more and more teeth. A molar nestled in the back of my medicine cabinet.  My mind reeled at the insanity of it all. It was a relatively new apartment. Had they been there from the very start? No, that didn't explain the one in the cereal. Despite my numerous attempts to rationalize the situation, I eventually had to admit what was happening. Someone was putting them in my apartment. The thought caused an electric burst of dread in my chest, not just from my current disturbing situation. But because of my past, you see, almost nine years ago to the day, my family was devastated by the loss of my sister Julie. After a long arduous investigation that turned up no body, no weapon, and no suspects, the police eventually concluded that she'd simply gotten lost in the woods. Despite that, my young mind remained convinced that some boogie man had taken her. I spent the rest of my childhood terrified of the day the man who took her came back to finish the job. Eventually, with the help of a little counseling and more than a little booze, I put it all behind me. But with each new tooth I found, I felt that fear returning, settling back in its place like an old friend. Needless to say, I immediately called the police. They collected the teeth for testing. About six or seven and strongly suggested I get the locks changed. I immediately called my landlord to have him do just that, but was greeted by his wife instead. Uh, hey, I said awkwardly. I'm Alex, one of Donnie's tenants. Is he there? Her voice was harried and tired. I can answer any of your questions. I've been handling everything while he recovers. Recovers? What happened to him? Well, she said, dragging out the word. There was an incident last week. He was mugged on his way to his car. I brought a hand to my mouth. Jesus, it will be okay, right? He's got a mild concussion, but he should be fine. I felt a burning in my chest and realized I'd been holding my breath. I let it out but still felt a sense of unease. Donnie had been attacked last week. Exactly when I'd found the first tooth, I had an awful thought and asked her a question on a hunch. Can you indulge me for a second? Was a master key one of the things that were stolen? No, of course not. She paused. When she spoke again, it was with less conviction. I don't believe so. If you don't mind, can you please double check with him? She obliged and came back a few minutes later, relaying Donnie's message. He says yes. He may have had a copy of the master key at the time. Why? Did you have a break in? I told her the situation and she agreed to send someone over to change the locks as soon as possible. By the end of the day, I had a shiny new keypad on my door. It did wonders for my state of mind, but the whole ordeal still left a black cloud of dread that persisted over the next few days. Had someone stolen a master key just a break into my apartment? The thought made my skin erupt into goosebumps. In an effort to shake off the constant anxiety, I ordered a few motion detectors online. When they finally arrived, I remember thinking the box felt lighter than it should have been. Unfortunately, I didn't think anything of it and opened it up. Nothing could have prepared me for what I found inside. Two severed ears sat in the box, browned from decomposition. My stomach shifted violently, and I dropped the box in disgust. I sunk to the floor and stared at it, trying and failing to decipher why on earth this was happening to me. The cops were there in minutes, snapping pictures and asking a barrage of seemingly never-ending questions. I was eventually pulled aside by the lead detective, a dark-haired man in a tweed jacket. He had an absurdly gravelly voice that sounded the way sandpaper feels. We're gonna need to search the apartment for any sign of who's been harassing you. Are there any relatives you can stay with for the night? Yeah, I said shakily. My parents lived down by the city. I can stay with them. He frowned. Is there anyone a little closer in case we need to ask you some questions? I hesitated. Well, I guess my sister is just a half hour away. I'll give her a call. I was hoping I could get through this without having to contact Luca, but it seemed I didn't have a choice. The end of my relationship with my big sister hadn't been loud or flashy. There was no massive argument that drove us apart forever. There was just the quiet, unspoken agreement that we didn't need to be in each other's lives. Despite all this, I eventually found myself on Luca's front porch overnight bag in hand. I winced when she opened the door. Luca and Julie had been twins, you see, and even after nine years I couldn't look at my sister without being taken back to that day. When she saw me, she looked puzzled before quickly replacing it with a sort of strained excitement.  How have you been? I've been better, actually. I said riley. I tried calling, but yeah, I got a new phone. The silence hung heavy between us. I felt like I should have been offended that she hadn't bothered to tell me, but I honestly wasn't. Listen, I'm sorry if we're just showing up, but some things happened. My apartment's been broken into. I left out the more colorful details of the story, not wanting to freak her out. Now, looking back, maybe she should have been.  No, it happened while I was gone. Either that or while I was sleeping, I thought to myself. I know it's short notice, but do you think if it's not too much trouble? She smiled and rolled her eyes. Yes, Xander, you can stay. I smiled and followed Luca inside. She set me up in her guest room, telling me I could stay as long as I needed. After I was settled, she plopped down out of the bed next to me with two Bud lights holding one out to me like a peace offering. For the nerves, she said, I happily accepted one drink turned to two and two turned to three. And eventually we were both pleasantly buzzed and talking with an ease that I never thought would have been possible. We laughed and joked and just generally caught each other up on what had happened after we'd last spoken about four years ago by my count. However, the conversation eventually ended up where it always did. Julie. God, you're just like her. I said, well, duh, she said grinning, we're twins. It's not just that. It's everything.  I smiled and nodded at her dice earrings, flashy and red, even your weirdo fashion sense. She punched me playfully and gazed out the window. Yeah, I see her every time I look in the mirror. She sniffed the month she went missing. I'd wash my hands with my eyes closed just so I didn't have to see myself in the bathroom mirror.  I realized her eyes were shiny with tears and I laced our fingers together. Not at all. I said, everyone said it'd get better, but it never did. It's been nearly a decade, and I still just want her back. She took in a shaky breath and I slowly realized it was from fear, not grief. And the worst part is, I think he's back. I snapped to attention. The mysterious he she was referring to needed no explanation. Our parents dismissed it as nonsense. But my sister and I had never quite let go of the suspicion that Julie's disappearance had been more than an accident. Why? What happened? She needed one hand and the other nervously. About a week ago, I went on a spa day with a friend from work. After we'd gone our separate ways, I caught the bus back home. A few stops before mine. This guy gets on stained dress shirt, scraggly hair. I smelled the BO on him from five feet away. There's no empty seats, so he asks in a mumble to sit with me. I start making up an excuse, but he just plops down next to me anyway. Everything's fine for a few minutes, but he starts rambling to himself. I was about to put my headphones in when I hear my name, like my full name. I'm afraid asking the driver to stop the bus might make the guy more agitated. So I decide to just wait for the next stop. Meanwhile, the guys going on and on about how it's not his fault and how he didn't mean to do it to her. When the bus finally stops, I quickly get up and start scooting past him. I'm almost out when he grabs my arm. I pull and pull, but his arm is like a vice.  He looks at me with big bloodshot red eyes and says, don't worry, I'll make this right.  I still remember the way he stared at me as it drove away. The tears were back in her eyes now. I can't stop worrying about it.  I opened my mouth to speak. But there was nothing to say. The boogeyman who'd haunted our childhood was finally back ready to finish the job. He'd started nine years ago. In the end, I just hugged her and she hugged me back. It was the last normal moment we'd spend together before she flipped my world upside down. What if he breaks in? What if he carves me up the way he did her? It took a moment. But when I did, I broke into a cold sweat. Carved up. Was Julie carved up? Her eyes flashed like she'd suddenly realized something. Yeah. I mean, maybe. I hope not. Her body was never found. How'd you know she was carved up? She blinked. I just assumed it. She said a little too quickly. How else would he have killed her, right? I stared at my sister, studying her face carefully. Even after all this time, I still knew when she was lying. He could have done it lots of ways. I said sharply, how'd you know that? She held my gaze and for a second I considered giving up. But something in her seemed to deflate and she came clean. Luca spoke quietly, barely audible over the roar of the fan. They found her body. The shock made me nearly drop my bottle. No. When? A few years ago. No, that can't be possible. Why didn't the police release that? They didn't want to tip their hand. They were hoping to catch the killer coming back to the dump site. Disbelief had seized my lungs, making it impossible to speak. I'd spent years agonizing over what happened to my sister and Luca had known the whole time. I didn't want to make you upset. She said quickly, I promise it was for your own good.  You lost that right when you decided to keep this from me. I turned away from her instead staring out the window into the night sky. She walked toward the door inside. I've got the late shift tonight. I'll be back in a few hours. Julie's file is in the drawer in my room if you want to read it. I'm sorry. I continued to stare out the window and she walked out, her footsteps fading in the distance. I knew I'd been harsh, but my blood was still hot with indignation. After I heard the door open and shut, I went and got the file she mentioned, a manila folder with a few simple documents inside. What else had she kept from me? I scanned the pages hungrily, not really knowing what I was looking for. I was going to give up when I spotted something in the coroner's report that made my heart drop. Extracted teeth. I read on, dread creeping through my body like an infection. Whoever killed Julie hadn't been content on just taking her life. He'd taken parts of her body as well, her teeth, her ears, and her eyes. I thought back to that first tooth. It'd been small, childlike. In an instant, I had no doubt in my mind that whoever had done this to my sister was the same one tormenting me now. I heard the door open and shut again, the sound of Luca returning. Listen, I called. I read the file and I think what's been going on with my apartment is tied to what happened to Julie. We might not be safe here. She refused to respond and I felt a stab of guilt. No matter how often it'd been of her to keep that secret from me, she was all I had left in the thought of losing another sister terrified me far more than any stalker. I'm sorry. I called getting up to meet her in the living room. I didn't mean for it to come out like that. Honest. I turned the corner into the hallway and froze in my tracks. The tall, disheveled man standing at the door was not Luca.  