Turbubabulence II, image by Pedro R. Rivadeneira
Song of Anonymous
(a nomadic novel)
Section
III
Tunnel
at the end of the light
Pedro R. Rivadeneira
(a work in progress)
III
tunnel at the end of
the light
“There is a little of everything,
apparently, in nature,
and freaks are common.”
Samuel Beckett, Molloy.
It is late on a summer afternoon, early
July, when i am, where i am, sitting in the Grote Markt Square in the Hague with
Anders, an old friend and colleague from my student days at the Koninlijk
Conservatorium: the sky, dark blue with scattered pink soon to become crimson,
deep orange and isolated gray clouds sprinkling too; the sun late to set in the
Northern European estival skies. It is here, in the square, full of the chatter
of tens of dozens of people out for the evening, drinking, smoking and
gossiping, the latter being a major form of entertainment and social control in
these parts, not much else to do, the widespread boredom setting heavily like a
wave on our heads and shoulders, on our backs, all tempered by massive amounts
of beer, schnapps, hashish and loud techno music, while some take it upon
themselves to police others, cutting them down to size, keeping each other in
their place, making sure they don’t get too self-confident, the entire scene seemingly
shaped by waves of gossip that come and go with the ebb and flow of the rising
and falling intensity of voices, all of which suddenly strike me as shouts and
calls on a boat in a stormy sea, spreading a nasty rumor or two around when
needed, the nastiness knowing no limits, it’s as thick as pea soup, you could
cut it with a knife as they say, i can see it out of the corner of my eye, like
a shadow, a fog or staticky mist silently hovering, watching, listening,
aimlessly adrift, floating above the unaware, unconscious crowd as they squirm
in their seats with excitement, anticipating the opportunity to test their
skills, to release their venom, connoisseurs of flattery, punishment, pain and
humiliation always eager to dig their talons into someone’s tender,
unsuspecting flesh. i can see it out of the corner of my eye, hanging low in
the sky, just above the roof tops, like a headache, a migraine aura, pulsating,
blurring my vision, my mind’s eye and ears, my ability to think and perceive
clearly scrambled by the static, a black static, slowly shifting shape and
place as it focuses on one part of the crowd more than another, resonating with
their fears and cruelty, seemingly feeding on them and feeding back into the
crowd such that a loop is generated between the crowd and it; the amorphous amoeba
of black static. Here, awash in the incessant talk about music videos, clothes
and newly acquired lovers, petty conquests both male and female, i sit quietly,
nursing another Belgium beer, the high alcohol content of the previous two
already setting on my brain with a gentle buzz, it is here, as i was saying, in
the Grote Markt Square, on a late summer afternoon that i meet her, Elise, as i listen to friends of a friend talking
about someone’s writing: taking it upon themselves to interpret it for me and
each other, explaining it, explaining it away to each other, completely tearing
it apart, degrading and debasing it, taking it away from her who wrote it and
in their odious boredom, tearing it down, destroying it, taking turns reading
bits and pieces of the text in mocking tones of voice, reducing it to
smithereens, convincing themselves and each other it’s not worth their while,
and it is this view, the only one worth listening to of course, and all along
the victim laughs her head off spitting out a slew of insults the likes of
which i've never heard before in this guttural Netherlandish tongue and which
shoot past me in a frenzy as she tries to snatch back the pages from her
maliciously snickering friends. Sandal, boot and tennis shoe clad feet stomp on
brick inlaid ground accompanied by table slapping laughter and chairs
screeching in a chorus of multiphonic clusters, a moment of putrefaction
suddenly waxing within as last rays simultaneously touch a far flung cloud
disappearing over the roof tops, straying away toward horizons unseen, and in
another corner of the square a group of young parents, framed by the languorous
late afternoon light as if by a spotlight, as if posing for a portrait a la
Rembrandt, they're all sitting around with their little pets, their children,
their babies, their human possessions, chattering and laughing, treating their
helpless little babies like things, possessions, objects of pride, showing them
off to each other like trophies, their prize possessions, flinging them into a
self-destructive world about which they won't be allowed to do anything. Watching,
listening to them makes my stomach turn - the idiots basking in the illusion of
a fulfillment that never really gets actualized delusional suddenly opening our blind eyes in the
midst of the black cosmic night that
surrounds everything - i think to myself floating suspended, aimlessly, like a
piece of flotsam gently rocked by mild waves, in an alcohol induced reverie -
Adrift in the
sounds from the square, Anders and i continue drinking our beers, occasionally
chuckling as we watch and listen to our friends Nadja, whom i once dated in my
student days and who now teaches Comparative Literature at the University of
Amsterdam, and Danica and her friends, drinking and smoking, snickering in
spittle filled Haagse guttural accent smirking, when suddenly i catch a
glimpse, a sideways glance, i mean peripherally, i catch a glimpse, two chairs away to my right, of two, flip
flop clad dirty feet with chipped black enameled toe nails, my gaze slowly moves
up thin long legs covered in tight black slacks past unusually long, spindly fingered
hands, also with chipped black enameled nails, at the end of long arms onto a
black ruffled blouse with pronounced cleavage, and finally, the profile of a
silently smiling face topped by an unruly mass of raven black hair, all of this
seeming to me to be a thinner, taller, vaguely female and sexier version of the
Cure’s Robert Smith. Nadja, catching me gazing at the stranger, grins through
the haze and noise, leans forward across the table and says - I want you to
meet my sister - she then leans in the opposite direction and, putting her
hands around her mouth, whispers something to the stranger who first looks at the
ground as she listens, then looks up in my direction with large sea green, gray-blue
eyes smiling, i smile back and wave briefly with my free hand and say hello
under my breath - this is my sister Elise - Nadja says smiling playfully, Elise
leans forward and says - Hola como
estás? - Oh! Spanish what a pleasant surprise - i say smiling
at her - I've heard a lot about you - she then says in English - all of it
good i hope - i wink at her and then
take another sip from my glass - but of course of course all of it good - she answers back playfully
with a big grin on her face - your Spanish pronunciation is very good where did you learn to speak it - I ask
Elise - I've travelled around a lot in Latin America as part of my studies -
she says smiling at me - oh really? what are your studies? - i inquire - I have
a doctorate in Latin American Studies - she answers - oh that's impressive! - i
say shifting in my chair a little and then ask - do you teach anywhere? - yes -
she answers - at the university in Utrecht - goodness! that's even more
impressive ! that's where the old
Institute for Sonology used to be! - i say genuinely intrigued - you should
come to Utrecht for lunch some time - she says - we can practice our Spanish
together - sure of course - I answer -
I'd love to visit and practice with you - Spanish - she says, her face aglow
with a mischievous smile - of course
of course Spanish that's what I meant . . . I'm sure . . . -
i mumble back beginning to giggle - anyway
the role of the arts music's role
in society is complex - i hear Anders say all of a sudden after a long pause,
interrupting my flirtations with Elise - it can be subversive and it can be
used to affirm the status quo this
latter kind of music commodity music has a conditioning function it plays upon certain feelings certain emotions and kinds of
thinking usually of an obsessive
nature I mean
so-called pop music serves this function it serves power by means of its utterly
conventional musical forms - he says smirking - and through the incessant
repetition of formulaic rhythmic
melodic and harmonic patterns along with highly cliched voice centered lyrics it reinforces certain psycho-emotional
limit cycles in people's minds
keeping them stuck in habitual modes of thinking and feeling keeping them in a state of dependency keeping them addicted to an increasingly
limited repertoire of fears and desires the latter of which never really get
fulfilled keeping the listener in true consumerist fashion endlessly coming back for more - he says
with increasing forcefulness and then takes another sip from his glass after
which he continues with his invective - and I mean voice centered here in the
sense it is meant in contemporary poetics - he articulates with precision in his basso profundo voice - this
inadequate mistaken notion that a
poem or in this case a song lyric is simply the outward manifestation of a
spoken or singing self-presence all
this evidently stemming from the belief that speech is
primary and prior to writing originating in the individual as ego a subjectivity that is characterized as hard and fast rigid
fixed and unchanging and whose
insights are therefore true a consistent and controlling self where the poem the song lyric expresses some kind of insight some kind of wisdom about life a kind of confession of a lived personal
experience that is supposed to be unique where the poet the
artist or in this case these so-called pop stars are somehow special endowed with wisdom endowed with almost mystical abilities and their
success their wealth their luxurious life styles are seen by society
as proof of this as if the pop star
were some kind of emissary who is in touch with the Devine so-called such a Romantic nineteenth century notion such utter bullshit! - he exclaims, a wide
grimace contorting his face - but just how unique are those insights just how unique is all that so-called wisdom when all those so-called pop songs and the
so-called stars who sing them are mass produced fabrications concocted by the
entertainment industry songs whose
messages whose oh so important
insights most to
not say all those self-centered
narcissistic pop star twits regurgitate over and over again with each
song that is touted as new? it's all a
simulacrum theater
a spectacle designed to give
the consumer what he or she wants to hear and thus temporarily pacifying her or
him until the next wave of prefabricated bullshit wisdom arrives - Anders spits
out vehemently, clearly irritated - and they are often referred to as
geniuses these pop stars or what's worse they refer to themselves as geniuses in the past a genius was someone with
