Over break, I started Rabid: A Cultural History of the World’s Most Diabolical Virus and I must say it’s one of the most brutal pieces of nonfiction to cross my desk. Wasik and Murphy headed up a research team for years, digging into the origins of the disease that took down Old Yeller. (Sorry to ruin it, Kiddo. The dog gets rabies).
They begin by blitzkrieging through a patchwork, non-chronolgical history of rabies in a tone that some might call disturbing and others downright macabre. Most insightful is how 50,000 people die every year from rabies simply because they can’t afford the cure. “Rabies has always been with us,” Wasik remarks. “for as long as there has been writing, we have written about it. For as long, even, as we have kept company with dogs, this menace inside them has emerged from time to time and shown its face to us.” This history, although comprehensive and entertaining, is unapologetically biased. Wasik assumes the same flawed assumption of most historians these days–that simply because he adheres to naturalism as a person, he can comprehend history before the first written language. To me, that’s absolute nonsense. I’m not calling into question Wasik as a  naturalist. I’m calling into Wasik as a historian into question. History, by definition, is the narrative of events as told by observers. How can we observe and retell any history where there were no living people?

This wouldn’t be such a big deal if he respected other world views, but he downright insults and belittles any sort of supernatural thinking, completely writing off entire races and religions because of a few bad eggs. Me? I wanted to hear about rabies, not about what Wasik thinks of the Roman Catholic Church. He goes on to use words like “diabolic” and “demonic” to describe the illness, but refuses to frame those words in a context that includes the supernatural. This is naïve at best and artless at worst. To quote Chesterton:

Mr. McCabe thinks me a slave because I am not allowed to believe in determinism. I think Mr. McCabe a slave because he is not allowed to believe in fairies.

In spite of all of that, I enjoyed the read and can recommend it solely on an entertainment level. The intro alone’s worth the price of the book, if you’re into that sort of thing.

Much like the outro in Danse Macabre. Stephen King sets up a masters-level class on the most disrespected genre in the history of fine arts: horror. In this nonfiction tome, he crafts an argument both honest and literary, both popular and intelligent, that rules in favor of horror films and books–and in turn defends his entire career.
I found myself inspired that such literature could be found among the dregs of pop culture, but find it I did. His literary peers might call this work charming but toothless, however I found this book working out muscles connected to my fantasy bone that I didn’t know I owned. Or maybe I knew it but had forgotten since childhood. His argument for why we want to be scared centers on the Medieval Danse Macabre–the dance of death. Cradle to grave, we dance with death and can never predict when he will take us. Because of that, the surprise of fear helps us vicariously face our fears and so become stronger for them.

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Unlike King, however, I believe there to be exceptions to this rule. I find no value in the simple glorification of violence or depreciation of sex. In his defense, he says he deplores these things and gives examples, but some of his examples of how violence and sex can work as elements of story fall flat for me. To what end? I ask after consuming any bit of culture. It’s one thing to wrestle through whether the ends justify the means, but another entirely to have no end, to continue a story without point or purpose other than vanity and depravity. That’s anti-art.

Not to say that King’s against art, but to say that he shoots to make no plans, to never discipline his characters seems a bit naïve, to let them act of their own accord. Now don’t get me wrong, I have great respect for Mr. King as a mentor and a great many other things, but to say in the same book that there are forces at work out there beyond our control and then to later affirm the ideal that we should resign ourselves to whatever comes scares me–it seem’s he’s naïve about his own world view or that he doesn’t believe it himself or maybe I got an early version before the inconsistency was revised out. In any case, I respect the guy above any other living American author, but I also respectfully disagree–if you don’t take the reigns on your story themes, if you don’t choose them in advance, you’d better believe someone or something will.

Which brings me back to Rabid. Basically this: don’t use the grammar of demons if you’re not willing to deal with the consequences. Now I’m sure I’ll get a bunch of emails writing me off because I admit that demons exist and refuse to resign myself over to their whims, but I’d rather sound poetic or childlike than naïve.

And no, those last two are not the same.