I would have expected rage or mania. But instead, there was just an animalistic coldness, a sort of icy determination. He was framed by a black rectangle. The door swung wide open behind him. Well, don't just leave the door open. I thought for one insane moment, you'll let out the AC. Then he took a step near me in his heavy work boots. And I broke from my trance. I spun on my heels and made a break for the door nearly tripping on my own feet. The man steps thundered behind me, getting closer. I searched wildly for an escape. I had mistakenly run deeper into the house rather than towards the back door. I'd hit a dead end any second. Finally, I spotted a bathroom. I dashed inside and swung the door shut. The lock clicked just as the man slammed into the door like a freight train. I sank to my knees as a barrage of slams and bangs began raining down on the door. However, it was heavy oak and held fast. I pulled out my phone, my hands shaking like a leaf, and began calling 911. And then the smell of gunpowder, a ringing in my ears. The door was suddenly wide open, a gaping chasm where the doorknob used to be. The man stood before me, a pistol in hand. I blinked as my mind finally registered what had happened. He'd shot off the doorknob. I just lost. I watched as he holstered the pistol and unslunged something from his back. In my terror, I hadn't noticed the satchel he'd been carrying. He began rummaging through the bag with a sort of grim determination, a carpenter looking for the right tool. The metaphor wasn't too far off from the looks of what was inside. I felt the color drain from my face as I watched him sift through various kitchen knives and scalpels and pliers, terrible possibilities flashed before me like a magician's deck of playing cards. What was he planning to do? However, he eventually settled on a small wooden box like what you'd keep jewelry in. He held it out to me almost delicately. I looked into his eyes and I caught a glimpse of something. Was it remorse? Then he finally spoke.  I just stared at him, trying to make sense of the incoherent mess of nouns and verbs. However, after a while, I began noticing some repeats. Words like sorry and forgive were very common. I also noticed phrases like I saw wrong and wrong one. Seemingly noticing my confusion, he paused. He took a deep breath and said simply one word, atonement. I wanted to slap the box away. I wanted to throw it into the deepest darkest pit in the world and run as far from it as possible. But I knew the best way to not end up with a knife in the gut was to do what he said. I picked up the box and reluctantly opened it. Inside were two white lumps the size and texture of rotten eggs. I might even have been able to pretend they were if it weren't for the dark black pupils that dotted each of their centers. The man looked at me expectantly and I slowly stretched my face into what I desperately hoped passed as a pleased smile.  He put his knife back in the bag zipped it and stood up. I was feeling my heart rate slow when the man turned around slowly. I'll be better from now on. He said, I'll do better. And then he disappeared into the hallway the stomps of his work boots fading into the quiet house. I felt something wet on my face a look in the mirror revealed tears streaming down it. What just happened? I noticed I was still holding that awful box the box of what was left of my sister. Did he think this would make me feel better? In some twisted way, he thought he'd been doing a good thing making things right. This explanation helped a bit.  There was more to it than that, right? Wrong. Wrong one. I'll do better.  Luca and Julie were twins. He hadn't been sorry for killing my sister. He was sorry for killing the wrong sister. I stumbled to my feet on shaky legs and called Luca. It went straight to voicemail and I belted out a stream of curses. Luca, I screamed into the receiver, get in your car, go straight to the police station now. He's coming for you. I white knuckled the steering wheel, swerving in and out of the different lanes like a madman. Horn sounded up angrily all around me, but I barely heard them. Getting ticketed was the least of my concerns. How much of a headstart did I have on that psycho coming for Luca? Was he already there closing in on her blade in hand? I put the awful questions in a box and pushed them to the back of my mind. I turned a corner and finally caught sight of the bar where she worked, its tacky neon lights flashing in the night. I screeched to a halt in the packed parking lot, nearly scraping the truck beside me. Throwing open the thick wooden door of the building, I scanned the place for any sign of my big sister. It was Saturday night and the bar was packed with bodies screaming, dancing, and laughing. I pushed my way to the back where I found a short redhead wiping off a shot glass from behind the counter. Shouting over the drone of people, I asked, is Luca here? The girl gave me a skeptical look, probably put off by my frenzied, scattered appearance. I couldn't blame her. Who's asking? I'm her brother. It's urgent. I saw her suspicion give way to concern. I haven't seen her. She never showed up to her shift. It was like a punch in the stomach. The cops were there in minutes, although it felt like an eternity to me. By the time they'd arrived, I chewed my nail so far down it drew blood. The same gravelly voice detective from earlier stood in front of me, flanked on both sides by stone faced police officers. I relayed everything that had happened, the break in the man, the twisted present he'd given me. I tried watching his face to gauge his reaction, but his expression was unreadable. I had just finished when another officer walked up from the parking lot, turning to the detective. We just found her car, sir. No sign where she may have gone. Something grim seemed to pass between the two men, and in one terrible instant, I realized my sister might not be coming back. About a half hour later, I was squinting under the harsh fluorescent lights of the station. I sat across from the detective, whose name I now knew was Vince Severson, and stared at the photos he'd laid out for me. I scanned each picture, looking for the man who'd attacked me. I tried to conjure an image, but his face eluded me. I was on the verge of losing all hope of finding him when I revealed the last page. When I saw the man's sallow cheeks and sunken eyes, my brain immediately lit up with recognition. For a moment, I was in the bathroom again, backed against the wall, staring into the man's vacant eyes. I took a deep breath and said, that's him. He's the one who broke in. Severson narrowed his eyes. Are you sure? We don't want you throwing an innocent guy under the bus. I looked at the image again and shuddered. Yeah, that's definitely him. Who is he? He smiled, showing 22 perfectly white teeth. You know, I can't tell you that, right? It's an ongoing investigation. What if I recognize the name? It might spark a memory. I looked at him pleadingly. I was grasping at straws, and we both knew it. Sorry, son, no can do. I was going to try again when his phone began vibrating. Excuse me one minute. Severson listened intently for a few minutes, bushy eyebrows furrowed. He scribbled a few things down on a legal pad, and then turned to me. Sorry, but I'll be right back. You stay put. And then he was gone, shutting the door quietly behind him. A minute went by. Two minutes. I looked at the desk and suddenly realized something. There was no window on the door. I could look at those papers and no one would ever know. I wanted so desperately to put a name to the face of the man who terrorized my family for so long. I jumped up and began rifling through the papers, taking care to leave everything back where I'd found it. I flipped through the pages of the legal pad Severson had been writing on. It seemed like a list of the evidence they'd found at Luca's house. Size 15 boot print, approximately 10 three inch black hairs. Trace amounts of animal fur. Severson had underlined in question mark that last item apparently not knowing what to make of it. I didn't either. Luca didn't have any pets. Where would the fur have come from? I kept looking until I found a document with all the faces I'd seen earlier, as well as their names underneath. A few seconds of quick scanning and bingo. Ben McLaren. I said the name aloud to myself, committing it to memory. Footsteps. Damn, I thought. I put everything back in its place and hopped in my seat just in time for Severson to return. The whole thing couldn't have taken longer than three minutes. Everything okay?  I smiled at him. Everything's fine. True restless to sleep. I spent that night finding everything I could out about Ben McLaren. Severson had promised to do everything he could to find Luca, but I didn't trust him for a second. Law enforcement had spouted that exact same line nine years ago, but they still never found Julie. I'd be damned if I was going to trust them to find Luca. After a few quick searches, I found an article detailing the turbulent life of Ben McLaren. He'd been institutionalized at the Webmeyer State Hospital after a psychotic episode that ended with the murder of his mother. However, despite this, he'd been recently discharged for his excellent recovery. Couldn't have been that excellent, I thought. It seemed to me like he'd reverted back to his old self, the second he stepped foot out the door. I looked for more information on the murder of his mother, but the article was sparse on details. Further searches were also useless. I put my head in my hands. All the momentum I'd been building up was beginning to evaporate. In one last ditch effort to get more information, I emailed the author of the original article, explaining that I thought Ben might be killing again. I glanced out the window only to find the sun peeking out from behind the horizon. It was already dawn. I'd been awake nearly 24 hours. I put my head down on the computer desk, not having the strength to walk to my bed. I awoke at around noon the next day to the ding of my phone. To my surprise, lounge had already responded, saying he'd be happy to meet with me. A few hours later, I found myself at Mel's diner, sitting across from a tall, spindly man about my age, mid 20s. He wore thick glasses and a blonde bun that just oozed millennial. So you really think McLaren's killing again? I nodded quickly. Does that surprise you? Not at all. He said coolly. I just figured he'd be able to wait a year at least. How could they let someone like that out so soon? I asked. Trent shrugged. It's more common than you think. The violence was solely based on his delusions. The psychiatrist must have figured that he's perfectly safe as long as he takes his medication. And if he decides not to, he gave me a grave look. Then situations like this happen.  