he lived in fear that the state of illumination with which he was blest - or with which he was afflicted - might be untimely withdrawn

one night i dreamt that i had made a pact with the devil: he was my servant, and anticipated my every wish... i found myself handing him my violin to see if he might manage some pretty tunes; but imagine my astonishment when i heard a sonata so unusual and so beautiful, performed with such mastery and intelligence, on a level i had never before conceived was possible! i was so overcome that i stopped breathing and awoke gasping. immediately i seized my violin, hoping to recall some shred of what i had just heard - but in vain. the piece i then composed is without a doubt my best, and i still call it the devil's sonata, but it falls so far short of the one that stunned me that i would have smashed my violin and given up music forever if i could but posses it.

tartini to j.j. de lalande,
voyage d'un françois en italie (1765-66)
(found in giuseppe tartini - the devil's sonata - played by andrew manze)
((title from thomas mann - doctor faustus - 1947))

tour de l'apocalypse

robert garcet's tower of the apocalypse
image from: fantastic architecture: personal and eccentric visions, 1980 harry abrams

text from the book:
born in 1912, robert garcet is a stonecutter by profession. around 1930, he settled in fort ebenemael, belgium, building a house there, then a workshop. in the early fifties, he began the tour de l'apocalypse. garcet sees the church as the cause of today's chaos. he pleads for the reinterpretation of the bible and the study of the past in order to obtain knowledge for the future. garcet is considered an eccentic and has met with much hostility, garcet has lived there most of the time.