“I am the forest,
I am ancient.
I treasure the stag,
I treasure the deer.
I shelter you from storm,
I shelter you from snow.
I resist the frost,
I keep the source.
I nurse the earth,
I am always there.
I build your house,
I kindle your hearth.
Therefore, you people,
hold me dear.”
— Inscription found in a 17th century forester’s house in Lower Saxony, Germany
Ich bin der Wald / Ich bin uralt / Ich hege den Hirsch / Ich hege das Reh / Ich schütz Euch vor Sturm / Ich schütz Euch vor Schnee / Ich wehre dem Frost / Ich wahre die Quelle / Ich hüte die Scholle / Bin immer zur Stelle / Ich bau Euch das Haus / Ich heiz Euch den Herd / Drum ihr Menschen / Haltet mich wert!
— original text, provided by @moornebheym in the replies
unironically, one of my favourite pieces of horror writing is victor hugo’s description of an octopus
[ID: photo of a book. Some of the text has been highlighted. It says “It is a pneumatic machine that attacks you. You are dealing with a footed void. Neither claw thrusts nor tooth bites, but an unspeakable scarification. A bit is formidable, but less so than such suction. The claw is nothing compared to the sucker. The claw, that’s the beast that enters your flesh; the sucker, that’s you yourself who enters into the beast. Your muscles swell, your fibres twist, your skin bursts beneath this unworldly force, your blood spurts and frightfully mixes with the mollusks’ lymph. The beast is superimposed upon you by its thousand vile mouths; the hydra is incorporated in the man; the man is amalgamated with the hydra. The two make one. This dream is upon you. The tiger can only devour you; the octopus, what horror, breathes you in! It draws you toward itself and into itself, and, bound, stuck, powerless, you slowly feel yourself emptied out within that horrendous sack, that monster. Beyond the terror of being eaten alive is the ineffability of being drunk alive.” End ID]
and don’t forget his drawing of one.
Octopus bearing the Initials V. H., Victor Hugo circa 1866:
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He basically thought octopuses were not only meaneaters but did so by absorbing people like a big amoeba. There’s actually several more paragraphs to this where he claims they’re also more like a living vapor than a solid animal, it’s adorable
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