Philips Magnavox Videogames and the Entertainment Revolution Trigger Happy - Manual (Page 352)

Trigger Happy
354
the champion now of human imagination and sexuality,
defeats the tyrannical god and casts him forever into
the abyss. For the moment, man’s inheritance is safe.
For what had Prometheus done in the first place?
He had given humans a power-up.
Burn this
The gift of fire. Like most children, I used to find
battery-powered flashlights fascinating toys. I’d
smuggle a flashlight into bed and turn it on after lights
out, beaming whirling patterns onto the ceiling for what
seemed like hours. The quality of light just before the
batteries ran out was my favorite: a barely visible
golden specter, loopingly scrawling its message in a
hieroglyphic tongue. It was a mystery. The fiery glow
of a tungsten filament powered by a couple of chunks
of lead and acid somehow translated into this sensuous
show.
The ancient Chinese, we are told, first invented
fireworks—made fire a plaything. For centuries,
fireeaters traveled with circuses, making dragonish art
from the destructive gift. To this day they give a
thrillingly organic flavor even to such celebrations of
technology-dependent entertainment as Manumission,