Asteria Blackwell Presents: Stories from the Lost Library of Elysium

A Journey Through Myth and Time: Athena's Library Returns Home

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A Journey Through Myth and Time: Athena's Library Returns Home

Asteria Blackwell

May 17, 2024

Friends,

On behalf of Elysium Public Radio, welcome to the Substack home for Asteria Blackwell Presents: The Lost Library of Elysium. I am your host, Asteria Blackwell, the High Priestess to the Library of Elysium.

Friends, I would like you to close your eyes for just a moment, and take a deep breath. Maybe one more for good measure.

Now, with your eyes still closed, I’d like for you to picture in your mind a great library - a library that is immense, and mystical. It’s half tree, and half stone, and as you step inside you’re greeted with the scent of old books and quiet forests. There seems to be no end to the shelves, which fade into shadow. There is a high arched ceiling filled with light and stars. You walk on a forest floor, soft to the step.

This sacred library was dreamt into being by the goddess Athena herself, and it is a sanctuary for forgotten stories and unwritten tales. I’ll be exploring those tales and the history of the library and of Elysium itself as we embrace the rebirth of this legendary library.

Eons ago, a devastating earthquake shattered the land of Elysium in two - sending half of the town down into the Underworld, and the other half up to the living world. During this commotion, the library fled and disappeared into a rift, and was lost.

But after lifetimes of searching, I am pleased to announce that our library has been found and brought home to Elysium. It is my honor to guide you through the archives, speaking into life stories that have been long silent.

I have launched Elysium Public Radio just for this purpose. In addition to stories from the archives, we will discuss current happenings in Elysium, we’ll hear from our resident Oracle, Big Midge, and all the news to keep you informed, whether you reside on the living side of town or the Underworld side.

I’ll bring you a new episode every two weeks, so be sure to subscribe here so you don’t miss an episode. You can find this podcast wherever you listen, but bonus content will only be on Substack.

For those of you who wish to become members of the library and get access to exclusive illustrations and content, then consider subscribing as a paid member. I’ve included just such illustrations here.

In today’s episode, I will tell you the grand history of our library, and the long search to locate it and bring it home. This search, and this endeavor has been a long labor of love and I am incredibly grateful it is finally ready to share with you, dear ones. So with this, I say, welcome. You were meant to find your way here.

Written Episode Transcript

ASTERIA BLACKWELL PRESENTS: STORIES FROM THE LOST LIBRARY OF ELYSIUM

Greetings and welcomes dear citizens of Elysium. You are listening to Elysium Public Radio. I am your host Asteria Blackwell and this is Stories from the Lost Library.

Now, before we begin, we must start with a warning. Yes, I realize the irony, for in the golden days we would start with an honored prayer to the muses for a memorable tale, but in these modern times, warnings have replaced prayers, and our lawyers are insistent.

So take this warning as our opening prayer: This library, these stories, this missive, this community is a safe and sacred space. Keep swords, daggers, poison, ignorance, and hate to yourself, for they have no place here. We are all seeking peace and softness.

There will be no tolerance for hateful words and comments, general rudeness, patriarchal and colonist attitudes, and those afflicted with the disorder of having their mouth be larger than their brains.

There is no guarantee every story will be a happy one. In fact, some will be awful - or, the muses forbid - boring. But what you consider boring and awful may not be so to someone else. That is the nature of storytelling. Not every story is for you.

I am High Priestess of these hallowed halls, I am King of this space. My word is law, and the law is that all are welcome here - and I truly mean all - every gender, every race, every background, and inclination. If you cannot abide by my laws, then please go roll in the mud with the rest of the pigs somewhere else.

For the rest of us, welcome. You were meant to find your way here.

Now, I know what you are thinking! You are thinking, “But Asteria! How can you tell stories from the Elysian library? It’s been lost for ages!”

And I say, yes, yes you are correct, but I am happy to announce that our Lost Library has been found! I, along with the line of library priestesses who came before me have hunted in vain for eons - until now.

