Flash Fiction, Romanesco Broccoli, and Programming
Or A Fine Deep Dive on A Continuity of Parks by Julio Cortazar
A Continuity of Parks begins with a man sitting down in his velvet green chair to read a novel. We can glean from the book’s passionate, harrowing prose that it’s a romantic thriller of sorts. Images of blood, kisses, and a rivulet of snakes foreshadow a deadly denouement. But then, something peculiar happens. The story shifts in perspective and we’re no longer reading about the man in the velvet green chair, but rather the man in the novel itself. Our neat, parallel narratives gently converge like ephemeral streams, and we find ourselves in the midst of something familiar, but new.
The clandestine lovers in the novel part ways just as a yellowish fog of dusk descends. With nothing but conviction and a dagger in hand, our new antihero covertly moves under the shield of night. He pushes past a cabin door, steps through a parlor, a gallery, and ascends a carpeted stairway, until he’s hovering over his target; a man sitting in a velvet green chair, reading his novel.
When I first read this story a decade ago I was utterly confused, lost in its miasmic structure. It was only when I confronted my discontent, that I realized it wasn’t the story, but rather my preconceived notions of fiction that had caused me such unease. Plot, structure, the linear nature of time. Once I put away those silly ideas and reread without prejudice, then Cortazar’s skill and tact became self-evident.
And while rereading and analyzing this short story I stumbled upon a quirky, logical construction that seemed to expand beyond the world of fiction.
Recursion.
Suddenly, the scientific and literary worlds collided like the metanarratives within the story. My curiosities pulled me further and further into a rabbit hole that led me to nature, computer programs and art. And now I’d like to share some of what I’ve learned with you.
