Directory of Lost Causes (By Quentin S. Crisp)

2008-07-29T22:49:00.002+01:00

The Trees are the View

The Hawk cults, blue eyes harsh and pitiless as the sun; the Owl cults, with huge yellow night eyes and wrenching needle talons; flying weasels and reptiles...

But the One God has time and weight. Heavy as the pyramids, immeasurably impacted, the One God can wait. The Many Gods may have no more time than the butterfly, fragile and sad as a boat of dead leaves, or the transparent bats who emerge once every seven years to fill the air with impossible riots of perfume.

At the sight of the Black Lemur, with round eyes and a little red tongue protruding, the writer experiences a delight that is almost painful... the silky hair, the shiny black nose, the blazing innocence. Bush Babies with huge round yellow eyes, fingers and toes equipped with little sucker pads... a Wolverine with thick, black fur, body flat on the ground, head tilted up to show its teeth in a smirk of vicious depravity. (He marks his food with a musk that no other animal can tolerate.) The beautiful Ring-Tailed Lemur, that hops along through the forest as if riding a pogo stick, the Gliding Lemur with two curious folds in his brain. The Aye-aye, one of the rarest of animals, cat-size, with a long, bushy tail, round orange eyes and thin bony fingers, each tipped with a long needle claw. So many creatures, and he loves them all.

So who made all the beautiful creatures, the cats and lemurs and minks, the tiny delicate antelopes, the deadly blue krait, the trees and lakes, the seas and mountains? Those who can create. No scientist could think it up. They have turned their backs on creation.

Since Friday I have been in Devon, where I was born and grew up. I have come here directly from Wales and notice some differences. My current Welsh location is very much 'the countryside', as is the area in Devon where I grew up. But Devon, it seems to me, is a lighter place, where it is easier to breathe, perhaps because the shadow of industry has never fallen across its soul.

There are certain delights to be had in revisiting one's old home that I do not intend to describe at length. Anyone who has read my short story 'Decay' might have some idea of them. Perhaps I can sum those delights up as the perfume of mildewed books. Since coming here I have, quite naturally, looked to my old sagging bookshelves, to remember what has been gathering dust, and I have pulled a few volumes off the shelves to take back with me to Wales, and I have inhaled the musty spores of exquisite decay that rise from their pages.

One of the volumes that I have been looking at is William Burroughs's The Western Lands. I have long wished to unearth a favourite passage from this book, which I have not found excerpted on the Internet. After trawling through the book for some time, I have discovered that the favourite passage is, in fact, not one passage, but a number of scattered passages on a related theme. I have put together such of those scattered parts as I found at the top of this entry, to recreate the passage as I remembered it, or almost, in my own little cut-up. The parts that are missing deal with Burroughs's idea of a Creator who existed before the Christian god, and whose Creation the Christian god stole. They also deal with the idea of mass-production setting in not only in human society, but as a kind of evolutionary spirit or trend, blocking the further creation of such beautiful, delicate one-offs as the aye-aye. Responsible for this ugly mass-production are both Christianity and science.

Since coming back to Devon this time, I have also had cause to ponder another passage from the work of William Burroughs, this time from (I believe) My Education: A Book of Dreams. In it he bemoans the destruction of the natural environment by human beings, mentioning the argument often given that the human beings in question - poachers, for instance - are just trying to survive. He dismisses this argument, saying something like, "So what? I don't care about these people. There are too many humans, anyway." I admire the forthright expression of his feelings here. Usually only children are uncorrupted enough to say such things. I know that I felt exactly the same way as a child, and reading this I had to wonder why in adult life I tend to soften my views. Why do I wish to make myself agreeable to people when I know very well that people are stupid and disgusting?

Soon after my arrival here, discussion that took place was naturally about what has changed and what remains the same since my last visit. The house is located down a dead-end little dirt track opposite hills and fields. Apparently, someone down this road started a petition in order to gain permission from the local council to cut down the trees along the hedge on the other side of the track, because they were 'blocking the view'. It seems enough residents of this road signed the petition for their will to prevail, and I don't suppose any local council anywhere has ever been averse to chopping down trees, anyway, since the prime delight of all who serve on such councils seems to be to vandalise all that is beautiful in the world and replace it with all that is petty and mundane. Trees spoiling the view? What sort of education, in what sort of culture, have these people had? The trees are the view. Naturally, I heaved a sigh, and quietly wished unpleasant death to visit all those who had signed the petition, as soon as possible. And, perhaps not as naturally, but with myself, at least, quite expectedly, I also felt guilty for wishing such a thing.

Later, walking by myself on the hill near the house, which overlooks the sea, I realised again that the closest I come to well-being is when I am among trees. I feel that I am myself again, and nothing of that other world - the human world - matters. It came to me also, as I walked the hill in the green and grey cool of dove-boughed avenues, that it is only proper that I should despise the mass of humanity; the mass of humanity is despicable. There is nothing wrong with my anger, and if I felt as naturally myself at all times as I do when walking among the trees I have known since childhood, then I would be quite calm about my anger, and there would be no malice in it. Even if I wished death upon some idiot - (isn't that line from the Bowie song, "I could spit in the eyes of fools", actually, absolutely right? - it would be wished without malice. It would be of the moment, and the next moment, purified, I would forget it.

I hear also that developers have plans - so far thwarted - for the currently wild slope from the edge of this dirt track to the valley below. I hereby wish unpleasant death to come speedily upon any would-be developers, and call upon the gods of the Owl cults, with their wrenching needle talons, to shred the developers's hearts, that they might die shrieking like little girls while blood pours in gouts from mouth, ears and eyes.

I write that quite without malice, of course.

This brings me to Dare Wright, who has a place of honour in my temple - an altar of her own. It was quite natural that, coming back to Devon this time, and ferreting among my old books, I should in particular wish to find the works of Dare Wright, which were known to me as a child, but which in adult life have only ever been a memory. They were easily found. There were two of them (there may have been another, which has disappeared), The Lonely Doll and The Little One. The former appears to be a second edition, and the latter a first. They are musty in a way that complements the pictures and the stories wonderfully. I have not read these books since childhood, so it was quite possible that, adult in years now, I would be disappointed by what I read. But I was not.

It seems to me that Dare Wright is a true original, and has done what originals do. Not only has she expressed something original, but her means of expression has been original, too, and it is perhaps this latter half of creative originality that so often baffles people, though the two halves are hard to separate. In any case, I feel that Dare Wright is someone who created with love, and it is no wonder, therefore, that so many in the world - dull-witted newspaper columnists and others who may as well sit on the local council and plan which trees they are next to murder - think that her work was kitsch, or that she was a crank, or, as Houellebecq wrote of "moralists" in connection to Lovecraft's hatred of adult life, "utter vague opprobrious grumblings while waiting for a chance to strike with their obscene intimations". The obscene intimations of the dull and dull-witted defenders of adulthood in this case are, predictably, to do with Dare Wright's sex life, or her lack of one, over which they hold a prurient clinic in the arrogant manner of psychiatrists, sure that they have more insight into Dare Wright's 'problems' than she had.

To pass one's life in the twentieth century (perhaps in any age), without submitting to the obligatory sexual relations of social belonging that are, in fact, as dull as commerce in the adult sensibleness of the assumptions they represent, seems to me a wonderful acheivement, and is one that I straightforwardly admire, however many psychologists, amateur or otherwise, buzz around the matter like poisonous flies, "waiting for a chance to strike with their obscene intimations".

M.G. Lord, reviewing a biography of Wright for The New York Times, claims to find the biographer more interesting than her subject. His/her insinuations begin in the opening paragraph:

MANY distinguished children's writers haven't had children of their own -- or, for that matter, conventional family lives. Lewis Carroll, a lifelong bachelor, enjoyed a famously eyebrow-raising attachment to the little girl who inspired ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.'' George Selden, the unmarried author of ''The Cricket in Times Square,'' also wrote ''The Story of Harold,'' a pseudonymous, semi-autobiographical adult novel that dealt with bisexuality and sadomasochism.

Oozing through the text we find the vile but all-too-common distrust of those who have not bred, of those who have not added to the population of this dull and commerce-led world. It doesn't take long for the insinuations to become outright slurs on Wright's character:

In real life, however, Wright was a mess: a frigid, miserable woman locked in a suffocating relationship with her monstrous mother, with whom she slept, nestling ''like spoons,'' until the older woman finally died in 1975.

Frigid? Isn't that the word that self-satisfied cads use to describe women who won't sleep with them, or other women use in battles of sexual competitiveness? M.G. Lord goes on to describe Wright's art as "accidental and campy", and compares her unfavourably with Henry James, who, of course, represents all things adult and realistic. "Grow up!" s/he seems to be saying to Wright. "Grow up and get a man and have children of your own!" And cut down more trees in the grove of childhood and bring the developers in to build your new home. Such is M.G. Lord, such are the "moralists".

When I read such reviews, written about those few human beings who have managed to touch me, by one of the dull majority who disgust me, I tend to think of the lines from Reel Around the Fountain, by The Smiths:

Fifteen minutes with you
Well, I wouldn't say no
Oh, people said that you were virtually dead
And they were so wrong

What has M.G. Lord given me? S/he has offered a slice of deadening criticism. What has Dare Wright given me? Oh, I can tell you, she is so much more alive than M.G. Lord that you would not believe. It also seems significant to me that the first lines in Reel Around the Fountain are, "It's time the tale were told/Of how you took a child/And you made him old". This is simply what the amassed ranks of sensible society, arms crossed, lips pursed, shaking their heads, do to children - they make us old. They cut down more trees in our grove. But when we recognise another child-spirit like our own, we find some way to escape from those gathered ranks of sensible adult humans. We find the cool of the sacred grove, where no one else goes, and there, well, there we find a fountain to reel around.

To me, though I never met her, Dare Wright is undoubtedly one of the beautiful people. In her book The Little One, she tells the story - and shows it, too, with her own wonderful photographs - of a doll called Persis, who for some time has been gathering dust on a bookshelf in an abandoned house. A turtle comes to the house one day, finds her, and liberates her. Hot in the wild summer grasses, she comes upon a butterfly, who advises her she would be more comfortable without her clothes. Liberated, once again, as she divests herself of her clothes, she falls asleep beneath a "baby tree". There she is found by two bears, one of whom is happy and one of whom is grumpy. They wake her, and immediately she springs up with arms outstretched and says, "I like you". She lives then, with the bears, in the woods, where she wears skirts of leaves and ferns, there in the sacred monochrome cool of damp earth and sylvan shade. She rides upon Turtle's back, with a saddle of moss, like Lady Godiva, and bathes at the edges of waterfalls. This is what is done in the sacred grove. Eventually, she climbs a great tree in search of honey to appease the Cross Bear, who she thinks does not love her. When she falls from that tree, Cross Bear takes her in his arms, and she discovers that he does love her.

It is hard to describe exactly what this story means to me, because so much of it relies on the photographs, which are far too wonderful, eerie, expansive and mysterious to be "accidental" as M.G. Lord seems to think them. But I know when I read this that Wright was someone who was ready to meet you there - in her books at least - away from the dull developers of the adult world, in that shady grove. And that, not the adult commerce of sex, is love. And now I am reminded of that strange and wonderful contrast between the songs Pretty Girls Make Graves and The Hand that Rocks the Cradle on the first Smiths album. The first song shows the despair that attends the workings of lust and competitive sexuality in human society ("I lost my faith in womanhood"), and the second, which follows immediately, shows something purer and deeper - the love of, or for, a child: "Please don't cry/For the ghost and the storm outside/Will not invade this sacred shrine/Or infiltrate your mind/My life down I shall lie/If the bogeyman should try/To play tricks on your sacred mind/To tease, torment or tantalise."

Also from The New York Times, this time by one David Colman, we have another article on Dare Wright. M.G. Lord was amongst the camp that try to dismiss with an authoritative sniff, using words such as "campy". David Colman still ranks in that dull majority, but his word of choice is "unsettling". This is only slightly preferable. He seems to invite Wright in for a while, but ultimately there is rejection here. He wants to appear to be considering opening the door before he slams it. This is how the article begins:

YOU might think that Kim Gordon, the bass player and singer of the eternally hip downtown band Sonic Youth, would not have much in common with mothers of a more conventional stripe. But a few years ago she had an experience many women her age could relate to. She rediscovered a favorite series of childhood books, ''The Lonely Doll,'' and thought about reading them to her 7-year-old daughter, Coco. Then she thought better of it.

So, why did the eternally hip Kim Gordon think better of it? She found it "too depressing", and she was concerned about the spanking scene. It might be "sadistic". Kim Gordon, who describes the work as both "creepy" and "compelling", ultimately wants to keep it away from her child. A similar attitude is expressed by Elizabeth Karlsen, who may be producing the film of Wright's life. It is interesting that so many people fascinated by Wright should treat her more like a case study than a human being, perhaps in the way that well-to-do Victorians would pay for a nice day out at the lunatic asylum before retiring to their respectable homes. Karlsen wonders if The Lonely Doll really fits in with the standards of today's world. Yes, "today's standards". That's what she's worried about. The same standards by which Kim Gordon also judges the book. How very hip. I mean, that really is very hip, isn't it - worrying about today's standards. That's what being hip means. I wrote recently that it's a good thing to realise that literature is better than rock'n'roll, and this is what I was talking about. Rock'n'roll (I don't know if Sonic Youth is generally thought of as such, but that's what it is, basically, a form of music made by young people that is designed to be rebellious) is, in the end, a form of social climbing. There are dreams of literature, and there are dreams of rock'n'roll, and there's certainly some crossover, but the dreams of the latter are more likely to be those kind synonymous with ambition and worldly success. Rock'n'roll has a greater reputation for rebellion than do the sometimes, er... bookish types who tend to represent literature. But it seems to me that you are more likely to find a true outsider in literature than in rock'n'roll, and the story of Kim Gordon and Dare Wright is a case in point. Kim Gordon is unsettled by Dare Wright - by Dare Wright, the cosy old writer of children's stories. Kim Gordon is hip and is therefore susceptible to hip - and essentially bourgeious - social influences like political correctness. What outsider ever cared about political correctness? Tell me. The answer is that none ever have.

Rock'n'roll rebels are unlikely to be true outsiders. The chances are that in their hearts they are middle-class social climbers. They are interested in social reform and other such cosmetic things. They discover the symbols left to the world by true outsiders - the ones that rarely got the fame and the money - and they wear them as fashion statements. But they take those outfits off again later, when they are relaxing at home, with their own children. They are outsiders only in externals. They have simply discovered outsiderness. And this is why their music gets worse and worse as they get older. They don't have their own direct contact with the sacred grove of the outsider that is the source of imagination and creativity. Rock'n'roll, in the orthodoxy of its rebellion, is unable to address death, unless it is the death of the young, when rock'n'roll comes into its own. Otherwise, it simply becomes more and more ridiculous as its purveyors age, while the creators of literature, familiar with death from the shadows in the grove of the outsider, come more and more into their own with age. Rock'n'rollers never really wanted to be outsiders - they wanted to succeed... by appearing to be outsiders. The true outsiders might or might not succeed, but they will always be outsiders. M.G. Lord may be right about Dare Wright's art being "accidental" in one sense - the outsider cannot help being the outsider. And in that sense, all great art is accidental. It's not the business-plan of the developers and the rock'n'rollers.

On Saturday, I watched the film Miss Potter, about another writer of children's stories, the famous Beatrix Potter. I'm not going to critique the film beyond saying I thought it was made simple for wide public consumption. (By co-incidence I notice that it has just been Beatrix Potter's birthday.) Beatrix Potter also seemed to dwell, as outsiders do, in her private imagination. And for her, as for myself, that imagination was linked to nature. She had her sacred grove in the Lake District. Happily, she was one outsider who also knew success. With the money she made from her books - which was considerable - she bought up thousands of acres of land in the Lake District to save it from the developers for the benefit of future generations. I wonder how many rich rock'n'rollers have the imagination even to do that much with their money.

I have probably written too much. The world saddens me. There are one or two beautiful ones that I can meet in that shady grove. As to the rest, I curse humanity. I curse a humanity that doesn't notice or care when the writer Thomas Disch, threatened with eviction in his old age, resorts to suicide. I curse a world that favours Jane Austen over Arthur Machen. I curse a society in which people think that trees block the view. I curse you, and I do the only thing that I can do, and retreat to that grove, while it still stands.

2008-04-13T00:24:00.002+01:00

Robert's Your Mother's Brother

A while back whilst discussing in a reckless manner the relative merits of atheism and theism (was I doing that?), I said something to the effect that I myself didn't have any definite solution to propose (to the philosophic/metaphysical/social stalemate and conundrum). Well, now I have.

I'm sure I have at times sounded hostile towards the idea of atheism, but there's at least one situation in which I very much approve of it. And that is, within the clergy. There is no doubt in my mind that the church is the proper place for the atheist. It is the perfect venue for the fetishism of stained-glass windows, of ecclesiastical vestments, of ritual, tradition, incense, liturgy, hymn and prayer, without all the fuss of having to 'believe' in 'God'.

I myself have at times longed to wear a dog collar.

I understand the call of the cloth. When one is pulling one's surplice over one's cassock in the vestry, rehearsing one's sermon, the feel of ancient and solemn stone all around, the worn slabs beneath the feet, the anticipated tossing of censers in the air, what need is there for that superfluity known as belief? God, they say, is in the details, and when you have as many details as these, you can find that he is mercifully lost in them, as in the folds of your frock and the flocking of your flock.

Who better to understand the subtleties of Nietzsche or Schopenhauer than your local vicar? Who is more strategically placed to fathom the depths of the Ligottian cosmic nightmare than a member of the Holy See?

Not only do I think that it is a good thing for priests of all denominations under the Cross of our Lord to be atheist, I think it should be mandatory. Although, I suppose there is some room for agnosticism, for instance, amongst wacky heterosexual priests and so on.

By the same token, it should be obligatory under international law, for all scientists, of whatever field, to be devoutly religious, and, so as there are no shirkers, let's be specific and say that they should be.... Quakers. It'll work something like this. A group of scientifically minded Friends will seat themselves together in a modest laboratory, bare of equipment, in complete silence. After some minutes, perhaps, at the moving of the Inner Light, one of them will rise to his feet and say:

"Friends, I have something I wish to share with you. Energy can neither be created, nor destroyed. Thus within any closed system, the level of energy, and by extension, also of mass, must remain constant."

"Thank you, Friend, we hear you." (Comes the chorus of response.)

The Friend seats himself once more, and again, some minutes pass in silence until, by the promptings of the Inner Light, another Friend stands and says:

"Friends, I feel that I, too, have something to say, and that a voice within me is asking me to pass on that no physical theory of local hidden variables can ever reproduce all of the predictions of quantum mechanics."

And so on.

However, since, Quakerism, is, obviously, slightly too congruous with atheism and with science as it stands, perhaps it would be best to go a little further, and from there to legislate that all scientists, must, by law, become yogis. They will then, therefore, sit in their laboratories (or stand etc.) in various forms of yogic practice, such as suspending lead weights from their testicles by string, balancing on the top of a broomstick, and so on. Experimentation is definitely to be encouraged. The Hindu cosmology should be on a scale sufficient to accomodate the needs of science (unlike parochial old atheistic Christianity), and yogic practice should both stimulate and temper the mind to the most blessed and fertile invention.

In such a world, viola! Bob is, literally, your uncle.

I imagine the following discussions taking place between men of science and men of the cloth in our coming world:

Father Coombes: But you see, my dear man, the true function of religion is to lead us on the path of renunciation - the renunciation of belief. At last to feel the air on one's naked defences is quite a relief.

Professor Guessit: You priests are so nihilistic. In your focus on the paraphernalia of celebration, you forget the creative principle.

Father Coombes: I'm afraid that setting your eyebrows on fire and wishful thinking are not enough to protect us from the divine and terrible non-existence of God, that comes upon us, in the end, like a trembling thunder of sunlight on a mid-afternoon tea party in June.

Professor Guessit: Can't you see the chauvinism implicit in such rational gnosticism? With our tongue-nailing practice we've already achieved great things, and there's no reason why we should not achieve more. Just the other day we made a huge leap in our development of teleportation. Admittedly, the development was actually to take a huge leap. But we're getting there.

Excellent!

Any form of teleportation developed through tongue-nailing meditation is a teleportation for which I would be willing to volunteer as a guinea pig.

2008-04-12T11:26:00.002+01:00

I have a dream

Insomnia strikes again. So, in that sense I don't actually have a dream. Or not tonight. Josephine.

However, as Robert Plant once said (almost):

I have a crazy dream, in which turquoise, yellow, black, white, copper and brown are all united, as one, in tearing their leaders limb from limb.

I'm finding David Korten's The Great Turning to be increasingly stimulating reading, and, as the slogan goes, don't just take my word for it. Here's an excerpt:

The public version of the Grand Area strategy, which was intended to rally the support of those who would be the imperial subjects, called for the creation of a free and equal community of nations and gave birth to the United Nations.

The real intention of the United States was articulated in U.S. State Department Policy Planning Study 23, a top-secret document written in 1948 by George Kennan, a leading architect of the post-World War II world:

"We have about 50% of the world's wealth, but only 6.3% of its population... In this situation we cannot fail to be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain this position of disparity... To do so, we will have to dispense with all sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our intention will have to be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives... We should cease to talk about vague... unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better."

This was the real agenda, and the agencies of its implementation would be the Bretton Woods institutions: the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). In 1995, the World Trade Organization (WTO) replaced the less powerful GATT.

Here's another:

In 1823, even as the westward expansion was still in progress, President James Monroe enunciated the Monroe Doctrine as a cornerstone of U.S. policy. The publicly expressed intent was to protect independent Latin American and Caribbean nations from efforts by European powers to recolonize them; the implicit message was that the United States claimed hegemony over the Western Hemisphere.

Theodore Roosevelt took the Monroe doctrine a step further during his presidency (1901-9), announcing that the United States claimed the right to intervene in the internal affairs of any nation that engaged in "flagrant and chronic wrongdoing." Future U.S. administrations defined this to mean any nation that transgressed against a U.S trade or investment interest. A 1962 U.S. State Department report to the Congress listed 103 U.S. military interventions in the affairs of other countries between 1798 and 1895, including interventions in Argentina, Japan, Uruguay, China, Angola, Hawaii, and Nicaragua. The reasons were often obscure but usually related to the investments of one or more U.S. corporations.

I've written a little about racism in recent months. Perhaps I'm slow on the uptake, but I am coming more and more to see racism as something deliberately engineered by our leaders to divide us. I hope that we, the deceived and exploited, shall soon reverse this situation by dividing them. With machetes.

2008-04-12T00:40:00.001+01:00

Making the world feel less English since 2004

First of all, apologies are in order to just about everyone for just about everything.

Secondly, I'd like you all to think of England.

I know I do, frequently.

It is actually a scientific fact that it's ridiculous of me to be critical of England, unto which Stevie Smith likened happiness, however, I live only to be ridiculous in the eyes and bosoms of all those who behold me, and so, let me proceed.

First of all, I've linked to this before, but I do think it's an excellent essay and expresses a lot of what I also would like to express. I differ from the opinions of Momus management here and there. For instance, it looks like I'm not a real man, since I don't really like gadgets (apart from my digital camera). But that's not really a surprise to anyone, now, is it? Errr... Am I referring to the same essay? Haven't got time to re-read it. To continue...

Oh yes, so there's not much left to say after that, but I shall say it, anyway.

The other day, lamenting the existence of my blog to a friend whilst soaking a whole boxful of mansize tissues, I found myself confronted with the following reply:

I like your blog. I think you should carry on writing it. It makes the world feel less English.

(Before I go further, let me point out I'm not treating England and Britain as interchangable, even though they are... No, I'm just joking.)

A couple of days later I came across the following collection of British adverts on Youtube:

Now, I do actually have a sense of humour somewhere, if I could only find it, BUT, just how many layers of 'brilliant' English/British irony (everyone wants some if it's irony we're talking about) are there in these adverts? What finally comes out on top? The beer is being sold as 'no nonsense'. That's what comes out on top. I'm not having a go at Peter Kay. He's talented and funny enough not to need my permission to exist. But let's analyse in a very (un)English way, the first of these adverts {actually the last one is not bad, and perhaps shows the genuinely good side to British (but not English) 'no nonsense'}. Okay, I'm not well up on sports, but some kind of international sporting event. Some foreign Johnny types do some fancy twirly things off the diving board. Then it's 'good old' John Smith from 'Great Britain'. "What can he do?" we're asked, almost as if it's a rhetorical question. Because we're crap, aren't we? (Is the subtext.) And what he does is 'a running bomb'. The foetal version of a bellyflop, or perhaps the Dambusters version, eh? Anyway, needless to say he wins. That's the spirit! And, the advertising slogan for this horrible beer that tastes like Fairy Liquid is 'No nonsense'. Really? I think there's quite a lot of nonsense in there. However. 'No nonsense' is what the British, and specifically the English, pride ... I want to say 'ourselves', to be inclusive, but I can't, because I don't share these sentiments... is what they pride themselves on. What does 'no nonsense' really mean? Not trying. Being crap. Hating other people for being better than you. Hating to see your mates do well. Etcetera. He hasn't been in the pub since Tuesday, his new girlfriend really has him under the thumb etcetera etcetera. (Oh yeah, the one about the old people's home is particularly horrible. Funny? Didn't raise a titter.)

Sorry, but I don't find it funny. Even as a joke, it's lazy. How ironic can a pint of beer be?

I do enjoy a drink, but... there is more to life than beer and 'a running bomb'. There really is. Open your eyes, if you don't believe me. There is... Well, let's start with Momus. There's Momus, criminally underrated Scottish musician and blogger. There's.... Justin Isis, Mark Samuels (ha ha, no I'm not going to just list all my friends, sorry), Bruno Schulz, Juana Molina, Chinese landscape painting, flying gliders, entomology, Arthur Machen, that really grim Polish artist who was knifed whose name I can never spell and I'm probably embarrassing myself and getting the country wrong, too, Maruo Suehiro, C.G. Jung, Stanislav Grof, Gurdjieff, Kate Bush, Sifow, Maeda Ken, Zhongguo Wawa, Jorge Luis Borges, Jeremy Reed, The Tindersticks, some people that I have unforgivably not kept in touch with (sorry again), Nagai Kafu, Tanizaki Jun'ichiro, Naruse Mikio, Takahashi Rumiko, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Ivor Cutler, William Blake, Yang Lian, Wang Wei, Li Bai, tai chi, Six Feet Under, the Peter Harris Experience, Andre Gide, Immanuel Kant, Fucking Amal, Thomas Ligotti, Kierkegaard, Ann Kavan, tree frogs, duckweed, two-tone, wolf-children, Marcus Aurelius and Norman Lovett in my living room alone. And that's still a very, very biased list, it has to be said. (Oh, and Kahlil Gibran, he quipped.)

And some of them are even English.

And some of them are even British.

Errr. I think that's all I really needed to say. I'll leave the last word to Kit Wright, a poet. I know nothing about Kit Wright except that he or she wrote the following poem. (If there are any copyright problems, will Kit Wright please get in touch with me, and I promise that the John Smiths will be on me for the evening):

Everyone Hates the English

Everyone hates the English,
Including the English, they sneer
At each other for being so English,
So what are they doing here,
The English? It's thick with the English,
All over the country. Why?
Everyone ever born English
Should shut up, or fuck off, or die.

Anyone ever born English
Should hold their extraction in scorn
And apologise all over England
For ever at all being born,
For that's how it is, being English;
Fodder for any old scoff
That England might be a nice country
If only the English fucked off!

2008-04-03T19:43:00.001+01:00

Interview with Rroland

When I write, as part of the ritual necessary to putting me in the right frame of mind, as well as making myself a pot of tea, I tend to put on some music. This is usually instrumental (with one or two exceptions). For instance, favourites include the soundtrack the from film Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters by Philip Glass and (currently) Mum's Finally We Are No one. Another disc that has graced my player during the ritual of writing, and at various other times, is Reflections on a Past Life as Played on the Roland Synthesiser, by Rroland. Rroland's music is, to offer a very general description, instrumental, electronic and ambient. However, I'm not sure I could really give and idea of genre here, and even the word 'ambient' seems misleading. Sometimes, when I'm writing, I find that the music refuses to be background music. Some of the pieces are too structured to really be 'ambient', seeming to build themselves in cyclopean blocks before the mind's eye, and even those that have a drifting quality are only really misty - if at all - at the edges. If this is drifting, then it is drifting as experienced by Walter Gilman in H.P. Lovecraft's 'The Dreams in the Witch House', who finds himself nocturnally travelling in dream through regions that "lie beyond the three dimensions we know" in "plunges through limitless abysses of inexplicably coloured twilight and bafflingly disordered sound; abysses whose material and gravitational properties, and whose relation to his own entity, he could not even begin to explain."

In the case of Reflections on a Past Life, however, there is some explanation, and that explanation is in the title. The fifteen tracks on the disc are a musical representation of a past-life re-lived, and, I must say, they do rather feel that way, like a therapeutic session, perhaps, with the likes of R.D, Laing, whose aim is to re-experience and thus to exorcise buried trauma. The reviews I have read of the disc use phrases such as "Candyland-on-crack", but my own experience is not of 'electronic popsicles'. To give an example, The Road up to Hell sounds to me like a cryogenically frozen soul watching paralysed as bits of karmic space debris burn up in the atmosphere of its aura.

Just the other day, Momus invited the readers of his blog to interview each other in his comments section. I wrote down an impromptu list of questions, and a number of people were generous enough to answer these (and all of them interestingly). Among these people there was Rroland, who has kindly given me permission to reproduce the interview here:

Q: What was the last book (s) that you read?

R: Street of Crocodiles Bruno Schultz

Q: How was it?

R: Funny, sad, inspiring made me want to compose new stuff

Q: Do you have any pets?

R: no, a mouse once lived with me but my landlord killed it

Q: What's your favourite non-alcholic drink?

R: Trader Joe's Bedtime tea

Q: What would be the preferred manner of your death?

R: in the backcountry while hiking, or with my head on my keyboard playing an endless distorted note

Q: What is the oldest article of clothing that you still wear?

R: that's a long answer, i wear everything until it falls apart

Q: What is your favourite kind of weather?

R: thick fog

Q: What is the least touristy place you have ever been?

R: San Diego, CA

Q: What place names make you laugh?

R: San Diego

Q: Have you ever been personally involved with someone born on an island smaller than Taiwan?

R: No

Q: Do you prefer to use chopsticks, knife and fork, or hands?

R: Chopsticks when possible

Q: Have you ever walked out on a film in the cinema, and if so, what was it?

R: 'I'm not There', The Heath Ledger parts were pissing me off

Q: What's your least favourite cartoon and why?

R: He-Man, because i am a mis-anthropist

Q: Who is the world's funniest comedian?

R: Franz Kafka

Q: What do you want to do next week?

R: Yoga

Q: Have you ever admired someone for political reasons?

