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Introduction When
I wrote the Book of Colours, I first and foremost wanted to tell a story
inspired by a dream. But when I placed Henry Faust in the United States to
search for and actually find my dream, I was not aware of what I had let myself
in for. “You have to understand that the world I encountered was the world you had dreamt up,” Henry said firmly. “You say you lived in a world that exists only in my mind?” “Well. Yes. But is it not true for us all? We each exist in a world that originates in our minds…” “What do you mean?” I asked. He
looked at me sternly. “If I look at a bird, the light photons of the bird
enter my eye and stimulate the retina. They are transformed into electronic
impulses, which are transferred to a designated part of my brain where they are
converted into an image, which I recognize as a bird. The place I perceive the
bird is in the brain, a place surrounded by the skull and in eternal darkness.
What I perceive with my twelve senses is experienced in my brain. But then it
becomes weirder: I only perceive my ‘surroundings’ when I use my senses –
in effect, opening my curtains and looking out my windows. If I don’t open the
curtains and don’t look out, I perceive nothing, so once again, in effect,
nothing exists. There is absolutely nothing out there. By deduction, what is out
there depends entirely on what I perceive.” He
looked at me with a strange smile. “You could say, I imagined it all,” Henry continued. “That whatever I perceive is reality, whether I dream, imagine or look out the window – it is all reality.” “Henry, you are saying that each of us perceives our surroundings differently?” “Yes. Because of what you are and essentially who you are. I perceive my surrounding differently because it’s me doing the perceiving.” I became scared. “So, how I perceive my surroundings has to do with me. Where is this me? Is it in my mind? Is what I perceive only an idea?” “Yes.” “Whose
idea?” I cried.
Gerhard Heinzelmann 2008 |