Yes, neighbors, you heard me correctly. The long, long search is over. What many have claimed was nothing more than myth or a figment of someone’s dreams has been located.

Now, as you will recall from your Unabridged History of the Elysian Fields that everyone receives upon settling here, our magnificent library was dreamt into being by Athena herself here in these verdant lands.

Athena, the great goddess of wisdom, stopped for a rest along our golden shores when she came in secret to visit her former lover, Medusa the Gorgon. I mean, I know the official story says they were just a priestess and a goddess and there as no funny business between them, but dears, when did you last see a priestess and a goddess sharing a bed so many nights in row? Yes, that’s what I thought.

Anyway, the poor dears, they had such a terrible falling out, and the goddess did some very bad things, and found herself suddenly terribly sorry. Now you have to understand that Athena prided herself on being independent, of always being in control and never showing weakness of any kind, but well, when those two broke it off the great goddess may have lost her mind and done some very unkind things she could not take back.

It’s hard to be so alone - as she had always been - and then to find herself full of something as mundane as feelings, well, it certainly had her out of sorts. NOT that it is an excuse for what she did, but she is a child of Zeus and sometimes the father’s personality peeks through.

But, as Athena wandered here, searching for forgiveness she did not know how to vocalize, she was very much still out of sorts. One evening she came across a lovely olive tree and sat down to rest. As she stared up at the roving stars singing the ancient songs of the world, she fell into a deep sleep. There the apology she could not voice sprang up unbidden and into life as the most magnificent library in any of the worlds - living or dead. It was a very Athena move, dear ones.

The library came into being complete with every book and scroll and story known to have been written, or told, and every story untold. It housed forests of trees and countless animals that held tales of their own, for the library was half tree and half marble, with snakes carved in lintels and stars shining inside. It was magnificently grand right from the beginning - a liminal sacred space.

Learners of all kinds, even women, much to the dismay of the men in the Agora, were welcome immediately welcomed into its hallowed halls. It is said that when the men in the living world heard of it, they grew jealous and began to construct the Mouseion - the great Library of Alexandria, which, though they tried, was a mere fraction of what our Elysian Library was then, and even less so now.

The carved ash doors of our library never closed, even at night. All were welcome, and all found refuge in the hallowed halls. Day by day the library drew those who worshipped the act of learning, most of them dead but a few surprisingly ambitious living ones as well, and the shelves grew with each passing day. No one could ever get an accurate count of how far it stretched for it kept doubling in size every few turns of the moon. The first librarian, a fierce young lady named Cassandra, eventually just gave up and stopped trying to quantify what could not be quantified.

For eons the library served as a beacon of knowledge. It survived everything from fire to plague - even a run-in with a great giant ark that washed down across the Elysian Fields after that ragtag group of pagans angered their god, again. But the library survived.

Until the Great Earthquake.

In the early hours of dawn on one ordinary Autumnlong day, a massive earthquake shattered Elysium in two, with half of the city forcibly pushed up into the living world, and the other half sinking further down into the shadowed realms of the underworld.

Elysium changed forever in that moment. The Living souls, who had settled above, suddenly found themselves in the underworld, and many of the Underworld beings suddenly realized they could walk above ground once more, and thousands of people began to move back and forth over the rubble as they pleased, without need of an escort into the Underworld, without the trials of a journey to the underworld, without sneaking by Cerberus, and without a passport.

In the ensuing chaos right after the earthquake, the priestess Daphne, who had become Priestess after Cassandra, realized our library had disappeared. Her diary says there was no debris where the library stood, but it was as if the entire building had picked itself up and run away.

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Which, dear friends, is exactly what happened. The library, in a moment of uncharacteristic panic, picked itself up, ran away on its fuzzy little owl legs, and slipped into a crack in the fabric of space time and promptly got lost.

And this loss has been incredibly painful for the citizens of this land to bear.