R: yes, Momus

Q: What is the most psychologically formative event of your life before the age of nine?

R: when I burned my dad's porn collection and started a field on fire and got in trouble with the fire department

Q: Where did you last go for a daytrip and why?

R: I walked about 10 miles across the GG Bridge from my house in SF and took the ferry back from Sausalito

Thanks for interview Quentin!

You may listen to some of Rroland's music at his Myspace page, here.

2008-04-03T18:32:00.001+01:00

Grotesque

Kirino Natsuo seems to be something of a phenomenon.

She is a Japanese author of, to my knowledge, what might be described as thrillers or crime novels. I know enough to understand that crime is big at the moment. For many horror and supernatural writers, for instance, it's the 'new horror'. I hear murmurings that the crime genre is considered pretty cutting edge right now, and I'm sure there are readers who will corroborate.

Justin Isis turned me onto Kirino Natsuo, describing her as an example of 'obasan rage'. 'Obasan' is Japanese for 'aunt', but is also used to refer generally to middle-aged women.

In London recently, I popped into a bookshop, saw a copy of Grotesque and bought it on impulse. I started reading it that day, and soon found it addictive. Here's what some of the blurbs say:

'Cool, angry and stylish,' The Times.

'Delves so deep beyond its own shock horror premise that much contemporary crime fiction appears cheap and exploitative by comparison...' Metro.

There are more, but I'll leave it at that.

After a couple of days of reading it, I met up with Mr. Wu in London (for those who are new to this blog, Mr. Wu is a pseudonym), and spoke to him about it, even then thinking I'd like to write a review of it.

"It's a Japan I recognise," I said.

"In what way?"

"Well, lots of people made utterly dull and spiteful by conformity."

"Hmmmm. It's funny you should say that. That's exactly, word for word, how I would describe Britain."

(If you're using this blog post for any kind of sociological study, well, I'm afraid that's about as incisive as my social observation is going to get.)

Anyway, the other day I finally finished the book, and now I'd like to write a little about it. I'll try not to give too many spoilers, though I'll have to discuss some aspects of plot. Basically, as explained on the back cover, the story is that of two women educated at the same elite school for girls, who both go on to become prostitutes, and who both are murdered. The story is largely told in the voice of the older sister of one of these women. Ironically, I don't think I can remember the older sister's name now. Damn, that's terrible, and I'll tell you why - because no one really seems to remember her name at all (maybe the author omits it on purpose, but I'm not sure). She lives in the shadow of her younger sister, Yuriko, who is extraordinarily beautiful. People think of her simply as 'Yuriko's (ugly) older sister'. Other parts of the story are told by Yuriko, the second woman, Sato Kazue, and the apparent murderer.

The sister tells us early on that if she had to describe Yuriko in one word, that word would be 'monster'. This seems a startling claim, but she makes good on it as the story unfolds. And the reason her sister is a monster? Not because she was born with an evil soul or any such thing, but merely because of her beauty. Beauty is monstrous because it is the focus of desire, and specifically male desire. This is a book that could be summed up as an unfavourable review of the male sex through the eyes of those most qualified to know them - prostitutes. Kirino Natsuo seems to have arrived on the scene like a brilliant party pooper at an office party, the razor sharp obasan casting a withering eye on the other office girls flattering their bosses and on the bosses simpering in return.

This is a book of unapologetic extremes, successfully pulled off. Just as Yuriko is described straightforwardly as a monster, so society is depicted in more or less absolute terms as a bullying hierarchy, and characters are divided starkly into 'insiders' and 'outsiders', 'sluts' and 'virgins' and so on. Although this could result in a dull simplicity if not skilfully handled, such polarisation is effective here for a number of reasons. The extreme views give a certain incisive power, like the stabs of a sharpened blade. Also, because the story is told from the viewpoints of different characters, and the characters not only reveal different sides of the same events, but different aspects of themselves over time, the narrative blade that Kirino Natsuo uses is not only sharp, but could also be described as double-edged. There's something else, too. Early on in the story, during the section set in the school for girls, where pupils are naturally divided into the 'insiders' who were at the school from the beginning, and the 'outsiders' who enrolled later, there is the following dialogue between the older sister and her best friend:

Best friend: "I didn't think there could ever be such a student here."

Older sister: "Even among the outsiders?"

Best friend: "Outsiders? Damn, you're like an alien, you know. No one laughs at you or tries to bother you. You just go about your business without a care in the world!"

As soon as I read this, and other similar descriptions pertaining to the older sister character, I had a strong feeling that they also applied to Kirino Natsuo as an author. She is 'not even an outsider', and this gives her angle a complexity that belies the seeming simplicity of 'outsider/insider', 'virgin/slut' and so on. It also leads me to imagine the office party that I mentioned earlier as a metaphor for the literary world, full of complacency and mutual back-slapping. I would like to think, and can well imagine, that the presence of Kirino Natsuo makes a lot of the old phoneys in the world of writing and publishing rather nervous. She might just spoil the easy game for everyone, and show up what cheats and slackers they all are.

Although none of the characters in Grotesque are exactly sympathetic, and certainly not admirable, it's definitely men who come off worst:

I can't think of any creature more disgusting than a man, with his hard muscles and bones, his sweaty skin, all that hair on his body, and his knobbly knees. I hate men with deep voices and bodies that smell like animal fat, men who act like bullies and never comb their hair. Oh, yes, there is no end to the nasty things I can say about men. I'm just lucky to have a job at a ward office so I don't have to commute to work every day on the crowded trains. I don't think I could stand riding jammed in a car with a bunch of smelly salary men.

Being a member of the male sex myself, you might imagine I would find this offensive, but I don't. Not in the least. I'm not sure why that should be except that it simply seems honest to me. It's not some sly political statement, not some part of the power struggle. The main narrator (and perhaps the author) is smart enough to disown any ideology such as feminism. Her hatred is personal, and that's something I can respect completely. In fact, I very much appreciate the opportunity to see the world in such a way, and hope that this is a vista that many men (and women) will find themselves subjected to unwittingly. Even if the picture painted in this book of the male sex is not the 'whole truth', I see no reason to give counter-arguments, which have been given for so long now, anyway, that they resemble excuses. For now, let us bathe in the pure hatred. The hour of obasan rage is upon us!

Yes, indeed, Kirino Natsuo is smart. Her style seems to me like that of someone so sharp she doesn't have to try too hard to prove anything, who can let things drop almost off-handedly here and there. For instance, I love this kind of thing:

Yes, I can well believe you don't want to hear any more about my grandfather and Mitsuru's mother and their disgusting love story.

What fascinates me is how Kirino Natsuo has taken an angle that is almost the opposite of cool - for instance, the obscure life of the frumpy, middle-aged woman who is the main narrator here - and turned it around to create something that is, to quote The Times once more, "cool, angry and stylish", and how she has done so seemingly without compromise. A work that concentrates solely on hatred, violence and ugliness could be accused of being shallow, and I suppose such a criticism is possible, and yet I feel that there is something in the sharpness and smartness of what Kirino Natsuo has acheived here that is not shallow. Its depth lies in the depth of suffering and the depth of hatred, the care with which the sharp blade of the narrative has been honed, and in all that has been left unsaid.

And, if you want pathos, how about the pathos revealed in small details, such as an aging and 'grotesque' prostitute, of good educational background, putting her finger to her chin as a deliberate expression of little girl cuteness in order to try and win some kind of sympathy from the man who is her oblivious customer?

Not that I would say this is a perfect novel by any means. I did not find, for instance, the narrative voice of the murderer as compelling as that of the older sister. Also, I understand that the author is influenced by Stephen King, and here and there I felt the prose (whether due to poor translation or not, I don't know), lapsed from sharpness into the kind of passable, plodding, action-driven prose characteristic of King. My overall verdict, however, is that I want to read more.

I looked up a little on Kirino Natsuo after I started reading the book. There were two points of interest for me. Perhaps three. I was surprised to find that she is a married mother. I shouldn't have been really. As a writer myself, I know very well that one should not necessarily take fiction at face value or look for a literal correspondence between the work and the author. However, I do admit that I was surprised - but not disappointed. I like the seeming disparity here. I like the fact that she is able so convincingly to project a persona that bears no resemblance to her outward circumstances. Yes, I still believe her work to be honest. Honesty in fiction is something very different to mere autobiography.

Secondly, I noted that although she has written thirteen full-length novels and a number of other books since 1993, only two of her books have been translated into English. This is utterly shameful. I don't know anymore whether to blame the publishers or the reading public for this kind of thing, but it does make me angry nonetheless. The proportion of novels being translated from English to other languages is much greater than the proportion being translated from other languages to English. Why? English literature is so dull and self-satisfied, and so is the English-speaking world. It seems like the only Japanese literature that most people can ever claim to have read (if they can claim any at all) is Murakami Haruki, in whose books, with their offensively coffee-table hip covers, we are currently drowning.

Did I say there was a third thing? Well, just that I looked up some images of Kirino Natsuo, too, and I find she has a rather wonderful face, as you can see above.

2008-03-31T00:10:00.000+01:00

Artmadeflesh

I've just noticed that the cover of Shrike has now been completed. This is good.

I know people have pre-ordered copies, too. Well, it's coming. You know, there's more in the pipeline, after Shrike, too. Much, much more, even if I have to jolly-well publish it myself, or even if someone lifts the memory stick of all my work off my corpse after I've been beaten to death outside the offices of Penguin Books for looking a bit like Doctor Who.

Well, the artist, Vincent Chong, has done a nice job. I like his work.

But now, I'm very tired. I think that Mr. Newton has had enough. Yes, I rather think he has.

2008-03-22T13:03:00.001Z

David Blunkett's Hands

I wonder just how manipulated I am. For instance, I find Heather Mills's face quite offensive, but I'm sure this response has been carefully engineered by the media, in the photographs chosen and so on. But why are they doing this? Or is this a silly question?

I've heard people say how brilliant Brasseye was at deconstructing supposedly objective television, such as news and current affairs programmes, and I would agree.

I'm pondering this partly because I'm reading Grotesque by Kirino Natsuo, which I hope to review once I've finished.

No worse fate can befall a man, says Burroughs, than to be surrounded by traitor souls. Indeed. Which soul do you trust?

I remember a conversation about Brasseye and the way the media creates images. He had watched, my interlocutor told me, a current affairs programme in which David Blunkett was being interviewed. And, at the conclusion of the interview, there was a moment where the camera focused on David Blunkett's hands. Why?

2008-03-20T17:01:00.001Z

A Tale of Two Teapots

I want to talk to you about teapots.

When I went to London last weekend I bought a new teapot. When I came back, I took some photographs of it. You will see the photographs below. I call them, 'My New Teapot 1', 'My New Teapot 2' and 'My New Teapot 3'.

Teapots are good things to take photographs of.

In fact, I have a whole new album of six pictures, all of them of teapots. I call this new album, 'Teapots'.

My new teapot was bought in the place where I lived just before moving to Wales, on the outskirts of London, in Zone 5, I believe. I was walking along the highstreet, looking in the windows of the shops, when there, in one of the gloomier, grimier windows, I saw something that made me stop in my tracks. It was a teapot.

You will probably notice from the photographs that this was not a common-or-garden teapot, or, at least, not a common-or-garden British teapot. Oh no. It was a common-or-garden Japanese teapot. Although my interest extends to embrace teapots in general, I especially like ones that come from Japan and ones that come from China. The latter are usually a little more delicate and showy and the former more rustic and 'minimalist'. That is, of course, a generalisation. You may also notice that the handle is not where it would be on a British teapot. No. This is positioned much more sensibly, so as not to break your wrist, above the lid of the teapot. Also, it is made of wicker.

As much as anything, it was this handle that attracted me. There's a story behind this. I shall tell it to you. My favourite teapot even is one that I bought in Japan. I will post a picture of it below. I bought it when I moved into my room in Ohbaku, part of Uji, near Kyoto. The city of Uji is the tea capital of Japan. Although I did not have much to do with human beings while I was resident in and around Kyoto, because of Uji, I had a lot to do with tea and all its appurtenances.

My favourite teapot was not expensive. It was cheap and mass-produced, but it was just right, in my eyes, and very kawaii. I also like, perhaps erroneously, to think of it as fuuryuu. For me, drinking tea is very much an aesthetic experience. I don't believe, either, that 'aesthetic' has to mean 'expensive'. No, no. On the contrary, it is very often (perhaps most often) the other way round. This is why the Japanese tea masters of old spurned the ostentatious Chinese tea utensils for use in the tea ceremony, preferring those that were plainer and more rustic.

During my time in Japan, I looked at enough ceramics closely enough to get a general idea of what is better craftsmanship, what is more expensive and so on. But good taste is not dictated by market value. Everything depends on context.

Last year, the wicker handle of my favourite teapot broke. There is not only misfortune in my life. If you look at the photograph of my favourite teapot carefully, you will see sellotape about the bottom parts of the handle. This was before it broke completely. I knew the day would come, and I dreaded it. However, the day it broke, it was just after I had filled it with hot water to brew some tea and was about to set it on the floor in my room. Perhaps half a centimeter before it touched the floor, the handle broke. If it had been seconds earlier, the entire teapot would have shattered, spilling boiling tea everywhere.

The teapot was saved. I only needed a new handle. This, however, was not so easy to come by. I could not find one anywhere in London. Even last weekend, looking at the Japan Centre along Piccadilly, I could not find any.

I have been using a stand-in for my favourite ever since the handle broke.

When I saw this new teapot in the shop window, not only did I like the simple black-and-cream design, I also noted the handle! If I did not want to use the teapot itself, I could remove the handle and transfer it to my favourite teapot. The shop was closed. I determined to come back early the next day.

I came back early the next day. The shop in question was a charity shop. I think it was Roumanian Relief Fund or something. I can't quite remember. To be honest, I was more interested in that teapot! It cost three pounds and fifty pence. The lady at the counter wrapped it in newspaper for me and put it in an estate agent's bag.

At last I brought it back to Wales. I noted, again, the layer of gunge that had collected on its upper surface from long neglect. I decided to try and wash this off, but it was thicker than I had thought. Eventually, I tried nail varnish remover and a cotton wad on the glazed black area. This seemed to work. Then I rinsed this off with boiling water. As I did so I remembered fondly a teapot I had once bought in America from a Chinese lady. She had instructed me in a particular ritual to perform with all new teapots to make them unbreakable. However, I couldn't remember whether or not that ritual only related to unglazed pots. I won't say what that ritual is. Apparently it's something done traditionally in China, so there must be only a few hundred million people in the world who know what it is, and I'd like to keep the knowledge exclusive and esoteric. I lost that particular teapot. Well, when I say I lost it, what I mean is that, very sadly, we parted ways.

There have been and still are many teapots in my life. I won't tell you all their stories now, if I ever do.

My new teapot is still sitting by the fireplace. It's not of genuine Japanese origin. I can tell that much. Despite the attractiveness of the design, I can also tell it's very cheap. The end of the spout is not formed well, and it doesn't pour as smoothly as it should. I'm wondering whether to decide if this means that it is beautiful in its imperfection, or whether it just means it's a dud; if it is the latter then I can transfer the handle to my old, favourite teapot. I have not brewed tea with the new one yet. After I've given it another good wash, I shall do so. And after I have done so, perhaps I shall make my decision.

2008-03-19T23:06:00.001Z

In middle life I grew to love the Way

In the recent storms the rain was heavy and the wind strong. I took a walk down the muddy track above the river one afternoon, and, just before I had reached the place where the pigsty is, I came to a tree that had been blown over and had fallen across the path.

When Gerard Manley Hopkins encountered the sight of an ash tree being chopped down, some time before composing a poem on a similar theme, he wrote of the event:

...looking out and seeing it maimed there came at the moment a great pang and I wished to die and not see the inscapes of the world destroyed any more

Although the tree before me had been felled by natural causes (perhaps one could argue that the freak weather of those days, bringing floods to Wales and the South West, was not natural), I felt something like the pang that Hopkins described. It was as if the future itself were felled and blocked my way forward. I sighed. There was nothing I could do. I contemplated the scene and looked around, not wanting merely to dismiss it from my thoughts. Of course, it occurred to me, the tree itself probably doesn't mind. Then again, I can't be sure of that. But as I looked to the side of the path, I envied those trees that were still standing, and, by extension, even that which had fallen.

Their roots delve straight into the good earth. They spring directly from it, and die directly into it.

I've long felt an almost erotic attraction to the soil. Perhaps 'erotic' is a wilfully inaccurate word, or perhaps not, but, anyway, rather than 'eros', the word 'thanatos' might have more bearing here. The thought of burying myself in rich, wet soil, there to decay, fills me with joy. This is by no means a recent attraction. One of the earliest poets in whom I took an interest, in my early teens, was Baudelaire, and of his poems, one of my favourites was 'The Happy Corpse', which starts with the lines:

Wherever the soil is rich and full of snails
I want to dig myself a nice deep grave -
Deep enough to stretch out these old bones

Thinking about my own return to the soil is more and more what sustains me. I just wonder why I have had to have the bit in between birth and earth.

Another of life's depressing little frustrations - I've looked all around and can't find the book containing the poem from which I took the title of this entry. It is, anyway, a poem from 300 Tang Poems as translated by Innes Herdan, one of my most cherished volumes. 'The Way', of course, is 'the Dao'. When I think of Daoism, I think of roots and earth, roots taking me down, down, into the earth.

Let me die before I die.

2008-03-18T14:02:00.000Z

Speciesism

I subscribe to an e-mail group called A.Word.A.Day. The idea is simple. Each day you are sent a new item of vocabulary from the English language, with quotes and background. I recommend it. And, Sesame Street was brought to you today, by the word 'speciesism'. I reproduce the e-mail here:

speciesism (SPEE-shee-ziz-uhm, -see-ziz-uhm) noun

The assumption of superiority of humans over other animal species, especially to justify their exploitation.

[Coined by psychologist Richard D. Ryder (born 1940) in 1973. From Latin species (appearance, kind, form), from specere (to look). Ultimately from the Indo-European root spek- (to observe) which is also the ancestor of such words as suspect, spectrum, bishop (literally, overseer), espionage,despise, telescope, spectator, and spectacles.]

"At one point in Darwin's voyage to South America, James Moore told me, the naturalist stopped in Brazil, where his blood ran cold to see slaves in manacles being tortured by Catholic traders. Darwin was enraged as a Christian, but also as a scientist, because he recognized that the slave trade relied on the false notion that slaves were a different, inferior and exploitable species.

"Upon his return to England, Darwin extended the idea to the way people treated animals, an early precursor to Richard Dawkins's argument about speciesism. 'To say man is the pinnacle of creation and all things were created for him ... Darwin says that is the same arrogance we see in the slave master,' said Moore."

Shankar Vedantam; Eden and Evolution; Washington Post; Feb 5, 2006.

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2008-03-18T11:54:00.000Z

My Copyright Policy

By the way, it's worth mentioning here, but I've briefly discussed copyrighting issues with a friend this weekend. Well, it was only casual, but it makes me want to restate my policy here. All the images I use are hotlinked, which I take as a reference to their source. If you want to know where they come from, you should be able to just right-click over them and go to 'properties'. I think that's how it's done. So, in other words, I'm just borrowing these images in the same way you do when you inset a youtube clip.

In terms of text, I almost always give the source, unless it's a casual, conversational allusion.

If anyone wishes me to remove any content or images on copyright grounds, just let me know.

2008-03-11T13:57:00.000Z

This is materialism

Vivisectionists have always had excuses for their hobby, but I have long thought the picture below sums up their true attitude:

This is also the basic attitude of materialism, a worldview whose architects include Rene Descartes, who believed that the world was a machine created by God (he was a religious man, and here we see precisely how science is shaped by Western religion) and that animals have no souls. He was in this way giving a license to all the vivisectionists that were to come.

Look at the picture again. That is what materialism, as formulated by Western religion and science, does to all of us.

2008-03-08T14:03:00.000Z

An Interview with Nagai Kafu

It seems to be a kind of a cliche for people to put up their old essays from university on the Internet. "Who wants to read that?!" says my hypothetical representative of the general attitude about this sort of thing, whom I shall name Gerald, even though I'll probably never refer to him again. However, I am going to act according to the cliche now and post here part of my final dissertation that I wrote for my BA in Japanese Studies. I graduated in the year 2000, so this was written from, if I remember correctly, mid 1999 onwards. Perhaps I started earlier, I can't remember now.

Anyway, I hope that people (including Gerald) will actually want to read this, and that they won't find it boring. Let me explain a little about it. The title of the disseration was 'Decay - The Life and Works of Nagai Kafu.' Nagai Kafu (1879-1959) is one of my favourite writers, and numbers among the handful of things on this planet that have kept me alive and relatively sane. The word 'decay' in the title of the dissertation refers to the fact that much of his work dealt with decline of traditional Japanese culture. More than that, however, there is a definite strain in his work of finding beauty in decay, in squalor, in all that is hopeless, all that is fleeting, all that thrives like weeds in the shadowy places of the world.

I look back on some of what I have written with acute embarrassment now. I was very pleased to be told that the dissertation had received the highest mark of any dissertation in the history of the department (as you can perhaps imagine), but the lecturers surely knew I was also being self-indulgent in many ways, and told me so. And yet they indulged me. Perhaps it was because they could tell I loved my subject matter. Having been a teacher myself, I know that it's always very refreshing to find someone interesting enough to be interested in something, and not so boring that they are always bored.

I certainly don't intend to reproduce the entire dissertation on the Internet. Not ever. Because of the abovementioned embarrassment, you see. What I intend to reproduce here is one of the appendices. I was so enthusiatic about my subject that I far exceeded the word limit. The only way I could get around this was by putting some of the material I had to cut back in as appendices. The appendix in question is in the form of an interview I conducted with Nagai Kafu. Now, if you look at the birth and death dates for Kafu above, and happen to know my birth (and possibly death) dates, you'll probably be scratching your head at this point. Ah, but I didn't interview the living Kafu, you see. I interviewed his ghost.

I have a hard copy of the dissertation here with me. It is spiral bound, and, considering I'm not much one for presentation (have you noticed?), beautifully presented. The cover, in particular, is very beautiful, but I don't think I'll be able to find that image on the Internet. Maybe I'll try and scan it in later, if someone is actually interested. And now, the interview:

The Long Awaited Interview

‘Tis the day of the festival O-Bon and your reporter awaits the presence of the illustrious author Nagai Kafu in a corner of Kamiya Bar, apparently a favourite haunt of the great man when he was alive. I have ordered something called an ‘electric brandy,’ the speciality of the house and a curious concoction indeed. Drinking it is not dissimilar to licking a battery. The place is very busy and I hope that no one will recognise the great man when he arrives. I want this to be a pleasant, relaxed interview.

Kafu, as he is generally known, does not give me the opportunity to let my excitement become strained or anxious by making me wait. He arrives with commendable punctuality at the appointed time. It is rather a tall man who strides through the door, and there is about him the general impression of sturdiness, somewhat belying what I have heard of his ill health. To my surprise, however, he is dressed rather informally, dare I say, shabbily, in an old striped shirt, open at the neck, a pair of exceedingly ragged trousers with rolled up bottoms, and sandals worn down at the heel. As he takes a seat he plucks a leaf from his tousled hair.

NK: I hope I’m not late.

YR: No, not at all.

NK: You must excuse my attire. I’ve just come from the garden and haven’t had time to dress. Let me just change into something a little more appropriate.

Before I can protest Kafu turns misty and unfocused. When his outline sharpens once more he presents an entirely different figure. Now he is dressed in an immaculate, dark Western suit and tie with polished black shoes. He removes his hat and relinquishes it to a passing waiter. He reminds me of someone. After a few moments I decide that he looks like a rather large-featured, Japanese version of Harold Lloyd. Maybe it’s the glasses.

YR: It’s very good of you to agree to this interview.

NK: Yes. It runs entirely contrary to my usual habits, of course. I’m somewhat distrustful of those who ply the pen, and I can see you’re one of them.

YR: Then, if it’s not too impertinent, might I ask why you did agree?

NK: To be quite frank I was surprised that anyone was interested. I’ve been laid to rest for forty years this very year, and I was quite out of fashion even towards the end of my own lifetime.

YR: Nonetheless, you are remembered. Your work has been translated into English as recently as five years ago. Works like Sumidagawa and Bokuto Kidan have even been translated into your beloved French. You say that you are distrustful of writers, but it is as a writer you are remembered.

NK: Yes. A disgraceful set of circumstances.

YR: Yet you yourself specified that you wanted your epitaph to read, “The Grave of Nagai Kafu the Scribbler.” [1]

NK: That would be the English translation, I suppose? I also stated I should like to be buried among the courtesans of Yoshiwara, but it seems that particular wish was not to be granted. [2]

YR: What I’m trying to get at is that you seem excessively self-deprecating, to the extent of being paradoxical. For instance, your proclamation that you should be taken no more seriously than an Edo gesakusha, what was behind that?

NK: Well, I believe I largely covered that question in a little essay called, ‘Hanabi,’ but since you ask, and it would be very tedious of me to refer you constantly to my writings, quite simply, I never considered myself that talented. I’m not sure that today’s people will understand the distinction, but I see myself more as a Saikaku than a Chikamatsu. [3] Besides, I actually have a boundless admiration for the Edo gesakusha. Should I have the fortune to be considered a genuine gesakusha I would esteem it a great accolade. Let’s put it another way. I believe it was in the fifth year of Taisho – that’s 1916 to you – that I renounced the literature of affirmation for the literature of ‘shumi.’ [4] Which is to say, I was writing more for my own sake, as an amateur – and you know the French word designates someone with a real love for their work - rather than trying to set any examples or fight any literary battles. That way one feels a greater freedom. It does not matter so much if one’s works are a little irregular, or not in step with the issues of the day. In short, one does not have to be the slave of others’ expectations. It’s an enviable position. No matter what authorities may be in power, they cannot stop you from thinking and dreaming what you wish. And similarly, they cannot stop you from writing what you wish, even if they make sure it is not published.

YR: You say you lack talent, and yet according to the Japanese I have spoken to, some in this very bar, your works are considered classics. They tell me your style is difficult, lyrical, finely polished. Of course, it seems all those things to me too, but in their comments I find my own views vindicated. I must say that I’m fascinated by the whole ambiguity of your position, as a latter-day gesakusha, as someone whose works are considered flawed by the likes of Edward Seidensticker, and yet as someone who, in the very fact of attracting such criticism, is evidently considered worthy of the attention.

NK: That’s not really a question.

YR: No, I suppose not. In which case let us proceed to another ambiguity. You seem distinctly individualist in philosophical bent and general temperament, and yet you appear to hanker after the Edo period, which was probably even more authoritarian than the Meiji period and all that it ushered in.

NK: Well, this is true. But perhaps that is the fault of my fatalistic nature. I do not admire authoritarianism, by any means. But the problem is one of aesthetics. The arts of Edo, not to mention the architecture and the manners, were far superior to the arts of our ill-considered 20th century. [5] The thing about the tyranny of the past, I suppose, is that it has been an oppressive cloud casting a great shadow, and I’m sure you are aware how fond I am of shadows and what is to be found among them. The ukiyo-e, for instance, for which I harbour almost religious feeling, is just such a product of this tyrannical shadow, the art of the oppressed plebeian, expressing in part resignation and in part defiance. Please note it is not the tyranny, but the resistance to that tyranny with which I am in especial sympathy.

YR: I’d like to extend this theme a little further in a slightly different direction. I put it to you that your attitudes are essentially conservative, and present as further evidence your attitude towards women. Your works evince a notable sympathy towards your female characters, who usually occupy low or disreputable social positions. However, your sympathy seems to cease should they rise from their positions of subjugation. For instance, in Bokuto Kidan, when talking about redeeming women from ‘the quarters of the thickly painted,’ [6] and giving them a domestic role, you state: “Every time such a woman changed her circumstances and ceased to consider herself humble, she would undergo a complete change and either end up a hopeless slattern or an ungovernable shrew.” [7] In short, your aesthetics seem actually to demand a certain cruelty for your hikage no hana to flourish.

NK: The extract you have quoted is from a work of fiction and not necessarily autobiographical. Nonetheless, I will stick by the remark. It is simple personal observation. I have nothing against women making good in the world. But I too have my own way to make in the world and my own interests to pursue. As to being conservative, that is a matter of interpretation. If being conservative means wishing to preserve all that is good in our traditions and our arts, and having a modicum of manners and decency in one’s dealings, then I admit to it unreservedly. By the way, if you read a little further in Bokuto Kidan you will find that Oe Tadasu muses that someone other than him might be able to make such a marriage a happy one.

YR: But you don’t believe in sexual equality?

NK: I don’t believe it is a very desirable position for men. Fully emancipated women are not very attractive. [8] But that is simply a matter of taste.

YR: Seidensticker quotes your second wife as explaining why she left you by saying, “He was very fickle.” [9] I feel sure that “fickle,” is Seidensticker’s way of translating, “Uwaki shite ita,” or, “Unfaithful.”

NK: This is the kind of scandal mongering I had feared. I would be obliged if you would mind your own business and limit your questions to my work.

YR: Yes, you’re quite right. Perhaps it is irrelevant. Speaking of which, do you think your work, backward looking even at the time of writing, has any relevance for readers today? Is it even healthy to be reading something that dwells so much on a past irrecoverably lost?

NK: My immediate response is to say that I do not care whether it is relevant to ‘the reader of today,’ or not. I have had occasion to wander the streets of Asakusa, Mukojima, where I set Bokuto Kidan, Fukagawa, Nihombashi – I could go on – and I find that as the city approaches the 21st century, there remains not a shadow of the city I knew and wrote about. I cannot hope to describe the overwhelming sadness that the sight of the modern streets induces in me. There is the sense of a world lost as in the blinking of an eye, and I come to feel the true meaning of what it is to be a ghost. ‘As I witness the extinction of the city’s spirit I feel in all my being nothing but a desire to be gone with it.’ [10] You ask if my works are relevant today, but that is not for me to answer. Why trouble my ghost with these questions? Perhaps it is best to be forgotten, to be perfected by obsolescence, to rest, rather than be called back and called back like this to a present where one does not belong. Let the past be the past and the present be the present. Only one thing – perhaps you should ask yourself why you wished to ask me such a question. I have passed on and such matters do not concern me, but the living are necessarily more restless than the dead. It is the living, perhaps, who are more haunted by the past.

YR: Have you anything to say before you slip once more through the ghostly turnstile to the other side?

NK: Yes. Your last question has set me to thinking. If I might be allowed to quote myself, and whether you act on it or not it is a truth, “I say it unconditionally: Our future has no road to proceed from save that of our past.” [11]

YR: Nagai Kafu, thank you very much for your time.

NK: Thank you.

And somewhat like a Cheshire Cat, Kafu fades away, leaving behind his spectacles and his gap-toothed grin for a moment.

*************************************************************************************************

Bibliography

[1] Seidensticker, Edward. Kafu the Scribbler (The Life and Writings of Nagai Kafu 1879-1959). Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1965. p.176.

