Fragments Attributed to Ozuls, XII–XVIII

Fragments XII–XVIII occupy an uncertain place in the Ozols corpus. They include the Talking Rectangle, Message from the President, Infinite Music, A New You and the Secret Policeman’s Map of Me: compact technological fables whose later resemblance to ordinary devices has encouraged a mythology of prediction that Ozols himself appears to have disliked.

This edition reproduces the Mensonge recension with variants from the Baldois typescript. Mensonge’s notes are substantially longer than several of the fragments and repeatedly object to translators who improve jokes, normalise names or describe coincidences as prophecies.

The present translation preserves contradictions rather than resolving them. Where the source tradition offers two incompatible versions, both are printed. Where it offers three, Mensonge supplies a fourth.