Yes, the citizens have since built the finest Amphitheater, which holds wonderful performances of songs and tragedies. And yes, of course, the largest Agora in all of the underworld, but they’ve closed that off to just members of the Elysian Senate, who, to their detriment, are just men.

And some of you will also mention the rather overstated buildings called “churches” in the living side of town, constructed by groups of rather determined Christian colonists, but those men are in even worse shape than those frequenting the Agora.

Those structures could never compare to the heart of Elysium, which was now gone, and we were the poorer for it, although I’m certain the men of the Christian colonists and the Elysian Senate will beg to differ, rather loudly, as they usually do.

Now - every Priestess of the Library has not broken nor wavered in their search to locate it. We have roamed endlessly, wading through muck and brush, whistling and calling, only to hear silence, or an occasional rude epithet in return.

But dear listeners, do you know where our misplaced library found itself after it slipped through the cracks?

It wound up in the Mirkwood Forests on the other side of Tartarus. It had a vague idea where it was, but it was most certainly lost. And scared, the poor thing. It has been there all this time, can you believe it!

Now, a few years ago, I was searching in the forests west of Valhalla, which, dear listeners, is as rowdy a place as you would image. I did try to just stay out of the way up there, but the music was so loud and they had gym equipment and beer horns spread everywhere - it was a mess.

Anyway, one day, a lovely luna moth, a beautiful pink and green luminous being, landed on my arm. The antennae waved and the moth floated around me, and so one does what one should do when such a guide appears, and that is follow them.

I became good friends with that dear luna moth, you should know. She would not tell me her name, for she said she was in a witness protection program and hiding from an overzealous god, so I just called her Luna and she was a lovely traveling companion.

Luna led me out of Valhalla, through Asphodel Meadows, past the remains of Herculaneum, over the River Styx, past that fetid swampland of Archeron, and the cicada-filled Cocytus rivers, through the remnants of the great city of Troy, past Tartarus, and then, after a pause in Atlantis, finally into the Mirkwood Forests where the ghost of giant redwoods tower up through the living world and brush the underside of the clouds. It is a breathtaking place, everyone should visit at least once in their lives.

In the deepest part of the Mirkwood Forests, we stumbled upon a lake that was not marked on any map we possessed, either human or moth. This lake was as wide as the sea, flat still mirror black, and the stars shone back on themselves, dancing in secret combinations.

Thousands of fireflies flashed from an overgrown island far out in the middle of the water. Like a stream of stars, they flew across the still waters and swirled around me and Luna, and directed us to a small boat made of bark.

I rowed us across the waters, with the fireflies lighting the way. Red gleaming eyes under the surface of the water watched us every moment of the way, and I was rather glad to be on solid ground. I would say if you do visit the Mirkwood Forests to maybe just stick to the beaches.

But, once we stepped foot on this island, we began to hear voices, and not a voice like as I am speaking to you, but rather a whisper, a rustle of leaves passing from one tree to another. The fireflies led us forward, on and on until we reached a clearing. There, we found the most magnificent scene, all illuminated by millions of fireflies. Our library sat hale and healthy, in deep conversation with a crystal book and a large ghostly white sycamore tree.

The library recognized me at once from my snake brooch - the sigil of the Priestesses of the Library, and it was very glad to finally have been found.

We soon discovered that the magnificent sycamore tree had taken guardianship of the lost library, and kept tender care for all of these eons. The crystal book had also found its way here from other distant lands, but its keepers had not found their way here yet.

After a few days of rest and lovely conversations, the time came to leave. More than a few tears were shed between the sycamore and the library, and I rather say our library is more tree than not these days. But that’s not a bad thing at all. What is important is that it was cared for, and we owe a great debt to the citizens of the Mirkwood Forests.

Our journey back took much longer, but, that is to be expected when towing a library home. There were only a handful of accidents; we may have to replace Charon’s boat, and I don’t think we can go back over the Acheron without being hacked apart by the beasts there, but what’s done is done and all is right with the world again.