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  1. allthewaydoc

    generally people die from rabies because it has progressed too far by the time they are properly diagnosed. If one is aware that they have been bitten by a rabid animal and they are treated with immunoglobins then their chances are pretty good. Often times though, they are bitten by a bat at night while sleeping, or the bat exchanges saliva with them while they are sleeping and they never even know that they have been exposed. The clinical signs are so random that it is a very difficult diagnosis and requires multiple different samples that may all be negative even though the person is infected with the virus. Once showing signs of rabies the prognosis is grave and the person almost always dies.

    1. lanceschaubert

      Thanks for the response, AtWD, although I’m unsure exactly what you’re responding to here. Which part of this post are you interacting with?

      1. allthewaydoc

        the observation that you made from the book where the writer said that most people die from rabies because they cant afford treatment. If you get rabies, all the money in the world is not going to save you!

        1. lanceschaubert

          Ah, thanks for pointing that out–perhaps I should clarify. People die because they can’t afford the vaccination. We rarely get it in the west and the wealthiest nations because we’re vaccinated. When they get it in countries where the poorest of the poor live, they can’t afford the vaccine to keep it from spreading. The spreading, not the initial contraction, kills people in droves.

          1. allthewaydoc

            actually rabies vaccine is not that common in the western world. The general public would never receive it unless there was some huge outbreak and even then most would still not receive it. Professions that are exposed to potential rabies are prophylactically given rabies vaccines for obvious reasons. Asia and Africa are the worst for rabies but vaccine is actually readily available. unfortunately most of the cases are in young boys under the age of 15 and they dont realize that they have been exposed and by the time they start to show clinical signs it is too late.

        2. lanceschaubert

          Well I certainly plead ignorance as I can only go off what they said–if you’re right it’s another strike against the historicity of the book.

          However, as curiosity, what about malaria? We’ve little need for the antivirus here anymore due to its irradiation in mosquitoes. Could it be a similar thing with modern animal control?

          1. allthewaydoc

            it is difficult with rabies. they have tried an oral vaccine where they could just put out food and have the wild animals eat it but it doesnt appear to be very efficacious. Therefore each animal must be caught and injected with a follow up vaccine given in one year and then every three years. it is an impossible proposition because not only is rabies in the canine population but also skunks and foxes and bats and other such animals. It just cant be done unfortunately.

            On a side note of interest, it is suspected that Edgar Allan Poe died from rabies.

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How?

Well, see, your comments & sharing whisper a few things to those who come after you:

The first is that this site is a safe place to speak up & stay curious. That it's civil. That discussion is encouraged. That there's no such thing as a stupid question (being a student of Socrates, I really and truly believe this). That talking to one another and growing together is more important than anything we could possibly publish. That the point is growing in virtue and growing together and growing wise. That discovery is invention, deference is originality, that we all can rise together. The only folks I'm going to take comments down from are obvious jerks who argue in bad faith, don't stay curious, or actively make personal attacks. And, frankly, I'd rather we talk here than on some social media farm — I will never show ads and the only thing I'm selling anywhere on the site or my mailing list is just the stuff I make.

You're also helping folks realize that anything you & they build together is far more important than anything you come to me to read. I take the things I write about seriously, but I don't take myself seriously: I play the fool, I hate cults of personality, and I also don't really like being the center of attention (believe it or not). I would much rather folks connect because of an introduction I've made or because they commented with one another back and forth and then build something beautiful together. My favorite contributions have been lifelong business and love partnerships from two people who have forgotten I introduced them. Some of my closest friends NOW I literally met on another blog's comment section fifteen years ago. I would love for that to happen here — let two of you meet and let me fade into the background.

Last, you help me revise. I'm wrong. Often. I'm not embarrassed to admit it or worried about being cancelled or publicly shamed. I make a fool out of myself (that's sort of the point). So as I get feedback, I can say, "I was wrong about that" and set a model for curious, consistent learning, and growing in wisdom. I'm blind to what I don't know and as grows the island of my knowledge so grows the shoreline of my ignorance. It's the recovery of innocence on the far end of experience: a child is in a permanent state of wonder. So are the wise: they aren't afraid of saying, "I don't know. That's new: please teach me." That's my goal, comments help. And I read all reviews: my skin's tough, but that's not license to be needlessly cruel. We teach one another our habits and there's a way to civilly demolish an idea without demolishing another person: just because I personally can take the world's meanest 1-star review doesn't mean we should teach one another how to be crueler on the internet.

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