[2] Ibid. p.152.

[3] Ibid. p.132.

[4] Ibid. p.82.

[5] Ibid. p.27.

[6] Nagai, Kafu. Bokuto Kidan. [A Strange Tale from East of the River]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1997. (A). p.126.

[7] Ibid.

[8] Seidensticker, 1965, p.22.

[9] Ibid. p.57/58.

[10] Nagai, Kafu. Danchotei Nichijo (ge). [Dyspepsia House Days (vol.II)]. Tokyo: Iwanami Shoten, 1996. (C). p.228.

[11] Seidensticker, 1965, p.49.

2008-03-07T18:33:00.001Z

If you can't see my mirrors, I can't see you

I've been tagged again, by Mark McGuinness. I've decided to accept this challenge, despite a feeling that I've rather exhausted the mine of random factoids about myself (of which I have to provide eight this time). I was actually sitting in the cafe in Asda just now (that's not an advert), eating apple and rhubarb crumble and drinking a cup of tea and trying to think of things about myself that I haven't already divulged. It was very difficult. I still haven't thought of eight. Anyway, I decided that anything that happened to me under the age of sixteen was off limits, and similarly, that anything pertaining to such parts of my person normally concealed by layers of fabric was also out of bounds. I hope that this will help me focus on what irrelevant parts of my life I really want to whore out to the reader here.

1) I have a shockingly poor educational background

Specifically, my primary and secondary education is so abominably poor that all those involved (myself included) should be slaughtered like pigs. I actually feel incurably bitter about this, since it's such a waste of my formative years - cruelty without culture or creativity. The educational system in Britain creeps somewhere beneath despicably useless in terms of quality, and apparently other countries look up to our education. So I am told. Let's put this straight, education should immediately give us an idea of who we are as human beings, and where we have come from, so that we can decide in an informed way where we are going. As it stands, it does the absolute opposite. It obscures who we are and confuses us. There really needs to be people getting their skulls cracked over this, because if there were decent education all else would follow. After kids have learnt to read and play with numbers a bit (or even during), they should immediately move on to the origins of the universe and the human race and move forward from there, taking in all the major developments in evolution and history. Also, nothing should be taught as fact, but only as 'the story so far'. It's taken me years just to realise how badly educated I am, and now, because of the schools I was forced to attend, where my delicate brain was left in the hands of criminally moronic pedagogues, I feel that I'll never really catch up with the absolute basics of education such as the history of Western thought from Ancient Greece to present day. Kids should have this stuff pat before they're twelve. These are the absolute basics, with which I am still fumbling. I'm a very slow reader, you see. When I read, you can see my lips move. (I've already broken my own rules, haven't I? This is under-sixteen stuff.)

2) I've never voted Labour.

3) In the CD player downstairs at the moment are five CDs...

... which are on rotation, if that's the correct phrase. I can't mention who the first one is by, because I promised not to mention him for at least a week, but it's his 2006 album. Then there's Caribou. Then there's The Books. Then there's Arvo Part. Then there's a selection of modern American music. As I write I am listening to Great Lake Swimmers.

4) I have a mouth ulcer at the moment.

I get mouth ulcers quite a lot.

5) I wish I could think of something to say that was actually interesting.

I noticed that Mark's 'eight' were really neat little moebius strips. And now I'm being pathetic. But maybe here's one, not particularly interesting. I hate lying. I wish now that I'd never told a single lie in my life. I wish that people would tell kids that it's not 'wrong' to tell lies, but warn them that if they hide these things deep inside, it will rot the very infrastructure of their being, like an infestation of termites. Which is sometimes how I feel about often very trivial lies that I told as a child (broken my own rule again), and which are now too painful, even though they are trivial, for me ever to probe the hollow areas they have rotted out inside me ever again. So, I hate lying, and I hope that I can get through this life without ever telling a lie again, but it might be difficult.

6) I'll probably blog him soon...

... (if ever I say I'll blog something later, you can guarantee I won't), but Ernst Haeckel is one of my favourite artists ever. I smothered my wall with prints of his work in the last place I lived. I wish I could have a mangina just so I could have his bizarre invertebrate babies.

7) I keep thinking now that...

... the first time I get an opportunity (which will no doubt be this coming Tuesday) I want to dress up as Britney Spears and sing 'Piece of Me' provocatively at a karaoke bar. And give birth to Haeckel's bizarre babies at the climax of the song.

8) I'm currently writing a story with Justin Isis...

which will probably be about novella length. I'm excited about it. It seems to be very good so far. I hope we can find a publisher for it. I think it probably falls into the category of 'awesome'.

So, now, are you sure you want a piece of me?

Anyway, I'm also obliged to tag eight people. I will make them people I've never tagged before, if I can. Hmmm. Poor creatures might actually have to read all this if I tag them. Oh well, let's see if I can find some people.

Okay, I tag Sarah, Fluffy Bunny, Gareth Hughes, Lokutus Prime, Kunst og andre slike ting, Violeta, Esther Sugar Winx and Allan.

Please, if you are one of those here, do ignore this tag if you're feeling tired or anything like that. This might well be the last time I ever respond to a tag myself, just so you know. I really feel like I've run out of random facts.

2008-03-07T11:59:00.002Z

The Year of Fucking Angry Writers

Just went downstairs to go to the toilet and noticed that the spring copy of ALCS News had arrived. I picked it up and casually flipped through it. Wendy Cope making a fairly reasonable point about copyright etcetera. And right at the back... Joan Smith invites writers to get angry. Invitation gladly accepted.

On the 17th of February, I posted a clip from the film Scum to illustrate what I'd like to do to the publishing industry. Sometimes I can barely contain my seething fury.

Because I think Wendy Cope has a point, I do try to credit any writing sources that I use on the blog, though I'm afraid I haven't actually paid anyone. The thing is, I really want people to read what Joan Smith has written, but doubt they'll go out and buy a specialist magazine like ALCS News that's not generally on the shelves in shops. So, I hope she will forgive me if I extract a little of that article below, because I'm behind what she's saying one hundred percent. And here it is:

What do I want for authors in 2008? That this should be the year we get angry and stop beating ourselves up. No one likes us much: the general public imagines we're all earning as much as Dan Brown, and if we aren't it's our own fault for not being popular enough. Publishers don't like us because we're not Dan Brown, and they don't know how to sell books by writers who aren't already bestselling authors. Bloggers loathe us because they desperately want to be writers themselves and envy the small success we've acheived by managing to get published at all.

Envy of authors is a widespread and corrosive phenomenon, which means that genuine greivances - and we have plenty of these - are dismissed as whining. No one wants to hear about all the things that have become standard, from barely civil rejections of manuscripts by editors who've loved previous books to incessant demands that books should be easier to read and make fewer demands on readers.

Damn right. Preach it, sister, if I may be so bold thus to address you. If I can get in touch with Ms. Smith and gain permission to reproduce the whole thing, or post a link to it if it exists online in some form (can't find it), then I shall. I love this woman.

2008-03-06T17:47:00.000Z

Not playing the piano is my hobby

I forget who it was - Grayling or Dawkins or one of those clones - came up with what he thought was a very clever and witty comeback to the accusation that atheism is just another religion. "If atheism is a religion," he said, "then not playing the piano is a hobby."

Obviously he didn't realise that he was not only failing to be clever and refute the charge, but he was showing exactly what a ridiculous religion atheism is.

Let's run through this shall we?

'atheism' is to 'belief' as 'not playing the piano' is to 'hobby'. Therefore this:

A: "What do you believe in?"

B: "I'm an atheist."

Is the same as this:

A: "What are your hobbies?"

B: "My hobby is that I don't play the piano."

To put it simply, calling yourself an atheist is the same as considering not playing the piano to be your hobby.

2008-03-06T16:06:00.000Z

And who can bear to be forgotten?

I've just received an e-mail containing some astrological news regarding a 'webinar' given by Oprah Winfrey and Eckhart Tolle. (A 'webinar'? Is that a new Doctor Who monster?) Apparently, because more than half a million people tried to tune in (or whatever the computer term is) at the same time, the site crashed.

Once again at the innovative edge, multi-Aquarian Oprah is using technology to share enlightening ideas. She broke out of her own book club "box" of memoirs and novels with her choice of Eckhart Tolle's The New Earth, a book about humanity's turningpoint -- in his words, to "evolve or die." Oprah is lending her star power to this surge of consciousness by teaming up with Tolle for a 10-week webinar, with so many taking part that it zapped her site's server on Monday night.

I got to the phrase "evolve or die", and suddenly found myself experiencing turbulence. I think at that point, or soon after, I recalled that I had today, in another e-mail, quoted a phrase from Bowie's song Ricochet: "Who can bear to be forgotten?" In the e-mail I suggested it might be a relief to me.

Anyway, I had a sinking feeling, reading that phrase, that, well, if it comes to that, actually, I'm going to take the latter option. Not by choice, just by destiny or something like that. It's not the first time I've encountered the 'evolve or die' ultimatum, and not the first time I've had a sinking feeling about it as I look around my room, full of urgently scribbled manuscripts that perhaps no one will ever read. For all the fact that I mumble about turning points, awakenings and enlightenment with cyclical frequency on this blog, I tend to feel that, when it comes right down to it, I'm really more in the chaff category than the wheat. I am, indeed, a lost cause, in all that I think, feel, do, see, hope, remember, fear, recontextualise, worship, abominate and sniff. I am on the losing side - you know, the one that doesn't write history, or make it. I am not one of those whom Noah the Second will be ushering onto the Ark. I am a solo unicorn, tossing my horn in a resigned sort of manner as the flood waters rise higher and, after shutting the Ark-door thing behind the two loved-up silverfish, Noah II slaps his forehead and says, "Hang on, I think I've forgotten something. Oh well, I suppose it wasn't important."

That's me, that is.

By the way, I have noticed that a lot of the people coming to my blog via a Google search are doing the search 'Eckhart Tolle skeptic/sceptic'. Maybe I should explain that I'm not a skeptic as such. I'm someone who's pretty interested in Tolle in a profoundly uncomitted sort of way. But I am not, and never have been 'a skeptic' - probably not about anything, if it comes to that. I mean, I've been skeptical, but not 'a skeptic', which sounds like another Doctor Who monster. Doctor Who and the Invasion of the Skeptics, or something. There's even a Skeptic's Dictionary online. You're probably best off going there if you're looking for full-on skeptic stuff, where you can be guaranteed that whatever the entry is, the definition of it will be a supercilious declaration of disbelief. I mean, who are these people who spend their whole lives going around looking for things not to believe in, and then putting them in alphabetical order? So, I'm not really a skeptic. If Tolle is sincere in what he says then he doesn't want to be treated as a guru anyway, and if he's not sincere in what he says then... Please finish that sentence on your own.

So, to get back to what I was saying, I have encountered this 'evolve or die' thing before, largely in the work of one of my favourite writers, housewives' favourite, Mr William Burroughs. I quote:

Desperation is the raw material of drastic change. Only those who can leave behind everything they have ever believed in can hope to escape.

Again, the sinking feeling. A very big sinking feeling. A sinking feeling, in fact, the size of the Titanic.

Oh well.

I don't think I can leave behind everything I've ever believed in. I have tried. I tried last Wednesday. It didn't work. Pathetic, isn't it?

And then, I think, maybe it's not so bad dying with all these beliefs I have, which also have to die. Maybe it's not so bad standing on the deck of the ship which is my soul, and of which I am captain, and saluting to no one at all as I go down with it.

That's the way I shall die. I shall die with the wind in my heart and dust in my hair.

I shall die and be forgotten.

2008-03-06T11:24:00.000Z

Lauren Ambrose

I don't have a television at the moment (I have no plans ever to get one, either), and any televisual needs I might have are being met by the computer. I've actually never owned a television in my life, though I have lived in houses where a television was present. Anyway, there is some television that I really appreciate, such as the now ended Six Feet Under. In particular, I'm a big fan of Lauren Ambrose. I don't know if I've ever seen someone in a television series who was so obviously and breathingly an actual person, which is wonderful. Anyway, some clips:

Hmm, during the compilation of this blog entry I briefly saw some item (maybe even old) about Ms Ambrose being pregnant, which reminded me of Thomas Ligotti's response on learnng that "there might exist some form of organic life below the glacial surface of one of the moons of Jupiter", to wit, "There goes another perfectly good wasteland".

2008-03-06T09:16:00.000Z

Our Batrachian Friends

I've known about this for a while - the crisis in amphibian populations - but was reminded by the Internet news item this morning.

I very much like amphibians, but even if I didn't I would be deeply saddened by this. I just don't know how much more of this I can bear to witness.

I believe it was in his diary that Nagai Kafu wrote the following, referring to his native city of Tokyo:

As I witness the extinction of the city’s spirit I feel in all my being nothing but a desire to be gone with it.

That's pretty much how I feel about all the good things of Earth currently being destroyed by the vulgar, despicable, gormless, brutish, boorish and brainless scum that we call humanity.

I'd rather not survive in a world in which they are the winners and the architects of all that is. I anticipate my disappearance eagerly.

2008-03-04T15:26:00.001Z

Morrissey's Blog

I often feel that the comments section is the best part of this blog, which is why I also feel it's a shame that I don't get that many comments, in a way. I'm not complaining, actually, as if I got too many, I probably wouldn't be able to respond to them all, anyway. However, this preamble is my way of leading up to the fact that Abbass very kindly posted a link to a Morrissey song recently in the comments section of this entry. I responded by talking about what the song title (The Lazy Sunbathers) referred to, and by posting some links of my own (though I neglected to point out the Noel Coward reference in the lyrics of The Lazy Sunbathers). One of the links I posted was to the Moz song above. However, it has occurred to me that this song is just too good for me to let the link to it remain hidden in a corner of the comments section, so here it is on the main page, at the top of this entry, the wonderfully titled, Mama Lay Softly On the Riverbed.

I'll come to some of the reasons I think this is an excellent song in a minute. Hmmm, first of all, to address Abbass's observation that I do post rather a lot of Morrissey. He was kind enough to say that there was nothing wrong with this, but this does seem to be a point of contention. So, I'd like to look a little at this contentious bone and then I promise I won't mention Morrissey for at least a week. The David Quantick 'review' to which one of those links should lead, really sums up just about everything that anyone seems to hate about Morrissey. I don't actually want to go through this point by point, because I want to have my lunch soon. What it seems to boil down to is two things: The accusation that Morrissey is racist and the opinion that his latest work is a let-down after the genius of The Smiths. Oh, there's a third thing - that Morrissey is a "vanity-stricken egoist with a persecution complex", but I just don't care about that third thing enough even to analyse it, probably because I'm one too and know how it feels. So, the first point - racism. Until recently I suppose I've thought that the question is a matter of no one being entirely free of racism or the potential for racism. Therefore, those who demand that Morrissey should prove he is not racist should first prove they are not. They can't. I suppose they are trying to prove they aren't by tediously throwing accusations at others, but I've had enough of this kind of prick. So, I have just tended to think that, within the qualification that no one is entirely either racist or un-racist, that I don't really know what Morrissey is, but don't find it, anyway, to impinge on his artistic output. However, having recently re-listened to Irish Blood, English Heart I found myself really struck by it for the first time. (It's never really struck a chord with me before.) I found it suddenly to be a very honest and intelligent response to accusations of racism - a response that is not 'drawn in' in the way his accusers would wish him to be drawn in.

Irish blood, English heart, this I'm made of,
There is no one on Earth I'm afraid of.

I think the word 'afraid' is key here. Inter-racial and inter-cultural relations should be conducted without fear, should they not? I felt this was exactly the right choice of word. Not to be afraid of who anyone else is, and not to be ashamed of who you are - that is what I felt the song to be about.

So, on this score, the mud of the muddied waters is settling for me now. Controversy continues, but I am more inclined to see this as instigated by those who want to make themselves look good.

To continue to the second point: Morrissey is not as good as he used to be/as good as The Smiths. Well, this is, in my opinion, true. I mean, I'm not sure how to be anything else but subjective here. However, I would make the qualification that Morrissey is not consistently as good as he used to be. Sometimes Morrissey the solo artist is as good as The Smiths, and that is something that is rare enough in pop music to be remarkable. In particular, I think he came up to Smiths standard with some of the material on Viva Hate and Vauxhall and I. In fact, You Are the Quarry, his 'comeback album' is pretty much in the same league as those two, in my opinion, particularly if you take some of the B-sides into account.

I think that Morrissey has certainly lapsed into artistic redundancy at points. I didn't hate Kill Uncle as much as many people seemed to, but I didn't rave over Your Arsenal the way some did. Southpaw Grammar and Maladjusted I find to be patchy, but pretty good, with some underrated gems on them.

This brings us to the last album, Ringleader of the Tormentors (dodgy commentary in that link), which came out in 2006, and which I have therefore lived with now for almost two years. To review it in brief, I'd say I really like some of the songs, but overall find it a little stodgy and a little bombastic. It was produced by legendary producer Tony Visconti, but, the truth is, I don't think I actually like the production, well, particularly not on I Will See You in Far-off Places and Life is a Pigsty. Some, such as writer Doulgas Coupland, have really rated this album. But I suppose I felt that if this had been Morrissey's school project and I had been a teacher, I would have been writing something like, "Could do better" on his report.

Unfortunately there then followed All You Need is me and That's How People Grow Up, which were 'not bad'. But I should not be describing a Morrissey song as 'not bad'. This is not a good state of affairs. The release of the Greatest Hits album compounded this sense of redundancy. People were beginning to mutter the words 'Las Vegas period'. I think some of them still are. I'm not.

And the reasons I'm not are largely due to some of the newest songs leaked in live form on Youtube, songs such as I'm Throwing My Arms Around Paris, and, of course, Mama Lay Softly on the Riverbed. These songs don't seem to feature quite the attention to detail lyrically as Morrissey has made his trademark in the past. I do remember one reviewer sayinf that Sheila, Take a Bow did not display Morrissey's usual ability to surprise us with words, and, compared to much of Morrissey's recent output, that song seems to feature surprising words in abundance. However, Throwing My Arms Around Paris does feature a lovely melody, and the incredible line: "Only stone and steel accept my love". And Mama Lay Softly on the Riverbed?

At first I found the words disappointing, reminding me of Elvis Costello's claim that Morrissey writes brilliant titles and then forgets to write a song for them. Some of it even seemed awkwardly phrased to me: "Life is nothing much to lose". And there was some laziness going on, too: "Was it the pigs in grey suits persecuting you?" The triteness of the word 'pigs' is slightly mitigated by the combination with the also trite 'grey suits' to make something that, together, is not as trite as the sum of its parts, but still.

However, I have been listening to/watching this clip a great deal, and even my doubts about the lyrics have evapourated. The tale seems to be one of a mother who is driven to suicide by drowning, Opelia-like, in a river. What I like about this is that, although the words themselves don't feature much of Morrissey's well-known invention and wit, the lyrics start from an unusual premise, and present the story with an unusual angle.

Mama, why did you do it?
Mama, who drove you to it?

There are many things to focus on in this world of ours, but Morrissey has asked us to focus not on sailors fighting on the dancehall, but on mother. Who drove you to it? Yes, indeed, what nefarious machinations are taking place here? The persecution of the mother brings into sharp focus the evils of an impersonal society. We can feel it. When asked about Morrissey in an interview once, I responded thus:

I recently had a conversation with a Morrissey fan. I hope she won’t mind me alluding to the conversation here, as it’s possible she’ll read this. She described Morrissey as ‘sacred’. In other words, she wasn’t prepared to accept criticism of him. And I understand the sentiment. I suppose I am slightly more prepared to accept criticism of him now than when I was younger, but the point is, whatever he may be like as a person (and I don’t know) he has managed to express something that to many people is sacred. I think this is to do with people’s innermost feelings about themselves, to which Morrissey has found his way. In Reel Around the Fountain, there’s the line, “It’s time the tale were told/Of how you took a child and you made him old.” It’s really the child that is the sacred thing – that innocence that is destroyed by a corrupt world. I think that’s what people identify with. It’s like when people say, “You can say anything you like about me, but don’t you dare say anything about my mother.” It’s a kind of displacement. The mother is really their innermost self. Or should that be, the Mozzer is really their innermost self?

And here is the Mozzer, in this song, after all, saying, do what you like, but if you touch my mother, I'll kill you:

Bailiffs with bad breath
I will slit their throats for you.

And in the clip you can see that he makes a slitting motion as with an old-fashioned cut-throat razor as he sings this. And who amongst us has not felt this at some time, that nothing mattered, as long as they could storm the offices of the Inland Revenue, or wherever the appropriate place might happen to be, and in the name of vengeance, slits the throats of every fucker there?

And then, that line that at first I thought was awkward:

Life is nothing much to lose.

It's so true, especially in a world that is full of 'un-civil servants', 'bailiffs with bad breath' and all the rest. It also reminds me of a Japanese death poem (jisei) I once read that was translated as something like: "Seen from outside, this world is not worth a box of matches." When there is nothing worth dying for, there is also nothing worth living for, and this line, which is not only true, but is also sung with feeling, brings us a little closer to whatever that very private thing is that is worth dying for, after you have spat out your venom on this putrid and despicable world.

I don't believe Morrissey is a celebrity for this reason - when I listen to his music, I don't want to be him, I feel okay about just being me.

And then, at the end

We're going to run to you
We're going to come to you
We're going to lie down beside you, Mama.
We're going to be with you
We're going to join you
We're going to lie down beside you, Mama.

This reminds me somehow of the bit in Blackadder where Doctor Johnson is trying to explain the plot of the dictionary to Kind George. "There is no hero, unless it be our Mother Tongue." "The mother's the hero? Nice twist."

It feels very right to me that Morrissey should very explicitly place himself on the losing side, on the side of the mother, here, at the end.

Well, I didn't call this entry 'Morrissey's blog' because that's what this blog is becoming, despite what some might think. No, I called it that, because that's pretty much how I'm coming to look at Morrissey's musical output. I don't think he's in a hurry to produce a masterpiece anymore. He's putting out whatever comes to him. He doesn't need more ammunition. Some of the shots he fires off will miss the target, but when they hit, well, you get something like this, something that reminds you, after all, that

Life is nothing much to lose.

2008-03-04T11:14:00.002Z

Weltschmerz

So many things in life piss me off. I don't have the energy to shoot them down here and now.

In a recent post I stated that, because of the discovery that I actually have readers, "I feel a little bit shaken up and that maybe I should be slightly more responsible, and less of an arsehole." I've kind of changed my mind about that, partly because I'm just so pissed off with the world that I don't know if I can manage those things anyway, and partly because of this. It's an article about how boring celebrity blogs are. I quote therefrom:

Take a look at David Beckham’s post just after moving to America. He says, “Well, it’s been a very busy 10 days since we arrived in LA, but we’re settling in nicely and you’ll be glad to know that my first few training sessions went well.” Of course they went well David, news flash – you’re a football god. What about your new home? Is there a spare bedroom for us? And what about your new best friends Tom and Katie? Come on Becks, give us something! If you have the will to keep reading, you’ll find one-sentence accounts of football matches and practices. After a while, the brevity of each post becomes a blessing.

I'm fairly confident that I know the reason why celebrities blogs are so boring. They don't want to offend anyone. When you're a celebrity, and you have a vast audience, the chances that someone in that audience will be offended by something that you have to say are multiplied accordingly. And for celebrities, the size of the audience counts. And, after all, they're only there to play football/make entirely redundant music/star in entirely redundant films and make money, anyway. Why the hell would they actually want to risk alienating their audience by opening their mouths and showing what arseholes they are?

For those of you who have only just tuned in, I am a writer and consider my blog to be secondary to my real writing. For that reason, I do actually try not to be an arsehole here on my blog. There's a bit in the film Amadeus where Mozart defends himself saying, "I'm a vulgar man, but I assure you, my music is not." I suppose I've long felt that my blog is not really me writing at all; it's me in conversation mode, opening my big mouth in a way that celebrities never do. That's fine, because I'm not a celebrity (I don't think there's any argument on that score). But it has caused me some anxiety because

a) I don't particularly want to be an arsehole
b) I don't want the fact that I am one to prejudice anyone against my real writing

However, for the moment, at least, reading that article on celebrities blogs reassures me that there are some benefits to being an arsehole, or rather, to not hiding it (not that I could really hide it if I tried, which I have). Because at least it goes some way towards stopping me being the entirely crashing bore that I would be if I were Victoria Beckham. So, well, even if I do make a limp attempt to be more responsible with this blog, I probably won't try much harder than I already have tried not to be an arsehole. I hope I've made myself clear.

Just to make it clearer, because apparently there can be language problems about these things, when I say 'arsehole', I don't mean 'asshole'. Using the language of the speech from Team America, I would no doubt be a 'pussy', which is different to a cunt. So, to recap, a cunt is like an asshole, though the former is probably a bit worse. A pussy, such as myself, may also be an arsehole, but is unlikely to be an asshole. Although there may indeed be some pussy/asshole crossover via the perineum, and this may even be more common than generally imagined.

I understand that this use of the word 'cunt' may be offensive to some people, but then some people are offensive to me. Besides, I'll probably go into the linguistic and cultural implications of this in a separate entry.

Examples of this particular usage of 'cunt': Jack Straw, just for being Jack Straw, but also for being a cunt with regard to voting for the closure of post offices in private whilst publicly campaigning to keep them open. Jack Shit, man of straw. And complete cunt.

William Hughes. Complete cunt.

I'm not going to give a long list here, actually, tempting as it is. I'm sure that I've illustrated my point.

Now, I hope I'm not one of the above, though it can't be ruled out. However, if I'm an arsehole then who would I give as examples? I don't know. I suppose someone like Jim Morrisson. I'm not saying that I'm as cool as he was or anything (I'm more the pussy version of an arsehole), but, you probably get the idea if I say that. No? Er... Also Dazai Osamu, Morrissey, Peter Cook... these are all people I like, by the way, although, of course, there are some arseholes I don't. Anyway...

All of this reminds me of a chap I knew at university who would always introduce himself by extending his hand to be shaked and saying, "Hello, I'm the Arsehole." This caused confusion and bewilderment in some, although there was a friend of mine who was 'like "Yeah, whatever"'. Personally, I couldn't help thinking, "Why didn't I think of that?" So, I'm afraid that if I introduce myself to you today, it must simply be as 'an arsehole', not as the definite article. Mind you, I suppose he may have abdicated from his position as 'the Arsehole'. I could fill that space. I wonder where he is now? Still with us, I hope.

Ah, happy days!

Some more cunts: David Beckham, Nestle, Sir Alan Sugar, Jeremy Clarkson, oh it's so boring, all the same old people.

Oh, one last thing:

We’re in no doubt that celebrities believe their blogs to be successful, but in our minds, they’re failures. Rather than giving us an insight into the real person behind the celebrity, they are simply another outlet through which to promote a current project – but we’re still left wondering about the part of the star that doesn’t get covered in the media. We wanted to know more about David, Victoria and Jamie as everyday people, not as footballer, diva and chef.

I don't want a fucking 'insight into the real person behind the celebrity'. I don't want any part of 'the star' that isn't covered by the media. I don't want them at all. What I'd really like is for Vlad the Impaler (not Vlad the Impala) to invite them to a really hot party where 'anybody who is anybody simply has to be there'.

2008-03-04T09:34:00.000Z

The Triumph of Human Judgement over Computer Error

The following is, to me, one more reason why humans merging with computers, as Ray Kurzweil would like us to, is a really, really bad idea. That is, anyway, one message that I take from this story. There are, of course, others. Please read:

http://www.skysurfer.ndo.co.uk/spetrov.htm

http://www.brightstarsound.com/

2008-03-03T12:38:00.000Z

The wind sings of the old future to any who are listening

2008-02-28T22:16:00.001Z

But I'm still getting educated but I've got to write it down and it won't be forgotten

It must have been on Question Time, and I can't remember the precise context now, although it was probably something to do with ASBOs. One of the panel that week was Benjamin Zephaniah, and, with reference to bad behaviour amongst young people, he said something like the following (I'm afraid this is from memory, so I'm bound to be paraphrasing): "What can you do when young people resort to violence? You cannot tell them to look up to their elders and betters for examples. If they look to politicians for their examples all they see is that every time politicians have a dispute, they go to war." I thought this was possibly one of the best things I've ever heard said on Question Time.

It doesn't really matter if I write this blog or not, in the sense that nothing really matters, but today I have been given cause to think about my approach to writing here. I happened to look up the statistics for my blog, how many visitors I get, where from, how regularly and so on, and I was quite surprised. I am curious about this sort of thing, but I'm not obsessed. Honest! This is the first time I've actually looked this stuff up (hence the surprise). I'd always assumed, despite my relatively high ranking in the My Opera blog tables, that I have about a dozen readers and get maybe half a dozen hits a day or less. Not that I'd even thought about it that concretely, but my general sense was something along those lines. I won't give figures here. Or shall I? Would that be vulgar? I can't remember the exact figures, anyway. They're not that high, but they are much higher than I imagined. It's funny, writing a blog like this is a bit like giving a speech from behind a one-way mirror to an audience you can't see. Occasionally there comes a voice over the PA from someone in the invisible auditorium. It's quite eerie in a way.

Anyway, I just mention this because now that I know there are actually people out there who are kind of listening (and I assume that's what repeat visits indicate) I feel a little bit shaken up and that maybe I should be slightly more responsible, and less of an arsehole. I don't know, maybe that's a bit of a tall order. In any case, I do feel inclined now to make the most of this blog and the free publishing opportunity it provides me. So far - you've probably noticed - I've treated this as a place to toss off - in a slapdash way - whatever I happen to be thinking at a certain moment. I'm not even sure I can promise an improvement in quality, since I certainly am inclined to privilege my pen-and-paper fiction. We'll see. Anyway, I still have some more of that pen-and-paper writing to do this evening, so I'll try to keep this short.

Before I go, here are a few more things I happened to be thinking about. First of all, despite not being particularly able to respond with alacrity to the request made by Ashley Tisdale here, I have to say that, more often than not I do consider myself to be materially wealthy. To put that in perspective without being vulgar and mentioning figures, I don't own a car, or a house, or have a mortgage, I hardly ever buy new clothes (they're usually donated to me by well-wishers) or new CDs or go to the cinema, and I don't have annual holidays abroad etcetera, etcetera. But I do find that, as I said, most of the time, I basically feel materially wealthy. I don't know why that should be when plenty of people with more money than myself don't feel wealthy, but it does interest me. There are some ways in which I feel a lack of money, largely to do with issues of travel and time, but I have to adapt to those limitations. However, I have an inkling that the way I feel on this score is really pretty natural. I drink green tea in very attractive Japanese ceramic tea bowls. I sit in front of the fire and read Bruno Schulz or Graham Greene. I occasionally watch a DVD, such as I Walked With a Zombie, and I can post my thoughts to an audience of literally quite a lot of people, whenever I want (depending only on those time issues, really) here. Oh yes, and I can go for walks and take pictures of trees. Sometimes I even buy sun-dried tomatoes. So, what is this if not a life of luxury? I'm sure it sounds funny, because I'm sure I always do sound funny, but I mean it.