And so here we are, speaking to you, our dear Elysian neighbors, from our great library hall, using this broadcast to relight the torches of learning and knowledge that have long been extinguished (not that there was anything wrong with them, but trees generally do not like torches, for good reason, so there was no reason to light them until now).

You may also ask, “Priestess Asteria, WHY are you telling all of this via a radio broadcast? Why are you not using a rhapsodos - those lovely singers of woven words? There is that newspaper thing floating around the living side of town, or you could always have a man speak this tale in the Agora on your behalf.”

And to that I say, over my dead body will I hand these stories over to anyone else, most especially a man. We citizens of Elysium must adapt to modern ways, as much as some may protest.

Even the underworld changes with the times, albeit slowly, but we do change. Our town is half living, as you know, and there is no good reason to hang on to outdated traditions.

I have no interest in using a man who claims unearned authority to dole these stories out one by one, and then claim credit for writing them. You will only hear them straight from the breath in my lungs to your ears. There will be no in-between.

With this, I am establishing the very first Elysium radio station - Elysium Public Radio - which will bring you stories from the library and other news from Elysium.

Hearing the stories from a woman may feel odd to some of you, but I ask you to keep an open mind. I realize some of you dear souls have been here much longer than others and that you may prefer the old ways, but I hope that you give me a chance. Perhaps, if you must, you can close your eyes and pretend I am a large, hairy man whispering gently in your ear.

Now, I have a handful of supporters to thank for making Elysium Public Radio possible. One of our platinum patrons is the Elysium Apple Festival Committee, and they have asked me to share the following:

The Elysium Apple Festival Board invites everyone out to the Golden Fields for our annual Idunn Apple Festival! We will have apple dunking, apple hunting, apple recipes, fried apples, apple cider, apple cider donuts, apple tea, apple races, and kettle corn.

Our apples are guaranteed to take a minimum of ten years off you, for they come from the orchards of Idunn, which are renowned for their age reversing properties.

The Idunn apple festival has been voted the Best Apple Festival in the entire underworld, so don’t fall for the false advertising of the Garden of Eden festival. Come see what all the fuss is about.

Bring a friend, or bring an enemy, both are cool with us as long as you are bringing your gold coins.

The Idunn Apple Festival will run through the next full moon. Don’t miss out!

Oh that sounds lovely, I will certainly be there. And for our second Platinum Patron, Crazy Nero’s Used Chariots.

Crazy Nero wants you to come visit him at his pre-owned chariot lot. He has a new shipment in, and has single chariots, double chariots, family sized chariots and even EMPEROR SIZED CHARIOTS. He has anything from two wheels to four wheels, and spiked wheels to gold rims.

All pre-owned chariots have passed a multi-point inspection and for just two gold coins down, you can drive off with your own wheels, so come on down today. Note: horses are not included.

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Thank you Crazy Nero, who is bringing you this weather update:

We sit at the cusp of Dark Spring.

Buds and roots still in the living edge of town, rising up towards a golden sun. The ground up top grows warmer with each passing day, and the darkness grows shorter. Snowdrops peek up through icy eyes, and the trees are just starting to open their eyes from winter’s sleep. For today, breezes will be soft and cool, and they’ll take on a sharp-edged chill once the sun goes down. Keep your long sleeves close, and have firewood chopped for the overnight hours.

Here in the underworld side of town, the aurora borealis is going strong overhead. Shafts of green and purple lights sway as curtains and the rivers reflect back as mirrors. The ravens will stay quiet for now, but the owls are watching. Near dawn, a light mist will dance through town. Some of you may see a hint of a rainbow.

There is a scent of honeysuckle on the wind, and we are all beginning to remember.

I cannot tell you how glad I am Dark Spring is here. Dark Spring is where we are half in winter, and half in spring, and we hold days of both seasons, and we sway back and forth, rising up from a winter dream.

New things rise, the rivers release their offerings on the shores, and stories rise up in the mist.

I hope you all can take some time and enjoy this lovely liminal season.

