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p.s. Hey. ** James Bennett, Hi. Well, I guess I meant that’s where the central dialogue takes place? Writing once written is you but not you and is only focused on understanding you? I don’t know. What you said, basically. It’s all about finding your limits, no? By continually testing them and seeing how far you can grow them? If you do that, you find your originality. I find that exhilarating rather than depressing. I always find that I can do more than I had imagined I could. Anyway, coffee, yes, hit me up when the time feels right. ** magkneesiumm, For sure. I co-make films, as I’m sure you know, and it’s confusing and depressing when people think what’s unique about our films is the films’ problem and not their restrictive idea of what a film should be. I quit university after one year, and I’ve never taking fiction writing courses ever for the very reason you mention. Again, people seeing or reading what they’re not used to or unfamiliar with as a problem instead of a possible adventure. Olivia Newton-John impersonators, wow. They must exist. I’m sure I’ve seen some perky blonde drag queens doing ‘Xanadu’ at least. You guys get really serious summers in Texas. I feel whiny complaining about ours. I have a friend in Houston who’s been sending me SOS filled texts. Have a very doable day. ** _Black_Acrylic, Your brother liked ‘RT’ too? Cool. I’ll take that as a victory. Based on that line up, you are truly a great teacher. ** Adem Berbic, Glad you’re safely ensconced, but that heat, yow. I’ve read very little Lacan. Formally bracing aligns with my memory. Everything’s transient, I guess, although books are also like rocks, but even less worthless? ** Dominik, Hi!!! Oh, a quickie. I’ll take it! I’m not sure when we’ll head to Norway. We had dreams of extending the trip and hitting a bunch of Scandinavian theme parks, but I don’t think we can afford that at the moment. Luckily the city where the festival is has one of our favorite theme parks on its outskirts: Kongeparken. That’s the park where, when we visited it some years ago now, almost all of the employees were Emo and Goth teens. Probably not true anymore. Sadly. So likely we’ll head up there a day or two before the festival screening on the 28th. I’ll be curious tp hear if you feel a tenable difference in Hungary now that the new regime seems to have righted a bunch of the old wrongs. Have an amazing time! Love will be your waterer if he can. It’s August, there’s nothing much else going on. Love wondering how different he would be if he’d grown up in Russia, G. ** Steve, Greaves was kind of all over the place, but even when the films aren’t so inspired, there’s usually great footage in them. I still haven’t read ‘2666’. I know, I know, but it’s so long. Nice about your friend. I just saw a visiting friend yesterday who I haven’t seen since at least the early 90s. So interesting how our physical forms have changed but what passes between those forms hasn’t changed at all. ** laura w, Hi. Murdoch is terrific. ‘The Piano Teacher’, yes, another good one. I did a spotlight post about it that I should really restore. I’m guessing you’ve read my very favorites: Quin, Compton-Burnett, Brooke-Rose. I’m blanking on the Perec adapted film. I’ll look it up. Seems like I would have watched it. Dead drips! Muted co-workers? ** HaRpEr //, Oh, cool, you saw ‘Symbiopsychotaxiplasm’, so good. Yeah, all that finessing needs to happen once the gush is in place for me. Then I just treasure hunt. ‘In Transit’, yay, so good. Very true about the sidelining, of course, but it also blows my mind that a lot of those writers were actually quite successful and widely read when they publishing their books. It gives me some hope about a potential UK readership. No equivalent in the US. Except I guess for some of the meta-fiction novelists back in the 60s & 70s. But they were all men. Of course. ** Joe, Hi, Joe! I’m good except for the summer heat. How are you, man? My email (the outlook one) is still the same, so that should work. Cool that ILP is doing those two reprints of yours! Take care, maestro. ** Okay. The post I have restored for you today is really, really old, like really old. See you tomorrow.
Now available in North America 
Hey Dennis! These are so nostalgic, haha. I really love the non-functional and exploded slides. I like the rotary phone too, my playground as an adolescent had a clock which seems like a better but much more boring choice. On the way back from my supermarket, there’s a really extravagant kid’s playground, with a huge rope cableway. I always go at like, 8 in the evening or 6 in the morning because of work, so it always seems abandoned, but I’m sure it’s popular at peak time, or the weekends or something.