I mentioned a while back that I'm reading The Great Turning by David C. Korten. There are some interesting figures within:

More than 1.2 billion people now struggle to survive on less than $1 a day. Some 2.8 billion, nearly half the world's population, survive on less than $2 per day.

I'd like here to contrast some of this writing with what I consider to be academically influenced bad writing. In the comments section of a previous post I accused Albert Camus of this affliction, but having had a quick look at some of his essays online, I find them disappointingly well-written, and must go elsewhere to find my specimen of useless wank... No, I've just seen the time. I still have miles to go before I sleep, so must bring this post to a conclusion, I'm afraid. Please find below the sample of David Korten's text that I was going to compare favourably with with some piece of obfuscatory nonsense (maybe later):

Had the benefits of the sixfold increase in global economic output acheived since 1950 been equitably shared among the world's people, poverty would now be history, democracy would be secure, and war would be but a distant memory. Driven by the imperatives of dominator power, however, the institutions of Empire allocated more than 80 per-cent of the benefit of this extraordinary growth to the most fortunate 20 percent of the world's people.

2008-02-27T20:54:00.001Z

I've prepared a document legalising mass-abortion

I quote from An Abrupt Climate Change Scenario and Its Implications for United States Security, by Peter Schwartz and Doug Randall:

With inadequate preparation [there] could be a significant drop in the human carrying capacity of the Earth's environment. ... an abrupt climate change scenario could potentially de-stabilize the geo-political environment, leading to skirmishes, battles, and even war due to resource constraints such as:

1) Food shortages due to decreases in net global agricultural production
2) Decreased availability and quality of fresh water in key regions due to shifted precipitation patterns, causing more frequent floods and droughts
3) Disrupted access to energy supplies due to extensive sea ice and storminess

2008-02-27T12:07:00.000Z

Shogyou Mujou

An earthquake in Britain. Although I hate to be alarmist, and hate even more to state the obvious, it is actually the end of the world. And yet, even as masonry falls about their heads publishers find themselves too timid to publish anything even remotely interesting, for fear it will shock the brains of the simpering, moronic readers they imagine to be their only hope of survival in this world, and upon whom they desperately wish to fawn.

WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY?

WHY?

Come on. We're all dying anyway, you might as well do what you know very well you should do and publish me.

I'm just typing up my current novel Susuki. I have come, in my typing, to my translation of the beginning of Kamo no Chomei's Hojoki:

The flow of the river moves forever onwards, and the ever-changing water is not that which flowed here at the start. Bubbles that float in the backwaters now burst, now appear and burst again, and never have been known to stay for long. The people of this world and their habitations may also be likened unto this.

Susuki is chock-full of good stuff like this. I only hope I can pull off the ending and the embedded texts. But perhaps I've given away too much already, and it will probably be about fifty billion years till it gets published, anyway, when some publisher - the message not yet having travelled to his decayed brain that he no longer exists - picks up the manuscript again after tossing it aside fifty billion years ago, and says, "Okay, it's not bad, actually, we might as well go ahead with it."

Kamo no Chomei, some eight hundred years ago, was witness to a whole series of disasters in the then capital city of Kyoto, including fire, famine and earthquake. He ended his life as a wandering recluse living in a portable hut, rather like the shell of a hermit crab, which is when he wrote Hojoki, A Record of My Hut. So, the end of the world has happened before, and he told the tale. The only thing is, in those days the world was Kyoto; now it's Planet Earth. Not sure there's anywhere left for me to take my portable hut.

Anyway, must get back to my Nero-like fiddling.

2008-02-26T11:39:00.001Z

The 'I Hate Pink Floyd' T-Shirt

It's funny how some blasphemies become almost sacred in a way.

I recently favourited this Youtube clip from South Park, and was going to e-mail it to someone, casually, but then decided not to:

I wondered why it was, at first, that I refrained from sending it. I had an instinct that there was something a bit crap about it, but it was hard to pinpoint.

I remember reading some quote from Britney Spears to the effect that South Park is "totally blasphemous". This is not really a mind-set to which I can relate, but I found it interesting. That 'blasphemous' was part of the vocabulary of a representative of the mainstream suggested that it might be a mainstream view that South Park was blasphemous. And, of course, that's a reason to like South Park. Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the guys behind South Park, reportedly hate all celebrities, and that's another reason to like South Park. Isn't it?

I'm sure Trey and Matt are great guys and would be great to hang out with, and I laughed a lot at Team America, but, after all, I do think the Goth scene is not quite spot on. Some of it is good, like the girl saying "whoah" after the line in Stan's poem, "my heart has been raped". That's a nice touch. But... hmmm... I don't know. I kind of feel like there's too much of an 'easy target' thing going on here. I get the impression that the Goth movement is slightly different (and more popular) in the US than it is back here in Britain, and for that reason feel a little hazy on the details myself. Nonethelss, I have by now used the internet enough to know that 'Goth fag' and so on are pretty standard insults in adolescent America.

The distance between being the angry subversive outsiders and being the boring bullies is probably not especially great. It seems easy to slip from the former zone to the latter, sometimes without even noticing. I feel that that's what's happening here. Yes, okay, so Goths pretend that they're being individualistic whilst actually conforming to the very strict social codes of their own peer-group. Okay, point made. But it's not that much of a point in the end. It is just as cliched and conformist as a point as the cliched conformist poetry being read out by the Goths here. Well, I don't know, maybe I shouldn't be expecting subtlety, but more even than the bullying aspect - because yes, I do realise it's a 'joke' and that's it's meant to be funny - it's just the sheer laziness of it that gets me. It's like traffic warden jokes in Britain. Even if I hated traffic wardens (which, since I don't own a car, I don't), I wouldn't find traffic warden jokes funny, because they have been repeated to the point of meaninglessness. 'Goths' feels like a 'traffic warden' target to me.

And it interested me to suddenly feel that South Park was being boring, because South Park is one of those blasphemies that has become sacred. Criticising it, in certain circles, is just unthinkable. Hmmmm. That whole conformist theme in the Goth scene is beginning to look really ironic.

Then I remembered another scene in South Park that didn't quite do it for me. It was the scene about Scientology that exposes Scientologists beliefs with the legend "This is what Scientologists actually believe" written across the screen:

(That's the only clip I could find of it this time.) Again, easy target. I haven't investigated Scientology deeply. I used to pass some Scientology shop, or whatever they're called, near Goodge Street Station all the time, and they'd always ask me if I wanted a free stress test, and I would always say no. I know what a cult looks like, and I'm not drawn towards anything so transparently about building a pyramid of power in order to make money. If I have to spell it out - I HATE THAT SORT OF SHIT. I did appreciate South Park going into details about the beliefs of Scientology, because I get the feeling that Scientologists would really, really hate this kind of stunt. So, good. However, in another sense the sketch was just very weak. It was, "Hey, we're Matt Stone and Trey Parker and we're too clever to believe dumb shit like this, because we're South Park and we're clever, and stuff" (sniggering behind their hands). I wasn't impressed. It's not even the beliefs of Scientology that I find objectionable or silly. If they can and want to believe stuff about Zenon the Warlord or whatever it was, that's okay by me. At least it's reasonably imaginative. I don't find it any more silly than most people's beliefs. It doesn't ring true to me, but it seems to mean something to some people. No, that's not what I find objectionable about Scientology.

In the early days of punk, John Lydon (Johnny Rotten) described himself as causing a stir by wearing an "I hate Pink Floyd" T-shirt. I seem to remember him saying, "Which in those days was, 'Ooh, how outrageous!'" No doubt Pink Floyd, at the time were one of those sacred blasphemies, and Lydon had seen this. I wonder how long before people, wanting to be 'Ooh, how outrageous!' will be wearing, "I hate South Park" T-shirts. Being outrageous is fairly conformist, as the South Park Goth sketch illustrates. Maybe, for some people, it is also inevitable or natural. Still, if that's all you've got going for you, it's not much, really. I believe that Roger Waters described punk as "shallow and boring", and he has a point.

Not long ago John Lydon appeared on I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here! or some such thing.

After the "I hate South Park" T-shirt phase, maybe it will be okay to like South Park again. Or maybe we can just like whatever we want to like anyway, and be Goth if we want, or listen to Pink Floyd, or even the Sex Pistols. If we want to. I don't especially advise Scientology, though; I'm fairly sure they're only after your money. Being Goth is less expensive.

2008-02-26T08:11:00.001Z

I told you so...

Look, I told you so. I told you so. I told you so. I told you so. I fucking told you so. I could have told you this years ago. How many more times am I going to have to say I told you so?

How many times have I had to take fucking pills just to placate other people when I could have told you years ago (and did) that they're placebos? How many other things have I told you that I'm going to have to say 'I told you so' about later?

2008-02-25T12:42:00.000Z

The White Hands

2008-02-23T23:00:00.000Z

Intermission

All of your doubts and questions will be answered in time. Please be patient until a full statement is issued. I can explain everything.

In the meantime, some thoughts:

And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.

- Nietzsche

To win is to lose. To lose is to win.

... I had held to the argument that the failures of our ruling institutions were the result of bad systems, not bad people. Yet a wave of exposes in 2002 and 2003 of pervasive corruption at the highest levels of corporate and governmental power suggested that many of our most powerful institutions are in the hands of ethically challenged human beings.

- David Korten

I am troubled. Caliban recoils from his own reflection. What am I if not someone who deals in fear?

Squares on the left of me, squares on the right. I am the only complete man in the industry.

Evil comes I know from not where. But if you take a look inside yourself, you just might find some in there.

- Jarvis Cocker

You are something that the whole world is doing.

If a person were to try stripping the disguises from actors while they play a scene upon the stage, showing to the audience their real looks and the faces they were born with, would not such a one spoil the whole play? And would not the spectators think he deserved to be driven out of
the theatre with brickbats, as a drunken disturber?... Now what else is the whole life of mortals but a sort of comedy, in which the various actors, disguised by various costumes and masks, walk on and each play their part, until the manager waves them off the stage? Moreover, this manager
frequently bids the same actor to go back in a different costume, so that he who has but lately played the king in scarlet now acts the flunkey in patched clothes. Thus all things are presented by shadows.

- Erasmus

All things must pass.

You're the one for me, Fatty.

- Morrissey

I have blood in my veins, hatred in my heart, and dreams of paradise.

(I might add some more later. I've wasted too much time on this, already, when I should have been concentrating on my real writing. Music provided by The Books. Thanks to Nick. Check them out.)

2008-02-22T01:44:00.001Z

Those who are capable of clear criticism must accept my opinion

I've been reading The Chinese on the Art of Painting by Osvald Siren. A translated excerpt from a text by art critic Teng Ch'un made me chuckle:

Someone said that Kuo Jo-hsu went too far, but I do not think so, therefore I now place the high officials and hermit scholars in two different classes, thus establishing my own humble opinion. Those who are capable of clear criticism must accept my opinion.

I'm not sure if English was Siren's first language, or whether he was just an academic, but his translations are clumsy and his general prose style is absent-minded, so translated excerpts tend to sound a bit babel-fish goofy anyway, but I really liked the idea of everyone having to accept Teng Ch'un's humble opinion. If they were capable of clear criticism, of course. Otherwise they could tell him to stuff himself.

Anyway...

I've long found myself far more drawn to traditional Chinese and Japanese painting than to the European tradition, and I do have some ideas why, but they recurred to me again this evening in a slightly different, or perhaps just very slightly more focused form. Really the refinement of attitude is only very minor, but it occurred to me that in Western art, traditionally, there has been much more of a tendency to murder by dissection. That is, I think, the defining tendency of Western thought generally. The reason I have had so little response to the great oil paintings in the various Western galleries I have wandered through, and such absorbed fascination when, for instance, seeing a Sesshu exhibition in Kyoto, is that, quite simply, to make the most ludicrous but necessary generalisation ever, Western art is completely dead. It has been pre-murdered by Western thought.

Let's go back to one of Siren's badly translated excerpts from the ancient Chinese texts of art criticism:

By revolving their thoughts and preparing the brush (licking the brush) the painters can represent the characteristics of everything, but there is only one method by which it can be done thoroughly and exhaustively. Which is that? It is called the transmitting of the spirit. People think that men alone have spirit; they do not realize that everything is inspirited. Therefore Kuo Jo-hsu despised deeply the works of common men. He said that though they were called paintings, they were not painting (as art), because they transmit only the forms but not the spirit. Consequently the manner of painting which gives the resonance of the spirit and the movement of life is the foremost. And Kuo Jo-hsu said that it has been practised only by high officials and hermit scholars, which is correct.

To me this is a mixture of what is so obvious that it hardly needs saying - although the obvious does seem to need repeating from time to time - and the frankly bizarre, in the form of weird, archaic Chinese hierarchical 'issues' that I don't claim to understand. (Perhaps there's a connection? I mean, part of the murderous dissecting quality of the Western mind is it's ridiculous dualism, which is also the dualism that leads to 'progress', real or so-called, because there is the constant dynamic of thesis, antithesis and - hopefully - synthesis, which can perhaps be seen in constant revolutions of thought and fashion. By contrast, Imperial China was, I believe, a place of great statis. Teng Ch'un himself, writing at round about, or shortly after, 1167, states: "Since olden times there have been many amateurs who have studied the art of painting very carefully. Consequently the records about it form more than one book. But in the T'ang period Chang Yen-yuan collected all the information about famous painters and classified them. His work reaches from Hsuan Yuan (prehistoric time) until the first year of Hui-ch'ang (841) and is called Li Tai Ming Hua Chi. In the present dynasty Kuo Jo-hsu wrote the T'u Hua Chien Wen Chih, which reaches from the first year of Hui-ch'ang to the seventh year of Hsi Ning (1074). These two books are the most important; other books are simply repetitions." In other words, there had been so little change in art criticism and the philosophy of art since prehistoric times, that you only really needed to read two books to know the whole lot. This sense of stasis actually fascinates me. I know many people would be appalled by it, but I find it in many ways attractive. I could go on about the implications, but this was meant to be a short post.)

The transmitting of the spirit... To me it can't really be argued that this is what art is all about, and, traditionally, Chinese art achieves this much more readily than the European tradition. I look at Chinese paintings with the same sense of refreshment and unwearying fascination that I have when looking at a tree, or at clouds. It truly is art created in the spirit of nature. It is alive, as opposed to dead Western art, upon which I can't keep my eyes resting for very long before I turn stalely away with a stifled yawn. (Ridiculous but necessary generalisation.) But no, actually, no, the generalisation isn't even that ridiculous for me. It's not really that much of an exaggeration. There's something of the textbook about Western art. Oriental art, traditionally... I can feeling it breathing back at me, the way the leaves of a tree breathe. And, of course, the fact that this 'can't be argued' is highly objectionable to Western artists and intellectuals, because they're all about argument. That's their thing. Thesis, antithesis and synthesis. That's what they do. Personally, I prefer photosynthesis, but, you know, the Western artist can't sit still long enough for that. You have to overthrow the last thing and then overthrow the thing you've just replaced it with.

All this leads me, of course, to Tanizaki Jun'ichiro, and since all roads lead to Tanizaki, where else? In particular I want to mention his long essay In Praise of Shadows, which is to me such a key text, and such a precious text, that I hardly even dare mention it here in case it becomes too popular or something and is dragged out of the shadows where its title tells us it belongs. I will continue nonetheless. In this essay Tanizaki laments the fact that Japan was unlucky enough to collide with a "superior civilisation" and therefore be forced to adopt the technology of that civilisation rather than develop a technology more suited to its own culture and spirit. Western paper, he tells us, is no good for writing on with a Japanese brush. The Western phonograph destroys the subtleties of the silence between notes on which traditional Japanese music depends. Technology is not culturally neutral; it comes with all kinds of cultural assumptions, which it forces upon any who find they must use it.

History has taken the turn that it has, but perhaps it could have taken another. If Western art is defined the tendency to murder to dissect, then how much more so Western technology? Western art is dead, and Western technology is death. But what if there could be another kind of technology that was full of the transmission of the spirit and alive, breathing the same air as nature? Wouldn't that be a better path to take than the one we presently tread?

Those who are capable of clear criticism must accept my humble opinion.

2008-02-21T17:16:00.000Z

From Here to Obscurity

Not long ago I announced that my short story, 'Sado-ga-shima', is now available from Rainfall as a chapbook. Well, that is now most definitely true, since I have received my author's copies of the book this AM.

I'm actually very pleased with it. It's a quirky and rather elegant little thing.

There are illustrations from Bret Jordan throughout, and the serried typeface, for some reason or no reason at all, looks good to me.

Many thanks to John B. Ford and Bret Jordan for this. It's not a typical horror story, or a story easy to categorise at all, and I'm chuffed to have it put out in this form. I do feel a little like a musician who has been working very hard on a piece that's kind of understated but difficult to play (a musician's piece), and managed to pull it off. I certainly don't want to overstate the case, because this is no blockbuster, but I feel a tiny little bit like, say, David Bowie after making Low, knowing pretty well that it will take some people a few years to realise he's made one of the pivotal albums of the seventies.

But no, perhaps that's too much of an overstatement. Let me put it this way then, I feel a tiny bit like Morrissey, sneaking one of the best songs he's ever written, Michael's Bones onto a B-side, with no album release (well, it appeared on a compilation later, inevitably).

I shouldn't have said that really, should I? That's for others to decide. Anyway, that's how I feel.

Only a hundred copies of this available, so it probably won't be around for long. And nor will I.

2008-02-18T22:24:00.000Z

Remote control, of course

DEPRIVED OF THE VAMPIRIC ENERGY WHICH THEY SUCK FROM THEIR CONSTITUENTS, AUTHORITY FIGURES ARE SEEN FOR WHAT THEY ARE...DEAD, EMPTY MASKS MANIPULATED BY COMPUTERS. AND WHAT IS BEHIND THE COMPUTERS? REMOTE CONTROL OF COURSE -- WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS

I find myself to be a person who thinks with feeling. That is, feeling and thought are for me inextricable. I value feeling, but I suppose I tend to believe the idea put about by some that this makes my thinking weaker. For a moment I would like to reassert the value of feeling. I forget who I'm quoting now, and this won't be verbatim, but I was once struck by a quote that runs something like this: "When a man tells you that you mustn't be sentimental, that's usually because he's about to do something cruel, and when he says that you have to be practical, it usually means that he's going to benefit from his cruelty."

I only intend to make this a short post, as a kind of memo, since I imagine I will add to this theme later (and I've certainly touched on it before). I've been reading about Ray Kurzweil, advocate of artificial intelligence, nanotechnology and so on. My constant feeling response to Kurzweil's words in speeches he makes and articles he writes, is one of being poisoned, like being in the presence of evil. I can certainly article this feeling in a rational way, but that's not what I'm going to do here (probably later). I simply want to make a note of this for the moment. So, having exposed myself to a reasonable dose of Kurzweil radiation this evening, I was feeling very sick with the world and with myself. I decided to settle down to some of my 'things to do' and catch up with some reading. I finished a novel and then got round to a book called The Great Turning by David Korten, which I was given recently. There's a quite thorough and interesting, been-there-done-that type review of the book here.

I noticed a few things. First of all, the book is very well written. It is a model of lucid prose, reminding me of my recent ranting about how many people think that being intellectual means having to write so that no one understands. Of course, this is a moronic tendency. That Korten's prose was concise and unjarring, that he was, in short, a good writer, immediately put me in sympathy with what he was saying. Secondly, I noticed that my mood was lifting. Where as Kurzweil seemed to be closing the future, this seemed to be opening the future.

Now, I've only really just begun Korten's book, and it is, apparently, meant to be the focus of a political movement, and, in the words of someone I know, "I'm not much of a joiner". I'm very much suspicious of movements and groups. Nonetheless, I was interested in this contrast between my feelings towards Kurzweil and my feelings towards Korten. I imagine I will write more on this subject when I have read some more.

I was particularly interested by the idea of ‘walking away from the king', mentioned in Korten's book, since this is the exactly the idea that had been revolving in my mind recently, of simply walking away from the manipulative games of those who currently control humanity, of not giving them your energy to feed on. Kurzweil, for instance, would like to present his man-machine future as inevitable, and suck us into his vision. Perhaps that feeling of being poisoned was something like the drain of energy that comes from accepting someone else's version of the world as inevitable. If such a thing is possible, I'd like to be able to walk away from vampires like Kurzweil.

2008-02-16T10:53:00.001Z

Fringe

It's really dawning on me that reading is a fringe activity, like campanology, or historical re-enactment. I suppose there's nothing that can be done about it, but it's quite peculiar to discover yourself on the fringe, when you always assumed, being yourself, that you were in the centre. No wonder I find it hard to make conversation with people in real life. I suppose my urgent desire to talk about the development of Nagai Kafu's style and themes throughout his life is a bit like... I can't even think of something it's like. We've already established that reading is about as mainstream as bat-husbandry, so I suppose talking about Kafu in mixed company would be like suddenly launching into a peroration on some of the more obscure cave creatures to share an isolated and only recently discovered subterrene ecosystem where evolution has taken an alternate course.

Actually, that sounds pretty damned exciting to me. I'm trying to think of something that would convey boredom and obscurity to 'other people' (who are hell). But I already know now that my finger's not on the pulse of the human race. Is it still alive? Is it dead? Who knows? Who cares, frankly, as long as I can read Nagai Kafu?

Anyway, I certainly can't talk to people about football. I mean, sorry. I try to be tolerant, but after a while I really just get pissed off with the way it's forced down your windpipe with a goose-fattening funnel everywhere you go. Why do men talk about sport? I once heard one writer ask another. And the conclusion was more or less because men are afraid to talk about anything at all and simply need something neutral to talk about to prove that they're not homosexual or something.

And any-fucking-way, why should I be tolerant of people talking about football in mixed company, when no one is ever tolerant of Nagai Kafu in mixed company? That's a metaphor, that is. For lots of things.

So, please excuse me if I don't hide my boredom on that subject, though I occasionally try.

So, yeah, this is me. I mean the Steve Buscemi character rather than the Thora Hird character.

Well, thank god for my blog, that's all I can say.

Hmmm. This was meant to be a short and pithy post.

IQ's a funny thing, isn't it? You know how you get albums, books, films and so on rated with stars or numbers? Don't you think they should stop doing that, and that it's the most infantile habit on Earth? Any review that is accompanied by a star or number rating is automatically a piece of shit that's not worth reading. I remember a hilarious comment left under one of these reviews online, which said something like, "So, what's the different between 71 and 71.4?", to which someone had replied, "Well, that's easy - 0.4". But IQ is exactly the same principle. Hasn't it ever struck anyone how ironic it is that people who are supposed to be defining intelligence are themselves so jaw-droppingly stupid that they think they can use the star-review system?

I just about hate humans. Really.

Anyway, I'll probably write another happening and finger-on-the-pulse blog entry later today. Maybe.

2008-02-15T12:41:00.001Z

What Is and What Should Never Be

Yesterday I wrote a little about the Monkey's Paw principle of the universe, which one might describe, if one has a pathological need to rhyme things, as the 'Universe Perverse'. Briefly stated, this principle is that, contrary to, or further than, the lyric of the Rolling Stones that declares "you can't always get what you want", actually, you can never get what you want. To quote, as is my wont, from William Burroughs, "How long does it take for a man to learn that he does not, cannot, want what he wants?"

I'd like to explore this principle further today with an illustration provided by Annette Funicello, in the song The Monkey's Uncle's Paw, to which I posted a link recently. Despite the brash and upbeat surface of the song, a look at the lyrics reveal it to be an intricate piece full of implied tensions and secret trapdoors of unexplored obsession. In terms of our theme for today - wishes and how they never turn out the way you want them to - the most important line must be, "And I wish I was the monkey's aunt". Not a particularly unusual line on its own, the kind, in fact, to be heard in every other pop song since 1963 (when sexual intercourse began). However, juxtaposed with the previous line, "I love the monkey's uncle", it takes on new and complex significance. We must approach this with care.

First of all, let us ask, why "the monkey's uncle"? If the monkey's uncle is, in fact, a monkey, why not simply, 'I love the monkey'? We canot discount, in this case, the possibility that the word 'uncle' was included for rhythmical and metrical reasons, however, the relation, so to speak, with 'aunt' suggests that this is no accident. Is the monkey's uncle, then, not a monkey himself? Is he some kind of Lovecraftian Arthur Jermyn figure? Such a hypothesis is supported by a line elsewhere in the song which runs, "Call us a couple of missing links". However that may be, after stating her erotic love for 'the monkey's uncle' (Uncle Arthur?), Annette proceeds to wish that she was 'the monkey's aunt'. "What a nutty family tree!" she exclaims later. Indeed. If she and the uncle are siblings of different parents then no blood relation is necessarily implied, and this may, in fact, be the scenario painted in the song. Is such a scenario accidental, or are there esoteric reasons behind its surface pattern? If so, it would not be the only part of the song to present a cryptic aspect. Another example comes in the surprise scene of the wedding:

[BB:] Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa
[Annette:] On the day he marries me
[All:] What a nutty family tree!
[Mike:] A bride!
[Brian:] A groom!
[BB:] A chimpanzee!

And there is the peculiar denouement, the twist in the tail, if you like - who is the mysterious chimpanzee? What does this enigmatic wedding guest desire? The twist in the tail here is that there is no tail. The chimpanzee cannot be the groom's nephew (the eponymous monkey), since he is not a monkey, but an ape. Has he come, like Mr. Mason in Jane Eyre, to interrupt the wedding with the revealing of some dark secret? Or is he an indication of just how nutty the family tree is becoming?

I'm afraid that I'm wandering off into speculation now. Let us take the other fork in the road. What if the monkey's uncle and the monkey's aunt were siblings to the same parent? Is this not the true implication of the "nutty family tree"? As well as expressing a desire to break the bounds of the taboo proscribing inter-species love, in her passion she wishes she could add to this transgression the transgression of incest. However, inter-species love and incest are mutually exclusive taboos. One is the taboo that results from the lovers being too far apart on the great family tree of life, and one the taboo that results from them being too close together. Our Annette wishes to have both at once! And who can blame her? Such is the nature of human desire. How long does it take for a very talented singer and actress to learn that she does not, cannot, want what she wants? She wants a family tree so nutty that the closest relatives are also the furthest away. Can such a thing be?

At this point I'd like to such the resolution to this conundrum by means of a further complication. I wrote in my post yesterday that "I'd very much like to be Annette Funicello". What if, right? What if, Annette became the monkey's aunt and I filled in the position that she had just vacated? It sounds like a dream come true. But I'm sure you already know what would happen. As Annette I would find myself gazing enviously at the monkey's aunt as she carried on her incestuous relationship with the monkey's uncle, scornful of the world's regard. Annette as the monkey's aunt would find it no longer so extraordinary to be in a relationship with the monkey's uncle, despite the novelty of incest, and also the possible novelty that Uncle Arthur was a monkey-human hybrid, because she would now be her own primate world, and the glamour would have vanished. And what would have happened to the consciousness formerly inhabiting the monkey's aunt? That's anybody's guess, but perhaps she would have migrated to my former mortal habitation, and I can tell you, I'm pretty damned sure that she'd be disappointed with that.

What can I say? It's a depressing world.

Anyway, I hope you don't mind me going on about Annette Funicello so much. I mean, which would you prefer, for me to go on about Annette, or for me to go on about Morrissey? Or, if you like, you could have both.

I suppose you're wondering, if you're particularly dense, what the attraction of Annette actually is. Am I being ironic? Well, of course not. In one of the Annette clips on Youtube, someone has left the following comment:

Annette was so bloody cute! How could anyone not have adored her? These must have been the days, now all we have is Britney Spears :(

To which someone has replied:

I agree!

It wasn't me, but it could have been.

She even manages to laugh faintly but almost convincingly at Frankie Avalon's utterly abysmal joke about sand boxes.

So, I suppose that my attraction is precisely (?) the attraction that Annette herself has towards the monkey's aunt. If I were ever actually to meet Annette, I imagine that I would be invisble to her, since I exist on an entirely different frequency. She is one of those people who makes me think it's a very strange planet indeed that is home to both of us. Maybe it's something like matter and anti-matter. If they actually come together the universe implodes or something ridiculous like that (someone correct me here). And, I'm sure that's exactly what would happen if I were ever to meet, on the same frequency of existence, Annette Funicello. Wishful thinking?

2008-02-14T13:17:00.001Z

The moment that you're waiting for will never come

I pretty much hate Valentine's Day. I suppose that's fairly predictable of me, and it's not as if I care that much in the end.

I've often thought that, actually, although the Nazi master-race ideology could be seen as the antithesis of love, in practice love is all about Nazi master-race ideology. This is because love, as it is generally experienced, is controlled by sexual desire, which is really the desire to wed one's own genes to those of the best genes one can find in order to join in with the glory of genetic immortality. It's pretty foul, really. Which is why the sight of public affection between couples is often so offensive. "Hey, look, we're winners in the human race," they seem to be declaring.

And the results in the surge of this urge to romantically merge are all kinds of destructive folly, such as building new houses for all those new babies on flood plains. I suppose I don't feel as sorry for nature as once I might have. Lovecraft once wrote that the most merciful thing in the world was the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. For me, I think the most merciless thing in the world is that God or nature has planted within us inextinguishable desires for what can never be. For instance, I'd very much like to be Annette Funicello, but it doesn't look like ever happening. And if it did happen I'd no longer be able to appreciate it anyway. It's that old monkey's paw trick - those in the ministry of wish-granting have been given a remit to make sure ever wish granted carries within it some pointless moral lesson designed to teach you you can never get what you want, so you should just give up (that is actually the big lesson of Classroom Earth). You can never word your wishes carefully enough for the wish-granters not to find a way to perversely misinterpret them. This is peculiar, really. I mean, everything in existence is only here because it has elbowed something else out of existence, which is to say that existence is, by definition, the master race. And yet some force in existence seems bent on teaching us not to want anything anymore and to just fade back into non-existence. Hence the flooding. And hence the oestrogen pollution that is causing such problems with reproduction. It's enough to make you sick, really.

The human condition is one of waiting for things to be other than they are. But they are never other than they are.

I remember reading a story by Thomas Hardy in which a young woman falls for a handsome young man. They become separated by fortune at one point, and he returns later, to be re-united with her, but he has become disfigured in the meantime. She cannot bear to look at him. When you have clearly seen this in human nature, how can you believe in love? Everything then becomes an odious lie that you have no choice but to join in, to some extent, though you can at least, in a spirit of bottomless bitterness, opt out of that lie by not reproducing.

Naturally, I hate articles like this one, in ways so infinitely subtle and complex that I cannot hope to articulate them. Well, first of all there's that pressure to join the loved-up master-race, and then, next to the article itself, is a little thing for you to fill in which will eventually lead to you parting with money in order to enhance your master-race status. No doubt the person responsible for this propaganda, by plugging into all this cliche-ridden competitive shit, is also a 'successful writer' and therefore displays the value of her own genetic stock and becomes eminently eligible.