uncommon talent and inventiveness uncommon intelligence and abilities uncommon passion and energy an uncommon capacity for work today however a genius is one of these prefabricated
stars who has risen to the top of the market put together by the entertainment industry
with its teams of writers producers
and marketers simply put today a genius is someone who has the capacity to
sell hundreds of thousands if not millions of cds or sound files as the case may be - he says, the
displeasure showing on his face with another grimace - at the same time you
have all those postmodernist theorists and writers from the seventies and
eighties who called into question the so-called genius position but who are
themselves individuals of above average intelligence who wrote difficult and
complex texts and whose writings back in the nineties were religiously
regurgitated by ourselves and our grad student colleagues in academe and who disingenuously glossed over or
outright tried to erase the fact that there are individuals with unique
abilities in an attempt to breakdown
the high vs. low distinction distinctions that make some people feel
uncomfortable as if negating those
distinctions was going to make class differences automatically go away the fact remains that we each have our own
unique physical and mental characteristics
though my height was an
advantage to me in high school when I was in the basketball team i still wasn't much of a runner other
shorter players were a lot
faster than me i was never very good
at track and field and forget about
long distance running and though I
seem to have a knack for music and languages and a certain kind of analytical
thinking I was never very good at maths no matter how hard I worked at it while there were others in my class for
whom maths were an effortless matter
differences and distinctions are not necessarily bad things on the contrary they can be good things to
my mind differences and diversity are not something to be suppressed - he says
taking another swig from his glass - eventually all of those postmodern theories fell under
suspicion given that common sense tells us not all works of art are of equal
value to say that Karlheinz Stockhausen is one of
the great composers of the twentieth century and that his works are
revolutionary is not the same as saying that the music of some self-proclaimed genius
pop star is great and revolutionary just what is so revolutionary about commodity
music? on the contrary it
is the music of conformity to the capitalist
consumerist and class system - he emphasizes - and functions as a
vehicle of advertisement and propaganda for that system as such it is counter revolutionary it is reactionary! - he says angrily
looking around him catching Nadja and Danica making mocking faces at him to
which he responds by giving them the finger and to which they respond by
sticking their tongues out at him followed by giggles and more mocking faces to
which Anders responds again with the finger - we fart in your general direction
- Nadja says with a snooty expression on her face while affecting a French
accent which makes Anders and I burst into laughter - well there you go! - Nadja
exclaims - I haven't seen you two laugh in years and you - she says turning to me - i've
never seen you so miserable! what is
going on with you? is that what
reading all that boring philosophy and critical theory does to you? - well it's kind of long to explain - i respond
still shaking with laughter - well yes
I've heard a little bit of what you were telling Anders but you can't be
so serious all the time you need to
get out more and enjoy yourself live
a little and all that you know eat
drink fuck and be merry - she
says now putting on an upper class British accent and batting her eye lashes -
yeah well hedonism can get rather boring pretty quickly
too you know - i respond meekly - not if you're doing it with the right person mon
cher - she counters with a big grin on her face, winking and throwing me a kiss
- yeah you might be right about that
- i admit feeling self-conscious of my gloomy mood and raising my nearly empty
glass in her direction i say - prost! - this is echoed loudly by all in our
circle who, raising their glasses, shout out the toast - well - i continue
turning to Anders with a frown on my face - going back to what you were saying
about voice centered song lyrics and poetry
it may not be an either/or kind of situation it may be more complex than that i think - i say with a drawl - i mean the role of the subject in poetry or song lyrics or whatever i
mean i think the relation
between identity and agency is negotiable
interactive fluid although less so if at all
in what you call the
prefabricated music and pop stars the entertainment industry as you say
concocts or constructs with that i agree whole heartedly - i
stammer, slightly slurring my words - but i mean i think we all bring our unique baggage to this composers writers
poets some song writers . . . i
mean we're all people with a psychology a history a biography as are the readers or the
listeners as the case may be i mean
whatever self there is may be
the product of the relation between listener or reader and the writer or
composer set off by the power of presence or
contact as Jakobson would have it anyway - i stumble on - after a while most poetry i read now-a-days begins to
sound like a Hallmark greeting card to me . . . we're not only dealing with the
death of the author but it seems to me the reader kicked the bucket quite some
time ago too just who is this reader
really? your so-called average
person on the street? one thing I
found shocking over the years when I was teaching at the college was that many to not say most of my students didn't like
reading at all and were not even remotely familiar with major writers like
Shakespeare Cervantes Borges Whitman Joyce
Dickinson or Stein writers of
complex literature let alone
philosophy and critical theory . . . and you can forget about them being aware
of any writers from other cultures like Li Po Tagore or Chinua Achebe who are fairly
well known around the world - well - Nadja suddenly interjects - at the same
time taking into consideration how
alienated we all are and how alienating our society is i have difficulty seeing how such a
relationship is possible just what is
meant by the relation between writer and reader under such terribly atomizing
conditions in which the individual is apparently
completely erased subsumed into
absolute anonymity? it seems to me that the reader the theorists
and critics are referring to isn't your so-called average person on the street
but other writers other poets critics and theorists like themselves especially in academe you're talking about a very insular a very specialized and privileged group of
people most of whom are white males -
yeah i agree with that specially what you say about how alienating
our society is that is the cause of
most if not all
my woes the crisis I'm in . . . I think . . . - i
say tentatively - then again my ideas on the subject of literature have always
been horribly confused and my
knowledge of literary theory scant I've changed my mind several times over the
years about these issues a lot of that
stuff was written in the late sixties and early seventies long before i was born - i mumble
awkwardly and then continue - on the one hand you have people like Barthes Foucault and Derrida who if i understand them correctly when referring to the death of the author
are basically talking about modes of reading how to read a text without normalizing
the author's intentions adopting it would seem a more open ended approach to
interpreting a text one where an act
of reading is in effect one possible construction of the text not
getting stuck in one hermeneutic methodology as it were - i mutter catching my
breath - at the same time i wonder if there is a limit to how many different
readings one can have? - Nadja interjects again, cigarette in upturned hand while
rocking her crossed leg back and forth gently. The way she holds her cigarette
reminds me somewhat of photos i've seen of Hannah Arendt which makes me wonder
if Nadja is doing one of her parodic impersonations she used to do in our
student days. The fleeting smirk i suddenly see slip across her otherwise
serious face leads me to believe she is, which makes me smile facetiously as
she continues speaking - are texts infinitely open ended? are texts that flexible? and is the intention of an author really that
easy to dismiss? isn't the way a text is structured and the
writing strategies a writer chooses an
expression of the writer's intent? an
expression of her or his point of view?
of her aesthetics? i mean aesthetic decisions are made while
writing who's making those decisions?
and
who is affected by them while reading the text? and these questions apply to the texts of
the theorists and critics who talk about the death of the author as well are their texts that open ended? are their intentions that ambiguous? are they that open to multiple
interpretations? don't they actually
have a message or messages they are trying to convey? specific ideas that they are in fact
trying to get across to the reader?
aren't they indeed despite
claims to the contrary trying to
communicate with the reader? if
nothing else the idea that
communication is impossible or at best that the information conveyed is full of
noise and ambiguities? - Nadja asks with impatience - when referring to the contemporary novel of
his time for Barthes language writing
seemed to have been a kind of neutral medium in which the subject
dissolves as it were the subject
disappears in the act of writing in
the act of producing language an act
in which supposedly all identity is lost and the text is
therefore far from being a simple and direct expression of the writer's
interiority but hasn't this always
been the case? I mean were nineteenth century writers just
simply and directly expressing their feelings their points of view their
subjectivities through their novels? I think it is rather simplistic and
reductive to see their works as a mere outward manifestation of their
emotions I think there is some of that to be sure I
don't think that this is an either/or kind of situation as you have already
pointed out - she says looking at me - but this idea that a novel or poem as the case may be is a conduit devoid of any kind of noise for the novelist's emotions for the writer's so-called voice seems
simplistic at best when I read Jane
Austin or George Elliott or Flaubert
I don't just hear a
single distinct central voice I hear voices many
given that the self back then as it is regarded by many today was not a fixed thing but an ongoing
process in which the I the me changes often from moment to moment I think that writers back then were very
much aware of the unstable nature of the self - Nadja says taking a sip of
schnapps from a shot glass - in one of her poems Emily Dickinson says:
And something is odd - within -
That person that I was -
And this one - do not feel the same -
Could it be madness - this?