I nodded. I want to see if there are any parallels to his previous murder. What happened to his mom? I can't find any information on it. He leaned in. The police tried their best to keep it on the low. Didn't want to cause a scare. Oh, I said. Disappointed. So you don't know. He flashed me a smile. I said they tried to keep it low. But I have my ways. One thing you need to know about Mrs. McLaren is that she was mean. Real mean. Ben started showing symptoms of schizophrenia early around 15 or 16. Whenever she caught him talking to people who weren't there, she'd beat him.  Now you'd think he'd want to get as far as possible from her. But not at all. He never moved out, lived with her until he was about 32. What happened? I asked, already fearing the answer. Well, they screamed at each other all the time. But one day it was particularly bad. This argument must have been the one that sent him over the edge, because he just snapped. Trent seemed to hesitate. He blinded her with his fingers, jabbing his thumbs into her eye sockets. Then he cut out her tongue with a kitchen knife. In her ears, he uh... Trent began fumbling over the words awkwardly. He finally settled on making a stabbing motion and saying, pencils. I shuddered. Was this what was in store for Luca? Had it happened already? God, that's awful. Why would he do something like that? He stared at his coffee. Did he do it right there in the house? Trent shook his head. No one knows where he did it. We just know where we found the body. He furrowed his brow, remembering something. They found animal hair on it. There was again, just like on Detective Severson's list. What kind? I asked. Don't know. Nothing from around here, though. Not a bear or a wolf for anything like that. I mulled over everything I'd heard so far, trying to make the pieces fit.  It's like he's disarming them, I said. He blinds and defends them so they can't judge him and he removes their teeth or tongue so they can't make fun of him. Trent was nodding slowly. Almost like the three wise monkeys. I gave him a questioning look. You know, see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil.  Exactly like that. I felt so close, maybe if I got inside McLaren's head, I could figure out how to find him. I thought back to the animal hair found at both crime scenes, then I had an idea that made me nearly drop my coffee. Trent, I said. Just a hunch, but did McLaren work at the zoo? Trent put a hand to his chin. You know, actually he did. It was that old one that closed down a few. He trailed off, coming to the same conclusion as me. He's obsessed with the three wise monkeys, right?  He finished. All right, let's let the police know. But I was already putting my coat on. He called out to me as I made a break for the door. Where are you going? To get my sister. The steel fence that surrounded the zoo towered over me like the walls of a prison. If my suspicions were correct, if Luca really was being held captive inside, then I guess technically it was a prison. I tried taking a step forward, but found myself frozen. The adrenaline that had carried me here was already beginning to burn itself out, leaving behind a thick cloud of dread. The thought of McLaren lurking somewhere deep in that zoo made me want to get back in my car and drive away as fast as possible. But I knew I couldn't do that. Who else was going to save Luca? The police? The theory Trent and I had cooked up was solid, but I knew telling the police would get me nowhere. They'd failed to save Julie all those years ago, and I had no reason to think this would be any different. I took a steadying breath, jumped up, and grabbed the top of the fence. After a few moments of struggling, I dropped down into the main plaza. My heart sank the second my feet touched on the cracked pavement. No turning back now. I began making my way deeper into the zoo, scanning it for any sign of McLaren.  I was hit with a mix of relief, vindication, and fear. It was finally time to see if my theory was true. I reluctantly headed inside, allowing myself to be swallowed into the foliage. One thing I noticed as I jogged down the winding dirt path was the complete absence of noise. Besides the faint whistle of wind going through the trees and the light thumbs of my footsteps, the habitat was almost silent. Even more troubling were the trees. They grew more and more sickly the longer I walked. By the five minute mark, they were so dry, they were almost petrified. It didn't take long for me to find traces of McLaren, a cigarette butt here, a broken beer bottle there. I just found what looked like a discarded candy wrapper when I heard it. It was a muted high-pitched whale coming deep within the habitat. Although it was barely audible, I immediately knew it was Luca. I broke out into a sprint towards the noise withered trees flying past me on either side. My chest burned from the sudden exertion, but I didn't slow down. When the path suddenly ended in front of me, I leapt over the small fence and charged deeper into the dead forest. The deeper I went, the louder the screams got until eventually it was all I could hear. The trees began thinning out until I found myself at the edge of a small clearing. Luca was at its center, lying on her back. After looking a little closer, I realized that her wrists and ankles had been tied to four separate trees, pulling her body into a strained X shape. And there, hunched over her, stood Ben McLaren. The sight of him made my blood run hot with rage. For a moment, I wanted to storm right in and wrap my fingers around his neck, but I knew better. McLaren wasn't particularly muscular. In fact, he was rather lanky, but I remembered from my previous encounter with him that he was armed. Charging in all gung-ho would only lead to a bullet hole in the chest. I was mauling this over when McLaren knelt down next to Luca, making her tense visibly. I'd been so focused on him that I hadn't noticed what he was doing. He grabbed her face roughly with one hand and used the other to jam something metal into her mouth. I didn't have to see it to know what it was. It was a pair of pliers. He was already starting. Luca belted a panicked scream as McLaren began pulling. I instinctively began running toward them but had to stop myself. McLaren would certainly see and shoot me before I got close enough to attack. I was no use to Luca dead. An idea suddenly popped into my mind and I dug my phone out of my pocket. I cranked up the volume to max, set an alarm for 10 seconds, and chucked it as far as I could. I stood there with bated breath, my sister's agonized psalms reverberating in my ears. The seconds seemed to stretch into eternity, and for a moment I feared the phone had broken on impact. But just as I was about to give up and start thinking of a new plan, I heard the wail of my ringtone coming deep from within the forest. Luca went quiet and McLaren jerked his head towards the noise like a dog. He glanced between my sister and the forest, seemingly doing some internal calculation. Then he reluctantly set down the pliers, unholstered his pistol, and began making his way into the woods. The second he was out of sight, I made a dash for Luca, knowing I'd only have moments before he found the phone and realized what I'd done. I'd known Luca would be in terrible shape, but actually seeing her up close made my heart sink. She was only in her late 20s, but she looked a decade older. Her hair was greasy and unwashed. She was wearing the same clothes she'd last been seen in, which were now filthy with mud and grass. She gazed up at me with an exhausted vacancy that made me look away. What are you? She began in a scratchy voice. I held a finger to my lips, and began frantically trying to undo the tangled knots holding her down. However, the rope was so firmly tied, it might as well have been metal chains. They were so tight that Luca's hands were tinted a pale blue from the cutoff circulation. I heard a twig snap coming from somewhere in the woods, and I realized that I had only seconds to think of something. Looking around, I noticed the satchel McLaren had been carrying in the bathroom.  I plunged my hand inside, wincing as I did, and pulled out a knife. I quickly began cutting one of her hands loose. Another twig snap. My heart skipped in my chest. I severed another rope, then a third, a fourth. And then we were running. Branches scraping our arms and legs, sweat pouring down our faces. I had to practically drag Luca behind me, as she was barely able to walk, let alone run. At first, I told myself that McLaren hadn't seen us, but the heavy footsteps behind quickly shattered that illusion.   I was beginning to think we may never make it out when the trees finally began to disperse. Luca and I burst out of the monkey habitat, emerging onto the bare plaza of the zoo's entrance. Although my body ached, I forced myself to sprint to the steel gate and give it a hard push. It didn't budge. At first, I just stared at it stupidly, but the sound of McLaren crashing his way through the forest brought me to my senses. I picked Luca up by the waist and desperately tried to raise her up and over the fence. She just begun pulling herself up when a horse shout broke the silence. You two get away from there. Fear froze my body, and I slowly lowered Luca back to the ground. Turn around. He screamed. Meeting the gaze of this monster was the last thing I wanted to do, but I reluctantly obeyed. His eyes, bloodshot and intense, stared daggers into me. You can't take her. I haven't fixed her yet. Despite myself, I felt familiar anger begin to bubble up inside of me. Fixed her. And you were going to do that how? By carving her up? Ben's eyes flashed with anger, and he pulled something out from behind him. Before I knew it, I was staring down the barrel of his revolver. No, no, you don't get it. He boomed. She's broken. Now let me fix her before I get angry. My rage evaporated instantly. I suddenly realized that my number one priority needed to be keeping him calm, at least long enough for me to think of a way out of this mess. What? What do you mean broken? Right now she's deaf and blind. She's just stumbling around in the dark. But if you just give her back to me, if you let me fix her, then I can let her see beyond the veil. She'll see the world for how it really is. I raised an eyebrow. And you'll do this by mutilating her. He narrowed his eyes. No, by releasing her. Now step aside and let me finish my work. Ben, I said calmly. I think you're very sick. You need to come with me so we can- No! He shouted, the gun shaking in his hands. You want to have me taken away, don't you? You think I'm crazy? No, I said quickly. I don't think that at all. I'm just worried about you. I don't understand why you need to fix my sister. Why do you want her to, how would he put it? To see beyond the veil. The gun in his hands lowered slightly, and some of the rage in his face seemed to drain away. Well, I've always been able to see things that other people couldn't. Beautiful things, things that would amaze you. I want someone else to see them too. I just want someone to- Understand you? He broke eye contact, staring at his feet like a child. I let go of Luca's hand and slowly made my way toward him.  