Shall I go through this point by point?

1) Some people think you don’t have to be all that attracted to the person you’re dating. I’m not one of those people. (And let’s be honest, who really is?)

Yeah, you're right. And that's exactly why John Merrick killed himself. He knew he would only ever know pity at best.

2) There’s a reason “sense of humour” is consistently at the top of every woman’s love list.

Because they like to think they have one.

3) My current squeeze was recently playing with my hair for the duration of an entire episode of Grey’s Anatomy (speaking of, is it too shallow to want the perfect boyfriend to watch Grey’s Anatomy with you?).

Yes, it is.

4) …comes out with our friends and plays the role of token adorable guy

This is the crux of the matter, isn't it? Token adorable guy or girl.

5) Like a designer coat you get for a steal, what’s the fun of talking about your big find if you can’t show it off? A perfect boyfriend isn’t just perfect when we’re alone; he’s perfect in public, too.

See, I told you.

6) …agrees to go splitsies when we order food

Splitsies?

I'm getting bored with this, so just one more:

7) I dated a bloke years ago who was big on guys’ and girls’ nights out. Which was fine, except that when he’d zip up his jacket and I’d say, “See you later,” he’d say, “Sure, unless I meet some other hot chick who wants me to come home with her, ha, ha, just kidding!” Guess what? Not funny. A perfect boyfriend makes a woman feel safe and secure.

See number two above. Sense of humour.

And another thing I hate is computers.

And another thing that I hate is

2008-02-12T14:28:00.000Z

The Monkey's Ant, Tall Paul and the Somoan Puberty Dance All Over Again

I have just discovered, to my sickened dismay, that the Youtube clips I posted earlier of Annette Funicello in Beach Party and Pajama Party have been taken down by some unspeakable party-pooper. I'm not sure it's worth living anymore, but I shall try to limp along, and in protest I shall post this clip of our Annette singing a very enlightened song about inter-species love:

For a better sound quality, go here. "I don't care what the whole world thinks/Call us a couple of 'missing links'." No? How about, "I love the monkey's uncle/And the monkey's uncle's ape for me"?

Thank you, our Annette, for going where few would dare.

But not even Annette singing Tall Paul can console me for the heartbreaking loss of the parties of beach and pajama, although it gets close:

I suppose I'll just have to make do with the trailer until someone kindly reverses the fiendish deed of the swine who swiped the other clips:

2008-02-10T15:44:00.000Z

Less About You

2008-02-10T00:45:00.000Z

Active Resistance to Propaganda

I'm posting here, Vivienne Westwood's manifesto, Active Resistance to Propaganda, as a pdf link. I won't say, for the moment, what I think of it myself, partly because, on first reading, I'm not entirely sure. However, I would be interested in other opinions.

2008-02-09T11:56:00.000Z

Sartre

The following is a brief sketch, skit or vignette from Justin Isis:

Beauvoir: Jean-Paul, we`re the most intelligent people in France, why don`t we get married?

Sartre: Well, yes, Simone, but don`t you see marriage is a bourgeois institution and also nothing of any value in a meaningless universe where existence precedes essence. Therefore, why don`t we continue to fuck while I retain the freedom to bang hot teen pussy whenever I want?

Beauvoir: (frowning) Well...all right...

Sartre: Uh, can you do my laundry too?

Beauvoir: ...

Beauvoir: ...okay.

2008-01-31T19:39:00.000Z

731

I just caught the tail-end, on the radio, of a report dealing with medical experiments conducted in Britain by the military. The person being interviewed (obviously a military representative of some kind) persistently avoided the question of who was responsible for the records of the experiments that have subsequently been lost. The interviewer, his voice dripping with justified sarcasm, said at one point, "So you poison people, and then you 'lose' the records?"

As I say, I only caught the tail-end, but I imagine the story must be connected with Porton Down, apparently "the oldest chemical warfare research installation in the world". We British have so much of which to be proud. I wonder if Porton Down has a plaque outside saying "Est. 1916".

Cunts.

Anyway... one reason amongst many that I was interested in this story was that, just yesterday, digging through episodes of Monkey Dust on Youtube (which I've been getting into again recently), I came across a sketch which looks like a reference to Porton Down. I'll see if I can find it again now. Ah, here it is, in the thing inset below, right after the first sketch about complete wankers:

Well, I could go off on a tangent about synchronicity, but I won't.

I'm not suggesting that the animated sketch above is a realistic depiction of what has gone on or goes on inside Porton Down, or, well, I certainly did not expect it to be, and I don't wish to find out first-hand, either. I noticed that the sketch mentioned the ebola virus, and did a quick search based on 'Porton Down' and 'Ebola'. From this article, we have the following:

[Porton Down] still sits among 7,000 acres of rolling Wiltshire countryside, with scientists working with the deadliest known disease agents - including bubonic plague, anthrax and even the ebola virus.

Opened in 1916 in response to Germany's use of the deadly mustard gas in the French trenches, Porton Down's history is filled with secret projects, whose real scope and intention were rarely explained to those on whom they were tested - which included servicemen and even travellers on the London Underground.

Scientists at Porton Down have always denied that they are engineering deadly new germs and chemicals for use against humans. They say their intention is only to understand how the weapons work, in order to forestall their effects.

But that has not stopped some shocking experiments from taking place. In the 1960s Porton Down scientists released harmless bacteria on the London Underground to simulate a biological attack. At about the same time they tested LSD on soldiers to investigate its "tactical battlefield usefulness".

Now, what I heard of the radio programme and what I have read suggests that the claims made of the exclusively defensive nature of the research at Porton Down are distinctly dubious. I wonder what will come out in years from now - I mean information rather than deadly epidemics, though I suppose it could be either.

The mention of the LSD tests reminds me of a documentary I saw some time back about the genesis and history of LSD. Of course, mention was made of the military experiments. It was hoped that LSD would be effective as a truth drug. I seem to recall some footage from these experiments. I do remember that the drug was finally considered useless (for military purposes, of course) and that in the notes taken from the experiments it was written that LSD causes paranoia in the subject. This is a prime example of what geniuses we're dealing with here. If I'd been administered LSD in a fucking military research base in a brightly lit room, surrounded by men in white coats and armed guards, I can tell you, I'd be pretty fucking paranoid, too.

Anyway, good to know that our future is in such hands.

I actually have a passing interest in military medical experiments, anyway. I've even been considering volunteering for (non-military) medical experiments, for a number of reasons, although, well, there are also plenty of good reasons not to. Probably the most famous of military medical experiments were those conducted by Dr. Mengele. (Incidentally, my favourite part of the Wikipedia article on him is the line, "Not all of Mengele's experiments were of scientific value". It makes him sound like an upstanding pillar of society who happened to get carried away now and then with his hobby. Which is probably similar to how he thought of himself.) However, perhaps the military experiments that most stick in my mind are those conducted in Unit 731, in Japanese-occupied Manchuria (Manchukuo). It always seems like we're never taught the most interesting parts of history at school, don't you think? I mean, I wonder why, at school, I was never taught about the Opium Wars. That would have been illuminating. Our curious and eager young minds, seizing upon this information, would have been able to see the stereotype of the Chinese opium den in a wholly new light after learning it was mainly us that was selling the drug to the Chinese, not to mention all the authoritarian 'drugs war' line of bullshit taken by the British government more recently. Similarly, but even more so, I feel like the existence of Unit 731 is one patch in the patchwork of history that has been unnecessarily and too often passed over.

I first learned of Unit 731 whilst studying East Asian history at university. I believe I came across the story more or less by accident whilst reading up for something else. I won't give a detailed account of that story here. It is a vile and plotless story, not to mention senseless. An exploitation film, called Men Behind the Sun has even been made based on events taking place within Unit 731. I haven't watched it because, despite my interest, and amongst other reasons, I am actually squeamish and don't enjoy the prospect of vomiting. If you're feeling strong of stomach at the moment, you could read a general list of the kind of 'experiments' that were conducted.

Of course, this kind of gruesome detail is 'memorable', and for some reason I have not actually analysed, I find the details (perhaps simple because there seem to be more of them) more memorable here than with the experiments of Dr. Mengele. However, I think the thing that really made me remember this story was the way that it ended. Since I'm lazy, I will quote from the Wikipedia article, which is succint enough:

At the end of the war, MacArthur secretly granted immunity to the physicians of Unit 731 in exchange for providing America with their research on biological warfare. The United States believed that the research data was valuable because the allies had never publicly conducted or condoned such experiments on humans due to moral and political revulsion. The U.S. also did not want other nations, particularly the Soviet Union, to acquire data on biological weapons, not to mention the military benefits of such research.

2008-01-30T15:50:00.000Z

The Secret Life of Aphasia

The other day I was listening to a neuroscientist on Radio 4 talking about intuition. The scientist in question, Mark Lythgoe, is decribed as an 'intuition sceptic'. I wonder what it is exactly that he's sceptical about? I certainly didn't find it clear from what he said on the programme. In any case, to me intuition is just something that's self-evident. I would not be able to write without intuition. It is more essential to the writing process than my hand. That's how I know it's there. My interest in the group unconscious also stems from my experience of the creative process, but I'm getting off the point a bit. I feel like denying the intuition is like denying the existence of the unconscious. I have heard people deny the existence of the unconscious. "Well, if I'm not conscious of it, then how can it exist!?" is the usual feeble reasoning. Let's see, hmmm, do you consciously control your heartbeat, your digestion, the growth of your hair? No? And yet it happens. How? Unconsciously - by means of the unconscious. I think we can move on now.

And the intuition and the unconscious are - of course - very much linked. Perhaps it would be enough to say that your intuition is simply your mind doing what Lovecraft hoped human minds never could do - correlating all its contents, or at least a vast amount of them, and considerably faster than the conscious mind can. I'm not sure the explanation stops there, but I don't, at this moment, insist on more to the intuition than that. (Well, I did mention group unconscious, didn't I? That would be part of the 'more' factor of intuition.)

I don't think that intuition is a simple or single thing, anyway, but, whatever it is, I'd like to give here an illustration of my own intuition. What do you make of this? It's twenty minutes long, so don't feel obliged to watch the whole thing:

I first saw this - the whole thing, in fact - some time ago and felt that there was something wrong about it intuitively. Now, I'm sure many people will say that you don't need your intuition to say that there's something wrong with this video, that reason is perfectly adequate to the task, we know that our thought-forms don't create reality, because otherwise there would be no gap between our fantasies and our actual experience. But that is not what I find to be wrong with this. I'm willing to accept that thought can be very powerful in creating our experience, and even see it as a possibility that thought composes the entirety of our experience. That begs the question, then, why we can't control our experience... Well, I'll come to that.

No, the thing that to me felt wrong about this whole thing was that it is offensively cheesy. The urgency of the opening sequence, the whispered voices, the sub-Hollywood/sub-Da Vinci Code mystical-historical imagery. I think I had a similar feeling when a perfectly reasonable (outwardly) person tried to recruit me for a marketing scheme recently. I'd like to stress here that my immediate judgement in the case of this film was aesthetic, and therefore instinctive and intuitive. Afterwards rationalisations came to me, but they were slower. One obvious rationalisation, which is fundamentally linked to the tackiness of the film, is the fact that although the talking heads here speak of positive thinking as a force by which you can be 'anything you want to be', none of them seem to have the imagination to think beyond, "I want to be a person with a flashy new car." Oh dear. How about, "I want to be a saffron, inter-dimensional sea-urchin whose ectoplasmic spines penetrate into different universes enabling me to sup upon the experiences of a myraid different beings at once, converting them into a hybrid dream which I then shoot through a labial blowhole into a higher dimension beyond the ever-collapsing cycles of time, where they are further refined into iridescent droplets of spray, each splashing against the rockface of nothingness in an ecstasy of perdition, at once wholly alien to all that has passed within biological experience, and yet containing a pink, fairy-light tincture of something that was once personality!"? I mean, that would be a start.

But no, it's all "I want a new house with a neat, white fence" and so on.

There's something else. I have, over the years, been accused - it may be difficult for some of you to believe, as it is for me - of being negative. Thinking about it now, 'negative' is a really piss-poor criticism of anything. I think it evinces the same lack of imagination as that to be found in the custodians of the 'secret'. But I have, from habitual doubt, always supposed that those who made such accusations about me, and recommended to me that I should think positively, were right. Recently I come to feel that positive thinking is not something that I have 'failed to acheive', or been too stubborn to adopt. Positive thinking is really the most negative thing of all - to have to screen your thoughts constantly in the fear that you'll think something depressing and lose that happy-clappy momentum that had almost brought you within reach of your brand new conservatory! Yeah, what am I missing out on?

Bollocks to that.

I did say I'd get round to the explanation of why, if life is composed entirely of thought - and, you know, of course, I'm not certain that it is - there is such a gap between fantasy and lived experience. Well, I think there's an explanation here that refutes 'positive thinking' as much as it refutes the reason of Mark Lythgoe. I remember Larkin writing in a letter to a friend - and I believe he was drawing on what he had read of D. H. Lawrence - that whatever systems and explanations psychiatry comes up with to cure everyone, or politics comes up with to build the perfect world, the unconscious will always come up with something new to fuck it up. You can't control your unconscious. You either are it, or it controls you.

2008-01-30T13:19:00.000Z

I Was a Teenage Punk Einstein

Well, not really, but close enough.

I was a member of a band called The Dead Bell. Some of you may know of this already, but I am reminding you now (and informing those of you who never knew at all) because the singer, guitarist and general musical maestro of that band has just started to put up a website of his work on the hinterwub. There are already a number of Dead Bell sound files there available for free download. There are also some sound files from Pete's next band after that, Dorothy, though there are some glitches in the recordings here, I notice, that are not present on the Dorothy CDs I have. Perhaps if you send a message to Pete via his site, and offer to make him some sticky toffee pudding, he'll be happy to do you a CD, but don't quote me on that. Do pester him to put up more stuff, though. We await sound files under the category 'current' with pleasure, in the hope that Pete did not intend to write 'currant'.

Here's the info on The Dead Bell from the site:

Music written, performed and recorded with Quentin S. Crisp around 1987-1992 if memory serves. Quentin wrote the vast majority of the lyrics and has a real gift with words ... This was an intense period and I recall feeling quite scared. We recorded on to an old 4 track tape machine in bedrooms of the various houses I was living in at the time.

Hmmm.

Well, I still have my Address to the Nation to finish. Is it worth it, I wonder? I noticed, looking in my old files just now, that I started a review of the biopic of Bettie Page ages and ages back, intending it for this blog, but never finished or posted it. That's what happens when I don't write an entry in one sitting.

Since I've just written a couple of reasonably long posts, I now feel justified in being self-indulgent and ending in a completely unrelated Youtube clip:

2008-01-29T13:09:00.000Z

The Curious Dilemma of the Liberal

Ye have heard that it was said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy: but I say unto you, love your enemies, and pray for them that persecute you; that ye may be sons of your Father who is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sendeth rain on the just and the unjust. For if ye love them that love you, what reward have ye? do not even the publicans the same? And if ye salute your brethren only, what do ye more than others? do not even the Gentiles the same? Ye therefore shall be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Matthew 5:43-48)

But I say unto you, That ye resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also. (Matthew 5:39).

This, to me, is the basis of liberalism. Others might claim that the source of liberalism is different, and, since history is vast and complicated, I would not presume to be the authority here. Nonetheless, I do have a notion that Western liberalism stems originally from Christian thought, that it is not fundamentally political, but moral and religious.

Those generally called liberal are, today, often in conflict with religious groups, or at least, with Christian groups. It seems to me, however, that it is Christian values by which we reject dogmatic Christianity as illiberal. We have seen how the church does not love its enemies.

Perhaps all ideologies hold within them the seeds of their own decline. For instance, in the above-quoted verses of the Bible, there is the comparison between the followers of Jesus and other people - the publicans and the Gentiles. You, unlike them, are to be perfect. By loving them, you will become better than them. And so we have, once more the division between people, and perhaps, in a way, a more deadly division than ever, since it is a self-righteous division.

Self-righteousness allowed the Christian West to colonise the world and send missionaries. Now, as a consequence of this imperialism, which brought us wealth, the world is coming back to us, to share that wealth, in the form of immigrants. So, self-righteousness, arising out of Christian liberalism, gives birth to multi-culturalism, which again requires something of the original liberal Christian values.

Yesterday, I listened to Radio 4's Start the Week, which this week featured guests Martin Amis, Quentin Skinner, Jim Al-Khalili and Asmar Jahangir. It was a fascinating programme this week, and you can listen to the podcast here. Asked whether he believed multi-culturalism has caused an "intellectual loss of nerve", Martin Amis replied, "Well, yes, and a moral loss of nerve. The deal with multi-culturalism is the only culture you're allowed to disapprove of is your own."

Amis was speaking specifically with reference to Western relations with the Muslim world. Amis goes on to make remarks such as the following: "The other day I asked an audience at the ICA, I said, 'Hands up those who feel morally superior to the Taliban.' There were about 120 people there and I'd say 40 trembling arms were raised. Now we all know the kind of thing the Taliban does and I think we'd find a lot more clarity if we looked at Islamism, or Jihadism, as a feminist issue. The Taliban, not satisfied with getting women out of public life, actually insisted on blacking up the windows of the houses that they were confined to so that they couldn't be seen, but also to deny them sunlight. Now, the audience at the ICA in there, you know, if they were to tell the truth, would admit to feeling moral superiority, but it wasn't that, it was a statement of principle: You don't feel morally superior to anyone except America, and by extension, Israel."

By the way, I believe he is using the word 'Islamism' to make a distinction between militant movements within Islam and Islam as a whole.

This quote is interesting to me because I have sometimes wondered what the liberal does when confronted with a conflict of loyalties. One has to support Islam, because it's a foreign religion (and really for no other reason than that), but one also has to support equality for women. What, actually, do liberals do in this case? Well, I don't know, because I no longer really consider myself a liberal. I did, for a while, in a lazy kind of way, in the way, for instance, as a boy, knowing nothing about football, I would always say, when asked what team I supported, that I supported Manchester United, just to keep people happy. This particular question is not a dilemma for me, although there may be some dilemmas related to it. For me, women's rights would immediately take the priority over a wish to avoid offending or demonising some fanatical religious group, even if they are foreign. Another interesting question is, did I really have to renounce my liberal credentials in order to support the cause of women's rights?

This is not an entirely hypothetical question for me, although I am not an oppressed woman and have not had any contact with the Taliban. I remember, before the destruction of the Twin Towers, receiving an e-mail petition from a friend of mine, regarding the Taliban. It gave details of the violence towards and oppression of women that was taking place in Afghanistan under the influence of the Taliban, and people were asked to sign in order to voice their disapproval and ask - I believe - for UN or governmental intervention. My friend had written, at the top of the e-mail, something like, "You know I don't usually get involved in politics, but this lot look really nasty." And I agreed.

It was not, in any way, a dilemma for me to sign that petition. Of course, since September the 11th, 2001, any criticism of any aspect of Islam has become a very sensitive issue, and the anti-Taliban petition I received now seems to belong to a different age. In this sense (as well as many others) I would say that George Bush's 'war on terror' has been counter-productive.

After 9/11 (okay, I'll give in and use the abbreviation), I was in a pub talking with a certain party who shall not be named (just because I generally prefer to avoid naming people) but who played his part in the world of horror and whom I hold in high esteem, and he asked me what I knew about Islam. Very little, I had to admit. He then went on to tell me that since 9/11 he had conceived a strong interest in Islam and was reading everything he could on the subject. I understood and felt infected by this interest. I must confess, however, my own determination to read up on the history and so on of the religion has not yet really become reality.

Of course, I was vaguely aware of Islam before this time, but the first occasion on which it really entered my consciousness as something to be cogitated on was in 1990, at the age of 18, when the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei upheld the fatwa against Salman Rushdie for writing his novel The Satanic Verses. Even at that age (and since some time before that, I'm afraid to say), I was a bit of a writer, and my immediate reaction, as someone who simply couldn't give a toss either way about Islam, was that this was an infringement of free speech, and an unacceptable barbarism. I didn't give it that much thought, however, but it remains among my 'first impressions' of Islam. I also remember Cat Stevens, sorry, Yusuf Islam, at the time, doing his bit by upholding the fatwa, too, and how I thought what a wanker he was. In a way, Cat Stevens is an example of Western liberalism in all its paradoxicality. Hate your own culture (free speech) and fly into the arms of another culture (in this case Islam).

I'm very willing to accept (even sympathetic towards) the idea that the English-speaking press has been more interested in focusing on negative aspects of Islam than positive ones. Nonetheless, I'm afraid that my own limited consciousness of Islam has come to be composed most vividly of negative impressions. The fatwa against Salman Rushdie, the violent oppression of women by the Taliban, the assassination of Theo van Gogh, and, actually, I'd like to pick up on something here. I distinctly remember, at the time of the fatwa against Rushdie, a number of people - and I don't mean Muslims, now, but, well, British non-Muslims - saying things like, "Well, I can't help thinking that he knew what he was doing and he shouldn't have done it." This is the old, "S/he was asking for it" argument. Really? Was he really asking to have a death threat against him, so that he had to spend the next years of his life in a secret location under police supervision? And now I hear people saying the same thing about Theo van Gogh. "Oh yeah, it's true they killed him, but he was a bit of a loud-mouthed prick." Oh well, that's all right then, I suppose.

I notice that the film, Submission, which Theo van Gogh made with Ayaan Hirsi Ali is now on Youtube. I have not watched it yet, but I shall. It has cost someone his life to make it.

Now, Hirsi Ali grew up Muslim. She is not a foreigner attacking Islam from the point of view of ignorant prejudice. And yet, liberalism has reached such a pitch of hypocrisy that that is how some liberals feel the need to treat her. I witnessed an example of this on television. It was the usual, "You were asking for it" treatment. Hirsi Ali was being interviewed about the film Submission and the death of Theo van Gogh. The interviewer, a caucasian woman, showed no concern or compassion for Theo's death, or for the fact that Hirsi Ali had received death threats herself, but only asked how Hirsi Ali could have been involved in such a film, that had upset so many people.

I found this curious. Something very strange was going on in our media. On the one hand, if you were the wrong person (IE, not a politician) or if you criticised Islam in the wrong way (IE actually looked at its theology, the history of abuse of women under Islam etcetera), then you were an Islamophobe and a racist and asking to be assassinated. On the other hand, to murder thousands upon thousands of innocent men, women and children in Iraq, partially using excuses of a 'war on terror', in the manner of that unctuous and evil shyster, Tony Blair, was perfectly fine and good and not in the least bit racist.

How has this happened?

My guess is that it's a combination of sincere liberalism and those who never had any sincere belief in liberalism manipulating liberal rhetoric, thought, feeling and so on to their own ends.

[Would you believe it, I've just written this whole article, and pressed the wrong button on the computer and lost everything from this point forward and will now have to retype the whole thing. Let us not squabble amongst ourselves. Let us unite against out common enemy, the fucking computer! Oh well, I sigh and carry on.]

I said earlier that I used to consider myself liberal. I haven't really changed since that time, and I suppose that in many ways I actually fit the liberal bill, even in the (possibly) negative sense. I mean, I pretty much hate my own culture. Western civilisation is built on genocide and slavery, and I find it very difficult to be proud of that. But genocide and slavery are also products of liberalism. I think so, anyway. I mean, if we go back to the quotes with which I started this entry, and take them as the basis of liberalism, then they gave rise to the self-righteousness that allowed the expansion of empire and the dispatching of misssionaries to all corners of the globe. To expand on this point, I know George Bush isn't generally considered liberal, but isn't his apparent desire to 'spread democracy' a consequence of liberalism, the missionary zeal of the liberal West? Perhaps I'm way off the mark there, but if I'm on it this is a good illustration of the paradoxical nature of liberalism - the assumption of cultural relativism as a universal value that must be imposed upon others at all costs, unless one flips over to the other side of liberalism and decides to side with the illiberal enemy. Anyway, to return to the point I was trying to make - not only do I hate my own culture, I actively favour other cultures above it, for instance, in my preference of Buddhism, Taoism, Hinduism and so on over my native religion of Christianity. But if self-righteousness and self-hatred are the two sides of the paradoxical liberal coin, then I seem to have both sides, perhaps to be a more complete liberal than many. After all, although I do prefer Buddhism, which, in its emphasis on no-self may be seen as a cause or symptom of groupism and conformity in the East, I also find that Christianity contains something lacking in all Eastern faiths. Jesus, apparently, loves you. He loves you in particular, with all your quirks and foibles and the things that drive everyone else so mad that they declare war on you. He loves you for your self.

This I find admirable. Not only that, it is still not adequately understood or appreciated.

So, maybe if I were to try and tie of these threads together in a glib manner, with some kind of soundbite, I would say something like, it might be best to love your enemy and your self, if you can. Loving your enemy does not mean submission. It can be assertion. There is a quality way of saying 'no', if you are doing it with an understanding of who you are and of who you are saying no to, and without any ill-will. Well, this is just an idea that I'm floating, anyway, a work in progress.

I suppose that I feel towards religion as I feel towards genre. Different genres interest me, have enriched my life and so on, but I'd hate to have to write within the strict limits of one genre for the rest of my life. I even find the need to define and circumscribe genre too closely to be very childish. Genre is our history. We can refer to it and learn things from it, but why limit ourselves by it? And yet, that is what readers and publishers (and even some writers) do; the readers out of egoism and narrow-mindedness, the publishers out of a craven desire for money.

And so with religion.

I don't want to see the eradication of religion, but I do want to see the abolishment of religious borders. We now live in a world where we cannot move without treading on each other's toes. In such a world, religion is a shared heritage. The separate religions are each cultural artefacts. The Japanese, for instance, should not be allowed to go on vandalising the architectural heritage of Kyoto as they do. It doesn't belong to them now. It belongs to the world. In the same way, how can you issue a fatwa against Rushdie for writing about Islam. It is his heritage to write about. And mine. Christianity is mine. Hinduism is mine. Buddhism is mine. Atheism is mine. And yours. And since this is world heritage, we should also take care of it. I don't mean with an exaggerated reverence (which is the tool used by those who say that religion belongs to them alone). I just mean that the books in the human library should be maintained in a legible state with no pages torn out. So, you, Taliban, oi, that means you! No more destroying Buddhist statues! They belong to all of us. Enough of your loutish vandalism! And no more bombing of mosques, either!

I suppose, in this way, I differ from Richard Dawkins. He seems to desire the amputation of religion. I would rather see it integrated or transcended, so that we can live in a world where "all is God and God is just a word". There is one thing I appreciate about Dawkins, however. He is even-handed in attacking all religions, whether they be Judaism, Islam or Christianity. In doing so he is helping to break down the hypocrisy into which liberalism has grown. I don't actually know what the general 'liberal' position is with regard to Dawkins, but I'd be interested to find out.

2008-01-27T13:11:00.000Z

Y O Y O Y

Could this be the greatest album cover of all time?

That is the question next to a picture of the cover from Nirvana's Nevermind album, which confronted me when I signed into my e-mail account today. The question linked to a poll, which, out of curiosity, I took part in myself.

There have been mutterings on this blog recently concerning questions of artistic taste, and I have felt the need to express my feelings of alienation from mainstream, or to use a slightly less cliched phrase, culturally prevalent tastes. Well, there's nothing very original about turning one's nose up at the mainstream, is there? And yet it seems inevitable or necessary for me, unfortunately. This poll is a case in point, not that I was expecting it to be stimulating or challenging. I still, however, managed to be disappointed, even with my low expectations, by the choice of album covers offered (my own choices being limited by the very crap choices someone else had already made for me). It's not that I hated all the albums that had made the selection, but was this really meant to be a vote about the greatest album cover of all time? As I said in the comments section of the entry I linked to above, people are weirded out so easily. I am reminded of one of those crappy '100 greatest' programmes that was on television a little while back, for the 100 greatest albums. By public vote (apparently) U2's The Joshua Tree hit the number one spot. The person with whom I was watching remarked that, by and large, people seem impressed when artists move away from complete blandness towards the edge of something, but any artist who goes over that edge manages to lose the audience completely. U2, with their appropriately named guitarist, probably mark the optimum positioning in terms of the majority of the audience thinking that you're 'far out'. And this is a very sad reflection. I'm trying to think of some sort of cliched phrase (there's a term for these expressions where you use the same formula but change one of two of the words) like 'my dad is further out than U2' to express how near in they actually are, but, the thing is, it already really goes without saying that my dad is considerably further out than U2, and I can't think of anything near enough in that it would hold the element of surprise that it might be further out than U2. If you see what I mean.

Having reached the midway point of my natural life-span, I'm not so likely to be impressed by 'pop stars' anymore, anyway, even the 'alternative' ones, who, I begin to see, are the people I knew at school who were stupider and less talented even than a good-for-nothing such as myself. But, you know, some music has been good for me over the years, so let's humour the musos for a while and look at some of the 'cover art' that they didn't even create themselves anyway, starting with the cover of Nevermind. Actually, out of all the album covers selected for the poll, this is certainly one of the better ones. At least it has some discernible thought behind it. There's a baby, a fishing hook, and a dollar bill on the hook. I get it. Biting satire with a hint of existentialism. Reminds me of Pink Floyd in some ways. Yeah, it works. Not subtle, but it works. It even seems to have some genuine and pointed anger behind it, which is good. The only problem with it, for myself and I suspect for many others, is that it smells a bit like teen spirit. It seems a little too close to the cover art equivalent of saying, "Yeah, smash the system!" A statement that can be lucrative. Remembering one or two annoying parties I attended in my early twenties at which numbers of people were leaping around drunkenly to Smells Like Teen Spirit as if they were being somehow edgy by doing so, and looking at this cover again, I begin to think that, perhaps more than anything, this cover smells of money. "Smash the system!" sells a lot of posters and T-shirts. We all know that. Kurt Cobain undoubtedly knew that, too. But did those who took this 'cover art' seriously and leapt about to Smells Like Teen Spirit? There must be some level of irony to this cover, but what level, exactly? Is it meant to fool people, or is everyone meant to perceive its irony straightaway? The whole thing is in distinct danger of collapsing out of sheer vacuousness. At least, as Momus has commented elsewhere, Kurt Cobain had the integrity to kill himself.

And that's one of the better album covers.

And, actually, it's tired me out analysing even that, so I'm not sure I want to go through a whole stack of these. Let's see...

The cover of Exile on Main Street:

I've never liked The Rolling Stones. I've always preferred Led Zeppelin. Really. Robert Plant has a much better voice, and, if you want rock'n'roll, why not go the whole way and really have rock'n'roll? Jagger's voice is boring. Keith Richards is boring. The pace of the songs is boring. (Am I the only person who prefers the Bowie cover of Let's Spend the Night Together to the Stones version?) The lyrics are boring. When I was doing my A-levels, my teacher for English literature, noticing, I suppose, some unusual enthusiasm in my essays, took me aside and gave me some copies of various works by Jean-Paul Sartre to read. He also related a story of when he was younger. He'd gone into a bar with a friend and some band came on playing very bad blues, and his friend and he looked at each other and said, "Let's go." That band was The Rolling Stones.