it seems to me Emily was very much aware that what we think
of as the self is not a fixed immutable thing
but something marked by change not a thing at all - she says
emphatically - the perception that I am a fixed thing a fixed entity in time is an effect of memory memory and how we picture ourselves in
our minds this representation of
ourselves we create in our mind's eye as it were
produces the illusion that the me is a stable structure in time but then again - Nadja says putting on her
mock high class British accent again - is memory something apart from the
self? couldn't the self be a process
that is aware of its being an ongoing process and that self-reflection where
the process as it were looks back on itself be what we are actually saying when we
talk about a self? which would take
us right back to the Cartesian cogito
wouldn't it? what I'm really
trying to say is that in a sense the self is fixed in as much as it
is an aspect of the process of change which itself seems to be permanent a kind of permanent impermanence if you
will - goodness Nadja! all of this is making me dizzy! i feel like we're going around in circles here
- i exclaim beginning to giggle again - I chase my tail therefore I am darling - Nadja says
grinning at me - you Cartesian dog! - Danica exclaims laughing which makes the
rest of us convulse with laughter again - that's Cartesian bitch to you! - Nadja
snaps back mockingly at Danica, the laughter irrupts again, and then, turning
to me Nadja says - they're just swirls darling a bit of turbulence that's all nothing to get upset about - she winks at
me and then continues in her normal voice - and yet despite
all the talk about the death of the author Barthes authorized everything he wrote by
putting his signature on it his
name his mark and all his books are
copyrighted just like Foucault and Derrida did and even Cage despite his claims
of removing the ego from the creative process if he was so egoless and free why did he put his mark on his works? why copyright them at all? there's an element of hypocrisy there don't you think? and of course these were all privileged white men why not do what U.G. Krishnamurti and Abby
Hoffman did with their publications which were not copyrighted allowing their readers to use their works
freely? but as you said I don't think it's an either/or situation
either there is an ambiguity in all
this which perhaps can be best
described as a kind of irregular or chaotic oscillation between both between a more centered voice and a
dispersal a refraction through language of that voice into many voices as Rimbaud once said Je est un autre
- Nadja states with a serious expression
on her face - not to mention that when we read we not only hear the writer's
voice or voices and the voices of the characters in a
novel but we also hear our own
voices - yeah I see what you mean I think I agree with that I've thought of all that before too - i
stutter clumsily, saliva dribbling down my chin while Anders watches me with a
smirk on his face, seemingly amused - but of course you have! - Nadja exclaims
playfully - but I thought about it first and am therefore the sole and rightful
owner of those thoughts! - she says pointing a finger at me admonishingly which
makes Anders and i begin laughing again - on the other hand - Nadja continues -
you have someone like Jameson who seems to have interpreted the death of the
author or rather the subject in quite literal terms where this death is seen as symptomatic of
the social changes brought on by neo liberalism and globalization and where the
individual as an autonomous entity has been pretty much erased terminated - i tend to agree with this
latter assessment - i say with some anxiety - mainly what you said about the
effects of neo-liberalism on society and how the individual has been
erased I believe I've experienced
this collapse into anonymity in my own flesh that was my whole point to begin with that's why i've been in such a gloomy state
- i mutter awkwardly again - at the same time I'm not entirely willing to dismiss
Barthes and the others' take on the death of the author . . . but all
along throughout the years what really seems to have died to me is the reader - i find myself repeating
- not the specialized reader in academe
which you've already mentioned
but the reader as the so-called common man your so-called average person in the
streets as you said - i mutter, again catching my breath and slurring my words
- did you mean Roman Jakobson the Russian linguist? the formalist theorist? - Anders asks with
marked interest - yeah if memory
serves it's been ages since i read
that stuff i'm feeling a tad blurry
right about now - Anders chuckles and says - ja you could never handle your drink very well
could you? - naw never been much of a
drinker really though i enjoy getting
a bit tipsy once in a while - i mutter back giggling softly - well you should smoke some hash it'll help you with that problem - he says
chuckling again - oh yeah! sure that's just what i need! - i say laughing
- if i smoke any of that shit i'll
collapse on the ground and fall asleep in a pool of my own vomit sounds wonderful! - well maybe that wouldn't be such a bad thing! -
Anders counters chuckling - it would for me! - i chortle back and we both begin
shaking with laughter, after a while Anders says - anyway i've
always found it very curious how so many of my so-called avant-garde
friends my experimental writer
friends my poet friends many of whom regard themselves as
Marxists as revolutionaries are so prone to listening to commodity
music to so-called pop music and
have the tendency of shunning experimental music they're aware of its existence they're aware of avant-garde music and
know some of the names but they really don't listen to it or bother to study it
its history in any depth - yeah, I know - i respond blearily
- I've encountered that sort of thing too it may be that many don't really know how
to listen to music it's ok to write
difficult complex poetry of an
experimental nature that is challenging to read and requires considerable
effort and reflection and knowledge of poetics and critical theory but it's not ok to write difficult complex and challenging experimental
music that requires close listening and reflection in typical bourgeois fashion they make music into a kind of
stimulant their morning cup of
coffee they want music to be a kind
of background noise or sound track to their lives whose function it is to be
the consoler the way your typical
male chauvinist thinks a woman's place is barefoot in the kitchen cooking surrounded by children barely seen but not heard a mere servant in
the case of music heard but not
really listened to they put music in
a position of servitude a slave to
the image like you have in film
where the music is used to support the visual narrative and the actions or
whose function is often no more than ornamental I've experienced this sort of thing also
in collaborations I've had with a couple of visual artists music is always treated as a kind of
supplement to the image - i say with increasing intensity - music is always in
a servile position to the image it's
never the other way round they privilege
the image over music they privilege
sight over sound they privilege
seeing over listening where
looking the gaze watching
and therefore surveillance all
of this takes precedence over the
other senses keeping a distance from the world from reality and this distancing this
not getting involved intimately is
extended through the various technologies
cameras video monitors television what seems to me a completely paranoid
position - i utter with increasing agitation - whereas listening involves a
kind of tactility listening is a kind
of touching it involves physically feeling sound musicking is first and foremost an
embodied a carnal activity the
ear drum is an extension of our skin
if we are really listening that is
if we are really paying attention with full body and mind . . . listening touching
smelling and tasting are incarnate bodily experiences and therefore constitute
a more intimate connection with the world
the emphasis on the visual and
the privileging of sight over the other senses in our culture is akin to the privileging of the
abstract of the conceptual over
concrete materiality the concrete
materiality of the body and the
world reality - i mutter feeling
wobbly, slurring my words again. i see Nadja, Elise and Danica staring at me
wide eyed with big smiles on their faces and then looking at each other, they
break out into facetious giggles. Shaking my head i say - can't you three take
anything seriously? - of course not darling
no one can be as serious and profound as you two - Nadja counters
putting on her mock British accent again - you are the queens of seriousness
and deep thinking - she says - ja the dark queens of the deep - shouts
Danica, which makes both Anders and I shake with laughter again - fuck you - i
say with a dismissive gesture - you should be so lucky - retorts Elise glaring
at me and batting her eye lashes. After taking another sip of beer, i continue
- for several years I've thought of making a work in which this hierarchy this authoritarian structure in which the
visual is privileged over sound over listening is overturned inverted in which the visual elements are an
outgrowth are in fact generated by
the sounds themselves where the
data from the parameters of sound you
know frequency amplitude duration texture
timbre and all that control
the parameters of the video images such
as light color tint
the vertical and the horizontal
the graininess of the
images the pixel information generating them the juxtaposing and layering of images and
so on molding and shaping them
according to the music's structures
and the visual data can then be fed back into the sound parameters
creating a chaotic feedback loop producing a work in which sound and the visual
material are coextensive and affect each other in unpredictable ways - so what
happened with that it sounds
interesting - Anders asks - well - i
respond catching my breath - that was years ago i accumulated hours and hours of
video all kinds of stuff from the
natural environment as well as urban and industrial areas I also gathered a lot of sound recordings
from those places I began writing an
algorithm for computer generated sound synthesis and computer processing of
sounds as well as processing of video images where the video was controlled by
the data from the parameters of sound as i already described but one day I just stopped one day I just had to stop one day I just couldn't go on
anymore something happened something caved in I felt a collapse - i say gasping for air
- i just couldn't go on the more I
worked on it the more video footage
I gathered the more sounds I produced and recorded the more isolated I felt the more alienated I became from people including family and friends the more I felt I couldn't relate to them
anymore in fact they all began to
get on my nerves in a big way the
acts of filming and the deep close
listening required in recording sounds changed me it changed my perception somehow it changed how I experience the
world as if I had crossed through a
membrane between worlds . . . anyway I've
found that this hierarchical structure
the subservience of music to the image
is taken for granted by visual
artists I've never heard any of them question that authoritarian
order that hierarchy which is telling - i say again feeling
agitated - why do you think that is? - Anders asks - it's a glaring
contradiction a double thingy you know - i say mumbling sluggishly - ooo
la laaa! - i hear Nadja exclaim - we want to know about your double thingy! -
ja - Elise chimes in leaning over and looking at me with a big smile on her
face - tell us about your double thingy - i hear Danica and her friends
laughing in the background and then stammer - well what i meant to sssay . . . wasss . . . a