Trust me, I mouthed. I once again began closing the distance between us. Listen, McCl- Ben, I understand you. He glared at me, training the gun on me once more. How could you understand? You don't know me. See? I froze. You're right, but I do know about your mother, about what she'd do to you, about what she'd call you. He seemed caught off guard by this. Listen, I can't possibly imagine what you must have gone through, but I do know that hurting more people isn't going to make anything better. I was now just a few feet away from him. I reached out my hand, palm up. Give me the gun, Ben. He eyed my hand skeptically. After a long moment, something in his face seemed to harden, and he cocked the revolver with a sickening click. I'm sorry, Alex. My heart sank. Wait, I screamed. You don't have to do this. But it was too late. I squeezed my eyes shut, as a thunderous bang reverberated through the air, making my ears ring. I opened my eyes, and frantically padded myself down, looking for where the bullet had hit me. That's when I saw Ben.  He staggered backward, gurgling and wheezing for a few moments before collapsing to the ground in a heap. My first thought was that he'd shot himself, but a quick glance behind me proved that wrong. There stood Detective Severson, his pistol still trained on Ben's unmoving body. You two get out of there. Luca and I were already on it, scrambling up and over the fence as if Ben were going to get back up at any moment. It wasn't until I was on the other side that I began considering what had happened. How did you know we were here? I asked. Glad to see you too, Alex.  My friend, he nodded behind me and I turned to see Trent jogging up from toward the parking lot, his bun bouncing in time with his steps. I tried calling you and when you didn't answer, I told the cops about our theory. They nearly laughed me out of the station, but Severson over here actually believed me. Severson pulled me aside and motioned at Luca. She sat on the curb, arms wrapped around her knees, staring at some spot on the ground. The ambulance is on the way. If there's something you want to say, now's the time. I nodded and walked over to her. She didn't seem to notice my approach, not even giving me so much as a glance. As I got closer, I noticed the full extent of her injuries. There were ligature marks all along her wrists, crimson slashes covered her battered arms and legs. I sat down on the curb a few feet away and tried to come up with some words of hope. In the end, I just settled on. It's finally over. No response. On closer inspection, I saw she was watching an ant slowly marching across the pavement. I sighed. Listen, I'm sorry I didn't come sooner. I never expected any of this to happen. If you want, I can start moving my things out of your house. She shot me a wry smile.  You're staying with me, at least until you can get a place of your own. Really?  She suddenly wrapped me in a bear hug so tight I thought it would break a rib. I just got you back. She laughed. There's no way we're going back to being strangers again. I almost wanted to laugh. It seemed fitting that the man who'd ripped Luca and me apart was the same person who'd brought us back together. We spent the next few moments in silence, just enjoying each other's company. Eventually, I sighed heavily and said, I can't believe he's really dead. It's exactly what Julie would have wanted. No, it's not. Luca said softly.  It had taken seven years, but the two of us were finally back together. This is what she would have wanted. Hey everyone, remember to like and subscribe if you enjoyed the video, and a special thank you to TP Savage for an amazing story. Make sure to go check out more of the author's work. If you'd like to support me further, there's a link to my Patreon in the description, and I hope you have an amazing start to your week. Thanks for listening.


theCUBE presents UiPath Forward 5, brought to you by UiPath. Hi everybody, welcome to Las Vegas. We're here in the Venetian, formerly the Sands Convention Center, covering UiPath Forward 5. This is the fourth time theCUBE has covered forward, not counting the years during COVID, but UiPath was one of the first companies last year to bring back physical events. We did it at the Bellagio last year, Lisa Martin and myself.  Back here in Vegas, David, talking about UiPath. UiPath is a company that had a very strange path, as I wrote one time to IPO. This company was founded in 2005 and it was basically a development shop. And then they realized they got lightning in a bottle with this RPA thing. And Daniel Dinez, the founder of the company, just really drove it hard. And they really didn't do any big kind of VC raise for several years. And all of a sudden, boom, the rocket ship took off, kind of really got out over their skis a little bit, but then got to IPO and has had a very successful sort of penetration into the market. The IPO obviously has not gone as well. We can talk about that, but they've hit a billion dollars in ARR. There aren't a lot of companies that, you know, have hit a billion dollars in ARR that quickly. These guys had massive valuations that were cut back, obviously, with the downturn, but also some execution miscues. But the one thing about UiPath, Dave, is they've been very successful at penetrating customers. And that's the thing you always get at forward, customer stories. And the other thing I'll add is that it started out with the narrative was, oh, automation, software robots, they're going to take away jobs. The opposite has happened. There's zero unemployment now, basically. We're heading into a recession. We're actually probably in a recession. And so, how do you combat a recession? You put automation to work and gain, if inflation is five to seven percent and you can get 20% from automation, well, it's a good ROI. But you sat in the keynotes. It was really your first exposure to the company. What were your thoughts? Yeah, I think the whole subject is interesting. I think if you've been involved in tech for a while, the first thing you think of is, well, hold on a second, isn't this just high tech scripting? Aren't you essentially just automating stuff? How cool could that possibly be? Well, it kind of was in the beginning. Yeah, yeah. But when you dig into it, to your point about the concern about displacing human beings, the first things that get automated are the mundane and the repetitive tasks, which then freeze individuals up, frontline individuals who are doing those tasks to do more strategic things for the business. So, one of the things that was talked about in the keynote was this idea of an army of citizen developers within an organization, not just folks who are innovating and automating at the core of enterprise applications, but also folks out on the front line automating the tasks that are interfering with their productivity. So it seems like it's a win-win for everybody throughout the enterprise. Yeah, so let's take folks through the keynotes. Basically, we learned there are 3,500 people here, roughly, we're in the Venetian and we do a lot of shows at the Venetian, formerly the Sands Convention Center. The one thing about UiPath, they are a cool company. Yeah, they are. Orange colors, kind of like Pure Storage, but they got the robots moving around. The setup is very nice. It's very welcoming and very cool, but 3,500 attendees, including partners and UiPath employees, 250 sessions. They've got a CIO Automation Council and a Pickleball Court inside this hall, which Pickleball is all the rage. So Bobby Patrick and Mary Tetlow kicked it off. Bobby's the CMO, Mary's the head of branding. And Bobby raised four themes. RPA is going from a tool to a way of operating and innovating. The second thing is, the big news here is the UiPath business platform, something like that, they're coming, but they're talking about platform and they're really super gluing that to digital transformation. The third is really outcomes shifting from tactical. I have a robot, a software robot on my desk doing mimicking what I do with the script to something that's transformative. We're seeing this operationalized very deeply. We'll go into some examples. And then the fourth theme is automation is being featured as a strategic line item in annual reports. Bobby Patrick, as he left the stage, I think he was commenting on my piece where I said that RPA automation is more discretionary than some other things. He said, this is not discretionary, it's strategic. You know, unfortunately, when you're heading into a recession, you can put off some of the more strategic items. However, the flip side of that Dave is as I was saying before, if you're looking at five to 7% inflation, maybe a way to attack that is with automation. Yeah, there's no question. There's no question that automation is a way to attack that. There's no question that automation is critical moving forward. There's no question that we have moved, we're still in the age of cloud but automation is going to be absolutely critical. The question is, what will UiPath's role be in that market? And when you hear UiPath talk about platform versus tool sets and things like that, that's a critical differentiator because if they are just a tool, then why wouldn't someone exploit a tool that is within an application environment instead of exploiting a platform? So what I'm going to be looking for in terms of the folks we talked to over the next few days is this question of, you know, make the case that this is actually a platform that extends across all kinds of application environments. If they can't seize that high ground moving forward, it's going to be tough for them. Well, they're betting the company on that. That's Rob Enslin coming in. That's why he's part of the equation. But that platform play is they are betting the company and the reason is, so the history here is in the early days of the sort of RPA craze, Automation Anywhere and UiPath went out. They both raised a ton of money. UiPath rocketed out to the lead. They had a much easier to install. You know, Automation Anywhere, Blue Prism, some of the old legacy business process folks, you know, kind of had on-prem, big stacks. UiPath came in a really simple self-serve platform and took off and really got a foothold in the market and then started building or making some of these acquisitions like Process Gold, like Cloud Elements, which is API automation, more recently, ReInfer, which is natural language processing. We heard them up on the stage today. And they've been putting that together to do not just RPA, but process mining, task mining, you know, document automation, et cetera. And so Rob Enslin was brought in from Google, formerly Google and SAP, to really provide that sort of financial and go-to-market expertise, as well as Shimgupta, who's the CFO. So they, and they were kind of late with that. They sort of did all this post-IPO. I wish they had done it, you know, somewhat beforehand, but they're sort of bringing in that adult supervision that's necessary. Rob Enslin, I thought, was very cogent. He was assertive on stage. He was really clear. He was energetic. He talked about the phases, ERP, internet, cloud, and then now automation is a new S-curve. He quoted a Forrester analyst talking about that. He also had a great quote. He said, you know, the old adage, better, faster, cheaper, pick