Introduction
Hiding something in the least expected place gives its discovery a sense of forbiden fruit.
Often it is while I am working on transforming a book that it reveals its inner significance to me. This book of essays attributed to Pope Pio XII (1876-1958, held office between 1939 and 1958) was probably a text given by the church to every couple in Spain ( and Italy) when they got married in the period of its publication (1940s)
It detailed how they should behave in the new domestic situation they were entering and was a guide to duties ( mainly of the wife) which are now obsolete. Although I was interested to see if the values inculcated could have meaning for a contemporary non gender specific couple I ultimately found nothing of interest apart from the frontsipiece and the chapter headings.
In Spain homosexual marriage is now a fact and there is a tolerance in the society unheard of in the period when this book was written. Nevertheless the catholic church continues to exert a strong reactionary influence both here and in many parts of the world. So it seemed obvious that my intervention would necessarily subvert this book, gutting it of content and leaving in fact only its title on the spine as a reminder of its original purpose.
This became the series of texts you will see and read but as I progressed I realised that my usual tools for writing – irony and satire – were not enough to fill the void I had created. Halfway through the work I decided to reverse the book – turning it upside down and starting from the back to engrave a series of texts which were bereft of Irony. This caused a tension which remains unresolved. Interestingly I ended up with the same amount of pages in each section although as might have been expected the new text intruded into the original.
Although I often write(engrave) directly on the page- risking all sorts of orthographical mistakes and not allowing myself the privilege of rewriting or “improving” the text - I often work on a parallel text at the same time which is usually included in the finished book in some way. Unfortunately space was limitted in this volume so this text became expelled to another place and can now be read for the first time with the complete “engraved” text as it appears in the altered volume. (p10-12)
Only now after I finished did I confirm my suspicions and discover that Pius XII , in 1933 ( and whilst acting head of the vaticans “extracurricular department”) and before becoming Pope, caused the church to sign the Reichskonkordat with Germany and has since gone down in history as the Pope who (possibly) turned a blind eye to the Nazi atrocities.
A fervent anti communist after the second world war ended he threatend to ex communicate italians who voted communist in the (supposedly) “free” elections , thus leading his country into a pact which would help the emergence of the new world power: America , the land of consumer opportunity whose pattern of development is leading us towards the complete destruction of every single world ecosystem except the Concrete jungle.
