Steiner and the Hypnotic Cue

Preface

Steiner and the Hypnotic Cue was written to develop the corpus of internal scripts in the English Department at Hillside School. The purpose of said scripts being to inform and inspire further writings.

The story is a collaborative piece, initially commissioned by David Noble. Robert O’Neill joined the project and developed many of the themes within the story, within the structure developed by Steiner Sanderson. David Noble added content to the work and Marie Laing did some early reading of the script to test for flow and integrity.

Pitched at students twelve and up, it is hoped that there is enough depth in the story to entertain across the age ranges, and that adults can glean from it

The ‘Cue’ discusses theurgic and thaumaturgic ‘Magic’, which can be found in the various philosophies of Wicca,  Thelema/Hermeticism or Cabbala. Our protagonist work changes in his environment, and undergoes a process of inner transformation throughout the story.

The work is accommodated most easily in the fantasy genre. Places, characters and times are rooted in reality, unlike, say,  the Harry Potter series, that have ‘fairy-story’ magic and events. Of course, Rowling grounded her story in a large number of genuine places and occult facts, much to the chagrin of Conservative Christians, who see Rowling enticing the young and impressionable into paganism and witchcraft.

Inducement into magic/witchcraft is not the aim of the novel; thus,  an opposing view is presented, represented by the sudden appearance of a female Charismatic, who pronounces judgement. She functions almost as a Deus ex Machina.  (A technique oft used by Rowling herself.) Yet, the scenario depicted realistically reflects many ‘street encounters’ with evangelicals and other proselytisers, and is essential to the narrative.  Both  Pagan and Christian viewpoints are opposed  by one of the central characters, who regurgitates the stock-in-trade diatribes  found in the endless atheistic websites and books that proliferate the media, repeating ad nauseam Epicurus’ scepticism.

The tale is told from the Protagonist’s POV, Steiner, in the first person. Steiner also functions as major  antagonist as he operates secretly and stubbornly, creating many of the plot conflicts.

The style and tone pay homage to the gossipy  narrative of Gibbon’s Sunset Song and the Satire of Saki’s Short Stories.

Thematically woven into the fantasy, religious and adventure narratives, the Cue explores the power of language to condition thought, and behaviour, and provide emotional security. The psychological framework for this was gleaned from Semiotics, Transactional Analysis Scripts, Hypnotic Word weaving and NLP.

No attempt at uniqueness is intended, as this tact has a long pedigree in story-writing, and has been made  famous by A. Huxley,  G. Orwell and Philip K. Dick. The narrative machinery is forced along as our protagonist interacts with his conditioning, which help, hinder and betray him in turn, leaving him with the awful prospective of engaging in independent thought. Indeed, it can be said that ‘The Hypnotic Cue’, is a pun as the story’s characters live out their lives in response to various hypnotic cues.

Hermeneutically  expanded,  ‘The Hypnotic Cue’ functions as an analogy, or allegory, describing humanity’s  ‘programming’, even ‘imprisonment’, to the various ‘Cues’ in our lives.

Similarly, the opposing philosophical themes function almost like a historical allegory:  The Occult (Paganism) is overpowered by Christianity, which is then attacked by Atheism.

The plot  is simple, but the story is not simplistic. Readers should be able to extract from the story what they bring to it. This becomes more acute when encountering the satirical and opposing philosophical viewpoints embedded in the story.

It is told without excessive moralising.

It is hoped that the reader derives enjoyment from the story, and appreciates the hours of effort involved.

Enjoy!

Robert O’Neill