double . . . sssstandard - Nadja rolls her eyes and waving her hand
dismissively exclaims with emphasis - boooriiinnng everyone has one of those! - more than
one - adds Elise - ja the entire world is filled with those - i hear Danica say
laughing - oh shut up - i snap back feigning annoyance smiling at them and then
turning to Anders i continue - i don't know
maybe something like a schizoid
dissociative maneuver many of
my friends and acquaintances
writers poets people in the visual arts comparative literature theorists many of whom claim to be Marxists progressives and all that turn out to be counter revolutionary
reactionary shits when it comes to their musical aesthetics and they seem to be
completely unaware of their contradictions - i spit out with a demeaning tone
of voice - go figure there seems to
be a split there some kind of
division a gap a . . . a . . . gaping crack or wound or
something . . . over the years it's
become apparent to me that in many
cases people's musical aesthetics is
revelatory I mean it reveals their true politics where they really stand ideologically and
more often than not it has nothing to
do with who they claim to be politically when they find themselves in social situations
say among friends and colleagues - i
mutter again sluggishly. The waitress has returned to our bunch of tables and
stands next to Nadja talking with her. i raise my almost empty glass which she
sees and acknowledges with a nod and a smile and after taking refill requests
from nearly everybody in our group, she quickly pivots around and briskly walks
away toward the bar - it seems to me - i start again leaning over in Anders'
direction - that all of what music appeared to promise as asserted several decades ago by Attali
in that book of his we all read so avidly
you know the subversive and
transformative power of music and all that has not really come to fruition I think that vision arose from what
happened in the sixties where it
appeared a change of consciousness was taking place and that society was
undergoing a widespread transformation and that transformation seemed to be
encoded in the popular music of that time
you know the Beatles the Stones Dylan
Hendrix but all of those
hopes were dashed in the seventies when it became apparent that those changes
were always already taking place on the stage set owned and manipulated by capital and all of
that music was assimilated and commodified and turned into a mere simulacrum of
rebellion i mean a kind of mystification
of the sixties of what happened in
the sixties a belief based on that
mystification the dream of
liberation which never really got actualized - i pause briefly gasping for air
and then continue - and at the same time
all of this was accompanied by the backlash against the various
emancipatory political movements that arose in the sixties a backlash we've seen unfold over the
decades up to our present time
why even back then in the
sixties just what did they mean by society? whose society? that transformation may have taken place
somewhat in some Western European countries and the U.S. but at the same time
terrible things were happening abroad
the war in Vietnam the
various U.S. backed right wing dictatorships in South America Asia
Africa the Middle East all backed by Western powers none of those changes that were supposedly
happening in some Western countries changed any of that nor did they stem the rise of totalitarian
capitalism the rise of globalization in fact
I would argue that much of that music has become an accomplice to the
rise of globalization and neo-liberalism and the ensuing standardization of
music has contributed to the erasure of local expressions of music in cultures
around the world whose traditional musical practices have been displaced or
outright replaced by western pop music or music modelled after western pop
music - of course - Anders picks up again - it has gotten to the point where none
of this may really matter anymore the
conquest has been so thorough and so brutally leveling that fighting back criticizing arguing against the system any
act of rebellion falls flat on its
face gets spectacularized rebellion is commodified and sold back to
the rebels as in music videos it comes across as parody you're allowed to say anything you want
because it doesn't matter it doesn't
change anything even
the intelligentsia seems to have capitulated and retreated into their ivory
towers even as they put out an
occasional publication which is interesting only to their peers for
the culture at large has little or no interest at all in any of that stuff and
looks upon them or I should say us academics with increasing suspicion those towers I'm afraid may soon come crashing down to the ground
the way things are going - he says with a sardonic smirk on his face - the bar
has been lowered so much on all levels in our society our culture morally
politically
intellectually aesthetically and so on few if any at all care to know anything
about all these issues you're talking about
let alone what you mentioned earlier
the role the function of art
in our world today or even if art
does have a function or for that
matter if it has a legitimate reason
to exist in this our consumer driven society
our consumer driven lives where art has been replaced by the products
of the entertainment industry we are
living in a time where values have completely disintegrated where
commodities products converse in place of people in an
increasingly impoverished language
all of which seems to me to be evidence of the end of aesthetic codes as
Attali put it in that book of his we used to read back in our student days -
Anders says with a sneer - still I'm
not ready to dismiss academe and throw in the garbage all their works even
if as you've said those works end up being mere academic
exercises that don't have any readily apparent practical value and don't
connect with the rest of society there still may be something to learn from
them even if the general populace has
nothing but disdain for them the
masses have been wrong before in the past
and have done terriblethings both on the right and the left and who says that the so-called average
man in the streets is somehow endowed with some kind of special wisdom isn't that romanticizing mystifying him or her as the case may be? and who's to say that we academics are all that different from the so-called
common man or woman? don't we all
have the same basic needs? and as far
as class is concerned none of us here
come from privilege we were all born
into working class families - Anders asserts now sitting up straight in his
chair - no we can't just give up those of us who are involved in the arts we can't just throw our arms down and
stop we have to continue with our
work because though it may not be readily apparent that work may still have something of value
to offer society and that includes the
so-called common person on the street
even if he or she can't see any benefit to it and because it gives those of us who make
those works pleasure it keeps us
interested in life because we learn things about ourselves and the world if
nothing else we must continue our work
for the sake of our psychic our
emotional survival our wellbeing - he
says with a brief, dry smile - and so here we are in the midst of Breughelland - he chuckles
surveying the scene around us - Breughelland? - i ask suddenly intrigued - are you referring to
Ligeti's opera Le Grand Macabre?- yes - Anders answers - that wonderful
Ubuesque opera by Ligeti wouldn't
you say it captures our times our
predicament very well? - he asks, a wry smile breaking on his face - more like
the times have captured and imprisoned us - i murmur glumly as i see a thick
and heavy darkness descending on the Grote Markt square seeming to dim the
lights, giving them a yellowish tint, blunting their rays, dampening all the sounds
coming from the crowd which now looks distant to me; all the chattering, the
merry making noise can't keep the unfathomable darkness at bay. A stifling fear,
an overwhelming sadness and grief takes hold of me as i realize with a shudder,
that it's only a matter of time before i and everyone else, will soon be
engulfed by that frigid blackness, lost to ourselves and each other forever, never
to be seen again. Anders looks at me with a frown on his face while leaning
back in his chair and crossing his legs - anyway - he says - it's no secret that
art has been alienated from society at large for a long time not only for the reasons we've already
discussed but ever since it became
autonomous ever since it gained
independence from the church from
religion from the so-called nobility
- he grimaces again - in fact this alienation has become even more
pronounced ever since more
recently due to the growth of
technological reason and modern science
it has lost its truth-function and consequently has been relegated to a
separate and autonomous corner of the aesthetic - he continues while reaching
for one of the beers the waitress has just delivered to our table - what's
more some would argue this condition of alienation this rift between art and truth is one of the more salient features of the
fragmentation of our modern world an
alienation and fragmentation that also affects us artists as well its inevitable if the role of art has come into question
in this world so too has the role of
the artist since you can't have one
without the other this is obvious in
the reaction you get from many people today when you say you're an artists or a
composer a writer or whatever they think you're being pretentious even we have difficulty saying it
right? we feel self-conscious I'm an artist I'm a poet I'm a composer a lot of people think all of that is a
thing of the past like Mozart or
Beethoven not entertainers though like your pop stars it's ok to call them artists that's ok - he says annoyed taking another
hit from his nearly spent cigarette - still
I'm not entirely convinced that the split between art and truth is as
wide and definitive as some theorists say it is if
i remember correctly your favorite
philosopher used to talk about the
truth content of the art work and
that art embodies a kind of knowledge
but it is a non-discursive knowledge in a manner similar to the way
dreams are implying perhaps that
there is more than one way of getting at the truth or that truth is not a fixed
thing but an ongoing process of discovery
an idea i find very exciting
don't you? - i look at Anders with a frown on my face and ask - what favorite
philosopher? you mean Adorno? - yes -
he says leaning back in his chair - isn't he your favorite philosopher? - i
take another sip from my glass and say - not sure i have a favorite philosopher
anymore they all seem dead to me
now the entire philosophical project
seems utterly pointless to me now it
all seems to have fallen flat on its face
especially in light of everything you just said about consumerism and
the total commodification of life of
course he saw it coming even
back then in his day Adorno saw it coming the complete domination of life by
monopoly capitalism as he called it - ja - Nadja cuts in - and what I find
really annoying is the putting on pedestals
the heroizing of all those big philosophers and critical theorists the fawning over them the wanting to bask in their auras as if
they were deities I remember while a grad student in New York every year some of them would come to our university
to present a paper or give lectures . . . I mean I like their work it often is insightful interesting to read and challenging and
it makes me think in different ways it's
even beautiful but I could never stand
many of my colleagues' especially some
of my female friends who called themselves feminists and my male friends
who thought of themselves as revolutionaries - she says emphatically, glaring
at me and Anders - fawning over these famous
powerful academic men these big
theorists and philosophers
unquestioningly latching on to and ventriloquizing every word they said