Anyway, so, the album cover. This is a montage of various circus freaks and artistes of the ring. This reminds me of one of my favourite films of all time, Freaks. I even suspect (but I haven't done my homework) that some of the people in these photographs might have appeared in Tod Browning's film. Apparently these pictures were not assembled especially for the cover. Instead, the cover is a photograph taken of an existing montage of photographs on the wall of a tattoo parlour. Actually, I like this. It's a nice idea. If I were to be critical I would simply say that photo montages as cover art are overdone and perhaps a bit lazy - a shortcut to appearing arty in a rough-around-the-edges kind of way. But a candidate for the greatest album cover of all time? It would be quite low down my list.

Next, the cover of London Calling by The Clash:

I will say immediately that I like this cover. Instinctively. I think it's great. Damn! We're not getting any covers that I can shoot down in flames. I'm going to have to change the whole tone of this blog entry.

So, why do I like it? Well, it's just a great, great photograph. I'm going to appear to contradict myself now, by raving over a photograph of a rock guitarist (or punk, come on, it's the same thing really, isn't it?) smashing up his instrument, after being cynical (I'm not cynical really, honest) about teenagers wanting to smash the system (and it is, after all, a laudable aspiration). But, despite being a cliche, this photograph works. It was caught at the right moment. The pose is... Babylonian, predicting some great collapse. It is Samson pulling down the pillars around himself. It is Sodom and Gomorrah.

Also, there's a homage to an Elvis album cover in the typography:

Hmmm. After all, these album covers aren't bad. And yet I feel like the overall selection was too safe and lacklustre.

I'd like to suggest, off the top of my head, a few other album covers that could have been introduced to the proceedings to prevent the whole thing from being as utterly suffocating as it is:

Into the Pandemonium by Celtic Frost:

Okay, so, as often happens, they basically just stole something from a greater artist, in this case Heironymus Bosch, but it was a theft well done. I stared at this cover for hours in my youth.

Hunky Dory by David Bowie:

Yes, it's very simple, and yes, Bowie already has at least one other entry in the poll, but if this one has been overlooked, then I'm not sure how. Bowie's made a career out of being enigmatic, but he's seldom looked more enigmatic than this. Some say that they see a resemblance to Greta Garbo. And the colouring is artfully done.

Boys for Pele by Tori Amos.

Tori somehow manages to work up a sense of dreamlike, almost Dali-esque, suggestion in this photograph. Some of the other photographs in the packaging of that album were even better.

Oskar Tennis Champion by Momus:

Delicate and otherworldly. Cut-out silhouettes and so on suggest a puppet theatre that blends into a never-ending backstage of different realities, each giving way to the next.

You know, I'm only just warming up to this, but I'm very tired and I need to adjust my body in various ways to alleviate this situation, so, actually, I'll throw the floor open and ask for the suggestions of readers as to what album covers should have been selected. I'm afraid my choices, too, were slightly staid.

2008-01-25T18:07:00.000Z

Sado-ga-shima

It looks like my latest story is available now. It's a chapbook containing a stand-alone long-short story called 'Sado-ga-shima'.

You should be able to see the details for the chapbook here, and you can order here.

I'm not very good at writing blurbs, but I wrote the following for this story:

At the ends of the Earth, off the dark side of Japan, lies Sado-ga-shima. The waves that mutter on its shores call you to your ultimate obscurity. You will never go to Sado-ga-shima; you are always there.

I don't know if that will be used.

I think Bret Jordan's done a great job with the cover.

2008-01-18T12:34:00.000Z

Annette Funicello's Hair

Have I mentioned that I hate my blog?

I did start writing my Address to the Nation, but it's currently in suspended animation (hey, that could be the opening couplet of a song). I think one of my main problems with it is that I have so far - and I don't how I even got onto the subject - called Damien Hirst a cunt in it about three times, and I'm not sure that's really called for. Hmmm. Then again, I'm tired of being nice. Not that I ever have been.

It's much easier to express my current feelings about life the universe and everything exclusively through YouTube clips. For instance, this:

I've noticed recently that, at least if one goes by the images that are left to us, the female half of the human species reached the zenith of beauty in the era of silent films. Witness:

Everything has come downhill since then. But even going back as far as the sixties, you can measure the difference in general classiness.

But, apart from blurting out things that you regret ever saying, another disadvantage of blogs is that it leaves you with less to share in private with the one or two people you actually manage to keep in touch with consistently. No one can say, "Hey, I didn't know you were an admirer of Annette Funicello's hair!" You broach the subject, and they say, "Yeah, I read it on your blog."

And this is exactly what my current life in Wales is like:

Well, when I say exactly like that, what I mean, I suppose, is more like a cross between that and this.

Finally (perhaps really finally), I'm all for having a laugh, but I have come to learn the meaning of a phrase that a friend of mine used in conversation many years back, when he referred to someone as being, "pathologically incapable of taking anything seriously". I saw a headline about the endangerment of Penguins recently that read something like, "Penguins in p-p-p-p-peril."

Is it obligatory to have some naff joke in every single headline ever written?

2008-01-09T18:06:00.001Z

Losing the Plot

Not long ago I listed some pieces of fiction that I have coming out. Two of those pieces have now been mentioned in online reviews, here and here. The two reviews are not entirely unfavourable, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to be churlish about them.

I suppose there can be something a little pathetic about making reply to reviews of your work that you don't happen to like. I do agree with Dazai Osamu that there's really no point in trying to explain one's work to someone who doesn't like it. You can't say, "Well, you should like it." It just doesn't work like that. The two reviewers also seem to be in agreement about the quality of my prose, so I suppose you could say they are being even-handed. However, if I feel justified responding, it's probably for two reasons. The first of these is that I could write better reviews in a coma. And I shall (well, perhaps not while I'm in a coma, but I shall write better reviews). I think that a review should be a good read in itself if we are to take the opinions expressed even vaguely seriously.

The second reason is that both reviews seem to be in agreement that my weakness is a lack of plot. Apart from anything else, in the case of 'The Fairy Killer', I don't actually agree, but, being personally close to that work, I'm not going to argue the point. More importantly, this is something that I've encountered before and wanted to address because it's really beginning to get on my tits. This criticism is the equivalent of saying that Mervyn Peake is not realistic enough, or that Leonard Cohen is okay, but he just doesn't know how to play a kick-ass guitar. If I were trying and failing to write a conventional plot then it might be a valid criticism, but - here's the point - I'M NOT. To quote Lou Reed, if 'plot' is that important to you, then you're still doing things that I gave up years ago. LIFE HAS NO PLOT, or not one that would be recognised as such by a Hollywood scriptwriter. I don't actually think that I have jettisoned plot, any more than an impressionistic painter has jettisoned representation of form, but I'm doing something different with it that probably isn't recognised as plot. Fine, let's not call it plot. In that case, what you call plot bores me. I am not even attempting to play by yours rules. If I am failing according to the rules I have set myself that's a different matter, and perhaps I am. But please don't lazily talk about lack of plot without even questioning - as I have - what plot actually is.

So, just in case anyone who has read my work and found it plotless is reading this too, if you even give a damn (enough of a damn to write a review, for instance), I would suggest you first widen your horizons by reading Nagai Kafu's A Strange Tale from East of the River, the works of Bruno Schulz, Dazai Osamu's No Longer Human, La-Bas by J-K Huysmans, anything by Denton Welch... I could go on. If you read these and find them disappointingly plotless, maybe it will start to dawn on you that some people like it this way, even if you don't, and that losing the plot is not necessarily failure.

2008-01-04T22:33:00.000Z

Maybe a Train

2007-12-30T10:54:00.000Z

Madness

I suppose it's kind of comforting that idea that madmen think that they're sane and never question their own sanity. I mean, the reverse of that is comforting, and is meant to comfort you, when people tell it to you again and again: "If you're wondering whether you're mad, then that's a sign of sanity." I wonder if it's true, though.

I remember a friend of mine saying something like this (I'll now do a bad impression of him):

"If, when I get old, right, if I go gaga, I want to go completely fucking doolally-flip barking mad. If I just think I'm Napoleon arrived on Earth from the Moon, I don't want to be Napoleon on Wednesday, and then on Thursday be thinking, 'Oh fuck, fuck, fuck! What the hell am I doing thinking I'm Napoleon? I'm a complete fucking loon!"

2007-12-28T13:26:00.001Z

The Excrement of Man's Best Friend

I suppose all these things are a matter of taste, but I don't actually like dogshit.

I've just come back from a walk on the beach in the seaside town where I spent many of my formative years. I used to walk my dog on that beach, and it was through walking my dog, I think, that I got into the habit of walking generally, even though I no longer have a dog, and have no plans ever to have a dog again.

I was hoping, on this walk, to take some photographs of this very picturesque (in an Arthur Machen, fungoid kind of way) and relatively little-known area of the world, when, walking along the sands, I knew, through sense of smell alone, that I had disturbed a carefully concealed landmine of dogshit.

At first I thought I could walk it off in the sand, or rinse it in the rockpools, but I should have known that this was not enough. I would have to climb some of the rocks surrounding the beach, to the areas of vegetation, in search of a stick. The sticks I found got rid of the bulk of the substance, but it was clear that a layer of muck still adhered to my shoe. I flattered myself that I was drawing on my country upbringing or some race memory, or even common sense, and tore up clumps of stringy beach-grass (I don't know the proper name for it) with which to wipe off the rest. In drawing my shoe up, had I got some on my coat? This was getting impossible. My walk had turned into a major operation against the insurgence of dogshit.

After a while, I told myself that my efforts would have to suffice, and hoped the rest of my walk would help ameliorate the situation. I also made a mental note to take my shoes off before stepping back inside the front door.

Is there any shit on Earth, I wonder, that is fouler than dogshit? This is how foul dogshit is: Depending on the human, it's even worse than human shit.

When I had a dog, it still had not really become law or social custom to take a plastic bag and scoop your dog's poo up after you. I generally tried to urge my dog into places that would not inconvenience people too much, what I think used to be called "kerbing (curbing?) your dog". On the occasions I trod in what someone else's dog had done, I took it philosophically as part of life's rich and very pungent tapestry. Now, I understand the reasons for the social custom of cleaning up after your dog, and they form, for me personally, a very good argument against having a dog, since I'm not overly keen to handle dogshit, even through the protective barrier of a plastic bag.

(At this point I begin to think to myself that there are people waiting to hear from me, and I will claim to have been busy. Writing. About dogshit?)

Anyway, I love dogs, but I am reminded of something William Burroughs said about dogs being the only self-righteous animal, which is what, he explained, makes a dog's snarl so ugly. Similarly, I wonder if the foulness of dogshit is not something to do with the indignity of the fact that dogs are the most closely domesticated of all animals. I would be mildly surprised to hear of a wild animal with fouler shit. If anyone knows of any fouler shit, I would be interested to hear of it.

2007-12-24T19:30:00.000Z

Not the Queen's Speech

I remember watching the Queen's Speech one year - no, not that Queen's Speech, the other Queen's Speech - and thinking that one day I must address the nation in a similar way at Christmas. But it doesn't look like it will happen today. There's too much going on and too little access to the Internet at the moment, and besides, you're probably not even there right now. So, just in case you are there, my apologies as usual for any tardiness in communication of which I am guilty. And, in my stead, my old friend Kate has been good enough to address the nation from her own front room, in her own pyjamas (or possibly someone else's pyjamas). All rise please, for Ms. Kate Bush:

2007-12-22T22:01:00.001Z

Christmas Message

2007-12-20T09:26:00.000Z

Paul Potts doesn't think he's anybody

I'm not an opera fan, nor am I a fan of talent shows, but I was very interested when I was told recently about the story of Paul Potts, a man from South Wales who sang opera on the talent show Britain's Got Talent.

The story that was told me involved a hard luck tale which ended in the tossing of a coin to decide whether to enter the competition or not.

I was very interested, but haven't yet found the coin-tossing detail online.

Anyway, before I re-tell the tale, here's the clip I later found showing it in full technicolour (well, telecolour):

Okay. Actually, that pretty much tells the story, as it was told to me, of a Welshman in a cheap suit, with a tooth missing, coming to a talent show near the end of its tour of the country, when the judges are tired and pissed-off with all the shit that they've sat through, and who are now looking at the same Welshman with weary disdain until he opens his mouth and sings.

Apparently there was some kind of documentary about him on last week.

Faces tell us a lot, I think. For instance, Paul Potts's face before and after he sings, and also when he's gathering strength in his singing. Also, look at Simon Cowell's face after a few notes of Potts's singing. I actually don't like Simon Cowell at all (I know, it's predictable), but I remember Quentin Tarantino talking about Cowell to Jonathan Ross. Tarantino said something like, "But you know, the thing is, Cowell's always right. If you actually take notice, he's always right." Well, I don't know about that, but credit where it's due, he put aside his pantomime-villain smarminess on this occasion.

Okay, I've watched enough of Charlie Brooker's Screen Wipe - and despite initial reservations I now love Brooker as only someone who's never met him can - to realise that television is illusion, but I don't think there was an entire audience of paid actors there.

Having looked up information on Paul Potts online, I see that he has had a real decent amount of voice training and apparently amateur experience. It seems that some people have called hoax at this. Hmmm. Well, who knows what is a hoax, but one thing I can say to idiots who think think that genius is not hard fucking work - you're wrong. Paul Potts probably did not just start singing Nessun Dorma in the shower one day, out of the blue.

I haven't seen the documentary, but as it was told to me (not verbatim):

"They brought this expert on the programme - this opera critic - and he was saying, 'Who does Paul Potts think he is? Who does he think he is? If he'd went for an interview in the opera world in the proper way, he'd have been laughed out of the room.' And this guy can't understand what it is about Paul Potts that just tears people up. Paul Potts doesn't think he's anybody."

As far as I can gather, no one knew who Paul Potts was as he was standing before them on that day. Within a few moments, there was an auditorium of people crying and cheering as if they had recognised something they knew deep down. This was not manufactured hysteria over Madonna in a pointy bra (that dates me). You can't fake that kind of reaction.

So, I don't care, first of all, if Paul Potts has had extensive opera experience, I don't care if the story is very sentimental, and I don't care if it all happened on a tacky talent show. I also don't care if he is now famous and about to become less of a gap-toothed, cheap-suit kind of guy. If I might be allowed to say it, good luck to you, mate.

Also, just to burn my bridges and address the critic who I have never met and didn't even see on the documentary, and who only exists to me as a kind of grey, generic 'critic':

"Paul Potts doesn't think he's anybody. You're the one who thinks you're someone, you elitist wanker!"

2007-12-16T10:27:00.000Z

I'm Not a Juvenile Delinquent

Boys and girls, this is my story...

2007-12-14T23:33:00.000Z

Those who, very patiently, put up with me

I think that one of the most fundamental emotions defining my experience of existence has been a kind of alloy of embarrassment and guilt.

This evening, I spent a very pleasant few hours in the company of Mr. Wu. Mr. Wu is the pseudonym (after all, I wouldn't want to compromise him by using his real name on this disreputable blog) of a friend of mine from university days. We're both Bowie-philes and studied Japanese together. When I stayed at Mr. Wu's digs for the first time in Kumamoto, we discovered we had a lot in common. T. Rex, for instance. I remember saying to Mr. Wu, when our friendship was yet young, "Do you think I dress like Austin Powers?" And he laughed and said, "Yes. I do." At that time I was not vegetarian. We went to a restaurant together to have basashi (raw horse meat), which I was eating just to be able to say I had eaten raw horse. As we sat in the restuarant, for some reason I felt prompted to say, "The waistcoats on these lobsters should be cerulean blue, but you've put them in Prussian blue. And where are the chocolate-covered ants?" (There were no lobsters on the table, as far as I remember.) And much to my surprise and delight, Mr. Wu recognised the obscure Alan Moore reference I was making (D.R. and Quinch, you get me?). I think our friendship must have been cemented at that point.

Anyway, Mr. Wu took me this evening to a Japanese restaurant not far from Piccadilly Circus. It was his treat. We started with Sapporo beer. I ordered tanuki soba. Mr. Wu had sushi. We were served by a very lovely waitress who picked up very quickly on the fact that we could speak Japanese, and very graciously and intelligently spoke to us in Japanese without the slightest shade of being patronising.

Afterwards we went to a pub, which was fairly packed with people enjoying themselves. Mr. Wu asked me to scout out for somewhere to sit while he got the drinks in. There were no empty tables, so I asked some people sitting at a half-empty table if it was okay to sit there. They said it was. Soon Mr. Wu arrived with our bevvies. And in a few minutes, the group who had been sitting at the same table, got up to leave. A young man amongst them turned to us and said, "It's all yours!" in an affable way.

After a while, my bladder felt full, and I went to have a piss. As I was washing my hands, the door opened and banged against my arm. The man coming in apologised fumblingly.

I was very tired, so Mr. Wu and I decided to go home early. On the escalator of Waterloo Station, a bloke passed me singing along to some music that was playing: "... how beautiful life is 'cause you're in the world..." I smiled inwardly. I did not even hate him for singing Elton John.

I feel like my misanthropy is melting away.

There are lots of things I could say here. For now I'll say a little about science. Regular readers of my blog will know that I have been very critical about science. But I'm beginning to feel that there's something self-contradictory in the position of being afraid of science. To be afraid of science is at once to disagree with it, and to suspect that it is 'right'. And that really has been my position, I think. This is not to say that I don't think I've ever made a valid point on the subject of science, because I think I have. For instance, I like reading New Scientist, but I also notice 'cultural assumptions' in the writing that I find strange. One small example - a headline that goes something like, "What a strange mind you have!" I can't remember if I read much of the actual article, but I think I've read articles like it, about how our minds play tricks on us, falsify memories, create much of our sensual experience out of nothing, or scraps of information, and so on. The thing I noticed, though, was the use of the word "you": "What a strange mind you have!", in other words, you, the lay-person, the reader. Your subjective experience is not to be trusted, but our scientific objectivity is. That's the kind of thing that tends to annoy me. However, if I think I've made a valid point about science at some time, it probably boils down to the very commonplace observation that science isn't everything. But life will demonstrate that, sure enough, without my help. Anyway, life is an experiment, and science is an essential part of that experiment. This doesn't mean that I won't vehemently oppose (verbally and perhaps even otherwise, who knows) certain things I find to be morally dubious, for instance in the area of genetic engineering.

When we were walking from the pub back to the Tube station, Mr. Wu told me that he had "rediscovered" my blog. "Do I come across like a complete arse?" I asked.

"No," he said (well he is my friend, after all) "you come across as very well-read and very balanced, which is strange, because I know how unbalanced you are."

At which point I almost fell off the pavement.

(By the way, I'm not really that well-read.)

I'm afraid that in my life I have been very, very selfish in many ways. I am sometimes afraid that I am actually insane. Embarrassment and guilt. I don't mean in any, "Hey, I'm a really wild and crazy guy!" kind of way, either, just in a sad kind of way. I think that it's actually true. Eckhart Tolle, whom I've mentioned recently, suggests that identity is a kind of madness. Sometimes it scares me how much madness there is in my life and the world, and I want the ground to swallow me.

Anyway, despite my madness, I'm really beginning to feel the support that many people have been giving me, and, if I may be allowed the self-indulgence of some sentimentality, I almost wish to weep knowing how little I deserve it.

So, well, tonight at least - who knows the future? - I feel like, actually, I like people. Tonight I feel like pessimism is over, that we don't need it any more. Who knows?

2007-12-14T15:20:00.000Z

Anoint my head, anointy-nointy

Aidan Smith, famous Irish poet and singer-songwriter has just compiled a great list of things that make life great.

I compiled a similar list a while back.

In immortal lines of Tom Baker's Doctor Who, in the best Doctor Who story ever made, ever (The Ark in Space), "That's good! You're beginning to think. Your mind's beginning to work. It's entirely due to my influence, of course! You can't be allowed to take any of the credit."

It occurred to, actually, soon after I had done my one hundred list, that among many, many glaring ommissions, perhaps the most glaring of all was that of Peter Harris, director of Wolf and Water Arts Company. If he doesn't mind me speaking in such terms (and he might take violent exception), he is a rare genius, as anyone who knows him will attest.

In case you missed it when I posted it on my blog earlier, here's the Wolf and Water version of Perfect Day:

Please enjoy.

I'd also like to mention that I Won't Share You by The Smiths, is a hugely underrated track.

Special flavour.

2007-12-13T00:29:00.000Z

Bugger Bognor

There's a bit in Hamlet - but I can't remember the exact bit - where someone repeats something the Dane has said back to him, and he retorts, obviously lying, that, "Those words are not mine", or "I never said that", or something like that. When I say "obviously lying", the thing is, it's so obvious that you know he has another intention. He is not lying at all. He is, philosophically, turning himself into a Heraclitean river.

Sometimes I feel like deleting my entire blog. And yet, so far, I have simply gone on writing it. Either impulse, to delete or to write (that is the question), is really quite irrational.

Similarly, sometimes I think that I suffer from a kind of social Tourette's (I don't mean that in any medically accurate sense, but in a very silly 'popular misapprehension' sense) and should care more about what other people think, and sometimes I think I'm far too nice, and shouldn't care at all about what other people think.

Perhaps the strangeness of it all comes in thinking that any of the ripples (of word and deed) in this Heraclitean stream are actually me.

These days, I believe, it's not uncommon for someone to die having left websites, blogs, MySpace profiles and so on behind them in a strange kind of posterity. Depending on how many people knew and were interested in the departed, the moths of consciousness will gather about the glow of the computer screen to see their life preserved there. But these words are not their life. Embarrassing or beautiful or boring, it's...

Someone who knows my interests very recently informed me, hilariously, of the construction of the world's largest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider, now nearing completion, and of the fact that there's a possibility that it may destroy the universe.

Perhaps it's another example of the silliness that so embarrasses me, which I should really feel utterly detached from, but I feel vaguely as if I might be changing.

In another of my books that I don't have to hand at the moment, because I have none of them to hand right now, there's a Japanese death poem (jisei), that goes something like this:

Oh, I don't care
Where autumn winds
Are blowing to

I'm reminded of a very similar jisei from a dying royal:

Bugger Bognor.

2007-12-12T10:36:00.000Z

Crisis in Bali

I quote from the lastest Avaaz newsletter e-mail:

We're here at the climate summit in Bali -- but it's reached crisis point. Working late, negotiators were nearing consensus that developed countries should pledge post-Kyoto emissions cuts by 2020--a step which the scientists say is needed to avert the worst ravages of global warming, and which will help to bring China and the developing world onboard. But then the news broke: the US, Canada and Japan rejected any mention of such cuts. Every few hours the draft changes.

If you disagree with the gross irresponsibility of the USA, Canada and Japan, please sign the petition here.

2007-12-11T18:24:00.000Z

All other countries are run by little girls

Last night I watched the Borat film. I know I'm a little late.

I found it to be brilliant, but excrutiating.

The 'controversy' surrounding the film has already been analysed to death, I think, and I don't really have anything to add to what has been said by others.

Here's a negative review of the film from Mark Kermode (it starts about thirteen minutes into the download/podcast). At one point Kermode says, "If you take away the political incisiveness [of the film] (which I don't think it has), you're left with a simple question: is it funny? For me the answer to that question is no."

I suppose, quite simply, the answer to that question for me was yes.

Apart from being funny, I also found much of the film to be quite jaw-dropping. Perhaps one of the things that most sticks in my mind is where Borat first arrives in New York and greets strangers on the train and in the street, "My name is Borat. I'm new in town. What's your name?" and so on, and is greeted with aggressive hostility. One person addressed responded, "My name's mind your own fucking business." Others threatened violence. Apparently there were over 400 hours of footage shot for the film (which was edited down to 80 minutes), so I imagine that other reactions from strangers, perhaps friendlier and less interesting reactions, were discarded. In a way the hostility of those people shown was understandable; they must have thought they were being approached by a weirdo intent on messing with them in some way, and, of course, they were right, though not in the way they probably imagined. However, I must admit to finding the level of aggression and paranoia quite shocking, even pathological. It might say something about environment, but there's a chicken and egg question here as to what determines environment.

I'm reminded of a story told to me by a Japanese friend some years ago, which I now recall only fuzzily. It concerned an incident that made the news in Japan for a while. A Japanese student was living in America, and had been shot and killed. I don't remember now the beginning of the story, but I believe that the student had entered the garden of someone's house in order to ask directions. The owner of the house took the student to be a trespasser up to no good, and came out with a gun. The homeowner instructed the student to put his hands on his head, which he did. He then, apparently, told the student to "duck". Seems like an odd kind of command, but that is how the story was told. Unfortunately, the student did not know that 'duck' meant anything except a kind of bird, and he was killed. This, my friend informed me, was a topic of conversation for a number of reasons. First of all, there was the problem of English language education in Japan, since very few Japanese would have understood the instruction to duck. Then there was the question of a kind of Japanese naivete with regard to other cultures. Such an incident would never have happened in Japan. For the student, it was probably something unimaginable - something belonging to the realms of fiction. There seems to be an interesting and very sad lesson there in the clash of realities.

Kermode comments that the Borat film is full of "rampant anti-Americanism". Some time back, on the Momus blog, I made some comments about the hostility that many people feel towards America that one American reader felt the need to pick up on as "anti-American". At this point I kind of sigh... I'll just say that I have no problems with people criticising British culture at all. I don't feel like I have to take it personally. Anyway, at a later point in the comments thread someone mentioned Borat, and the fellow who had taken me to task, obviously still a bit agitated, left the following rather memorable comment:

"Borat is such an Ugly American. No, wait, he's a British actor playing a Kazakhstani."

2007-12-06T15:45:00.000Z

Strange Tales Volume II

I keep meaning to let readers know what stories I have forthcoming, and I've left it so late that one of them has already come. My story 'The Fairy Killer' is now available in the anthology Strange Tales, Volume II, from Tartarus Press.

I also believe (to be confirmed, as they say) that I shall have something new coming out from Rainfall Books before too long.

In the distant future, a novella of mine written many, many years ago will also be published by Pendragon Press, in the Triquorum series.

A short story of mine is to feature in Postscripts 13.

And a story of mine is also confirmed for the anthology Holy Horrors.

I think that's the main stuff on the forthcoming list, apart, of course, from the big(ish) one, which is my novella, Shrike, due out from PS Publishing next year.

Hopefully there is also lots of other stuff in the pipeline.

We shall see.

2007-12-05T15:34:00.000Z

Negotiating with Terrorists

Continuing from my recent post about Morrissey, immigration and racism, I think I should make a distinction clear here (the problem with my blog is that I write almost all posts in one sitting, and there's always something left unaddressed). I started off by talking about James Watson and saying that I felt uncomfortable calling him racist. I then went on pretty much to say that saying negative things about immigration did not make Morrissey racist, and it could have been inferred (incorrectly) that I thought Watson's and Morrissey's remarks in some way equivalent. Of course, they're not. If racism is an unfounded belief in the inferiority of a particular race, then saying that one's country is losing its identity because of the number of immigrants is clearly not a racist statement. Suggesting that Africans inherently (as a matter of genetic inheritance) have lower intelligence than caucasians, with no evidence, would seem, almost by definition, racist. In the case of Watson, in the quotes of which I am aware, he referred vaguely to tests that showed Africans to have lower intelligence, and stated his belief that in a few years we would discover that there is a genetically determined lower intelligence among Africans. There are a number of things to be said about this. It would appear to be part of the whole scientific racism phenomenon, of which one famous example is the 1994 best-selling study The Bell Curve. Scientific racism is, in itself, a huge subject, so I'll have to really limit my remarks here. First of all, I'm not aware that anyone has yet come up with a satisfactory definition of intelligence that would make it possible to reliably test for it, anyway, so that all tests so far must be assumed to be in one way or another biased. Secondly, Watson seemed intent on anticipating a future discovery of genetically lower intelligence. There are all kinds of questions here, as to why he would even wish to anticipate that, and so on, but, once again, I will limit myself. How will something as nebulous and indefinable as intelligence be correlated with DNA? That's my question. In the same way that it's correlated with answers to culturally-biased examination papers today? I mean, first of all, you have to decide whether or not someone is intelligent in order to correlate it with genes, surely? Without spending paragraphs and paragraphs on the subject of racist science, I'm going to stick my neck out and say, quite simply, that I think Watson is wrong. At the moment, I don't really feel the need to say more than that.

Perhaps, given the fact that Watson's comments so well fit the bill for the definition of racism above, you might wonder why I feel uncomfortable calling him racist. I think there are a number of reasons for this, and one of them is that I feel that people have become trigger-happy with the word in recent years. I do think that people have recognised that they can shift attention away from themselves and their own shortcomings by pointing at someone else and saying, "Racist!" I also think this is a deeply cowardly and unhelpful tactic. Since I don't particularly like Watson, I felt there was an element of that in my own accusation, and I didn't really like that. To be honest, whether or not Watson is racist was, for me, almost a side issue. What I found myself taking exception to were his values as expressed in the kind of society he would apparently like to engineer (genetically) - a society in which "all girls are pretty". If he's being serious here, and I assume he is, then I can only say that I think his aims are vile. I don't think that his vision could ever be acheived, anyway, but it's a 'master-race' vision. His comments about Africans were therefore interesting to me because, of course, racism is a huge factor in any 'master-race' vision. I was keen to speculate about whether there might be something inherently racist and 'master-race' within the ethos of the whole field of genetics, and it was pretty convenient for me to rope Watson in to support my speculation. In the end, I don't have daily (or any personal) dealings with Watson, and there's no actual need for me to comment on whether or not he is racist. But since his comments are in the public domain, I can still comment on them. Beyond that, I'd rather give him the benefit of the doubt, as I would hope that people would give it to me.

There's another factor in why I would rather not sling about accusations of racism. That is, I think that racism is one part of a wider problem, and the basic problem of being human, which is simply how to live with other people's differences. If I were to give a single word to the wider problem of which racism is part, I would call it 'dehumanisation'. In other words, by characterising a particular race as inferior, you are dehumanising them. But it's as easy - perhaps easier - to dehumanise someone by calling them racist, as it is to dehumanise them through the use of derogatory racial stereotype. I don't believe that people are born with a tattoo behind the ear saying "racist" or "not racist". As I've said before, I think anyone is capable of racism. Racism is as nebulous as identity. If someone expresses a racist view, surely it's far more helpful to talk about it than to turn them into an outcast. (Yes, I know some people are more difficult to reach than others, and do present a very real problem.)