two. Said you don't have to do that anymore with automation. He cited reports from analysts, 50% efficiency improvement, 40% productivity improvement, 40% improvement in customer satisfaction. And then, what I always, again, love about UiPath is there are no shortage of customers. They do as good a job as anybody. And I think I would say the best of getting customers to talk about their experiences. You'll see that on theCUBE all this week. Talked about Changi Airport from Singapore. They're adding 50, able to serve as 50 million new customers, new travelers with no new headcount company called Vital or Vital. And I say that 100,000 employees having access to it. Uber, 150% ROI in one year. New York state getting 1.2 million relief checks out in two weeks and identifying potentially $12 billion in fraud. They also talk about 25% of the UiPath finance team is digital and they've only incremented headcount, you know, very slightly one and a half times their revenues grown to about a 10x. And really, he talked about how to turn automation into a force multiplier for growth. And to your point, I think that's their challenge. What were your thoughts on Rob Enslin's keynote? First of all, in addition to his background, Rob brings a brand with him. Rob Enslin is a brand. And that brand is enterprise overarching platform. Someone you go to for that platform play, not for a tool set. And again, I'll say it again, it's critically important that they demonstrate this to the marketplace. That they are a platform worth embracing as opposed to simply a tool set. Because the large enterprise software providers are going to provide their own tool sets within their platforms. And if you can't convince someone that it's worth doing two things instead of one thing, you're never going to make it. So I've had experiences with Rob when he was at Google. He's the right person for the job. And I buy into his strategy and narrative about where we are in the critical nature of automation. Question remains, will UiPath be able to benefit from that trend? So a couple things on that. So your point about SAP is right on, EY was up on stage. EY is a huge SAP customer. And they chose UiPath to automate their SAP installation. And they're going all in with UiPath as a partner. Of course, I often like to say that the global system integrators, they like to eat at the trough. When you see GSIs like EY and others coming into the ecosystem, that means there's business being done. We saw Orange up on stage, which was really interesting. Pop the air from Spain. Yep, talking about, he had this really cool dashboard and then Ted Coomert was talking about the business automation platform and all the different chapters and the evolution. They've got to get to a platform play because the thing I failed to mention is Microsoft a couple of years ago made a token acquisition and got it to this market. Really providing individual automations. And making it, you know, it's Microsoft. They're going to make it really easy to add it really cheaply. SAP would tell you that they have the same thing. And then just grow from that. So UiPath has to pivot to a platform play. They started this back in 2019. But as you know, it takes a long time to integrate stuff, okay? So they're working through that. But this is, you know, Rob Enzlin put up on the slide. Go big, I tweeted. Took a page out of Michael Dell.  Final thoughts before we break. I think go big or go home is pretty much sums it up. I mean, this is an existential mission that UiPath is on right now, starting this day forward. They need to seize that high ground of platform versus tool set. Otherwise, they will never get beyond where they are now. I do want to mention too to folks in the audience, there's a huge difference between a billion dollar valuation and a billion dollars in revenue every year. So, you know, these guys have reached a milestone. There's no question about that. But to get to that next level, platform, platform, platform. And I know we'll be probing our guests on that question over the next couple of weeks. Yeah, and the key is obviously going to be keep servicing the customers. You know, all the financial machinations and, you know, they reduced yesterday their guidance from the high end being 25% error growth down to roughly 20% when you factor out currency conversions. UiPath has a lot of business overseas. They're taking that overseas revenue and converting it back to dollars. The dollars are appreciated, so there are less of them. I know this is kind of the inside baseball, but we're going to get into that over the next two days. Dave Vellante and Dave Nickson. You're watching theCUBE's coverage of UiPath Forward 5 from Las Vegas. We'll be right back right after this short break.


Welcome back to NPTEL, the National Program on Technology Enhanced Learning. As you are aware, these lectures are being brought to you by the Indian Institutes of Technology and the Indian Institute of Science. We are in module 4 of these series of lectures and you are aware that the fourth module is devoted entirely to literary criticism. We have several schools of criticism here, which we are going to talk about to discuss and we have already been through two of these and today the topic is Marxist literary criticism. In the last two lectures, we looked at some of the important postulations given by classical literary criticism and by liberal humanism and we are now today moving into a very important, if not the most important school of literary criticism, which has had a rich tradition and a long history. Before we go to Marxist literary criticism proper, it is very important for us to know what Marxism as an approach, as an ideology, well as a critical tool, as an analytical tool entails. Some of you we are sure are aware of the main postulates, the main theoretical, you could say the main propositions of Marxism as a whole, but let us at the beginning of today's lecture first look at what the main points in Marxism are. You are aware that the two most important figures in Marxism are Karl Marx and his collaborator Frederick Engels and you also aware that the most perhaps the most famous treatise by them written by them is entitled the Communist Manifesto. Now, what exactly is Marxism or as an approach and as said as a tool, as an analytical tool, studying society, politics, philosophy, literature. What are the most important things that we as students of language or literature ought to know. So, let us come to the first slide here, generally their approach is known as historical materialism. Now, we need to look at first at these two terms, historical and materialism or history and matter. Before we ask the important questions within historical materialism, we need to know what materialism is.  Here it is different. Idealism is usually understood versus another term in philosophy namely idealism. Now, obviously I cannot go you know into detail about these, but suffice it for us here to know that idealism is an approach is an is a school of thought is an ideology. So, to speak that looks you know or that considers the idea or the spirit as the most you know as a source source or whether it is life or the source of meaning or the source of our destinies. The one of the most important proponents of idealism was the German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel. Hegel believed in what is what he called the absolute spirit. He believed in a in a in a platonic sort of way. We know that Plato believed in forms that are eternal and this world being only a mere reflection of those eternal forms. Likewise, Hegel believed in the idea that everything emanated from an eternal idea idea with a capital I idea and that we are a mere reflection of that eternal idea or God or absolute spirit. On the other hand materialism completely rejects the idea or you know the idea or you know forms or God or absolute spirit as the source of all life, all meaning and all movement in history. Materialism holds that matter is supreme, that all meaning, all life, all social arrangements are destinies. So, to speak now here by destiny I do not mean the way we understand destiny in you know pre-ordained sort of a religious sort of ways that destiny simply how our lives are going to work themselves out. The source of all this is matter, more about that a while. So, suffice it for us to understand here at this stage simply with these two terms historical materialism that the source of all meaning the source of our life, the source of all our arrangements social economic political is matter and it has a historical, you know it has a history behind it. The kind of lives that we are leading here today is a result of history looked at from a material sense. So, you understand what materialism is that it is not being materialistic in the sense of liking you know fancy cars etcetera. So, let us look at the slide here what would historical materialism seek to study. Historical materialism seeks to study things like the organization and structure of societies. So, it would ask questions like how are societies organized and structured and second how do these societies develop and change. So, in the first case is really the structure and the organization of society and the second is society in motion. What leads to social change? Why do societies change? We know that societies do not remain the same social arrangements rules regulation norms etcetera. The kind of lives that we lead are you know these are never the same these change. So, Marxism true is historical materialist approach seeks to give us answers right. So, here we see in the slide that the structure of societies and the causes of change of societies the movement of societies the nature of their movement. These are you know basically speaking these are the things that are sought to be understood by Marxism as a whole as you know we have not yet moved into Marx's literary criticism. Next again the two very important terms in Marxism. So, we know that we are we study socio-cultural change structure, organization and change and we ask the question how why do societies change and what are the causes of social change right. So, Marx's health that among other things the forces of production those productive forces which contribute towards the production of our material lives right and the relations of production that is the relations of between you know or among people in the production process right among people are sorry are determined by or are related to so to speak to the forces of production. These together we understand as what they called what Marx called the mode of production that is every historical epoch is going to be characterized by a certain mode a certain mode of production or you could say a certain way of production. Now, let me give you a few examples what are these modes of production modes of production are as we know these are you know this really is a it is it is interesting that Marxism is both a micro and a micro theory. So, if you look at history, history is explained in Marxism as you know marked by different ways of production production of what production of essentially our material lives right. Now, examples here would be for instance ancient slavery in ancient slavery you had a certain way of production in feudalism you had