Next, I have an announcement from The Oracle, also known as Big Midge. Big Midge has abandoned the Oracle’s Sacred Cave and Temple Complex due to ongoing water and mold issues. While this lovely building served as a sacred space for years, the upkeep is too expensive, and she no longer wants to live in a cave. She says her bones are too old, quote, “Fuck this shit.” Plus, she wants a garage for her motorcycle.

So, as of now, do not go to the Oracle’s Temple. It’s closed. Big Midge has asked that you email your questions to oracle@asteriablackwell.com and she will give me answers to pass along. We will have the email address in the show notes.

You know, good for Big Midge. I’m glad she is upgrading her space. Everyone deserves a nice place to rest. I like this new system for oracles, it kind of reminds me of that old Dear Abby column I used to read when I lived above. She was a lovely lady.

On that note, I have some oracles ready to pass along from Big Midge:

Oracle number 1:
Big Midge, please help me. I live next to someone who has a fancy chariot and the alarm keeps going off in the middle of the night. And then they don’t turn it off! It goes for hours and hours, like they can’t hear it! I’ve asked them multiple times to disable the alarm since they can’t hear it anyway, and they’ve refused. Please help, I haven’t been able to get any sleep in weeks.
Sincerely,
Sleepless on the Hellespont Parkway

Dear Sleepless on the Hellespont Parkway:

On behalf of everyone in Elysium, and especially Sleepless on the Hellespont Parkway: To the dumb shit who can’t sort out their chariot alarm, I foresee a visit to the healer if you do not get that alarm fixed. You know who you are, Dag the Bard.

Oracle number 2:
Dear Big Midge: What is the meaning of life? Why are we here? Why do we suffer and die and then come to Elysium to live out an afterworld existence, just to be reborn and do it all again?
Sincerely,
Asking for Everyone

Dear Asking for Everyone:

The answer is 42.

Oracle number 3:
Dear Sir or Madam: I am prince Tunde from Nigeria. Your help would be very appreciated. I want to transfer all of my fortune outside if Nigeria due to frozen account. If you could be so kind and transfer small sum of 3 500 USD to my account, I would be able to unfreeze my account and transfer my money outside Nigeria. To repay for kindness, I will send 1 000 000 USD to your account. Please contact me to proceed.

Dear Prince Tunde: Try again, answer unclear.

Oracle number 4:
Dear Big Midge:
Every night, I wake up to the sounds of whispering, but I live alone. This may sound crazy but I think the tree outside my window is the one whispering. I don’t know what to do.
Sincerely, Haunted by a Tree

Dear Haunted by a Tree:

The ghosts wait for you to be able to hear them, so their stories can take root in your soul, and rise up one by one, until there is nothing in your heart except a forest of stories. You will find yourself there, a ruby-throated oracle with raven wings, the one who will sing into life the memories of the trees.

Oracle number 5:
Dear Big Midge:
I’ve lost my keys again. Would you like to come over for dinner Friday evening and help me search for them? I’ll make your favorite.
Brunhild

Dear Brunhild:

Your keys are in your pants in the dryer. Can you like, put a hook by your door? This is the third time this week you’ve asked.

Thank you Big Midge for your oracles. Remember, send her your queries to oracle@asteriablackwell.com and she may grace you with an answer of some kind, which she says may be good or bad and be sure you want to know the answer before you ask because there are no refunds and she is just the messenger.

Solid advice for us all, Big Midge.

The Generally Undead Support Group wants to let everyone know they will meet from 7 - 8 pm in the basement of the Elysium Community Center every Tuesday evening. All souls who identify as vampires, strigoi, draugr, mummies, or otherwise undead are welcome. Coffee and snacks will be provided.

And if anyone has announcements, please pass them along so I can let everyone know.

Now, lovely shining souls, it is time for the heart of our broadcast - becoming reacquainted with our lost library. A handful of you may remember it from eons ago, but most, including myself, do not.

