Non-man

2018

An audio play about a non-man — a person who, by transcending all that is human, becomes an enemy of the species. I understand transcending “all that is human” as an action aimed to achieve a concrete set of goals. Non-man’s actions are also intentional, yet their intentionality is unrecognisable to anyone but himself. The audio play is accompanied by an object — the skull made of plastic that encapsulates the sound source. The skull is also a great stand for the headphones.

Non-man is a person who, as a result of an accident, artistic activity, occult practices and an accidental unexpected event (an enlightenment achieved through prolonged fasting), discovery of psychopathic features in himself, alongside reading of a certain text by Libera (or something completely different), started acting against his own species and his own needs. Non-man parted with himself, bade farewell to everything he enjoyed and all that gave him a sense of comfort in the world, and of recognition among people.

Non-man can be a teenage mutant, a baker or an artist. He can also do something else, for example operate a computer or some machines. He can also successfully combine those identities or not have any of them. The function is not important; what matters, is that Non-man treats his identity as something external, a means to a very concrete end.

He disguises himself well, but it’s possible to discover his nature by seeing how he sits in a corner and glowers. He can be a perfect imitation of a human, but his goals are deeply inhuman. This means they are not focused on purpose — at least by human understanding. Non-man’s purpose is inhuman, incomprehensible for humanity. Contact with this kind of purposefulness causes anxiety, confusion, sadness and goose bumps.

He seems to represent some kind of alien order, to be an agent working for a strange agenda or a probe collecting the data. He will never sincerely say “you’re looking good, I don’t have such nice clothes” or “I hate vernissages, I want to go home”, or “hi, what’s up?”. He will say so only if it brings him closer to the realisation of his own inhuman goals. Therefore, he slightly resembles T-1000 Terminator, which naturally stirs dislike and anxiety. Sometimes, people instinctively hate Non-man and recognise the enemy of humanity in him — which he does not necessarily have to be, although undoubtedly he plays in a completely different team — unless it’s useful for him, but then the humanity says: „you are with us or against us”. Possible goals of Non-man include: lying down and stillness (as opposed to activity of the world), realising artistic visions (as something impractical and unprofitable). They may also include breeding strange germs, gardening or something else.