Cool, I’m still really enjoying that book, I’ll let you know when I finish it. It’s really unnerving, it’s really colonising my thoughts. It has this very scary authorial voice, where it occasionally interrupts the first-person narrative of the boy to look back on the “true meaning” of the events, and is often wrong – and perhaps, may not even be the protagonist as an adult. It’s super unique, I’m really enjoying it. Hope you’re well, love from here. Adios.
apologies it took me about a fortnight to reply to your comment regarding the piano. But I do inform you that I greatly appreciated your recommendation of Moonlight Sonata and am looking into that as a future practice.
The one thing that’s so tricky with “A promise” from SH2 is the right hand note that is essentially G A A# C D and then back down from there.
You have to really concentrate, or do enough finger exercises (no matter how fun it is to play) or perhaps due to my somewhat novice skills, its easy to mess up the timing of the notes/ not hit with the right velocity when going back down. Sometimes I miss the “C” when going down But other than that, its pretty simple, and perhaps I just need to fresh up on my finger muscle dexterity.
But yes, thx for the recommendation!
For “A promise” this is considering your playing that part at the correct time measure/or very fast, it can get tricky, but yes!
My brain is able to spin these temperatures as God putting me in writing boot camp, plus air con comes as standard here, so no sweat (or a conscionable amount at most).
This post for me is an evocation station. I don’t know how good your mental map of the Balkans is, but I’m essentially on the northwestern tip right now, which is by extension the most Western and cosmopolitan (i.e., basically the only part that isn’t peasantville), and the further east you go, the more it looks like the above, and I have family in places that definitely look like the above. There’s a specific visual texture in it which I struggle to isolate and explain. No doubt I’m culturally conditioned to think this, but I think the East does a worse job of (or maybe refuses) hiding its sort of inherent visual and spatial brutality than the West, and that’s after you take out the pale orphans in Adidas and mouldy playgrounds and whatever else — I’m talking about something more fundamental than the cliche of Russia and wherever looking grey and poor and concrete-y.
I think I have a running advantage here for writing in that I’m just speaking the local language (which is also like eight different languages for obtuse political reasons), so I can let English mentally flounder about to my brain’s pace until I’m ready to plop it out onto the page. In London, actually having to speak English too much before writing in a given day seems to break the spell.
I think Lacan is fascinating as an erector of systems. Like, you’re reading his stuff and not getting it, and there’s no one line or paragraph or essay which makes it click, but then you realise that it _had_ clicked without you realising, but the act of realising that disappears it. There’s some elusive core of fascination there, for me at least, which I can’t possibly explain. And I’m sorry to say that I’m drawn to writers for whom extreme, caustic pessimism is blithely treated as a factual baseline from which to proceed.
I dunno, re: the transience of writing, I have some sort of half-baked complex about writing alone, for moi, being in this sort of abstract place that sits perpendicular to the not-much-ness of Everything Else. But I also don’t believe that it’s ’transcendent’ in any real sense, or that it can be meaningfully separated from the material reality of some words on a page which may or may not have a shelf life. I’m not really sure what I believe here. Certainly I have some sympathy for the Lacanian take which can be very, very, very crudely boiled down to it being language or language-alike structures all the way down. In which case I guess writing is just a privileged form of What There Is. But that sounds a little too neat and self-congratulatory, doesn’t it?
Wow, some of this is worthy of a spooky Mike Nelson installation. In fact he has a show on in Leeds right now, something to do with old tyres I think. Remember seeing a few of his uncanny spaces up in Scotland back in the day, the guy really did have the art world at his feet.
try as i might i blank on remembering any of my childhood playgrounds structures. what i remember is stuff that wasn’t really dedicated for the purpose — a brick plaquard wall in a park, a filled-in well
near where i live now, though, one of the local churches has a full playground in the shape of noah’s ark – outside that is three full size crosses you can climb on! more meant for passion plays i guess, plus i’ve seen them prop puppets up on them every easter, but a child could certainly climb on one
something really evocative about the picture of the child couple staring off into the sky, fate unknown
have a good time today
Thanks Dennis, sent the email earlier. x
The graininess of these photos qualities really add to the bleak temperament of childhood bliss in the midst of minimalistic dilatation. Oh but its cute. I really like the Telletubbie statue. I like the idea of wooden sculptures in a children playground.
