Tardis

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Tardis
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What Keep Their Lines Alive was the second story in The Book of the Peace.

Summary[]

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Notes[]

  • This story received an interlude, titled A Scene, in The Book of the Peace Dossier. The vignette's title has a hidden meaning in that the list of locations it gives (forest, grassland, sky) gives an order of book of A lines in What Keeps Their Lines Alive that unite into the "A scene", hinting at events after the end of the story.
  • The story was accompanied in the author-curated Spotify playlist by the songs Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie by Joanna Newsom, Then the Morning Comes by Smash Mouth, and Solitude Standing by Suzanne Vega.[1] Then the Morning Comes was intended to be the "background track" for Cá Bảy Màu.[2]
  • The story was inspired by Bertolt Brecht's dialectical theatre, particularly St Joan of the Stockyards; the title is a reference to the line "What keeps mankind alive?" in The Threepenny Opera.[2]
  • A large number of pop culture sources are referenced through interpolated phrasing or otherwise inspired lines: Amanda Palmer's "Bed Song"; Borges' The Garden of Forking Paths; David Bowie's "Lady Grinning Soul"; Shoujo Kakumei Utena; Hedwig and the Angry Inch; Legally Blonde: The Musical; Addams Family Values; and Undertale.[2]

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