Darkly truthful: An indigenous séance with Novalis

Abstract

Thinking and writing draw on those who have gone before, in a more than abstract way. In this article, I answer the call of one philosopher–Novalis, the early German Romantic–in the form of a séance, which is really a dialogue with the dead. I speak to him, as a Maori writer, about the abstract philosophical issues that Maori encounter and anticipate his responses and his thinking. I suspect Novalis would have taken delight in this sort of a-rational event, especially with his own tendency to focus on the supernatural and invisible realms. He revered the dead and darkness. He was an interdimensional communicator par excellence, and my aim in this article is to speculate alongside him and, as a Maori writer, form some productive ideas in community with him.