Lately ive been trying to get better at my words, as I always fight to do, haha. Sometimes my brain resets or something.
I have this deeply sentimental relationship with writing as a sacred art form. Theres a rawness to it, as it was the first and only art form that got me out of the terribly agonizing years of the most intense and delirious episodes of addiction, sadness, and disassociation. The characters in my book are the reason im not dead, and to my surprise, I had wittingly designed it that way at 17. I felt pathetic how this book chained me to a life, and paralyzed me from committing the most gruesome acts upon myself. (I was obsessed with rodenticide and chemical “Cleansing” is how I saw it at the time) A part of me felt weak and pathetic that this book was this reason that faltered my actions, but now, I think I kinda see the strength.
That period of delusional instability, addiction, dissasociation, where if not for it I wouldve ran a blade through my necrotizing muscles!(Well, I suppose I had unsuccessfully)
But now its like, I cherish writing so deeply, that pursuing a creative writing degree seems pointless.Id rather chase workshops and book fairs, and vagabond wisdom. truthfully, I’d like to keep my weirdly evoking writing style (of course I’d love to learn to structure it in an impactful way!) Yet now that ive somewhat escaped what put me in survival state, the real me comes back to what I have always innately chased as an expression…
Music!
Have u ever been a dj? Thats one of my current endeavors rn which makes sense since I really love curating music playlists and listen to a lot of different genres and sub-genres. Also blending n stuff.
To be fair, I never desired a writing degree, and the only reason im changing my major to music is because someone I love dearly(if only as it friend, it’s starting to seem like, ya know the “Melvin” human I mentioned who is a beast at drums and is actually going to take a piano class this semester with the teach who taught me last semester!) inspired me to pursue this goal and not fear it. I always fear “What is the point of this? I dont want to be on this earth, but sometimes, sometimes, usually at the latest of night, I feel accomplished, and that is enough to pursue these things, I Think.
Still I consider myself a writer, as I still have so many stories I’d love to materialize into the world. Not sure if I consider myself primarily a writer or musician yet, although right now, I’d say im more experienced in writing if we are talking about the act of playing an instrument and how long ive been doing it. My big things are writing, music—and drawing could be something I do at future possible gigs, selling designed patches and prints, as for my writing, I plan one day to do a graphic novel–so that helps there!
Sewing is my hobby, cherished as an act of love. Like ex, right now im making a cat plush for a friends Bday.
It will all work out. Oooh of course I’d love to travel more when I get a job! When my beloved cat takes her last breath, I’d love to set out for the world and leave all these things somewhere safe with a trusted friend (I can now trust my friends!) and then come back.
Oh how Excited I am for next semester! I will be taking writing and inquiry (yay a writing class so I can hopefully soon take a creative writing/fiction class) aswell as….get this….dont get too excited…you might want to _____ ______ _______ real quick, actually im erasing that, because I know when someone tells me that it gives me the urge to do it right then, and im only joking, and dont want to ruin such cherished breaks.
Anyways! Im doing an electronic musics class! Yippe!
I hope your coffee is splendid this morning. I tried a coffee ground called the Southern pecan light brew or somn
How is the edm/rave scene in France? Is there a D.I.Y music scene? Like hardcore/alternative more specifically?
hey get out of here you damn clankers
These are fabulous. There’s a memorial statue for a cinema stampede in paisley town centre that’s like a little girl with a giant hoop through her head. Same vibes as these.
Also! Will be in Paris the week after next! Can I hit you up for a coffee!
