If each ordinal n is identified with the set [n] of all ordinals less than or equal to n, then a ≤ b if and only if [a] ⊆ [b].‍

Or to put it another way, suppose the big circle represents the fictional world of Other Clocks, which concerns the seven O’Shaughnessy brothers and how each learns—or fails to learn— to deal with desire, art, and power.

The three larger circles within this big circle represent the works of three of the O’Shaughnessy brothers. Bry O’Shaughnessy’s illustration of The Complete & Authoritative Periodic Table of the Elephants along with Nog O’Shaughnessy’s schematic drawing Hell, emended 21c. appear tangentially in Bern O’Shaughnessy’s novel The Quiet Underwoods.

Meanwhile, Wish Bernum (Bern’s protagonist in his novel The Quiet Underwoods) has written his own novel, Bark Mice.

Father Norm de Plüm and his work on Dunts have no real part in the fictive O’Shaughnessy universe, and he is alarmed to find himself even appearing in this diagram.