Sunday, December 6, 2009

Pandering to the Zombie Agenda

A shamble of zombies came together at the end of October for the 2009 Wellington Zombie Walk.
Some were dressed for the Pride and Prejudice and Zombies Ball later in the evening -- who can refuse an invitation that includes Regency Dancing and fresh brains? -- hence the Jane Austen costumes in the top frame.

The Obeah-woman is presumably from one of the Caribbean slave plantations of the time. These are never explicitly mentioned in Austen's novels, but are present implicitly, providing the income that sustained her characters' life-styles of cotillions, casual violence, hard drinking and amphetamine-fuelled car chases. So it made perfect sense that a forerunner of vaudou among the slaves might somehow have been brought back to England to spark off the zombie epidemic. I was loath to ask the obeah-woman to confirm this, on account of her dilated pupils.

One of the products grown on these slave plantations was indigo. The indigo trade was perhaps of even greater interest than the salted pineapple trade, because like many other pre-industrial-chemistry dyestuffs (madder, 'whelk purple', woad), the word originally described not so much a colour as a SHUT UP SMUT

5 comments:

ifthethunderdontgetya™³²®© said...

I was loath to ask the obeah-woman to confirm this, on account of her dilated pupils.

She was just happy to see you.
~

tigris said...

as a SHUT UP SMUT

It is almost as though you hear these words, whether from external or internal sources, frequently enough to cause you to expect them at the end of sentences where most people would instead tend to expect a short pause or full stop.

zombie rotten mcdonald said...

This is relevant to my interests.

Hamish Mack said...

I would imagine that subscriptions are available and frequent newsletters.
Notice that the average Wellingtonian does not see people being zomboid around them.

M. Bouffant said...

The Orion slave woman w/ the red headband has piqued my interest, but I'm shallow that way.