Conspicuous Valentine: Diesel Clementine
This is wonderful. With my childhood playgrounds I can’t pick out a specific interesting detail from memory. However, this is different but I grew up in Crystal Palace in London and the main park there has these famous dinosaur sculptures that are really brilliant. Since my family relocated, I haven’t seen them in a while, but I still dream of them. There’s also this crazy gothic terrace that has these big sphinxes. It’s all a Victorian mask of extravagance, but it rubbed off on me.
As much as I love Pynchon, Gaddis, Barth, Gass, and so on, one area they couldn’t play around with gender like Brophy, Acker, and even Burroughs sometimes.
It’s like they could dismantle the language around violence and sexual identity to a certain extent, but they were totally stuck within binary thinking when writing about gender. Gaddis comes the closest in ‘The Recognitions’ with his description of a party with drag queens and trans women that very thoughtfully weaves in a baroque history of gender variance in a very beautiful way. Other than that, gender fuckery is just used as a gawking, depraved spectacle by a lot of those writers. And I’m not talking about reading these books representationally, I’m talking about how these writers play with a kind of formal fluidity and double-meanings of words but can’t extend that to gender for some reason. But I’m half sure I’m projecting.
what a great restored post today! the images are haunting in that unique way that still lifes of post-soviet eastern europe are. like everyone left or something. which, admittedly, a lot of people did. i read cafe europa recently enough it’s still on my mind- though of course that’s more about the balkans than the ussr states. there was also a recently published book, spring in siberia, i don’t think you would get a ton out of it as an artistic work but it’s a pretty interesting journalistic novel about growing up during that period that’s stunted by an underdeveloped call me by your name-esque love story. when i pick up most books from that time/set around that time i do so mostly as a history geek and am not expecting to be excited by them as works of art. function over form, for once.
i have read quin, yes! only berg, though, but i liked it so much- admittedly, a lot of it was because it reminded me vaguely of angela carter’s bristol trilogy which is her most underrated work. compton-burnett, i have been meaning to get to for years but have been stifled by the fact that up until, what, three years ago she was almost entirely out of print in the us (but now not anymore, thank you nyrb!). and i’ve never even heard of brooke-rose, but i will do some digging. good to hear about murdoch- i actually really wanted to read the sea, the sea, but the length startled and scared me, so i think a severed head is the best place to start.
the perec adaptation is the man who sleeps, directed by queysanne and perec. the lead and potentially only actor looks like a bit like a gallic ian curtis. the drips had the wonderful effect of displacing my dickhead coworker as they were right over his desk. i was quite happy about that. i hope even if your day sucks you have some small wins regardless.
I think I remember this really old post. It’s hard to forget. Whew.
Good to be home, trying to catch music and reading before I’m out of town again for the weekend. Started Andrew Durbin’s book on Paul Thek and Peter Hujar. Pretty interesting of course, but I’m having some trouble with it.
Bill
Well Dennis, all I really gotta say is that this is totally the type of post I come here for. I think novel recs and beautiful currated image selections like this are my fave posts on the blog. Just genuinely so up my alley that its hard to single out any images… the wonky robots, the fucked up kids riding the waves, the faces on the swingset, this uhhhh bear looking thing in a robe? Just beautiful stuff. I remember roaming around in the fog as a teen and seeing these odd rusty playground statues emerging from the fog… it was amazing.
Anyway, keeping it brief, just trynna get thru the week. Smoke is really bad and its hit my partner extra bad so im in caretaker mode. Still need to find time to practice and all that, but we’ll make it happen. Getting perverse and interesting ideas for stories, which is always nice. Like, using the cyclical motions of the physical labor at one of my jobs to dictate the structure of a short story and stuff…
One actual question tho: I saw someone describe The Sluts, seemingly positevely as “gay evil Lolita” and my eyes started to roll so far back into my head. Maybe I’m off base, but that seems wildly innacurate. It reminds me of seeing blurbs comparing your stuff to Burroughs. So the actual question is: have you ever stopped getting annoyed at comparisons that completely miss your modes of stylizing prose? or did it never bother you at all? Thanks byeee ^_^