Page:Knight (1975) Past, Future and the Problem of Communication in the Work of V V Khlebnikov.djvu/109

101 This should be seen also in the context of the passages quoted already, in which Khlebnikov envisaged radio-transmission of lectures "to any school at the foot of a green hill", saw "the language of lightning" as the "conductor of scientific truth", and hailed "air-sailing“ and "the gift of spark-speech" as the two new "feet" of humanity.

A reading of Khlebnikov's writings on "fate"-especially his post-revolutionary ones—shows that the idea of motion at the speed of light and the concept of humanity as a sort of "light-ray“ or radio-wave were not mere incidental notions but were absolutely fundamental to his developing world-view. In his now-characteristic way, he saw the "ray of humanity"—in his "Nasha Osnova" written in 1920—as moving not through space but through time. He likened the 317—yearly "shifts" of human history (which he believed he had 'discovered') to the vibration: of a balalaika-string. This was only one of several such balalaika—notes: the vibrations of another string were manifested in people's heart-beats and footsteps; another represented "the central axis of the sonorous world." But for Khlebnikov, the long-wave string—pulsing at intervals of 317 years—was the most important one. The extent to which the idea of electro-magnetic waves and their control had penetrated into Khlebnikov‘s consciousness may be gauged from the following passage, in which the poet elaborates his idea of humanity as a ray through time:


 * Once science had measured the light-wave, studying it in the light of figures, it became possible to regulate the course of rays. The image of a distant star is brought up close to the writing-table with these mirrors. The sizes of infinitely small things, previously invisible, become accessible view...
 * Let us suppose that a light-wave were populated by rational beings, with their government, laws and even prophets. Wouldn't it appear to them that a scientist who used mirrors to regulate the course of waves was an almighty