as if their words their thinking were
law or the word of God! all those wise
men with their oh so deep thoughts and insights - she scoffs - and I must
say despite all the talk about the
need for the critique of power those
big philosophers didn't do much to discourage the fawning especially when it came from women to say nothing of the sexual harassment
that goes on and the professors both male and female who engage in that sort of
thing and have affairs with their students
and of course - she continues getting angrier
- they reserved the right to judge and criticize but nobody could judge and
criticize them especially if you were
a student some of them got incredibly
defensive if you doubted questioned or criticized anything they
said if you weren't readily willing
to accept everything they said as the truth with capital t you were liable to be subjected to some
kind of punishment which could jeopardize your academic career and some of them
showed their true reactionary colors in the way they reacted to the 9/11
catastrophe where they ignored or outright dismissed the historical context in
which that tragedy occurred
namely the history of western imperialism and
interventionism in the middle east which has been the cause of so much
resentment so much hatred a certain literary critic comes to mind in
that regard whose work I admired she showed herself to be a total
reactionary shit an apologist for
imperialism and of course some of her
poet friends some of whom claim to be
Marxists and whose works she discusses in her books never
took her to task about the things she said
had any of their students uttered those same words in their classes they
would have been punished
ridiculed berated humiliated as I've seen happen on several
occasions while I was a graduate student there complete hypocritical shits the lot of them - Nadja says grimacing with
disgust - it wasn't only irritating
it was disappointing
depressing to see all those people who were always prattling
on about the need for the critique of power and always preaching emancipatory
politics reproducing the same old hierarchical authoritarian structures which people have
been reproducing for thousands of years
a glaring contradiction which most in that environment refused to look
at it was bullshit! and I'm afraid that sort of thing is still
going on I see that tendency in some
of my students even today - Nadja says visibly annoyed taking another drag from
her cigarette - and speaking in more general terms speaking of tendencies in society at
large despite the feminist critique
of the patriarchy we still continue
to engage in competition the
patriarchy's game par excellence - she says scoffing again - it's all
one big contest it's perpetual
war playing the game on the
patriarchy's terms where you have
women wanting to be part of the military and participate in wars and fight for corporate
interests and imperialism or wanting to be part of the capitalist corporate
world be part of the capitalist
system which is a system that has roots in slavery and colonialism and
which from its inception oppressed everybody women
children and men animals and
plants the very earth itself! - Nadja
exclaims annoyed - and this is celebrated as a big achievement for women! all of this is presented as desirable as something women should aspire to being part of and at the service of the patriarchal
power structure! being part of the capitalist hierarchy! this is seen as a big achievement for
women! it's infuriating! such utter bullshit! I
just can't stand it! - Nadja says angrily raising her voice further - I
mean what difference does it make what
the color or gender of a person is if that person is going to serve the
interests of power if that person is
going to serve the interests of the white patriarchal socio-economic order if she or he is serving the interests of
capitalism or any other such totalitarian
oppressive system for that matter - she exclaims angrily again - yeah -
i mutter with trepidation - i could never understand why anyone male or female would want to be part of the military or
the corporate world why anybody
would have those kinds of aspirations I know the usual rationalizations that it's patriotism the desire to serve one's country but of course there are many different ways
of serving one's country ways that
don't involve violence and destroying people and countries abroad there are by far more positive constructive ways of serving one's
country I think some people use the
patriotism argument as a cover for their desire to kill people who don't look
like them it's racially motivated . .
. they enjoy killing and being part of the military legitimizes their homicidal
impulses I honestly think some people
are attracted to the violence and the danger and exercising power over others
through violence . . . of course the military and corporations have a lot in
common they're both hierarchical authoritarian
structures where orders are given from top to bottom a lot of people like that sort of
thing they feel secure in those kinds
of structures a lot of people really
don't want to be free they want to be
told what to do what to think . . . there's
something kind of sadomasochistic about the whole thing . . . - yes yes
everybody knows about all that - Nadja says impatiently interrupting me
looking around with an angry expression
on her face, nervously swinging her crossed leg - going back to academe I mean
I find I'm barely able to control myself my irritation when some of today's theorists who were
part of the circles of those big philosophers and critics and basked in their auras come
to Amsterdam to lecture and later on during dinner take it upon themselves to tell me their
cute little stories about Derrida what food he liked the
little tunes he would hum or whistle the
jokes he liked to tell how he played
with his dog or his little cat or whatever
oh! oh! Jacques! oh! Jacques! oh! oh! oh! oh!
oh! ah! ah! ah! ah! ah! uuuuuuuuuuuuuu! ah! ah! ah! ah! AH! - Nadja chants
loudly with a mock orgasmic staccato making everyone burst into laughter - or about
Jameson's backyard barbeques and baseball stories and de Man mijn God!
de Man a fucking Nazi! I had relatives during the war who were in
the resistance who were tortured by
the Nazis and taken away to labor camps from which they never returned - Nadja
exclaims angrily - how could someone like de Man . . . and Heidegger! mijn God!
an avowed Nazi! a member of the
party! and he never apologized for his Nazism
either of course what could he
say? no apology would ever be good
enough after all the barbarism that took place during the war . . . how can
they be given such respect in the academic and literary worlds! even if their ideas are interesting! even if their insights were spot on! I
could never accept this! I find it
infuriating that they get so much attention and respect in the academic and
literary worlds I never include their works in my
classes as far as I'm concerned they
should be banished to oblivion! - she exclaims angrily again - every time the intellectual
progeny of those big philosophers and theorists I mentioned earlier come to Amsterdam or I encounter them in a conference
somewhere they just have to tell me
their same little insipid stories and
I ever so politely tell them yes you told me about that last time I
saw you to which they respond feigning
surprise oh? really? I don't remember
that oooooh! sorry! - Nadja says again mockingly,
pursing her lips - yeah it's too bad
when things like that happen
disappointing - i say glumly - though I've always been partial to the
Frankfurt School I really enjoyed
reading Derrida Foucault Deleuze Baudrillard and others I think their work is important especially the critique of power and
violence and the deconstruction of the entire tradition of thought on which power
and violence are often based or I
used to think it was important anyway
it's been years since I've read any of that stuff I'm well acquainted with the sexual
harassment bit too and the idolatry it tends to banalize the entire project of
philosophy and critical theory in academia turning it all into somewhat of a
circus but the fact remains that
academia is a power structure itself and it's one that doesn't get examined
closely enough and openly so the hierarchical nature of it and those who hold positions of power in
that hierarchy don't allow for such an examination for obvious reasons which
tells me that some of the individuals who talk about the critique of power and
so on do not examine themselves
critically enough or even at all and put all the responsibility entirely on the
political economic and social
institutions which are run by people who themselves don't examine
themselves don't examine their
actions and motivations closely enough I think it's rather naive to think that by
just acquiring a position of power in a hierarchical system of some kind whether
political economic educational
social etc. - i stop briefly
to catch my breath - that one is going to be able to use that
power to do good more so if the individual in question has not
studied himself thoroughly and doesn't have a deep understanding of her mind
and how it works and what motivates his actions if he is at the mercy of his impulses and
fears if one's actions are motivated
by egocentricity . . . but even if one does study oneself and is aware of one's
motivations more often than not one is surrounded by people in those
hierarchical structures who aren't self-aware and whose motivations are based
on selfishness and fear and whose actions are therefore defensive and short
sighted a lot of energy gets put
into maintaining one's position in the hierarchy which is highly inefficient
and counterproductive - but there are some examples of positive changes that
have been brought about by political action - Nadja interrupts - like the Civil
Rights Movement in the sixties the
Voting Rights Act desegregation the war on poverty the women's movement don't you think? - well yes you're right - i say feeling my energy
levels beginning to wane - but don't forget that all of that was going on while
the war in Vietnam raged and in which
terrible things were done to that country by our government they
basically pulverized that country what
our government did to Vietnam was a crime against humanity plus
our government continued with its long standing policy of interventionism in
Latin America and elsewhere in which horrible dictatorships which did terrible
things to their people were propped up
and the war on nature has continued unabated since that time and before then our government has allowed corporations the fossil fuel industry the chemical industry to continue polluting and poisoning the
environment which has led to the crisis we are currently in not much has been done over the years in
the way of prevention because the corporations hold so much power in our
political system not to mention that
in recent years a lot of those gains you talk about which took place in the sixties and
seventies have been greatly eroded - a
heavy, palpable silence has fallen on our group of tables and seems to filter
out the noise in the square around us. In an attempt to break the silence, i
raise my voice and say - add to that
the rise of right-wing extremism and nationalism which is very
frightening in the U.S. there is a large sector of the white
population that agrees with white nationalism white supremacy and they are armed to the teeth it's
a very scary situation - i stutter awkwardly - over the past two decades
political conditions have deteriorated in a way which can only be described as
alarming frightening in a few years the gains of decades made
in the areas of voting rights civil
rights women's rights environmentalism is being rolled back and hypocrisy greed and dim-wittedness are suddenly at
the helm just as we saw in the previous century here in Europe with the rise of fascism
and totalitarianism all of this is
