RJM Corbet
Deus Pascus Corvus
Ok, so I have finished writing my book 'ERLOS' and here is the introduction:
ERLOS
By RJM Corbet
Introduction
Douglas Perry was born with a part of the back of his skull missing. The back of his head looked strangely caved in. His breath did not smell good and his eyes were small black pebbles that glittered with intensity. He was a quiet person. It was the intensity of a brave spirit limited by a deficient physiology. There was an air of melancholy acceptance rather than self-pity about him. Perhaps it was just his natural state of mind. Anyway I never saw Douglas smile.
His parents had provided a home for him at a private institution for adults with autistic and other mental difficulties. It was on a farm outside the small, dry town of Malmsbury near Cape Town. I know little about his parents or his early life though it was clear he loved them and they were concerned about his wellbeing during his short adult life upon this world, while he waited for Erlos to rescue him.
At the time, I was writing an article about the farm for a magazine. Douglas meanwhile, was looking for someone to write his story.
The farm with its plain vegetarian lifestyle and philosophy provided few frills for those who lived there. It wasn’t a bad place. The residents worked in the fields growing much of what they ate together at a communal table. There was the usual drab institutional TV lounge with old magazines, playing cards and board games. There was a common room where they could play table tennis and a darts. There was a small library for those who could read and there was a chapel.
Douglas’s own room contained a narrow bed, a cupboard and a hard backed chair. There was a single bookshelf, a cheap transistor radio, and a cheap pine desk with a portable typewriter on it. Such was his world. It was a few square meters on planet Earth that he could call his own. He was often tired and often distant in thought and suffered terrible headaches but never showed any sign of boredom or lack of respect toward the mentally damaged people with whom he was compelled to live.
‘Distant, I hear my name, and it becomes my whole life’s work to journey towards that voice, and all the million broken, fading parts move as they can toward that name -- Obekallah -- and pieces begin to come together in old familiar patterns, bits of myself, stronger, like streams that join and flow together, becoming a mighty river that at last finds the sea, the final explanatory whole.’
I promised Douglas to see what I could do and he lent me some of his notes to take home. I visited him from time to time over the next few years and, in the age before computers, we stayed in touch with letters and phone calls until one day he phoned to tell me that we would not see each other again. He told me that Erlos was coming to take him home, and wished me good luck with writing the story. After that, for many years, my own life took its own turns, not always good, away from writing, but Douglas was never far from my thoughts and for years his story kept going round and around in my head.
Now after many false starts here is the story of Douglas Perry/ Eldrinda Benkilte of Erlos. Some of his original writings are included in an appendix at the end of this book. In using these documents as partial material for Erlos, I’ve essentially needed to condense several stories into one. Whether or not this has been a wise choice and whether I’ve taken too much of a liberty in doing so only he could know. I have, however, kept all the original the original documents that have survived. Unfortunately many of his letters have gone missing as a result of the many changes and movements in my own life over the intervening decades.
Erlos has not been an easy book to write: even knowing where to begin. I ask you to bear in mind that this is always Douglas Perry’s story, written in the form of a novel as he himself tried to present it, rather than a biography.
I ask you to remember also that Douglas had part of his brain missing from birth. Even without this obstacle to mental clarity, he was always trying to recall these events through what he referred to as ‘layers’.
ERLOS
By RJM Corbet
Introduction
Douglas Perry was born with a part of the back of his skull missing. The back of his head looked strangely caved in. His breath did not smell good and his eyes were small black pebbles that glittered with intensity. He was a quiet person. It was the intensity of a brave spirit limited by a deficient physiology. There was an air of melancholy acceptance rather than self-pity about him. Perhaps it was just his natural state of mind. Anyway I never saw Douglas smile.
His parents had provided a home for him at a private institution for adults with autistic and other mental difficulties. It was on a farm outside the small, dry town of Malmsbury near Cape Town. I know little about his parents or his early life though it was clear he loved them and they were concerned about his wellbeing during his short adult life upon this world, while he waited for Erlos to rescue him.
At the time, I was writing an article about the farm for a magazine. Douglas meanwhile, was looking for someone to write his story.
The farm with its plain vegetarian lifestyle and philosophy provided few frills for those who lived there. It wasn’t a bad place. The residents worked in the fields growing much of what they ate together at a communal table. There was the usual drab institutional TV lounge with old magazines, playing cards and board games. There was a common room where they could play table tennis and a darts. There was a small library for those who could read and there was a chapel.
Douglas’s own room contained a narrow bed, a cupboard and a hard backed chair. There was a single bookshelf, a cheap transistor radio, and a cheap pine desk with a portable typewriter on it. Such was his world. It was a few square meters on planet Earth that he could call his own. He was often tired and often distant in thought and suffered terrible headaches but never showed any sign of boredom or lack of respect toward the mentally damaged people with whom he was compelled to live.
‘Distant, I hear my name, and it becomes my whole life’s work to journey towards that voice, and all the million broken, fading parts move as they can toward that name -- Obekallah -- and pieces begin to come together in old familiar patterns, bits of myself, stronger, like streams that join and flow together, becoming a mighty river that at last finds the sea, the final explanatory whole.’
I promised Douglas to see what I could do and he lent me some of his notes to take home. I visited him from time to time over the next few years and, in the age before computers, we stayed in touch with letters and phone calls until one day he phoned to tell me that we would not see each other again. He told me that Erlos was coming to take him home, and wished me good luck with writing the story. After that, for many years, my own life took its own turns, not always good, away from writing, but Douglas was never far from my thoughts and for years his story kept going round and around in my head.
Now after many false starts here is the story of Douglas Perry/ Eldrinda Benkilte of Erlos. Some of his original writings are included in an appendix at the end of this book. In using these documents as partial material for Erlos, I’ve essentially needed to condense several stories into one. Whether or not this has been a wise choice and whether I’ve taken too much of a liberty in doing so only he could know. I have, however, kept all the original the original documents that have survived. Unfortunately many of his letters have gone missing as a result of the many changes and movements in my own life over the intervening decades.
Erlos has not been an easy book to write: even knowing where to begin. I ask you to bear in mind that this is always Douglas Perry’s story, written in the form of a novel as he himself tried to present it, rather than a biography.
I ask you to remember also that Douglas had part of his brain missing from birth. Even without this obstacle to mental clarity, he was always trying to recall these events through what he referred to as ‘layers’.
