stopped, and turned to look at Anna. “What happens to us when the text reverts to the original?” Pam asked. “When we ‘scrape it clean.’” Anna was silent. Pawnee looked queasy. “We’re sacrificing ourselves, aren’t we?” Pam said. “That’s what you’re asking of us. Or, at least, that’s what you’re asking of me. I imagine you’ll be just fine; you can probably use your mysterious dyslexia powers to slide into that story, no problem. But what happens to me, my self, if everything was erased? If I had to guess, I’d say that that other Pam and I don’t have too much in common. If only one of us was going to live in that other world, I don’t think it’d be me. And if that Pam and I… I don’t know, blend consciousnesses or some sci-fi bullshit, that’s still not me! Let’s just call it what it is: you’re asking me to give up my life so you can restore things to your definition of what ‘should be.’” “Yes,” Anna said simply, “that’s what I’m asking. But it would be a noble sacrifice. Everyone in this world is suffering,” she continued, getting more heated, “for the sake of cheap jokes. People are hurt. Dozens of people are dead who shouldn’t be! And we can fix that!” “What about the people who aren’t dead, Anna? Your father, the firefighter? My mother, the disgraced railroad tycoon who cosplays as Mikhail Gorbachev? And yes, as I’m saying that, I realize how ridiculous it is, but is her ridiculous life worth less than this imaginary other version of her?” “I need to sit down for a moment…” Pawnee said, sinking to the ground and closing her eyes. “And what about Pawnee?” Pam demanded of Anna. “Where does she end up in all this? She doesn’t exist at all in the other story. Without this book as it is now, she’s fucking dead. You say she’ll be the ‘new ape’ or what-the-fuck-ever, but what does that really mean? For her as a person, not as a metaphor or a device.” “It’s not that simple,” Anna said. “We’re not erasing, remember, we’re resetting. And we need a catalyst, something that bridges the two worlds, in order to start the reaction [Interesting. I should have known better than to think that my digression on page 21 could possibly be an inconsequential, one-off joke. It all comes back around. Always. Pawnee is the pharmakon. She is simultaneously the remedy and the poison — both of this “tainted” world and that “pure” one, yet at the same time of neither world. She is a representative of both, she represents both, but therefore represents neither; represents nothing but representation. And that’s how Anna can use her. In being of the pharmakon (in other words, pharmaceutical), Pawnee is analogous to that other infinitely empty signifier: writing itself. That fact that she herself is written, that she is a part of the very structure she defines/defies, only makes the analogy more fitting. Under Anna’s guidance, Pawnee can turn herself inside-out; and, consequently, turn the text inside-out. Make the outside retreat inside, and once more restore the inside to the outside. Or, of course, she’s just as capable of doing the opposite. Of being the poison instead of the remedy. As I set out on page 21, writing itself is a pharmakon, yes, but also a mimesis. An empty, false imitation of speech. A simulacrum of speech’s simulation. But Pawnee is wholly original. Despite — or due to — being a combination of two mimetic lies, she becomes something completely new, completely true. Of both worlds, but also of neither. Not a copy of anything (note: this isn’t the same as being a copy of nothing), a facile non-facsimile, an object with no Platonic ideal, she is the antithesis of writing. Not at an infinite remove from truth, but something beyond truth. If she plays her cards wrong (i.e. only plays at play instead of putting it into play), she could, instead of turning the text inside-out, in fact turn inside-out-ness itself inside-out. Which would be, for lack of a better word, not fuckin’ great. Anna, you’re playing a dangerous game. Because in using Pawnee as a pharmakon, you’re making her a pharmakos. Pharmakos, φαρμακός, a concept roughly equivalent to a scapegoat. In ancient Greece, a pharmakos was a person who was taken outside the city and executed. Sacrificed. Some cities only performed this rite in times of crisis, as a catharsis. In Athens, it happened every year on the sixth day of the Thargelia — Socrates’ birthday. The Greeks believed that the death of the pharmakos would facilitate the purification of the city. By sacrilizing the victim, the community was able to turn its violence inside-out, and this inversion from effect to cause repeated, mimicked, that initial sacrificial turn that enabled the very oppositions of inside/outside, before/after, and even cause/effect itself. In ritual of the pharmakos, the city both closed itself to the outside and opened itself. Closed, obviously, by differentiating the other, thus solidifying the self. He was evil, trouble, pestilence incarnate. He is gone now, so we who are still inside the walls are good, safe, prosperous. And yet, at the same time, it was he (through his expulsion) who allowed the safety to come about. Therefore, he must be honored, venerated. He is sacred. An embodiment of the poison, while simultaneously the cure that drives out the poison — sound familiar? And it is precisely this role that Anna is forcing Pawnee to play. Pharmakon by virtue of being pharmakos. Does Pawnee know that this is her fate? More importantly, if she did, would she agree to it? Now let’s uncover (or should I say dis-cover?) another link in the chain of signification.] #DetectivePony