accompanied by a hostility to the intellect and everything intellectual a philistinism that is characteristically
hostile to the arts the sciences culture - i utter feeling increasingly
nervous and self-conscious - and the masses
the so-called popular masses have been encouraged in this mind
murder this mind hunting by the
autocratic rulers we have seen rise to power in the last few years everything has once more overnight become dictatorial as in times of old as
in the nine-teen-thirties and I for a long time indeed for years while teaching at the college experienced firsthand in
my own person in my own flesh how they are after the heads of
those who think this hostility
includes the students members of the
faculty and administrators as well this
smug philistinism is prepared to sweep out of its way anything it does not like and that means mainly anyone who thinks who is artistically and spiritually
inclined anyone who is not materialistically inclined that
is anyone who is not capitalistically
inclined this philistinism having the upper hand is suddenly again being used by governments
everywhere the masses the so-called popular masses emboldened by their autocratic leaders are on the move clutching at their possessions their bellies their guns and their identities their ethnic their national their so-called religious identities they're on the march against anyone who
thinks anyone who questions and dares
to disagree with them it is a truly
frightening situation anyone who
thinks and questions anyone who is
critical is to be mistrusted and even persecuted as we saw happen during the rise of
fascism and totalitarianism in the early part of the twentieth century something similar is happening now - i say
with exasperation and anxiety trying to catch my breath. i look at my friends
who are glumly staring at me with deep frowns on their faces which makes me
feel more nervous and panicky, prompting me to start speaking again in a louder
tone of voice and at a faster pace - it seems to me that the entire project of
philosophy and critical theory has failed miserably in dealing with the crisis
we're in and have been in for a long time
for centuries even thousands of years our alienation from nature our
ongoing war with nature which has been
raging for thousands of years the fragmentation of the human psyche the division along ideological lines the threat of all-out war between the
superpowers . . . I was brought up to believe that by means of reason we could
understand ourselves and the world we live in and that we could solve the
various problems we are facing . . . and that by means of reason a fundamental change of consciousness could
be achieved . . . but philosophy
thought reason have failed miserably in bringing about
the change of consciousness they once promised this is a glaring fact especially in light of or
I should say in the long
shadow of the catastrophe that now looms over us and which it seems
will reach its critical point in the not too distant future - i gasp for
air again and continue - all that knowledge all that very nuanced and virtuosic
thinking we have seen from philosophers and critical thinkers and others has not been able to avert the widespread nihilism we have seen rising
everywhere over the past several decades
it turned out to be a form of entertainment distraction escapism intellectual escapism to be sure but escapism nonetheless I regret not having used that time and
energy for activism especially
environmental activism something I
should have done long ago and may now be too late we
all should have been a lot more involved but we were all swamped in our
academic careers . . . - oh come on now man! - Anders exclaims straightening
out his long, boney, lanky frame in his chair while reaching for his tobacco
pouch and rolling paper - you can't just throw everything in the garbage like
that - why not? - i respond - well wouldn't that be nihilistic too? - Anders
says visibly irritated - not necessarily - Nadja asserts - it could be putting
aside what no longer works
acknowledging its limitations
seeing it is ineffective in dealing with the current situation maybe
J. Krishnamurti was right after all when he said thought cannot solve the
problems thought itself has created
it just complicates things further especially when thought is based on
egocentricity he said a different kind of intelligence is
needed - Anders and I sit quietly looking at her and listening, occasionally
taking a drink from our glasses - he stressed the importance of understanding
ourselves not just intellectually and according to what others say not what some authority figure says we are for example in psychoanalysis but to find out for ourselves and in this regard he stressed the importance of
meditation not as some kind of
method taught by some guru but by
just sitting quietly by oneself in
solitude and choicelessly without
judgement or any kind of condemnation
observe oneself I like his
idea of choiceless observation
choiceless awareness - really? - i hear Anders say with marked
skepticism - just try and get billions of people rabidly addicted to
consumerism all of whom want to live with the same living standards we have in
the west to stop and do this
choiceless awareness you're talking about most people
are not willing to do this kind of work on themselves here or anywhere else given that it's often unpleasant even painful - or - i add - try and get the
millions of rabid consumers here in the west
who are completely conditioned by capitalist ideology to read Nietzsche Heidegger and Derrida and who tried to deconstruct the entire Greek based
logocentric western metaphysical tradition and make people aware of the
underlying assumptions on which their views their beliefs their
perceptions of reality are based and which they take for granted try and get them to read and reflect upon
Karl Marx's and other Marxist writers' critique of capitalism try
and get those millions many of whom are
overworked and underpaid to read
those very complex and nuanced texts which take a lot of time and energy to
wade through and reflect upon most people are too exhausted and don't give
a shit to care and what's more they're very suspicious of academics philosophers intellectuals and as of late as you've mentioned already this suspicion of intellectuals has been
getting worse . . . - of course Krishnamurti
was Indian - Nadja suddenly interrupts - he was not part of the tradition of
western thought and as I've seen often during my academic
career despite the various criticisms
of ethnocentricity there is a marked
tendency among western thinkers to not take thinkers from other cultures
seriously there is a kind of prejudice and condescension what
strikes me as a hangover from the western Eurocentric colonialist mindset which saw other
cultures and non-white races as
inferior but this prejudice is hidden it's been swept under the rug as they say and I don't recall during my entire academic career ever having heard anyone address this
issue - yeah well - i speak up again -
I read somewhere that toward the end of his life Krishnamurti expressed misgivings about
his life's work he apparently felt
no one had really got what he was talking about and he said he feared for
humanity's future he said he saw
terrible things happening he felt
that he had failed to bring about the psychological revolution the revolution of consciousness he spent
most of his life talking about I'm
afraid I agree with that he died
about thirty five years ago and it seems a lot of what he feared is now coming
to pass the destruction of the
natural environment the growing
climate catastrophe pandemics the rise of authoritarianism the big powers of the world vying for position
taking us ever closer to war - i realize that all along, i've been sliding down
in my chair and slouching, as if my body was slowly melting or under a heavy weight
pressing down on it from above. With considerable effort, i push myself up
using the chair's arm rests and sitting up straight i continue - my parents
used to tell me that back in the sixties scientists were warning about the
dangers of pollution and over population
this was in the mid-sixties Rachel Carson had just published her book
"Silent Spring" a few years earlier in which she documented the detrimental
effects of DDT on the environment in
particular the bird population eventually in the early nineteen seventies DDT was banned in the U.S. and some other countries around the
world but for decades its use in
agriculture around the world had been widespread and scientists found traces of
it in the fatty tissues of animals in the arctic and other remote places evidently the stuff had been spread
throughout the world by air and water currents since that time all kinds of other pesticides and
herbicides have been used all over the world further adding to the levels of
toxicity in the environment not to
mention the dumping of toxic waste from factories into our waterways soil and air like the factories along the Saint
Lawrence causeway who for decades have been throwing PCBs into the river which
has led to birth defects and deformities in the Beluga whale population who
live near the river's mouth - i pick up a newly filled glass of beer from the
table in front of me, take a swig and then continue - my parents also told me
that they heard about the greenhouse effect for the first time in the
mid-seventies how scientists back
then were warning about increasing amounts of co2 in the atmosphere and how we
needed to transition away from fossil fuels and find other cleaner sources of energy that was forty five years ago or
more I wasn't even born at that
time and since then little or nothing was done by the
governments of the world to prevent the situation we now find ourselves in and as you all know for
decades the fossil fuel industry has engaged
in a campaign of denialism and misinformation with the purpose of creating
doubt and discrediting the scientists
and they still have enormous influence over our politicians and our
political system - i hear cackling laughter and jeers coming from the crowd in
the square. i turn my eyes in their direction and see the crowd has changed
from real, living people to a mass of skeletons and rotting corpses. Throngs of
them, marching into the square from the side streets, are stumbling and falling
over each other forming heaps of cadavers that slide off one another onto the
ground. Others are sitting around at the tables talking, drinking and smoking, farting
or vomiting profusely. Still others are up and about leaping, hopping and
twisting, contorting themselves in a grotesque dance to the eerie sounds of
distant drums and high-pitched pipes, all of which reminds me of "The
Triumph of Death" by Breughel. Some in the crowd have noticed me looking
at them and wave at me playfully. Alarmed, i quickly turn my gaze away from the
square and look at my friends who are staring at me with big frowns on their
faces - is something wrong? - Anders asks looking concerned - I . . . I just
saw your Breughelland crowd turn into a horde of skeletons and rotting corpses
- i mutter with difficulty, feeling agitated - oh come on now man you're drunk you're just stressed out you
just need a break that's all - Anders says looking worried - just forget about all
this for a few months or however long you need it'll come back you'll see go to Spain lie on a beach in the sun get laid you need to enjoy yourself more you'll feel a lot better in a few months'
time you'll see you'll come back to your music your writing with a fresh mind fresh eyes and ears - i shrug and say - i
don't know Anders these feelings this state i've been in has been going on
for several years now it may very
well be we are in the time of the death of art Nietzsche or Hegel
predicted it has lost its place its function we do it for purely selfish reasons - we always
have - Anders says - artists have always done it for themselves first and