The library is sentient, as most know. But what that means is, yes, it holds scrolls and books, but it also holds lost stories and voices, the words of those who cannot, could not, write down their own, be they be lost to time, colonization, or patriarchy. The words of the souls that were burned, killed, or just worked to death.

It holds the stories of the trees, those that lived and those that got cut down. It holds stories of ghosts and shades, of gods and queens long forgotten. It holds songs of stars and stones, of moss and mushrooms. It holds the stories of us all.

Our library is beautiful. I hope one day you will come for a visit. Remember, library cards are free to all.

It stands in it’s old home across from the Agora. As you approach, the ground rises up and up and up, helping you towards the doors. A soft breeze generally crosses your face in welcome.

The library may appear like a normal temple upon first glance. There are great columns of marble, yes, but as you draw closer you realize half of the columns are sycamore trunks, as white and smooth as any marble column.

Those sycamores stand as the caryatids of Ancient Greece did - those immense statues of the priestesses holding up the ceilings of the temples. These sycamore priestesses form the roof protects the stories of the world. This is their life of service.

Those priestesses have arched their limbs out and up into a vaulted cathedral ceiling, as tall and magnificent as any Notre Dame or Rouen cathedral that stands in the living world.

Depending on the hour, you may find dappled sunlight filtering down into the inner sanctum, down onto marble floors half covered in mossy mounds fit for curling up to read for hours. I am sitting on one now, in fact. This is the most comfortable moss I’ve sat in, and I’ve sat in the moss of Asphodel Meadows!

As the sun sleeps, constellations whirl overhead. The Via Galactica, the Silver River, the Milky Way shines as Orion, The Pleiades, and Cassiopeia all swim by in stately silence. Moonflowers open and offer up their siren scent, and the favored luna moths swim around the persimmon trees.

The moss is soft to the touch, it smells clean, like the edge of spring. If you look closely at the moss rising up on the trunks holding up the roof, you can see tiny mushrooms no larger than a grain of rice.

There is nothing but peace in this place. The lanterns that hold the fire of knowledge have been relit and crackle in the space. The fire of knowledge cannot harm the trees, and the trees have no fear here.

Endless rows of shelves filled with books, scrolls, tablets, and such radiate out from the center. Once you enter, and as you look down each row you see trees interspersing the rows. It is not only human stories that live here. Ghosts and shades wait patiently, holding onto their memories with tight fingers. Incense wafts here and there, sweet and a little sharp, clearing the mind and soul.

A moon faced owl sits high in the branches with sapphire blue eyes, eyes that see old gods and old souls. It holds the keys to another lost building, waiting to be found.

Scrolls rustle on their shelves, waiting. A few books and papyri fly gently about. Sometimes single scraps of paper flitter down from an unknown space in the ceiling, with a few sentences or words. There are piles of these scraps all along the floor, like the forest floor covered in autumn leaves.

As I speak this to you know, I can hear the cicadas beginning their evening song and somewhere in the far reaches of the stacks, a story is singing, but not in any language I can understand.

I am still finding new rooms and spaces. I have yet to find my office, but the front desk is clean and open for business. There is a card catalog, which works well for the newer books but less well for the non-book books, and I am still sorting out a better system for those. I am happy to begin checking out items immediately, and all are welcome to come and sit, and study or read. And for those who did not have the privilege of an education, we will be offering reading lessons and I am happy to help anyone in this area.

These stories have waited long to be found, and are eager to be told. I will do my best to honor them, this place, and you, for supporting us in this endeavor.

This is our great Lost Library of Elysium, home at last, the shining beacon of knowledge and learning. Twice a month I will bring you a story from the archives, so be sure to join me as we explore this magical world.

We - by which I mean me and this library - are excited to share these stories with you.

I welcome your feedback! Please email me at asteria@asteriablackwell.com, which I will also list in the written show notes, or stop by the main circulation desk for a chat.

My name is Asteria Blackwell, and you have been listening to Stories from the Lost Library on Elysium Public Radio.

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A Journey Through Myth and Time: Athena's Library Returns Home

Written Episode Transcript

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