This brings me back to Morrissey, who has now issued a statement in response to the NME article. It's a fairly interesting read, though I note that Morrissey is not really as good a prose writer as he is a lyricist. I noted in particular his full support of the Love Music, Hate Racism campaign. I found this interesting because I'm not sure I would support that organisation myself (incidentally, despite being a vegetarian and oppoosed to vivisection, I don't particularly support PETA, either; I don't like Pete Singer's utilitarian philosophy). Why am I unsure? Because they oppose the invitation made to the BNP to speak in an Oxford debate about free speech. As a writer, if I am passionate about anything, then it has to be free speech. My impression is that the people of Love Music, Hate Racism, like many, many people who would probably say they support free speech, don't actually understand what free speech is. It's very tedious to have to say this for the thousandth time, but free speech doesn't mean letting people say anything as long as you agree with them. It means letting people say anything even if you don't agree with them. It's always better to talk than to fight, surely? I suppose that the invitation to the BNP could be seen as a deliberate move to stir things up a bit, but really, what's the point of even having a debate on free speech if you're only going to invite people who agree with each other?

I'm reminded here of the stance inevitably taken by governments with regard to terrorism. "We don't negotiate with terrorists," they always say, as if to prove how strong and morally upright they are. This is really another permutation of the pointing a finger at someone else to distract people from one's own shortcomings. Now, though, instead of "racist" we have the word "terrorist". They're terrorists, we're not. They're racists, we're not. No negotiation. No talking about things. If we talk to racists, that makes us racist. If we talk to terrorists, that makes us terrorists. And we wouldn't want that, because we're good people, aren't we? And the fight goes on.

I'm going to wander off into left-field a bit, here, I'm afraid, and say that my final musings in my blog post about the whole Morrissey debacle - the musings about whether or not nations should exist - have a lot to do with the idea of enlightenment. As in, yes, Zen and all that. I mentioned that I almost always write my posts in one sitting, and I'd like to do that this time, too, and now I've only just got onto another VAAAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSTTT subject. I'm beginning to flag, but I shall try to rally. Let me just get some water.

So, where was I?

It occurred to me that one possible problem with my thinking on questions of race and immigration was the tendency to look at some abstract big picture and take things to their 'logical conclusion' (always a bad idea). I did mention what has often been my antidote to logical conclusions and 'big picture' thinking - individualism, or my own version of it, which is simply taking each person as I find them and each moment as it comes. I don't want to dismiss the immigration debate entirely, but as I'm sitting here writing this, immigration is certainly not a problem for me, and perhaps, as Eckhart Tolle suggests, nothing is really a problem in the here and now. This is linked with an old idea of mine, and one which I'm almost certain is not originally my idea, that the answer to all our social and international frictions is not political, but spiritual - that we will continue having violence on an individual and a mass level until everyone is enlightened.

By the way, I hope that no one reading this is imagining that I'm going to come to some great conclusion at the end of all this? No? Good.

Enlightenment is something that interests me deeply. I'm not even sure if it exists, but it seems to me that it might constitute the only possible redemption for the individual and the race.

What is enlightenment? Er... don't ask me, Guv. Apparently it's pretty fucking ineffable. For those not overly familiar with the 'concept' I'll try and give some (undoubtedly unhelpful) pointers in a minute.

I am not aware that I've ever actually met anyone who is enlightened, though I am informed by someone I trust that he has. Still, I'd rather rely on my own experience in being able to say definitively that enlightenment is 'natural and real'. There are, however, many, many accounts of enlightenment available, in books, on the Internet, and all over the place.

Some time back, the writer Thomas Ligotti published, for a limited time, his long essay The Conspiracy Against the Human Race on the Internet. The essay was a discussion of horror fiction heavily slanted towards an exploration of pessimistic philosophy, with the overall effect of being an argument for the voluntary extinction of the human race in order to put an end to human suffering. One by one, Ligotti examined and dismissed possible answers to suffering. Naturally, one of these possible answers was enlightenment. This was dismissed, too, as something that only ever happens accidentally, and that very rarely, and which, if it happened wholesale, would reduce us to beings interested in nothing more than our next meal, if that. I found this exploration of the subject of enlightenment (and by extension, the essay as a whole) to be weakened considerably by the fact that it seemed to rely on the figure U.G Krishnamurti as the ultimate authority (or anti-authority) on all things enlightened. U. G. seems to present us with a particularly curmudgeonly version of enlightenment, and blasts all other enlightened beings (apparently including the original Buddha, by which I suppose is meant the prince Gautama Sakyamuni) as charlatans. However, there are other accounts of the subject to be taken into consideration, such as that, for instance, of Suzanne Segal.

For myself, I find that I have become, over the last few years, strangely interested in the reputedly enlightened figure of Eckhart Tolle, author of a number of books on the subject (more-or-less) of enlightenment, most notably, The Power of Now. I mention him here in particular, because of certain remarks he has made on the subject of group identity:

The self does not want to be free of that; that's not where the longing for freedom comes from. The longing for freedom does not come from self. The self speaks of freedom, but then sabotages it continuously. It says, 'I'm looking for peace', and then creates conflict. And then you can see how it operates collectively, the same mindset operates collectively. 'Let's have another peace conference.' And in the meantime they produce massive amounts of weapons. So... 'Let's talk about peace.' The peace process. They're still talking about the peace process, and they're continually throwing grenades and machine-gunning... The peace process. Peace - they don't want peace. Because the mindset depends on non-peace for its survival. And so whether your sense of self is predominantly a personalised sense of sense or whether it's predominantly a collective egoic sense of self - a religion, or a nation, or a racial thing - then it can be even stronger than the personalised; it's actually exactly the same principle at work, exactly the same mechanism at work, but can be even more mad than the personalised sense of self, which is mad enough. But you can see how mad humanity can become when they identify with a collective 'me'. That's the height of madness.

As I mentioned in my previous post on the subject, it is identity itself (the self itself), that appears to be the source of all conflict. This is something that Tolle says, and something that I'm inclined to agree with. The thing is, I personally don't know what to do about such a situation. I appear to have a self, and it doesn't seem to be disappearing anytime soon. Also, in the same way that there's some lingering doubt in me that we should simply do away with national identity, I can't help feeling there's something of value in the self, too. For instance, I'm not sure how love is possible without a self. (Who would be loving whom?) But I'm aware of counter-arguments - that it's precisely the self that obstructs love. In any case, if enlightenment exists, it doesn't appear to be something that can be understood or arrived at by reasoned argument. It seems to be in the nature of a quantum leap of consciousness that happens without being willed, and does not happen when it is willed.

All of this is an ongoing internal debate for me, that I engage in, and then let go, engage in and let go...

On the question of whether Eckhart Tolle is himself enlightened. Well, first of all, I'm not sure such a question is even important, but I'd be disingenuous if I said it wasn't a question that interested me. I'm inclined to think that, of all the examples of reputed enlightenment I have encountered, he is the most convincing candidate so far. I cannot fault anything he says. I find no pettiness there, nothing pernicious or manipulative or wilfully obscure. I am, however, not without reservations on the question, which, just for the record, I will list below, though they probably serve as a list of my own shortcomings more than anything else:

1) I have reservations simply because I am a doubting kind of person in many ways. I think doubt is an important part of keeping an open mind.

2) I hate the title 'The Power of Now', which reminds me of the song The Power, by Snap!. It's a curious question as to whether being enlightened should enhance one's taste. Why should I anticipate that it should? (And why should I put such faith in my own taste?) Nonetheless, this kind of thing bothers me. I remember seeing the website of someone who claimed a near death experience, and gagging at how tacky it was. "If you've died and gone to the shining edge of the cosmos and back," I thought to myself, "how come your poetry is so utterly shite?"

3) Tolle changed his first name from 'Ulrich' to 'Eckhart', apparently post-enlightenment, as an allusion to the mystic Meister Eckhart. If the basis of enlightenment is having no identity, why change your name, which shows a concern with identity?

4) Does being enlightened oblige you to write the same kind of insipid self-help books as everyone else? This is a bit of a worry for me, as I'd rather keep writing a rather dark vein of... stuff. Also, there's a samey-ness here that's not entirely attractive.

5) After having read pretty much everything Tolle's written and watched his DVDs and so on, I still don't feel especially enlightened, which is bound to be my fault. However, even assuming that Tolle is enlightened, and this is my fault, what's the use of going on reading the books and watching the DVDs?

6) It's not only me. I haven't actually heard of a case of anyone becoming enlightened after reading any of his books or watching his DVDs.

7) Tolle's apparently quite wealthy now, and continues to make money from his teachings. This does bother me a bit. But then, maybe this is a problem with perceptions of enlightenment. Why shouldn't someone enlightened have money, as long as they're not attached to it, and as long as that's not what motivates them? I suppose one answer to that question would be that they might want to avoid more than average material wealth simply in order not to hoard.

8) He's 'too nice'. This sounds like complaining for the sake of complaining, but I think I do trust people a bit more if they show their dark side. I like the tai chi symbol that shows darkness and light intertwined. Is it possible to deny the darkness? That's not a rhetorical question. I think it's worth considering. I mean, I'm not sure I want violence to continue forever just for aesthetic reasons. I'll give an example of Tolle being 'too nice': He's blandly dismissive of drug use. Okay, so he doesn't take an authoritarian tone, and what he says is fair enough (if you have highs, you'll have lows), but he seems unwilling to look at the fact that it's possible even to have 'noble' drug use, as in certain tribal rites of passage. This strikes me as a slightly 'radio-friendly' approach.

9) Not showing one's dark side, somehow, also seems to have implications about sexuality. I haven't entirely fathomed why this is. I suppose that I tend to subscribe to the Woody Allen view that "Sex can be dirty, but only if it's done right." I find it hard to imagine healthy, wholesome sex without wanting to puke. Eckhart does talk a little about sex, describing it as "the most deeply satisfying experience you can have on a physical level", and does apparently have a partner (no prurience here, please), but I honestly find sexual desire and the kind of enlightenment he presents to be somehow incongruous. Interestingly, Buddhism, too, has a tradition marked with asexuality. There is the celibacy of the monks, of course, and there's even the fact that there's no Buddhist wedding ceremony. As someone who has at least a nodding acquaintance with sexuality, I suppose I'd like a better idea of how that fits in the enlightenment picture without having to resort to castration or something.

Actually, I think that's pretty much it - my list of petty excuses for not being enlightened, but, like everyone else, contributing to all the horrible conflict of human society. I suppose that makes me a terrorist, too. But I think, as we're all terrorists together, we should try and negotiate with each other.

2007-12-04T16:28:00.000Z

Bali

Please look at, and if you feel inclined to, sign the climate change petition here.

2007-11-29T15:06:00.000Z

Skinstorm

A while back I wrote about the scientist James Watson and the comments he made about lower intelligence among Africans, which apparently led to him being asked to resign. At first I was hesitant about saying that he was racist, then I said he probably was, then I felt uncomfortable with this and ammended my comment. After that my discomfort with any accusations of racism I had levelled grew, so that I wanted to write something else on the subject. I even felt sorry for Watson. He, like many people in recent years, has effectively been blacklisted for speaking in an unguarded manner. In being asked to resign, he has basically, it seems to me, been told to shut up. Although I think my own worldview is very different to Watson's and I even rather despise some of what he seems to stand for, I don't really want to live in a world where if certain people don't like what you have to say, you must shut up.

Well, before I could get round to writing anything new about Watson, something else caught my attention and has, for some reason, been preoccupying me. A while back on the Morrissey Solo site someone anonymously posted some news (or a rumour) that a "skin storm" had once again taken place between Morrissey and the music magazine NME. On the discussion thread of that entry, NME's editor, Conor McNicholas, denied that there had been any fall-out, describing such rumours as "unsubstantiated noise".

Soon afterwards there came a statement from Morrissey's manager, Merck Mercuriadis, with the text of a lawyer's letter addressed to the NME.

It seems to be a complicated sort of story, but apparently the text written by the original interviewer, Tim Jonze, was entirely re-written by the NME editorial staff, and Jonze subsequently disowned the feature. The issue of NME in question features a picture of Morrissey on the cover with the quote, "The gates of England are flooded. The country's been thrown away." Above and below this are the rather unsubtle headlines, "Bigmouth Strikes Again" and "Oh Dear, Not Again". On the NME site, a caption tells us that "Cover star Morrissey gives his most contentious interview in years."

The bone of this particular contention is that of immigration.

And it truly does seem to be a contentious issue. The discussion threads on the related news items on the Morrissey Solo site, here and here, make for interesting reading, not so much for the articulacy of what is said - since the comment are seldom very articulate - but because of the strength of the division between those who seem to believe that saying anything negative about immigration amounts to racism and those who think the negative aspects of immigration are simply facts that must be faced.

Here are a couple of articles giving the whole story in brief, with quotes from the interview in the former, from Sky News and Drowned in Sound.

I don't actually have a 'position' on immigration because, quite simply, I don't feel like I have enough information on the subject to come to any conclusions, but it's not something to which I have given no thought. In fact, I have given quite vigorous thought to immigration and race relations in general ever since living in Japan and experiencing what it was like to be part of a racial minority.

I'll attempt to jot down some of my thoughts on the subject now in no particular order:

I don't know how widespread this view is, but I've always felt that it is quite possible to become British, not only in a legal, but in a cultural and social sense. Trevor McDonald? British as tea and crumpets. Salman Rushdie? I would have said he was British, too, but I saw him once in an interview saying that he didn't feel British. Fair enough. His choice. Kylie Minogue? You get the picture. In Japan, such a thing is impossible. You are either born and bred Japanese, or you are not and never will be Japanese. I did not like this. I felt that the Japanese had cut themselves off from the rest of humanity. I began to feel a poisonous resentment at the invisible social wall that existed, and grew contemptuous of Japanese society. Did that make me racist, I wondered? Maybe I am racist, I thought - racist for thinking that the Japanese are racist. It seemed to me an immensely depressing dilemma, and I began to feel that the whole question of race will never be solved. There are differences between peoples (and people), on all kinds of levels, and differences seem inevitably to lead to conflicts. What can be done apart from making everyone the same, which would be another very depressing solution, even if it were possible. Perhaps, I thought sometimes, the Japanese were even right not to want foreigners becoming part of their society, since the whole society was, anyway, so etiolated and hidebound that it would probably fall apart if it tried to integrate one or two people who had not been indoctrinated into the unwritten rules since birth. "Make sure they come. Make sure they go." That, as someone who taught me Japanese, was the attitude towards foreign students and foreigners in general. Nice to have guests to admire your quaint little home. But you don't want them hanging around for long.

I came to a determination that individualism was the only viable way of interacting with the world, although I could see problems with this, too. In any case, I didn't want to interact with anyone as the representative of one group with the representative of another. Even to think in terms of groups seemed to me inevitably to lead to racism. On the other hand, I recognised that there are, indeed, such things as national traits. Is it racist to recognise and criticise such traits? I decided it was not, since criticism would be based on attitudes and social practices and not on any racial attributes. No culture or group of people can possibly be exempt from criticism.

I basically despise political correctness. I know there are many intelligent people who support it, but I simply do not believe that you can systematise tolerance. Such systems, on the contrary, breed intolerance and witch-hunts. They stop people thinking and they stop people talking openly. There can no longer be any honesty and no longer any celebration. I remember a conversation I overheard in a restaurant. The speaker appeared to be a headmaster. He was talking about how any Christmas celebration had been banned at his school (apparently against his wishes) since it would make non-Christians feel left out or alienated. After that ban, requests had been made for (I believe it was) Ramadan to be celebrated at the school. The headmaster, grimly and wearily, told of his satisfaction at having quashed that particular request. "If we can't have Christmas, they can't have Ramadan." No celebration, but instead a sullen resentment on both sides - that is the price of political correctness.

Britain once had an empire, through which we acquired considerable national wealth, though naturally this was never distributed in a particularly even way. Considering that our wealth has come from foreign lands, it seems only right that we should share that wealth with the rest of the world now by accepting immigrants. However, there does seem to be a certain measure - quite a strong measure, in fact - of self-hatred in the 'liberal' position that even to question immigration is racist (and the equivalent of wishing to set up death camps). I can understand that. I mean, I know all about self-hatred, and I often think that Britain has had a worse influence in world history than just about any other country on the planet. But I don't think it's at all constructive to base social policies on self-hatred. I think there should be an open, and, if possible, unbiased enquiry into the real impacts of immigration and that any policies should be decided according to the findings of such an enquiry. Having said that, I'm not especially optimistic about political solutions to any social problems.

The 'liberal' view that questioning immigration is tantamount to racism implies that there should be no limits on immigration whatsoever, since to apply a limit surely one has to question where that limit should be. If there is a reasoned principle behind this view (and perhaps there isn't) then logically it can only be the utopian idea that nations should not exist. Perhaps they shouldn't. Will there be wars as long as there are nations? It's hard to tell with certainty, but it could be the case that nationhood is inherently destructive. Perhaps it would be magnificent if the British were so welcoming and self-effacing that there were no controls on who crossed our borders and lived here. That would mean we were laying no claim to territory, that we had, effectively, dissolved the nation. I don't think that will happen unilaterally, however, if it happens at all. And round about here is where I get stuck, I think. Isn't it, in the most basic sense, identity that leads to conflict? I am me because I am different to you, because I am different I do things differently. I don't like it when you do this or that. These are my camels, not yours. Etcetera. And nationhood is group identity. And yet, however many times I ask myself whether it is imperative for nationhood to be dissolved, I cannot come to a conclusion. Let's imagine that nations were dissolved politically - there would still be language groups, religious groups, other kinds of groups. Would these be new, slightly more amorphous nations? And do we really want to wipe from the globe all the differences that cultural and other identity brings?

I actually think this - and pure survival in a ransacked environment - is the biggest issue facing the human race at the moment, and I must apologise if I can't solve it in a brief blog post. Anyway, whether you agree with Morrissey's (alleged?) comments or not, I think he has touched upon an issue that must be talked about, and not swept beneath the carpet by the arbiters of political correctness.

2007-11-22T14:48:00.000Z

Banned and Creepy

I saw this animation some time back on Ligotti Online, where it was posted as an example of something 'Ligottian'. I came across it again just now on YouTube while browsing idly:

There was a whole list of banned cartoons and commercials in the related videos list. I watched a few of these, too. I was particularly struck by the Calvin Klein advert. In the comments, someone observes that it looks like the start of a snuff film. I would add that the unseen voice behind the camera addressing the urchins in front of it reminds me of that guy in one of the Airplane films who is charged with showing a young boy around the cockpit and begins to ask questions like, "Have you ever seen a grown man naked?" "Do you like watching gladiator films?" and so on.

2007-11-14T13:51:00.000Z

Joss Stone - She's Bad

I don't know much about Joss Stone. I think if I initially noticed her at all it's because she was a Devon lass, at least for some of her upbringing, and it's rare for anything famous to come from Devon (apart from the fact that the entire United States could have been said to 'come from' Devon, of course). Anyway, I've never liked the little of her music that I've heard. It reminds me of Charlie Brooker's bewilderment at the winners on Simon Cowell's dreadful cultural vandalism project (I forget its name) - singers who are, in Brooker's words "apparently good". I've never really understood what was ever meant to be good about Joss Stone or any of her ilk. However, there is now apparently supposed to be something bad about her. My attention was caught by this article. In particular it caught my attention because I had seen some list of 2007's most annoying people (or some such thing) on television, and she was amongst them. The gist of the backlash against her seems to be that she went to America and picked up an American accent (plus various assorted American idioms). I find this in some ways curious.

Please allow me to explain. From late 2000 to early 2003 I spent time away from Britain in Taiwan and Japan. I noticed a number of things about Britain when I returned. Obsession with the property ladder. Increased marketing everywhere you turned your eye. And a new wave of Americanisation of the English language. This is nothing new. It has been occurring at least since the Sixties and probably long before then. One small example is the fact that before I went to Taiwan most people in Britain favoured the word 'film' over the word 'movie'. After I got back from Japan the situation was reversed. Ever since the onset of the nineties I have noticed wave after wave of Americanisms. Before we had Seinfeld here no one used the word 'wuss'. Before The Simpsons no one used the word 'butt'. Now these are in common use. Even our grammar has changed. Where once people would have said "I have", they now say "I do" (can't give a good example right now), they tend to use the present perfect tense less often, and so on. The extent of this is such that I picked up a British book of linguistic cliches recently and, flicking through its pages discovered that not only were well over half of the cliches American in origin, but this fact was so taken for granted, or so invisible to the authors, that it was at no point even commented on.

To a certain extent I think this is inevitable. I'm not going to neurotically weed out the Americanisms from my speech patterns. What I find strange is that I seem to be far more aware than those around me of what are Americanisms and what are not. For me to use the word 'movie' would actually take an effort on my part, as if I were deliberately slipping a French word into conversation for effect. This makes me suspect that people are actually watching American films and taking notes and adopting the idioms. I see no other explanation. Why? Because they want to be American. And yet there is a broad public rejection of Joss Stone because she picked up some Americanisms after actually going to America. Americanisation is so general here that I do not believe all former Joss Stone fans were remarkably uninfected. There must be at least a ninety per cent hypocrisy rate there.

It's not merely linguistic hypocrisy, either. Why do the British believe themselves to have any less blood on their hands than the Americans over Iraq, for instance? Who voted the mass-murderer Blair back into Number 10? You - the great, morally superior British public. When you condemn Joss Stone, you protest too much. Increasingly, Britain disgusts me.

2007-11-12T13:44:00.000Z

Where I'm At

Please leave your message after the tone...

2007-11-10T11:49:00.000Z

The VP Team

I have just been informed that sections of The VP Team have gone up on Youtube.

The VP Team is a film project by Wolf and Water Arts Company, with whom I used to work (and still do occasionally). The publicity states:

During 2003 we were invited by a group of adults with learning difficulties to come & help them make a video about the government’s “Valuing People” white paper, which is the document which sets out how people with learning difficulties should be treated by the services that serve them & society in general.

The obvious danger from the outset was that making a video about a government white paper ran the risk of being as exciting as making a film about paint drying…that is until one of the group suggested we do it in the style of the 80’s action series “The A Team”

Here are the clips on Youtube:

2007-11-08T21:42:00.000Z

Fate has just handed it to me

Hello.

Recently, in Waterstones, I picked up a book called It Is Just You, Everything is not Shit, which was a reply to the book, Is It Just Me, Or Is Everything Shit?.

Basically, where the latter is an encyclopedia of everything that makes life shit, the former is an encyclopedia of everything that makes life great. Simple really.

Anyway, I picked up this book and started reading. I appreciated the idea, actually, but I had my quibbles with some of the entries. For instance, Harold and Maude. I know it's Mary's favourite film (in There's Something About Mary (have I got the right name there? Mary suddenly sounds strange for some reason. I know that the film has a great many admirers, but sadly, I cannot count myself one of them. I don't know, I was a bit blitzed when I watched it, so maybe my judement wasn't the best, but I found it embarrassing. And then there are entries like 'Falling in Love'. I suppose he had to include that one, and he even apologised for its cheesiness.

The point is, I thought that I could probably make a better list. Perhaps I couldn't, actually, but then again, I think I probably can. It won't be as long as Steve Stack's (I think that's his name, not sure) list, because I haven't got the time right now, but, after all, as I'm so keen on pointing out, it's quality not quantity that counts, so without further ado:

1) Where to start? This will have to be random order, so... Kate Bush. We live in a cynical age, but somehow I just find it impossible to believe that Kate Bush is not a lovely person. I'm not even envious of her success (maybe just a bit) because there's no way I can begrudge it.

2) Working with the writer Justin Isis on the blogzine Chomu and in other ways. Justin is one of the best writers I've ever read.

3) The fiction of Mark Samuels. Underrated, if you ask me.

4) Bettie Page.

5) The smell of an extinguished match.

6) The extreme pessimisn of Thomas Ligotti.

7) The fact that Mark McGuinness is doing this.

8) Sheridan Quaint. I'm a big fan of.

9) Lawrence Maynard aka Le Soldat Perdu.

10) Momus aka Nick Currie, scottish singer/songwriter and best blogger on the planet, not to mention, a great lyricist.

11) Robin Davies calmly and steadfastly debating with me about science on this blog.

12) Sarah giving me an 'I love your blog' award, which I was too curmedgeonly to pass on to anyone else.

13) Pete Black. Great guitarist and all round great guy. (The Dead Bell, Dorothy etcetera.)

14) Ed Gaughan, the most talented comedian on the planet.

15) Lots and lots of people who I am too shy to mention here, mainly because they don't have a public profile, and that's GREAT!!!!

16) Discovering Flight of the Conchords.

17) Discussing obscure Bowie tracks with Mr. Wu.

18) Morrissey keeping on going.

19) Tony Crisp, dream interpreter.

20) Marmite on toast.

21) Interbreeding, because it's definitely one of the best blogs on the planet.

22) Ian Dury, diamond geezer. Reasons to be Cheerful, indeed.

23) Everyone who's helped make my current move more bearable.

24) Talking with Stuart Young in the pub about Ken Wilbur and other such things.

25) Gordon Ramsey mentioning on Jonathan Ross that it's not good to eat cod, because they're almost extinct, even though Ross was a bit of a tosser and said that it didn't matter because science would invent a new fish called the crod or something.

26) Going for walks. I like going for walks. I don't really explore, to tell the truth. I'm a creature of habit. I stick to the same old circuits. But sometimes (every day) I feel the need to get out of the house and take my constitutional stroll.

27) The memory of Emily.

28) Underwear.

29) Reading Japanese novels in the original (I'm just showing off now).

30) Getting messages from strangers over the Internet telling me they love my writing and then they never contact me again, probably out of shyness, of because they have realised that I'm a complete idiot.

31) Lord Whimsy, mammal of paradise.

32) Rroland and his strange celestial music.

33) Cheese on toast. Also known as Welsh rarebit, or is that something else.

34) The extreme dementia of Aidan Smith and his Panda Shaving Torture.

35) Handy bendy Ghandi.

36) The writers group in Twickenham and Langton's bookshop.

37) Fantasy Centre on Holloway Road.

38) The lyrics of 'Painting and Kissing' by Hefner.

39) My ongoing depression.

40) Kate Winslet.

41) Dr Magnus Pike.

42) Free porn on the internet.

43) Choosing to spell 'internet' with a lower case 'i'.

44) Bill fucking Hicks.

45) People who want to write, but never get around to it.

46) The poetry of Jeremy Reed.

47) The walk along the Thames from Twickenham to Richmond.

48) Suehiro Maruo.

49) People who actually get round to writing.

50) Eckhart Tolle.

51) Wales.

52) The fact that I can more or less like Prince, even though a friend archly said to me that it's just a short step from Prince to Tina Turner.

53) Weird Al Yankovic.

54) Going around doorknocking talking to people about the environment as if it were a proper job.

55) The fact that, on the Late Edition, whatever his name is, I can't remember, severly dissed Jeremy Clarkson and the Hamster bloke.

56) The word 'bloke'.

57) The fact that I can use American slang such as 'dissed', because I'm English (mixed blessing, perhaps).

58) Philip Larkin, whatever anyone says.

59) Sexual innuendos concerning Smow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

60) Extravagant and crippling shyness.

61) Quoting Morrissey and just not caring.

62) Nabil Shaban.

63) The fact that I can write all this without the intermediary of a publisher and editor.

64) The fact that I'm not making any money doing it.

65) J-pop.

66) Paul Whitehouse. Brilliant.

67) Leonard Cohen getting into Zen.

68) The group unconscious.

69) LSD.

70) I'm sure the world's authorities are actually very scared.

71) Yann Martel sending a new book every two weeks to the Prime Minister of Canada.

72) Michael Moore getting flack from liberals because he 'gives liberals a bad name', but doing it anyway.

73) Monty Python.

74) Terry Gilliam.

75) Not being 'autistic' (surely that word has got to drop its negative associations soon) about the world, as Momus wonderfully says that rock music is.

76) Author's reading their own work, even if they do it badly.

77) Nagai Kafu.

78) Mishima Yukio actually fucking disemboweling himself.

79) The fact that the Final Fantasy musician bloke linked Morrissey and Mishima in an interview, and that a reviewer described my story 'The Tattooist' as a blend of Mishima and Morrissey.

80) Spike Milligan. And Peter Sellers, too.

81) I think I'll keep going to a hundred and then stop there, or this will go on forever.

82) Tartarus Press.

83) People organising farewell dos for you, because you're too busy writing blog posts. (And packing and stuff, to be fair to myself.)

84) Being able to hate George Bush even though everyone else does.

85) New Scientist magazine. I know that I'm a bit of a wind-up merchant about science, but it is asking for it, really. Anyway, this is a quality magazine and everyone should read it. And the graphics are fantastic.

86)The comic 2000AD still being called 2000AD even though we've past that year now, so that implications of futurism there are appropriately fucked.

87) Moaning about people not keeping in touch with me, and then being lazy myself about being in touch with others.

88) Tom Butterworth, whether he likes it or not.

89) The fact that I think I probably will succeed as a writer, whatever that means.

90) Tom Baker's Doctor Who. You know it's true. And Lalla Ward, too.

91) Death.

92) H.P Lovecraft, and the fact that Michel Houellebecq severely digs him.

93) Fireworks - remember remember the fith of November. One of the strangest national festivals ever, whose Macabre overtones fascinated T.S. Eliot.

94) Syliva Plath and Ted Hughes.

95) Me fucking up a lot of interpersonal encounters by appearing to be standoffish, or too eager or something stupid like that.

96) Unashamedly being a Momus fanboy.

97) Being sexually unattractive.

98) We're almost at the end now, but there's still so much more to say, like John Lydon digging Kate Bush.

99) The Cure, whatever Morrissey thinks.

100) David Bowie in The Man Who Fell to Earth. Surely enough to turn the heads of even the most red-blooded heterosexual male. And I'm going to cheat here by including an extra one about me actually having been christened Quentin Crisp, whereas the more famous Quentin Crisp was born Dennis Pratt, before he 'dyed' his name.

I'm sorry for everyone and everything I've missed off, but I had to finish somewhere. And, to unashamedly quote Morrissey appropriating a cliche and recontextualising it, "Good Night, and thank you."

2007-11-02T00:37:00.001Z

From Now On Only Bad Things Will Happen to You

There's an episode of Six Feet Under, in which the character Nate has a vision in which his dead wife tells him, "From now on only bad things will happen to you."

I felt I knew exactly what it meant, with an almost mystic recognition.

What is it that is so fascinating and 'true' about such a statement? I think there would not be such fascination about it without the beginning clause, "From now on". This suggests that once upon a time it had been possible for good things to happen. I seem to remember such a world, too. And now I find myself in a world in which it is no longer possible for good things to happen. It is this contrast, of things going wrong, that seems to constitute the nightmare quality of human existence, because it is a nightmare. What could be better calculated to torture consciousness than to suspend it between two realms of infinite void - void in the sense of the unknown, since that is what they are - without memory of where it came from, knowledge of what it is or means of guessing what will become of it?

And yet I once knew life as something other than nightmare. How did the transition occur?

I have noticed that on the occasions - not that frequent, since I tend to downplay the nightmarish quality of existence in conversation and social interaction generally - that I have mentioned to people that it's actually impossible for good things to happen, they have either never admitted that it was true, or they have not understood what I was talking about (perhaps both). I can't really blame them for the latter if their experience is different to mine, since my attempts to explain this impossibility have usually ended with me uselessly opening my mouth like a goldfish, and finding no words. I'm sure it must sound like a very stubborn, emotional insistence. But it's not really like that at all. It's not something stubborn. It's something so fine that it slips through my fingers. It is something that, having permeated everything, is now no longer susceptible to the categories and divisions of language that would be needed to adequately describe it.