foremost it's a need we do it because we must - that may be the
case - i interrupt - but the context has changed drastically and whether we are artists or not regardless of what profession one may
have we are still responsible for our
actions and inactions we are responsible
to each other and our world to
continue working this way just for
oneself is analogous to hiding one's head in the
sand not wanting to see things as
they are it's escapism art as leisure activity as I believe
Hegel put it a different kind of
action is needed I'm afraid the arts
too have failed miserably at bringing about the revolution of consciousness we
were brought up to believe in a
revolution which is greatly needed if we are to deal with any degree of success
with the immense problems that are now staring us in the face it may be that the expectations we had
from art were very unrealistic to begin with we were deceived by our own love and
fascination for it and the things
people told us about it I'm afraid
that fascination distracted us from doing what needed to be done all along a different kind of action was
needed and we failed to heed its call
we just didn't give a shit we
were too wrapped up in ourselves as
usual if I sound pessimistic it's
because this situation has been going on for decades without much significant
change those who have the power do
whatever they want and the rest of us just put up with it for fear of
retaliation of some kind we consoled
ourselves by hoping that someone the
scientists our elected officials
would do something about all these problems we are facing of course scientists have been trying to
do something about it for years they
have been sounding the alarm for a
very long time but by and large governments around the world haven't had
the will to do anything about it - oh come on now man! - Anders exclaims -
you're being far too negative you
need to have more hope - really? - i answer back - I'm the negative one? and all along I thought the negative ones
were those who are causing so much destruction in our world you know
the big corporations who continue to poison our world to poison us who create wars for profit and exploit us
with impunity the big
imperialist autocratic governments of
the world who want all the power for themselves and are willing to go to war
for it and to think that all along I
thought they were the negative ones
silly me what was I thinking! -
i say smiling sarcastically at Anders - and as far as hope is concerned it's beside the point we've wasted our time hoping it's past the time for hope long past
a different kind of action is needed
has always been needed from
the very start - ja hope is part of
the problem - Elise suddenly cuts in - we've been hoping for decades and
decades and very little has changed in any substantial manner we are still stuck in the same rut heading
for disaster hope is just another
form of postponement it's escapist I agree with you when you say that a
different kind of action is needed - and what kind of action do you think that
would be? - i ask her with a friendly smile - to be sure it would involve a
massive rebellion where we show up with torches and pitch forks at the
residences of the powerful and hold them accountable - Elise says grinning
facetiously - and how do you propose to mobilize the masses to do that? - i say
- I don't know I think it would happen
spontaneously when the pressure gets too unbearable of course that may lead to total chaos it seems a lot of people aren't really
clear about who the enemy really is - she says waving her hand dismissively -
yeah that's a good point well
by then it might be too late as far as the ecological problems are
concerned - i mutter blearily - to your point about knowing who you're fighting we
recently had an insurrection in our country but it turned out the
insurrectionists didn't really know what they were fighting they didn't really know who their enemy
really is they were in fact defending
the enemy the big corporate
powers the rich who own and control the
country and the political system they
thought the enemy is the politicians
and to be sure many of them
are corrupt but they are not the ones
with the real power and they were also
blaming people of color and other minorities all of whom don't have much power
at all certainly not much when
compared to the white majority - come on man - Anders says - you need to take a
break you need to go on a good
vacation forget about all this go to the south of France lie in the sun go to Italy have some good Italian food and wine that Mediterranean diet will do you good - oh
Anders! please! - i hear Nadja exclaim
- you sound like one of those silly
stereotypical characters in one of those corny self-discovery Hollywood
films - really now? - Anders asks beginning to chuckle - yes! - Nadja answers -
you know the ones with the disaffected privileged white businessman or housewife in midlife
crisis . . . go to Napoli! eat some-uh
pizza! watch a football-uh match-uh learn to enjoy the simple things in life-uh
eh? - Nadja says putting on an Italian accent and gesticulating with her hands
after which she switches back to her normal voice and says - go to Bali live the "simple" life with the
"simple" people in a small "simple" village - she smirks
making quotation signs in the air with her fingers - have the village wise man
instruct you on how to live blah dih
blah dih blah have an affair with
the artsy eccentric expat and all
will be fine! most of my Italian
friends can't stand Italy the
corruption the inefficiency why
they all want to move to Sweden
how boring! - she exclaims again - well at least the trains run on time - i hear Anders
counter beginning to laugh, the rest of us can't help ourselves and are shaking
uncontrollably with laughter at Nadja's playful mockery. At the same time, i
hear laughter rising from the crowd in the square, they seem to be laughing
with us. i look in their direction and see the horde of the dead all looking at
us, laughing wildly. The revolting stench of putrefaction wafts across the
square in our direction but i seem to be the only one in our group who notices
it. i nudge Anders and point to the square - what is it? - he asks - look they're back again the dead
they're laughing with us . . . or at us . . . - i say trembling with
fear - what are you talking about?
have you been smoking my stuff? are you having delirium tremens? - he says
jokingly, i shake my head still terrified and look away from the crowd. Anders takes
another drink from his glass and in an attempt to change the subject, leans
closer and says - well in any
case you're not the only one who is
experiencing the kinds of feelings you were describing the feeling that it's all been done in
music the arts is
really quite widespread many are
feeling this crisis you describe and it can have some profound and unsettling
psychological effects disturbing
effects I should say in some cases a
profound ontological crisis caused by losing what once gave one a sense of
identity a sense of meaning and
purpose in life one's sense of being
is called into question which in some
cases can lead to a psychotic break
or what some refer to as a dissociative disorder not the least of which are the phenomena
of depersonalization and derealization - he takes a last toke from his
cigarette and snuffs it out in the ashtray on the small table we're sitting at
- what do you mean? - i ask feeling apprehension - well based on what I've read depersonalization and derealization are
temporary psychological effects produced by trauma some kind of traumatic event in one's life
and are characterized by the feeling of being cut off from reality as if one
were behind a barrier like a pane of
glass between oneself and the world
or as if one were living in a dream
as if one were high and can't come down - he says beginning to roll
another black tobacco and hashish cigarette - one can also have feelings of not
being real which some call
derealization and is characterized by the impression that one's physical
actions and one's body are not one's own
these symptoms are often accompanied by visual phenomena such as tunnel
vision static distorted and blurry vision and interestingly a kind of flat two dimensional vision or that things look
the way they do in a dream other
symptoms may include a distorted sense of time the fear of going insane so-called existential thoughts emotional numbness a blank or foggy mind memory loss and strange fears of an
obsessive nature - what do you mean by existential thoughts? - i suddenly blurt
out - thoughts about the nature of existence what it means if anything to be alive to be here in this world questioning the very nature of
existence of reality - Anders says
while carefully rolling his cigarette - but isn't that normal? aren't those
things people ponder throughout the course of their lives? - i ask as a deep
feeling of unease wells up inside me - well
yes once in a while or maybe
just at certain points in their lives but they soon become involved in the
hurly burly of everyday life finding meaning or purpose in it and soon forget
about the existential stuff but
people who are experiencing depersonalization and derealization tend to obsess
about it and are often besieged by feelings of pointlessness and emptiness an emptiness they describe as having the
effect of producing a deep feeling of meaninglessness in life in existence in some cases some people have been driven to suicide
by such feelings but anyway
all of these symptoms are
supposed to be temporary they're
supposed to wear off after a certain amount of time - he says with satisfaction
as he stares at his new and deftly rolled cigarette which he quickly puts
between his lips - and what if the trauma is an ongoing process? - i say
shifting uneasily in my chair beginning to feel irritated by Anders' detached,
nonchalant manner - well - he answers smiling - then maybe we're screwed and if
we are going to feel depersonalized and feel as if we were high all the time
and can't come down if we are going
to feel as if we are living in a dream
we might as well get high and enjoy it - he says chuckling lighting up
his cigarette - how do they say? if
you can't beat ‘em join ‘em? - he utters between puffs, the smoke dimly veiling
his pale blue eyes and angular face as it rises and dissipates above his sandy
colored hair. Thinking back, i can't remember a time when Anders wasn't high on
something. In our student days it was the very popular ecstasy along with the
ubiquitous hashish laced cigarette - and what about the grief? - i utter
hoarsely under my breath - how do we deal with that? - the grief? - Anders
answers back tentatively - yeah you
know the grief of seeing year
after decade after decade the destruction the brutality the callousness what grieves me most is seeing decade
after decade since I was a child the destruction of nature and how little
has been done to stop it - i utter with increasing irritation - are we supposed
to just adopt a flippant attitude about everything intoxicate ourselves and have fun? - i say
sarcastically - well - Anders begins - that's what our creative work is for it helps us work through the grief our pain - oh please! how is it you've become so sentimental about
art! - i exclaim exasperated - so disgustingly sentimental about the arts and
heroizing them to boot! art as savior
blah dih blah dih blah you really
don't believe that shit do you? - Nadja interjects snidely -
but art I mean especially politicized art seems to be condemned to a certain
harmlessness in part due to excessive
explanation it's been explained
away people become inured to it by
all those boring explanations and being lectured at being talked down to by people like me -
she says giggling self-consciously and taking another sip of schnapps - and in
part due to it having always remained in the margins which it can't leave if it is to maintain a
critical distance from mainstream culture where it would become formalized and