a certain way of production where land was the most important factor and the relations of production essentially were you know may be characterized by two sort of binary you know binary opposite social state our life for instance the landlord and on the other hand the tenant who works on the land and on the landlords farm sorry. Now, these are relations of production which are sort of corresponding to the mode of production that is there in the time. So, social change is explained as you know a crisis so to speak happening in history during certain times when the forces of production are you know the forces of production are not sort of in sync with the relations of production when the forces of production are they develop at such a what are forces of production forces of production you know are different factors that go into the production process technology could be one science and technology for instance. And these are the social organization is such that they the social relations of production act as as Marx says act as chains or fetters on the forces of production the forces of production eventually sort of are free of free themselves from the social relations of production and society moves into you know if you if you want to understand this the understand the source of why society changes because the forces of production and relations of production are sort of at odds right and the forces of production you know sort of are free from the social relations of production and society moves on to another epoch. Then the next important terms are the base and the superstructure Marx argued that every in every society and every mode of production every epoch there is what we call we can have a two tier almost an architectural sort of metaphor is used here a two tier structure of you know and sort of an infrastructural base and the superstructure the base if you look at the slide here the base comprises again the forces of production and the relations of production the base is an economic base to put it very simply here of course the base is an economic base now Marx says that according to right this is very important according to the nature of the economic base there would arise corresponding superstructural elements now in the superstructure he said these are essentially to put it you know to use one term only for it is these are cultural elements for instance corresponding to now remember we are using words like corresponding to Marx never meant that these are deterministic that the base is completely going to determine he kept it more you know he gave it more space really and he understood the enormous complexity of the superstructural elements ok. So, he says that these are determined by all these correspond to right the economic base and here we find the legal system for instance then social very important social institution like the family, religion, education and eventually our consciousness now when we study Marx's literary criticism what are we going to do where are we going to place the literary text it is obvious to us that the literary text would be in the superstructure my correct here the products art for instance the products of our consciousness right like art will also be related to the economic base that is the forces of production and the relations of production or what we may call the mode of production this is very important for us to understand before we go to study what Marx's literary criticism is again to quickly recapitulate Marxism studies or Marxism the aim of Marxism is to study the organization and structure of society. Second to study how societies and why societies change how they develop from one epoch to another we call it historical materialism because we understand the past in terms of our in relation to in very important relation to history or to the present to history that is the present is always determined by history and you know we do away with the idealist Hegelian way of looking at the idea is the most important source of everything and here the idea is replaced by matter. So our material economic arrangements right give rise which is the base give rise to the superstructural elements in our culture among which we find art also or being a very important part. So Marx lay great importance on social consciousness right for instance as we will find later on he said that our consciousness does not determine you know the kind of societies we have, but it is the kind of societies we have that eventually or that will always determine the kind of consciousness that we have. Here when we say consciousness we do not mean simply you know aware you know as being conscious or as being aware of things right. We mean by consciousness here we mean really our everything our mental consciousness, our emotional consciousness, our intellectual consciousness, our moral consciousness right. So all our norms or so called virtues or so called you know evil aspects or you know everything that is part of our consciousness our ideas of good and bad, our ideas of for instance the best social and the best economic or the best political arrangement. Our ideas of the best literary texts for instance these are all to be understood in the term consciousness here it is not just being like I am conscious or I am aware of my surroundings in a sort of cognitive sort of way. So let us read from this slide which will make this first point clear to us. When we talk about historical materialism we have to remember these words from Marxism that men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please. They do not make it under circumstances chosen by themselves, but under circumstances directly found given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all the death generations ways like a nightmare on the brain of the living. Now we obviously these are these words are beautifully put this says that we there is no doubt we make our own history or we make our own destinies, but the past plays most important part in sort of the carving out of our destinies or of our histories. Now we are going to move into Marx's literary criticism proper and what I have done in this lecture is obviously there are several ways you know in which you can or we could talk about Marx's literary criticism. Sometimes we can just refer to one book for instance Terry Gildon's very important book on Marx's literary criticism. What I have done here however is I have tried you know tried to bring to you some of the important formulations commenced in pronouncements on Marx's literary criticism from a couple of sources in a bit to enrich our understanding of Marxism. And in that with that view in mind we have first a quotation from Klekinov who says that the social mentality of an age is conditioned by that age's social relations. This is nowhere quite as evident as in the history of art and literature. We talked about social relations of production just a while ago when we referred to the two very important terms the forces of production and the social relations of production in Marxism. Now this is how we move into literary criticism from Marxism and one of the better ways is to put it through Klekinov for instance what does he say? He says here that the social mentality of any age is conditioned or is determined by the social relations of that age. This is a point also when we saw when we talked about the base and the superstructure the base. Now here Klekinov lays more importance on the social relations of production. He says that the social relations of production now again what is the social relations of production? Simply put for instance in a capitalist system the worker the worker and the owner of the means of production the capitalist that is a relation social relation of production. The relation between or among workers that also is a relation of production which is determined by the way the production process is arranged is very important and the economic mode of production that is all and the forces the nature of the forces of production even the degree of development of the forces of production. Now the social relations condition the kind of mentality now this mentality is also related to the word consciousness that we found a while ago. So, Klekinov says that you know how are we to gauge how are we to understand the nature even the complexities of the social mentality of any age. He says you only need to look at the art particularly the literature of a certain period. The literature of a certain period is more or less going to tell you what the social mentality of that particular epoch was like. Now, obviously it is not so simple as that all the literary texts of a certain age is going to be reflective of its social relations. It is of course, far more complex and it should be so, but if we have to theorize on the nature of the literary text in relation to the mentality social collective mentality of a particular period then we can safely say that the literature of a period shows us the social mentality in all again qualifying it in all its complexities, in all its different hues, in all its problem takes of that arises from the social relations of that particular epoch. And go back where does the social relation come from, where do the social relations of a particular age come from they eventually come from the mode of production or the economic arrangement.  Now, from this slide really what we have done is we have begun to relate the literary text to Marx's propositions or to Marx's statements. To follow I hope this is this is an important point here in important juncture in our lecture today. So, we talked about historical materialism based on superstructure, forces of production, and we come to the we have come to the literary text as being you know as being a complex indicator so to speak of the social mentality that arises from the social relations and the economic relations of an age. So, this really is one of you know the part of theorizing of the literary text in relation to Marxism. Now, we will go straight to a quotation from Karl Marx himself from the Grunerys. Now, many say that Marx and also Engels did not really you know talk so much about the literary text about literature. Whatever you find are more or less sort of sporadic there are more collections on Marx and Engels on literature and art for instance, but it is said that their main focus was not obviously the literary text, but you know there are some brilliant insights that we get particularly from Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. When you look at some whenever or wherever they do talk about literature, art and its relation you know their relation to you know to social relations and forces of production the modes of production. We find some brilliant insights that are given which are then taken up by other scholars who practice criticism or theory from a Marxist perspective. One such quotation and this is something that is oft quoted is from the Grunerys. Now, let us read from here. Marx asks this question is Achilles possible when powder and shot have been invented and is the Iliad possible at all when the printing press and even printing machines exist. So, here first we find that Marx is through you know asking these questions is actually making a statement that in a time when there was the