I was walking home earlier today and a mother was walking along with her children. Her little girl was saying something like, "Where's my sticker? I've lost my sticker." And it sounded as if she were about to cry if she did not find her sticker. Does human happiness really depend on the presence or absence of a piece of paper with adhesive on its back? You may think I'm only talking about children, but really adults are just the same. What's a job apart from a sticker that says, 'useful member of society'? What's a lover apart from a sticker that says, 'attractive, worthwhile human being'? Does the sticker really make a difference? However many stickers you stick on yourself, does it ever constitute something good happening? No, it's just a sticker, and you're going to lose it, anyway. And then you'll cry, probably. What else can you do? Because you suddenly know that from now on only bad things will happen to you.

(Well, I've just been interrupted by a phonecall from Mr. Wu, still suffering the ravages of a sore throat, I noticed, so I've probably lost my train of thought now. The last thing we were talking about before ending the phone conversation was Daisy Pulls It Off, but that doesn't help me now.)

Ah yes, I was going to say that, I have really got to the point in my life where I wonder how people are even able to have children. I like children, actually. Well, in a general sense. When I'm not forced to be at all responsible or that kind of thing. But it's because I like children that I don't understand really how people can continue to have children.

When I was a child, the world certainly seemed like a place where... I'm not sure how to finish that sentence. It didn't seem, anyway, like a place where only bad things happened. I think it must be something to do with the onset of the sense of time. Time destroys EVERYTHING.

I don't think there's really one point at which the transition occurred. Its conquest was stealthy and inexorable. I remember, for instance, that by the age of about thirty I was definitely aware that I had for some considerable time been living a nightmare. Horror, I reflected, as a literary or cinematic genre, is often seen as something that presents you with 'another world'; you are invited to enter in, to stray from the 'normal world', if you dare. But I realised now that, for instance, the cosmic horror of H.P. Lovecraft, was merely daily life. Normality was horror, or horror was normal.

Last night was Hallowe'en. I attended a reading at a branch of Waterstones in London. This was, specifically, a reading from authors anthologised in The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror #18. After the five authors present read, there was some discussion, chaired by the editor, Stephen Jones. I can't remember now exactly who said what or repeat it verbatim, but there was a question as to why the writers assembled were drawn to horror in particular, and at least two of the authors responded to the effect that no other genre is really adequate to dealing with how people actually feel about their lives any more. "Science fiction has missed predicting the future again," I seem to recall someone saying. And someone else said, I believe, "Well, it predicted the future, but it failed to get past, to leap over the two million corpses we're now heading towards." (I think that figure is a significant underestimate.)

If everyone waited until they were old enough for disillusionment with life finally to set in, for that transition to horror to take hold, before having children, I wonder whether that would do the trick. And yet, there are people who have children later in life. Presumably they have never been disillusioned. Or perhaps they never had illusions to begin with. Perhaps they always considered life as the cruel spiritual torture it is, but never saw this as a reason to refrain from procreation, because they never had anything else with which to contrast it. I don't know. It truly baffles me. You would think that now, in the 21st century, when it is becoming apparent to human beings collectively that we are vile and life is vile and there is no future but suffering, disappointment, death, mayhem etcetera, that the population would start to dwindle significantly. But no, it continues to grow.

I am mystified.

I don't really know why I write this, except that I'm here now, anyway, so I might as well. Sometimes I worry that I might be insane. I don't mean in any interesting way. I just mean in some way that will cause me unbearable anguish as my soul gradually unravels towards extinction or some psychic doom worse than extinction.

I suppose I shouldn't worry on other people's account, though, since if I am insane, then no one's likely to notice, anyway. Perhaps I should be more worried that I might be sane. That would surely be a much more terrible possibility.

There does seem to be a flaw in my thinking somewhere... I am perplexed.

2007-10-30T19:27:00.000Z

You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone

I'm moving. My room currently looks as though it has been invaded by a particularly vindictive burglar. Soon I will be gone, but before that happens this room has to look pristine. So I'm very busy, in the very melancholy and stressful way that moving makes one busy. So, if you're waiting to hear from me, well, that's probably why you haven't heard from me yet.

The other day I popped into a certain second-hand bookshop in London, because I happened to be passing, and I said hello and was given a nice cup of tea. I'm generally a conversationally disadvantaged person, but after a while a conversation with one of the staff got underway, about the way in which many writers are known only for one or two works when they wrote a great deal - this had been prompted by the fact I'd noticed a volume by M.P. Shiel on the shelves, with a title I had never heard of. I think it was something like Lord of the Ocean. On the same shelves I noticed a copy of The Pillow Friend by Lisa Tuttle. I remarked that Lisa had written the introduction to my next book, and there was some discussion then of her work. I took the book of the shelf and looked at the price. It was twelve pounds, which, to someone like me, is a lot of money. I had read Lost Futures and Memories of the Body by Tuttle, and enjoyed them both very much, but I had not read this.

Eventually, I decided it was time for me to ramble on, as Robert Plant might have said, although not to find the queen of all my dreams, but to find lunch at a nice greasy spoon. I looked at the copy of The Pillow Friend I had placed back on the shelf. What the hell! I thought. This books wants to be read, and it wants to be read by me. I took it to the front desk and laid out the cash.

Then I left the shop. As I was walking down the road I saw another of the staff from the shop coming my way. Apparently he had just come from a late lunch himself. He stopped on the pavement and we chatted for a while. He spoke about the state of the book business. "The bookshop is dying," he said, "Publishers, bookshops and writers are all finding it hard to survive at the moment, because no one really wants to pay the kind of money for books that will keep them going." He spoke of how the Internet has driven book prices down, how bookshops have been closing one after another. Then he asked me how I was doing. As if to prove him right I told him that I was moving, because I can no longer afford to live in London. He commiserated with me and asked what I am going to do now. This is a question I have been asking myself. How will I continue to survive? I really don't know. At least, anyway, I will have a roof over my head. But who would want to be a writer now, when the world of books, and perhaps the world itself, is coming to an end.

We went our separate ways. I popped into an Ecuadorian greasy spoon and ordered a vegetarian full English breakfast, for my late lunch. I looked at my new purchase. I have got into the habit of reading so many books at once that I have instituted a policy of not starting any new books until I have finished reading a certain number, so I thought it would be a while before I could start reading this. But then I thought, what the hell, this book wants to be read, and it wants to be read by me, so I opened it and started reading.

There are few things in my life of which I am proud. I'm not proud of the fact that I'm socially inept, or that I've never had much money, or that I am so judgemental of people, or that, like a baby, still-born, or a beast with his horn, I have torn everyone who reached out for me, or that I have consistenly failed to seize the day (despite the fact that I should obviously be immensely proud of all these things). But if there is one thing I am proud of, it's the fact that I have never compromised in my writing. If I succeed at this, it will have been entirely on my own terms, and I will be able to count it a true victory. But I haven't succeeded yet. I am not recognised by the world as a writer sufficiently that I don't have to give any further account of myself. I have to justify my existence by doing other work, too. Some writers are able to work full-time and still write wonderful stories. In fact, I'm fairly sure that most of them simply have to. I honestly don't know how they do it. Having tried this myself, I have nothing but the utmost respect for such people. Unfortunately, I don't seem to be one of them. I remember now when I was in Japan, I had a conversation with a girl there that has proved highly prophetic. She asked what I would do when I returned to England. I said that I supposed I would have to work. She replied that she couldn't imagine me working. "Sugoku maipeesu na kanji," she said; "There's an incredible 'my own pace' feel about you." I have been working - but I am reminded very often that I do the work much slower than everyone else. I do really seem to be on a different time-track. My current work - a decision I made in order to make it possible for me to write - is part-time. But it does not pay my living expenses.

The future looks extremely uncertain to me. Perhaps I shouldn't be so proud of my lack of compromise in my writing. I actually think I'm incapable of compromise. And without compromise, the likelihood of me being able to make a living is reduced drastically. I sometimes think that my writing will be sufficiently recognised to support me the very moment that my miserable existence comes to an end. You know, death is a great career move and all that.

Speaking of death, these days I try to remind myself as often as I can that I could die at any time, so I'd better be satisfied with my life just as it is. Some people might anticipate another clause to that sentence: "I'd better be satisfied with my life just the way it is, or change it now." But the truth is, I don't really think I can change my life; I just don't seem to be a carpe diem sort of person. Or rather, I think the only possible way for me to change my life is through contemplation of death and acceptance. In fact, usually when I think of death, I feel ready to go. I feel like, yes, I did it my way, even if I have totally fucked things up. However, one thing keeps me going. I still haven't written enough. It's not to do with quantity so much, though partly. I just know that I haven't acheived my full potential in my writing yet. My brain truly is teeming, and my ideas for stories seem as numerous as stars in the sky. And one day, I feel, I will write something that magically comes off the page like nothing that's been written before. Perhaps I will never get there, but I do think that I am getting better and better as a writer all the time.

I think that in some ways I used to be more tolerant of what I see as bad taste. Now it seems to me criminal and corrosive. To vote for trash with your money is just one of the many ways to make the world a worse place. I would like to discourage it. For myself, I don't see the point of reading a book that's too popular. (I don't mean to imply that everything popular is trash, though that seems to be the general rule.) For instance, J.K. Rowling has enough readers already. She doesn't need me. I want to make sure that those endangered works are kept from extinction by having a home in the consciousness of one more human being - me.

Anyway, this is just a status report, really. You'll miss me when I'm gone. There are people I'll miss, too. There are, in fact, certain people I miss right now. I hope we get the time to get together. I hope that we can reflect on the fact we could die at any moment and still feel satisfied with who we have been and who we are.

This article is interspersed with Youtube clips that have been amusing or otherwise fascinating me lately.

2007-10-28T11:16:00.000Z

Transhumans - Robots in Disguise

Well, I've only just got out of bed, but I have a lot to do today, and, since I haven't received any new e-mails, I thought I might use this time to continue my ruminations on John Harris' quest for immortality, bio-ethics, and what I have learnt is called 'transhumanism'.

I haven't really got anything planned, so all of this will be a kind of jotting of notes to marshal my thoughts.

First of all, immediately after I'd written my last post on the subject, I hated it. When I tried to analyse why this should be so, it seemed to be a kind of self-consciousness about it, an almost self-imposed distance between the authority of my target - John Harris - and myself, which I nonetheless attempted to close. It was that attempt to close a self-imposed distance, I think, that made me cringe. Of course, the distance is not entirely self-imposed; I'm sure that Harris would describe himself as an 'expert' on something or other and use every opportunity that academia, science and so on furnished him with to pull rank on those with whom he disagreed. He speaks with the idiom of authority. Perhaps what I hated about my entry was that I was using that idiom - or an uneasy version of it - in order to attack that idiom. Actually, I'm not sure how else it is to be done. This is the game of 'being taken seriously' that I referred to.

However, it also occurred to me that (and this is something that the likes of Harris often take advantage of) language often creates the illusion that two different things referred to by the same word are the same thing. I identified a desire on my part to be taken seriously in order that I might be able to challenge the 'being taken seriously' of Professor John Harris. When I thought about this, however, it seemed to me that, yes, I do want to be taken seriously, but in quite a different way to John Harris. My impression is that he is in the game - as are most or all so-called 'experts' - of being taken seriously in a hierarchical manner. This is vertical 'seriousness', and it is quantitative. For instance, someone might say, "I have an IQ of 180, and therefore my intelligence is higher than yours, and therefore what I say goes." Quantitative = vertical = hierarchical. I would like to be taken seriously in a qualitative way. What does that imply? That implies that I'm human, with human qualities and feelings, and therefore would like to be treated with respect. I invite anyone to savour the 'quality' of anything I say and experience it for themselves, not to accept my vertical authority. This kind of qualitative 'seriousness' is immensely important if we are to avoid human atrocities. As I have said before, such atrocities are made possible when people are treated in a quantitative rather than a qualitative fashion. What happened in the Nazi extermination camps was a result of human beings stripped of their qualities, no longer seen in terms of irreducible qualities. They were 'not taken seriously'. Their persecutors held the hierarchical authority of quantity that is the same as that which John Harris holds, and which is the same that he propagates when he smugly speaks about having not a single spiritual cell in his body. In this connection, it's interesting to note that, when he's contemplating the possible problems of immortality, he considers it in mathematical terms. Why should it matter, he asks, if no new people are born (if everyone is immortal) if the number of human years lived is the same (though shared between fewer people)? Thankfully, he does decide, after all, that the 'renewal' brought about by new people being born is desirable, but the mathematical consideration seems typical of the tenor of his thoughts.

John Harris has already foreclosed on any possibility of the spiritual (quality) in life. What is his idea of immortality? It seems nothing more than a quantitive extension of numbers in a life-span. 120 is necessarily more desirable than 80, because it's a higher number. This really seems to be the way he thinks. He will be able to fit more in to a longer life-span. He will be able to have a longer shopping list. He will be able to play more rounds of golf. Is this the best that the dynamic duo of science and materialism can offer us? It really seems to be. We will extend your life, and you will be able to do more. And we will call this "immortality" even though it's not, because we don't want to think about the fact that we will still inevitably die. In fact, we don't really want to think about anything except our longer shopping list. Is this a mature and wise way to sculpt a future for human beings?

I've said before - and had it thrown back in my face sometimes - that the whole aim of science is control. I don't find this to be an admirable aim. John Harris would appear to be of the transhumanist movement. I quote from the Wikipedia article on that movement:

Transhumanist philosophers argue that there not only exists a perfectionist ethical imperative for humans to strive for progress and improvement of the human condition but that it is possible and desirable for humanity to enter a post-evolutionary phase of existence, in which humans are in control of their own evolution. In such a phase, natural evolution would be replaced with deliberate change.

Humans in control of their evolution! What does control mean? Control implies lack of union. There are two things here - what is controlling, and what is being controlled. And what is it that is being controlled? Answer: nature. Actually, I see this as an impossible and disastrous project. The thing that is controlling is the ego, the conscious mind, and the conscious mind is much slower and clumsier than the unconscious (nature). In a sense, none of this matters, because it's like some freaky, hilarious and sinister puppet show, in which the puppets vow to control not only the hands pulling their strings, but the whole world on which those hands are contingent. Nonetheless, it's a phenomenon that will be cataclysmic for us humans, and I'd rather see it averted while there's still time. Do musicians think about what note they have to play next? No. If they did, they'd totally fuck up the tune. They let the unconscious mind, the memory in their body, take over. For humans to want to try and 'control' their evolution, is like a musician thinking, "Okay, I'll play B-flat next. Now, I'll play a G, but hold it a bit longer." Etc. It's not going to work.

At this juncture, I'd like to note that, if I recall correctly, I read in a book called, In the Beginning Was the Worm, about the 'discovery' of DNA, some idea that biology and physics have in some way swapped roles. Traditionally, biology (the organic science) was seen as the one in which there was greater unpredictability, and physics as the one with immutable, logical laws. At some point in the twentieth century this situation started to reverse. Now biology is all about immutable rules, and physics is embracing ideas of uncertainty. I know which I prefer. I don't have the book to hand, but I remember that one member of the Watson-Crick DNA team in particular was adamant that everything in the universe must be predictable, that given sufficient data, every outcome must be knowable, that all life is, therefore, mathematical. Personally, I can't think of anything worse than a totally known, totally predictable universe, but that was actually the ideal for this highly influential individual. That was his holy grail. Control. Traditionally the forces of order are seen as good and the forces of chaos as bad. I'm on the side of chaos in this one. Here, order is totally soulles and oppressive.

On the subject of DNA, I was interested to note that, just after I wrote my last entry on bio-ethics, the papers were full of James Watson's idiotic racial comments, which have apparently led to him being asked to retire. Hmmmm. I feel like I want to take a step back here and approach this one leisurely. The target is too easy, and I don't want to play some facile race card here. I quote:

The eminent biologist told the British newspaper he was "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours -- whereas all the testing says not really."

Okay, he's not specific about what testing. Are we talking about IQ tests here? I think he could have been a bit more circumspect in what he said. If Africans have scored on average lower in such tests what this proves is that Africans score on average lower in IQ tests (if that). To immediately assume that a difference in intelligence has been demonstrated is, anyway, reckless. So, I don't immediately think that Watson is racist. I think that he's probably arrogant and stupid, and believes that his position as a scientist means he can say whatever he likes. Okay, actually, he's obviously at least a little bit racist, or else why jump to such a conclusion when his scientific training should tell him not to jump to conclusions? (I have slightly ammended this view in the comments section here.)What interested me here, though, is that these are the words of the co-discoverer of DNA, of someone known for his work in the field of genetics. I would like to posit here that scientific theory is not - as many would like us to believe - ideologically neutral, that it springs from something within the people involved, that it is, in brief, a projection. What is the cultural meaning, then, of DNA? Something that mathematically determines what life is? That turns life into a computer? Into a quantitative hierarchy, so that one living thing can be quantitatively better than another, so that it can be quantitatively enhanced? Watson has also given his approval to a world in which, through genetic intervention, "all girls [are] pretty". Yeah, sounds at first like an old man's joke, doesn't it? But when you consider that this is an eminent scientist working in the field of genetics, this takes on a distinctly sinister complexion.

Would it be good if we rid the world of all ugliness and deformity? Maybe we would then spare people suffering. I remember - I believe it was the disabled actor Nabil Shaban - talking about people who suggested eliminating deformity before birth. His (I believe rightly) furious response to this was, "What these people are saying is that I should not exist." (Might not be verbatim.) I am also reminded of Ian Dury's rousing declaration that I seem to remember was on the cover of the single Spasticus Autisticus, but unfortunately, I can't seem to find the declaration online. Maybe later. Anyway...

There is something a bit Nietzschean about the transhumans. Nietzsche, of course, famously wrote that "man is something that must be overcome". Interesting that Nietzsche, too, should be linked with the Nazis. Actually, I have some sympathy with Nietzsche's sentiment, but it's as if the transhumans have taken all the interesting bits out of the Nietzschean idea, and are determined to become superhuman in the most shallow way possible. Nietzsche was talking about a kind of spiritual transcendence, an evolution through death of the ego (please do correct me if I'm wrong, I'm speaking from my memories of Thus Spake Zarathustra). The transhumans, on the contrary, want to avoid any kind of death (and, I expect, especially of their egos). I have used this metaphor before, but if Nietzsche was proposing evolution the hard way, then that could be compared, for instance, to winning someone's heart. How do you do that? It's not an easy or clear-cut thing. The answer of the transhumanists is to use rohypnol. Easy. It gets results, yeah (the usual scientific boast), but are these really the kinds of results you want?

In describing humans in terms of machines, and saying that the only way forward is technological advancement, what the transhumanists are doing is actually emulating robots. Robots are their role-models. But not mine, I have to say. It's as if something in them simply can't believe in the qualitative experience, that should be avaiable to everyone, of humanity.

2007-10-28T00:19:00.000+01:00

Calling Marcus Moore

I've resisted doing this for some time, but I am haunted by the memory of a certain friend with whom I lost touch some time after he emigrated to Australia. I've Googled him with very limited success, and he doesn't appear to be on MySpace. Marcus, if you're reading this, please get in touch with me. If you don't want to (or can't) contact me via the Internet, things will still reach me from the old postal address you know. Also, if anyone out there knows of Marcus Moore and can put me in touch with him, or vice versa, please do so. Just some detail to make sure you have the right Marcus Moore (if you know one). He moved to Australia in the early Nineties (from the UK). There, I believe strongly, he became involved in the world of comics. On the Internet I have found a comic called DeeVee, edited by one Marcus Moore and one Darren White. I believe this to be the very same Marcus Moore, international man of mystery. He also appears to have worked with Eddie Campbell on the Bacchus series of comics. The Wikipedia entry for Bacchus mentions Marcus Moore, and the name even has a hypertexst link. However, it seems to be linked (I believe erroneously) to a baseball player of the same name.

If it's true that everyone on the planet is connected to every other person by no more than six degrees of separation(apparently the evidence for this is not actually very strong, though it's an appealing theory), then the chances of someone who knows Marcus (or Marcus himself) reading this should be high.

Anyway, I shall perhaps find out.

2007-10-19T10:50:00.000+01:00

Spooky Kabuki in Susuki

Well, I'm going to leave the bio-ethics theme for a while and probably come back to it later.

I am currently writing a novel called Susuki, which is the sequel to my forthcoming novella, Shrike. Shrike is to be released by PS Publishing in mid-2008. Unfortunately, the fact that Susuki is a sequel to Shrike does not guarantee its publication. Publishing is an incredibly precarious and dilatory business, which, if you are prone to feelings of anxiety and suspense, can become a kind of water torture. I suppose that you probably don't have such problems getting things published if you're not actually a writer, by which I mean, if you're a celebrity. Apparently the novel Crystal by 'glamour model' Katie Price has "outsold the entire Booker shortlist combined". My source for this information is The Observer, which gives a facetious list of ways to write a blockbuster a la Katie Price:

Don't read books. It's a waste of time. Katie Price admits that she doesn't bother with fiction. Or non-fiction, for that matter. Although occasionally, she might dip into a bit of 'true crime'.

Employ a ghostwriter. Only losers write their own books. But make sure that you don't give them any credit or mention their name. A former journalist called Rebecca Farnworth is the actual 'Katie Price' in question and has, so far, written two autobiographies and two novels, with another autobiography and two further novels on the way.

Etcetera.

In this way the whole publishing industry becomes enslaved to people who don't care about literature or books. Do Katie Price's 'readers' actually read books? I doubt it very much. It's as if some conservationist body were somehow hijacked by golfers who decided the best way to save the rainforest was to turn it into a huge golf course. It's as if I managed to buy a football team and decided that it would be a vast improvement to the game if the players stopped kicking some stupid ball around and instead trained to become kabuki actors, giving performances of famous kabuki plays every time they came out onto the pitch (actually that would be great). It is the death of books, on which theme I might write more later. (I would like to add here that while previously I was quite indifferent to Katie Price, now I am more biased towards the idea that she should put on any top ten list of Britons who must immediately be assassinated.)

Anyway, on to happier things, to wit, my current novel, Susuki. I'm not going to say what the novel is about, not before the novella to which it is a sequel has even been released. I will say that I probably make greater use of my background in Japanese studies in this novel than in anything I've written previously. I've also had to do more research for this than for anything I've previously written, since there are certain sections that might be called historical. I usually try to avoid research, mainly because I don't have the budget for it. I think it's a fact that few readers grasp that writing a novel is a bit like making a film. If you don't have a big budget, you will be less able to invest in the kind of research that produces a spectacular epic spanning centuries. You will be making a low-budget film with unknown actors, limited sets and locations and so on, and the script and acting had better be pretty good. This is because, if you're not making a lot of money from writing, or you're not independently wealthy, you just don't have the time to do the kind of research you'd like to. The analogy falls down a bit in one conspicuous sense - even an independent, low-budget writer can come up with amazing special effects, and actually often does special effects better than the big studio writers.

This time, however, I have already done a significant amount of research - botanical, meteorological, cultural, literary, historical, etcetera - and intend to do a great deal more. Even if I bankrupt myself doing it, which, believe me, is a distinct possibility. All that despite the fact I cannot hope for a readership the size of that maestro Katie Price. Yes, indeed, only losers write their own books. So, in today's post, I just thought I'd share with you something rather special. It's a piece of research I did that informs one particular paragraph of the novel, and it is in the form of a film clip. This might give you some idea of the kind of things that are preoccupying me in this novel. Ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy famous onnagata Tamasaburo dancing in the role of Sagi Musume, the Heron Maiden:

You can watch an interview with Tamasaburo here.

Recently, I also discovered this rather interesting thing on the Internet. Writer Yann Martel is sending a book every week to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, partly, it seems, because he believes that the Canadian government does not sufficiently value culture. Now, if only I could get Katie Price's address, perhaps I could set up a website called, "What is Katie Price reading?" What would be the first volume I sent her, I wonder? Any suggestions?

2007-10-13T23:03:00.000+01:00

Getting Serious

Time is running out.

Why do I write?

Because I know I will die?

Maybe.

I was thinking of writing you readers an e-mail today, in other words, not writing about anything in particular, but writing about my recent news and preoccupations, that kind of thing. The thing is, I feel as if I really need someone in particular to write to in order to do that. I could tell you that I've been rediscovering Kate Bush over the last couple of days, or that I've decided that my inner self is actually a dead ringer for the Phantom of the Opera:

But without focusing on one thing in particular, or having some linking theme, it might all be a bit boring.

So, maybe I should go straight on to the next actual theme that has been brewing in my mind, which comes to you courtesy of Professor John Harris.

I remember reading somewhere - but I've forgotten where - someone commenting that Nagai Kafu (one of my favourite writers) could have been a great writer IF ONLY he'd been able to take himself seriously. I actually think Nagai Kafu was a great writer. I like the fact that he seemed to consider himself a bumbling amateur in the realm of letters, that he deliberately sabotaged a lot of his own works, that he left them in irregular shapes and so on.

In the book The Little Prince, there's an episode in which an astronomer from Turkey gives a lecture on some new asteroid he has discovered, only to be scoffed at and mocked by the Western astronomers who are his audience; they are unable to take him seriously because he is not wearing a suit and tie. Later he comes back with a suit and tie and delivers the same lecture to great applause.

If you want people to believe in the asteroid you've discovered, you've got to get them to take you seriously.

This leads me naturally to the question, why do I hate my blog? Is it because I cannot take myself seriously? In other words, do I hate it because I think that I'm an idiot and therefore cringe at the thought that my opinions are seeing daylight? The answer is yes. So, why do I allow those opinions to be read? Why not delete them? I suppose I feel like I don't want to censor myself. I don't really want to be taken any more seriously than I deserve to be. I feel like people can fairly competently decide for themselves whether I should be taken seriously or not, without me donning the prose version of a suit and tie in order to hoodwink them. And maybe I don't deserve to be taken seriously at all. What is that, anyway? Being taken seriously, I mean? It somehow suggests someone with no sense of humour. Lack of humour is lack of self-awareness and reduces one immediately to cariacature, and cariacatures are, as we know, impossible to take seriously. Therefore anyone who is 'taken seriously' is immediately, as my rendering of that phrase suggests, a person in inverted commas only, and not to be taken seriously at all... We could go round and round with this one - my desire not to be taken seriously is really a desire to be taken seriously since I know or think that only those who are not taken serioulsly can be taken seriously. To stop us getting dizzy with this spinning, for now at least, perhaps I should say that refusing to act in such a way as to be taken seriously is actually a continual abdication of authority. Maybe even that explanation won't suffice to stop the spinning, but it will have to serve for now.

So, I don't want to be taken seriously. Why would I want that? Oh yeah, to persuade people about the asteroid that I've discovered...

To take oneself seriously, to persuade, for instance that infanticide might be okay (an opinion championed by Professor John Harris) must take an enormous amount of confidence, it seems to me. To do so publicly, at least - to crusade. Can I imagine myself in the position of Professor John Harris, talking to assemblies of people and to newspapers about how infanticide is quite acceptable (in some cases)? I find it difficult. Surely, I think, such a degree of confidence borders on the sociopathic? Does John Harris have no sense of responsibility? One would hope that he did have, being, as he is "a member of the British Medical Association's ethics committee".

Do I feel a sense of responsibility, then? Is that why I hate my blog? I suppose, yes, it is. But aren't I taking myself a bit seriously feeling all responsible about a mere blog? Hmmm, interesting. Maybe I am.

If I were to extend that sense of responsibility, I would say that I have a duty to comment upon those things that I think are wrong.

I've been reading up on Professor John Harris. I've just read a lecture he gave on immortality. He asked his audience to challenge him with difficult questions. It doesn't look like they did a very good job of it. Professor John Harris appears to be very articulate, persuasive and funny. He makes immortality - acheived through genetic tampering - sound very attractive and reasonable. However, although I found his speech very interesting, and well-made, I am not persuaded. I am tempted now to aspire to be taken seriously - as this man is - simply in order to challenge what I believe to be a pernicious influence in society. I've decided to use John Harris as a kind of mental punchbag to get my thoughts in order. There are a number of questions I must ask myself, and the first of them, which I may come back to, if I don't abandon this project altogether (that is, if I decide early on that the answer to the question is 'no') is, "Is it a good thing to be taken seriously?"

What's the most serious a person can be taken? Serious enough to be rendered immortal, perhaps?

Let me fire off a few warning shots to warm up.

Well, for starters, Harris' whole enterprise for immortality (even though at the moment he's only laying the 'ethical' groundwork) is based on a lie. I find immortality to mean (according to the Oxford Dictionary) "living forever", but this is not what Harris is proposing, not even what he is able to propose. What is actually envisaged is a kind of theoretical immortality in that the cells of the body do not degenerate, but continue to regenerate. This, as Harris says, does not render the individual invulnerable. In other words, you can still die of just about anything; all you've done is eliminated death through general wear and tear. And this is the 'most optimistic' scenario. In fact, immortality might only mean an extension to one's life. Do I have an objection to extended life? I'm not sure yet. However, the lie of the word 'immortality' sends a warning signal to me. The Professor is not facing up to something here. Death will come, Professor. It will come, however postponed. You would like to postpone it forever, I know, but you do not think that is a possibility. So, you will simply put off what you are afraid of for as long as you possibly can. This postponement is the basis for your entire argument, as if the slight gain of longevity and the waving about of the word 'immortality' can put paid to the spectre of death. Not sure I want to be on Captain Harris' ship when it sails. Didn't want to inspect that gaping black hole in the bottom of the good ship Immortality, did he?

Anything else?

I think there is something else. There is, to me, something about the genetic modification of human beings of the aspect of a final solution. It is a final solution by stealth, creating a master race perhaps without bloodshed, but with at least some of the underpinning assumptions and attitudes behind the attempted final solution of the Nazis. This is an impression and an instinct; it's possible that I may modify this view later, if I continue with this 'project'. However, in support of that view at this moment, a quote from Harris on when infanticide is acceptable:

It is well-known that where a serious abnormality is not picked up - when you get a very seriously handicapped or indeed a very premature newborn which suffers brain damage - that what effectively happens is that steps are taken not to sustain it on life-support.

What Harris is talking about is the elimination of genetic stock (read 'the killing of human beings') that is not 'pure'. I myself do not pretend that this is a black-and-white issue, but Harris' bias here is clear - towards a genetic super-race, if necessary at the price of killing. How is the killing of a human being justified? Usually mathematically, by utilitarian means - the greatest good for the greatest number of people (or maybe just for the 'greatest people'). To reduce humans to quantities it is necessary to strip them of qualities. How are they stripped of qualities? Through the philosophy of materialism. As Harris happily says of himself, "I know that there is not a spiritual cell in my body."

Well, I might continue this theme later.