printing machine and the printing press, epics like the Iliad by Homer would not have been possible. In a way what is he saying? He is, see he is tying the literary text and epic to the material realities of its time by contrasting it the material realities of the time of Homer to the material realities of England for instance during the time of the printing press of the time of Jackson. He is proposing this that an epic like the Iliad would not have been written in a time of the printing press. The time of the printing press is also the time of the beginning of you know the rise of the middle class which is again important for the rise of the novel. So, the epic now takes a new form which is the novel in a time which is you know in a time which is very different not just you know not just as you know not not from the point of view of the ideas that were you know extend during the time, but also from the point of view of the material conditions. Let us read this again. Is Achilles possible when powder and gunshot have been invented and is the Iliad possible at all when the printing press and even printing machines exist? Is it now he asks is it not inevitable that with the emergence of the press bar the singing and the telling and the muse sees that is the conditions necessary look at this the conditions necessary for epic poetry disappear. In this question really he is giving us a statement that the way of the epic the nature of the epic is bound to disappear with the changes that are or with the disappearance of a certain material way of life. Do you understand he says singing the telling and the muse these sees to exist these factors of the epic these sees to exist you know with the emergence of the press. So now again this is yet another example of how materialism is then in this sense understood as the source of what even a of even the genre. How many changes in material lives can also change or in material conditions can also change the very genre of literary text. Then it is often argued that you know with Marxism a way of writing which is a realist mode is deeply entwined. Now Marx says and Engels demands on the artist now most of what I am reading here is from Terry Eagleton. Marxist and Engels demands on the artist include truthfulness of depiction almost a very similitude truthfulness of depiction a concrete historical approach to the events described and personages with live and individual traits reflecting typical aspects of the character and psychology of the class milieu to which they belong. So there is a certain not a mere reflectionism not a simplistic reflectionism, but you know from a Marxist point of view we would expect that the characters that are depicted in a novel for instance which is again you know which is again constrained by time and space you know where we know from which social milieu these characters come from at the time during which the time of the setting of a novel for instance Marx and Engels required or Marxism requires that the artist be faithful in his depictions or depictions of the characters and says the characters where even the individual traits of individual characters have to correspond to a certain type that was you know that was characteristic of a certain time. Now let us quickly read this again Marx and Engels demands on the artist include truthfulness of depiction a concrete historical approach to the events described and personages with live and individual traits reflecting typical aspects of the character and psychology of the class milieu to which they belong. The author of genuinely realistic works communicates his ideas to the reader not by didactic philosophizing right, but by vivid images which affect the readers consciousness and feelings by their artistic expressiveness. This word is very important here didactic there are many you know many scholars who are how shall we put it who are who are anti Marxist or who do not who argue against Marxist literary criticism importantly by saying that Marxist literary Marxist literary criticism is didactic right. So, in the sense that it is as they say too ideological right that it is almost again propagandist, but as Engels says Marxist literary criticism expects right a that the artist when he or she is you know is catching his characters delineating events for instance a be true to the actualities of those times and instead of philosophizing in a didactic or even in a doctrina fashion right would with vivid realist or realistic images right express their ideas or you know have the literary piece come out as an artistic expression which is far above the you know the didactic or moralizing philosophy that one would expect. This is very important what this also suggests that Marxist literary criticism was not looking for propagandist kind of literature it only asks that there be a connection there be not simply a connection, but there be a faithful you know depiction of the time and the types of characters that that were or are there in a particular in a particular stretch of time or space. Now, let me quote from Jauss his essay literary history as a challenge to literary theory because here it he makes an important distinction he talks about Marxism by making an important distinction between another school of thought that your many of us are here aware of that is a formalism particularly of the Russian school. Now, he says that the formalist school needs the reader only as a perceiving subject right who follows the directions in the text in order to perceive its form or discover its techniques or of procedure as you know form was enormously important in Russian formalism that is why the word formalism right form and he says that it is only enough for the reader to kind of discover you know the techniques or the formal aspects take joy and pleasure in sort of unraveling the you know identifying the formalist nature of you know formalist elements in a text. It assumes that the reader has the theoretical knowledge of a philologist sufficiently versed in the tools of literature to be able to reflect on them. So, you one expects that the reader should be in formalism should be well acquainted with you know the various tools or tools of analyzing literary text and should be able to discover so to speak the beauty of the formal elements. On the other hand he says the Marxist school on the other hand actually equates the spontaneous experiences is important where here the reader is assumed to be you know as he says sufficiently well versed or well trained in understanding the literary text, but on the other hand he says on the Marxist school actually equates to look at this word here the spontaneous experience of the reader with the scholarly interest of historical materialism. Now, by spontaneous we are not stopping at simply spontaneously experiencing a literary text along with one's spontaneous responsible literary text. One also expects the reader to bring in his or her scholarly interest of historical materialism which again let us read which seeks to discover relationships between now this is most important discover here you discover the form or the technique and take sort of you know take pleasure out of you know discovering the you know the nuances of technique and procedure. On the other hand in the Marxist you know approach what we do is we discover not the formal elements, but let us look at this here seeks to discover the relationships between the economic basis of production and the literary work as part of the intellectual superstructure. This I need you to really look at very carefully because it is really I bought in Niels's words you know it is because really I think he strikes the right code by saying that it is there is not that Marxist literary criticism engages itself only with kind of an archival work or almost you could say an even an architectural sort of work where you are trying to dig out history and trying to make you know a correlations between the text and you know the or the text position in his in space and time says no there is great joy this great spontaneity of the reader and when the reader is equipped with understanding the historical realities of the text. Then the pleasure the so called readerly pleasure of you know or the pleasure reading a text comes when you discover he says the relationship here between the economic basis of a particular age of or you know and its production process and the literary work as remember the part of the part of what part of the consciousness the cultural consciousness of a time or what he calls here the intellectual part of the intellectual production of the superstructure. This is very important for us to understand again what the three scholars we saw here a Plekhanov a of course, Marx himself when he asks the question would the Iliad have been possible or why on the other hand why is an epic not the most important genre during say for do you say the say 18th century England. It is because the material conditions have changed second we looked at Giorgi Plekhanov who said that the social mentality of an age is related to its social relations and we also know that the social relations are related to the forces of production of the economic arrangements and he claimed that nowhere is this relation most well you know sort of demonstrated than in the art and literature of a time. Then we found through Thierry Eagleton when he talks you know when he talks about the literary text here when he talks about when he talks about realism and he talks about the importance or even the expectation in Marxist literary criticism that there has should be you know a faithful depiction of characters you know of setting right according to the historical time in which the text is set. Then we came to Jaus who talks about who compares Marxist literary criticism and the formalist school and says that where as in the formalist school we try to unravel you know we try to get pleasure you know in the reading process by unraveling the formal structures of a text by unraveling you know the procedures that have been used. In contrast to that in Marxist literary criticism we have you know the spontaneous reading of a text tied to an understanding of the historical realities of that text and understanding a text a writer as you know part of the superstructural elements of any age as it says here to discover the relationship between the economic base of production and the literary work as part of the intellectual superstructure. These are immensely important formulations I would really say these are the core formulations that those of you who are beginning Marxist literary criticism we know this lecture is really a basic level lecture in a basic level course that has been designed for students particularly in engineering colleges who have their first exposure to language and literature. It is important for us to understand this systematically to find out what Marxism says a about society about social change in organization and b where the literary text lies as far as the entire Marxist framework is concerned. What according to them is the function of the literary text and secondly you know how is a reader to approach a literary text how is a reader to understand or perceive a literary text and we saw this in contrast to the formalist school. Then coming back to Terry Eagleton and again quoting from Marxism and literary criticism Eagleton says art and literature were part of the very air Marx breathed as a formatively cultured German intellectual in the great classical tradition of his society right Marx in fact some of you may not know Marx also had written poetry right and he had he had great he had great admiration for you know for the greatest of the writers like Shakespeare for instance and if you read Das Kapital and then some of his other works you will be surprised to find excuse me the literary allusions that we find in his text. We find here evidence of the accidentally fine mind who was not simply looking only you know you know only to make certain theoretical formulations on economics on culture on you know culture in the sense of the material lives that we lead. But we find here a person who was also you know also so well versed in literature and some of his writings really read like we saw in the example from Bruneris really you know read so you know read so beautifully when we look at them from an aesthetic point of view. Now Eagleton therefore says that art and literature he describes the milieu in which Marx was was writing art and literature were part of the very air Marx breathed as a formatively cultured German intellectual in the great classical tradition of his society. His acquaintance with literature from Sophocles to the Spanish novel Lucretius to pot boiling English fiction was staggering in its scope. The German workers circle he founded in Brussels devoted an evening a week to discussing the arts and Marx himself was an inveterate theater goer the claimer of poetry devourer of every species of literary art from Augustine prose to industrial ballads. This is Eagleton giving us the background of how Marx was also steeped among other things in literature. Then we come to a million Trotsky here because here we find you know how should I put it a variant of Marx's literary criticism that was you know that many feel was deeply a deeply polemical almost so to speak you know propagandist. So what I want to do here is you know bring to you what Trotsky kind of argued for in his seminal book literature and revolution published in 1924. So this kind of Trotsky's variant of Marx's literary criticism comes in for quite some flag from you know people who are who do not really follow the Marxist school of thought. Now let us look at the slide here Trotsky literature and revolution says that you know when one practices literary criticism one needs to one needs to lay focus on not you know the formal aspects not on you know the didactic aspects of the philosophy in the philosophy in there not on the so called spiritual aspects of a text he says that our job is to be polemical to be problematic to be interventionist. So that when we perform literary criticism on a text we are not simply looking at certainly not just a description of what the text is saying we are not looking at this formal aspects we need to be interventionist literary critic needs to intervene in the text in order to show the inequalities that are there in society in order to foreground the exploitation that is there in society hence called polemical or interventionist. So he says let us look at the slide again literary criticism should be polemical should be interventionist the literary critic should eventually help in giving shape to to to cultural policy to social policy and one should declare this is very important with Trotsky and one should declare what one stands on art and sorry culture is one should also declares one declares one's intellectual position right. So Trotsky here was very clear on the job so to speak or the function of a writer or sorry of a critic. So Trotsky says that culture feeds on the sap of economics and the material surplus is necessary so that culture may grow develop and become subtle he says in the social roots and the social function of literature that our Marxist conception of the objective social dependence and social utility of art when translated into the language of politics does not at all mean a desire to dominate art by means of decrease and orders. Culture is Trotsky seeking to defend his view of what Marxist criticism ought to be like he says we just because we want to study the objective social dependence and the social utility of art does not make does not mean that it is propagandist. So we will stop here indeed there is so much else to talk about I could only bring just a few critics here we should have also looked at Lucache and his theory of the novel and we could have also looked at some of you know a way in which some of the texts may be looked at from you know an actual text would have been decoded from a Marxist perspective. What I wanted to do is first to bring to you some of the you know the very core very elementary things that we should know about Marxism because you cannot go straight to Marxist literary criticism without knowing what Marx had to say about society about the organization structural society and though and why you know social you know social change happens in the first place and we therefore, saw well let me let me now you know pose some questions right. So, that we can we do this recap by posing some questions for instance if I ask you a question like this how did Marx look at social structure and social change how we going to answer that question one of the ways in which to answer this question obviously is to say that Marxism is an approach which is historical which is materialist. Then we go on to say the importance talk about the importance of history in Marxism in general in Marxist general theory in particular and we say that the source the source of meaning the source of you know understanding a literary text the source of our social lives our cultural arrangements the source of the kind of the nature of our social relations that we have and eventually the source of the literary text is not you know is not something that is you know that is that is sort of outside of the material world that we live in the source is not the idea we have to go beyond the idea and say that our social consciousness our literary consciousness comes from matter that is the most important thing matter in the sense of the way our material lives are arranged right. The way ways in which the economic base works right the rules and regulations which determine the production the distribution and consumption of material goods that leads to as we understood a superstructure right that base leads to a superstructure and that superstructure is conditioned though of course in very complex ways by the economic base and what was what is entailed in the superstructure in the superstructure we found are entailed social institutions like the family like religion like education and consciousness art literature second if you know we if we ask how is sort of how is the literary text the social mentality of an age and third the social relations of an age how are these related then we take recourse to Lekhanov's words for instance and we say that Marx's literary text looks at the social mentality Marx's literary criticism looks at the social mentality of an age as being best demonstrated or indicated so to speak by art and literature art and literature are the best best vehicle so to speak of the social mentality of an age now that social mentality is again related to the social relations of productions that are there at a certain given point of time and finally the social relations of production are determined by why what the way the economic arrangement is done in society to follow then next we may ask a question like what is you know we can ask what is you know the mode of writing that is most conducive so to speak to Marx's literary criticism or that is expected from a writer and we say that the realist mode is the mode of writing that is most conducive to an artist according to Marx's literary criticism and the realist mode demands this from an artist that he or she does not sort of go away from the type of characters that are possible in a certain age or in a certain given socio-cultural milieu we cannot move away from that if we have to be faithful to our depiction you know or in our depiction of characters and setting the setting should also reflect so to speak in however problematic and complex way should be reflective of the actual material conditions that were extant in that time so this is demanded from the and in this case it is really perhaps the realist novel the realist novel that you know is the best exemplar of what Marx's literary criticism expects a writer to do so that was what and we also remember Marx saying in the Brunerist that the epic is not sort of possible of course one can self consciously write you take say that well I am in the 21st century and I am going to write an epic we are not talking about that the epic is in a different sense not possible in a time where for instance there is a printing press and where material conditions are very different from say ancient Greece for instance and then in there we saw he said that the Iliad is not possible you know the characters like Achilles are not possible in a time when the material conditions are very different it is very important for us you know there are many critiques of what is called the vulgar school of Marxist criticism in the sense that in the sense that one always expects one always expects a propagandist kind of writing while we are always you know for instance the worker is you know the worker is shown to be to be in a very simplistic way the finest of characters whereas the for instance the capitalist is shown to be in a way the characters are not fleshed out there are no complexities that is the vulgar kind of Marxist criticism that many have perhaps rightly so attacked we also looked at Trotsky and literature and revolution one of you know the classic pieces in Marxist literary criticism and one that has been attacked also a lot by scholars who are against Marxist literary criticism by pointing to the fact that he always asked for interventionist you know an interventionist mode by the literary critic and by the artist for polemics for you know eventually shaping cultural policy right but Trotsky himself says that well just because we want to find out the you know you know and sort of scientific systematic objective we want to carry out an objective inquiry through the literary text into the socio-cultural relations of production into the economic base does not mean that we are doing it in a doctrinaire sort of way right. So, there is perhaps sought a balance between you know the pleasure of reading a text for its own sake and of course bringing in social change by showing the way the text willingly or unwillingly reveals the social inequalities and the realities of exploitation of a certain age. So, these are some of the questions that are important that may come up well there is indeed so much else to talk about as far as Marxist literary criticism is concerned but stay with this it is enough for us at this juncture to simply look at these important points this say foundational points that we have raised in our lecture and in the next lecture we shall move on with another school of criticism thank you for now see you next time.