ritualized packaged into a museum
piece and then discarded ignored and thus neutralized tamed - Anders smiles and shrugs and
begins blowing smoke rings into the air. Danica sticks her tongue out at him
and then makes a loud farting sound at him all of which elicits a guffaw from
Anders who then shrugs again and continues blowing smoke rings - and
creativity! just what does that mean
in this day and age where everything is derivative repetitive! a copy of a copy of a copy of a copy! the idea of creativity is itself derivative a nineteenth century notion as is the idea of the new! - i exclaim
again annoyed - we've been through all that already as I've already said the arts have failed us miserably art was supposed to change our minds it was supposed to bring about a radical
change of consciousness it was
supposed to teach us how to think and perceive in different ways for a long time we searched for the new
sound and soon arrived at a point where it seemed new sounds new timbres had been exhausted but this is always from the point of view
of a doer who acts upon an objective world that is seen as separate from him or
herself the doer the observer who is in reality an integral part of that
world an aspect of that world - i say
tiredly catching my breath - back in the eighties Nono
Berio and Lachenmann were already saying this that the new sound the unfamiliar sound was no longer
possible and that all that was left us was to work on the grammar of music work on finding different and new ways of
structuring the materials of music
but maybe it's time not so much for a new sound but a new listening it is time for the listener to do the
changing from within without expecting something or someone to force that
change upon her or him from the outside as it were we have to do the work ourselves in ourselves instead of waiting for someone or
something to do that work for us it is
the listening and the listener who are old for we have hardened crystalized into hardened personalities into
things hardened egos whose senses have
become blunted as if covered over by dead skin scar tissue we've become completely covered over by
scar tissue - i say with exasperation while slowly sinking in my chair - our
entire minds our entire bodies covered over by scar tissue we live in a cocoon of scar tissue - i say
breathing heavily - I mean for a
long time we thought that by changing the sounds this would change our listening change our minds our so-called insides our consciousness but this requires that we the observers change
deeply wha' I mean is we want the world around us the world outside as we like to say to change according to our desires our wants
but never do we think of changing ourselves we've become calcified assimilated into the walls of a maze like coral growth we've become assimilated into the walls of a
labyrinth that extends in all directions
radiating outward from our cities and towns like a cancer growth consuming
nature and replacing it with our calcareous growths wha' I meant to say is we've become stiff settled in our views and habits it is our senses our listening that are old not necessarily the sounds we hear - i say
feeling wobbly, slurring my words - the sound of a violin or a piano those very familiar sounds may sound utterly new if our senses were changed if our senses were somehow renewed if we could listen to them as if for the
first time wha' I'm really trying to
say is that for a long time we thought that by making new sounds finding new sounds new and different timbres this would change our listening and this
would lead to a radical change of consciousness but those new sounds soon became old once
they were internalized by our hardened egos
with their repetitive habits
once those sounds became part of our memory's repertoire of things to
hear - i mutter with increasing exasperation and unease - we want the world
outside as we are wont to say to change for us while we remain unchanged crystalized into a collection of habits we want the world outside as we are in the habit of saying to change but we don't want to look at the entire
structure of our minds which have
calcified we don't want to do any
changing ourselves we are utterly
selfish - i say nervously feeling a panic attack rising which begins to
restrict my breathing - the whole world is a mass of fortifications and embattlements
and each individual if they can truly
be called that is a mass of
fortifications and defense mechanisms - i say fidgeting nervously with my hands
- none of us are truly willing to change ourselves from the inside out to really look at the entire structure of
our minds our habits our motivations and change all that we always want the world outside to change
for us who are unwilling to change ourselves from within we are unwilling to adapt ourselves to the
so-called world outside but we want the so-called world outside to
adapt itself to our so-called insides
to our so-called world inside
we always want the so-called world outside to adapt itself to us and our
desires our whims and if it doesn't if it resists we force it we bulldoze it we pave it over we turn it into a projection of ourselves of our insides we try to force the world to adjust to our
ideals to our beliefs to the images we create in our minds and so
live in constant conflict with the world and ourselves but more often than not the world life
the universe is indifferent to our desires - i say meekly struggling to
breath - I mean back in the
eighties when I was a child Berio
Nono and Lachenmann were saying this
they were already saying new sounds are impossible and that we need to
focus our attention on the grammar of music
how compositions are organized
it's been decades since then and here we are in the midst of an
unfolding catastrophe made by ourselves - i say weakly feeling wobbly again -
this catastrophe in the making is our real true composition or decomposition if you prefer we are in the middle of a catastrophe in
the making and all you can think about is art?
there won't be any art if we
don't have a livable planet! - i somehow manage to exclaim - putting ourselves
into our work our so-called artistic
work at this point in the current context is tantamount to
burying our heads in the sand it's
utter selfishness yet another distraction more
escapism a different kind of action
is needed! - and what action would that be? - Anders retorts - well that is the question isn't it I just don't know maybe one that requires we put our lives on
the line how many of us do you think
are willing to do that? - i ask snidely - we may have to fight to save our
world - i stutter angrily - but that would lead to more destruction - Anders
answers back -All
of a sudden i'm feeling dizzy and nauseated, i lean forward in my chair as a
jet of vomit forcefully ejects from my mouth. i slide off my chair and fall to
the ground still vomiting - mijn God! - i hear Nadja exclaim, Danica and her
friends begin laughing raucously - Anders!
do something! - Nadja shouts. Anders quickly gets up and leaning over me
takes hold of my arm and starts to pull me up. i sit up supporting myself with one
hand on the ground, then Anders, putting his hands in my underarms, lifts me up
onto the chair - man! - he exclaims - you've had too much to drink to soon! -
you think? - i answer back babbling helplessly - yes! - he says - come on we have to get you home and in bed - wait!
- i exclaim pointing at Elise - that's her line! - Elise and Nadja look at each
other wide eyed and start giggling - I think it's time for you to go home! -
Anders says helping me stand up i turn toward Elise and say - it was nice meeting
you i hope to see you again soon - of
course - she says smiling - it was fun
i'll call you you can visit
with me in Utrecht - sounds good sorry for the mess - i utter with embarrassment
as i notice my vomit covered shirt - no problem no worries - Elise says beginning to giggle
again - Taking me by the shoulders, Anders turns me around in the direction of
Prinsegracht, the main avenue we are to follow back to Anders' apartment. Nadja
gets up quickly and walks around the tables toward me, she then embraces me giving
me a kiss on the cheek and says - it is so nice to see you again - yes it's nice seeing you again too - i murmur mechanically
- I'll call you next week I want you
to come and stay with me in Amsterdam for a few days ok? - yes - i mutter back
- i would really like that - and pointing at Anders i say - this guy is really
starting to get on my nerves with all his drinking and smoking - Anders shakes
his head and chuckles - Anders please
take care of him - Nadja says sternly - of course what else can I do? he's completely helpless! - Anders says
loudly - yes I'm a completely helpless
and useless human being - i say in a monotone emulating what I think of as a
robot's voice and start goose stepping as Anders begins pushing me from behind,
all of which elicits more laughter from Danica and her friends - glad to've
been of service to y'all toodle doooo
- i chant waving at them. As we move toward Prinsegracht avenue i suddenly
catch a glimpse out of the corner of my eye, the corner of my right eye, to be
precise. Trembling and with mouth agape, i turn my head toward my right and see
a tall figure clad in a long, black overcoat standing on the far-left corner at
the rear of the square. His hands are clasped at either side of his large, deathly
pale, balloon-like head. His eyes are two dark holes and his mouth another,
larger black hole from which issues a screeching sound that cuts through the
crowd's noise. i turn to Anders and with urgency shout - we better get the hell
out of here! - why? what's wrong? - he says - never mind lets get out of here - i stammer - don't
tell me - he says sarcastically - it's the dead again oooo
oooooo - he chants mockingly trying to make a spooky sound as in a
horror movie - Walking becomes difficult as it happens every time i get drunk,
my right leg grows stiff as if i've suddenly developed a peg leg and now i find
myself hobbling along awkwardly trying to keep up with Anders whose long gait
seems undiminished by all his drinking and smoking. Not a word transpires
between us as we walk toward his apartment where i've been staying for the past
few weeks. Halfway down Prinsegracht avenue i'm feeling nauseous again and ask
Anders if we can rest for a moment. We stop by the entrance of a women's
clothing store with big glass doors with brightly polished brass handles.
Though the store is closed, the lights are on in the display windows which show
mannequins in different poses wearing different kinds of garments of varying styles
and colors. I lean against the wall by the entrance breathing heavily. i see a
middle-aged woman with dark curly hair wearing a long grey coat and holding a
large black purse approaching us on the sidewalk. She stops in front of Anders
and addressing him in Dutch asks while pointing at the store entrance - excuse
me do you work here? - no! - Anders
booms in his basso profundo voice as he looks down upon her - we don't work at
all! - oh! - cries the woman stepping back a few paces. i can't help myself and
burst out in loud laughter and begin vomiting again - mijn God! - the woman
exclaims alarmed - you drunken idiots! - she yells angrily and briskly walks
away from us furiously clutching her purse with both hands against her body while
swearing. i'm leaning against the wall with one hand alternating between laughter
and vomiting, barely able to keep myself standing. Chuckling, Anders takes me
by the arm and begins walking me down Prinsegracht again toward Hofje
Zoutkeetsingle, the small, dead end alley where his apartment is, on the other side
of the canal after the avenue makes a sharp turn north - what the hell was that
all about? i mean what was she doing out at this time of the
night? why would she think you work
at that place? - i ask panting - who knows - Anders responds - I've seen her
around before she's one of the
neighborhood's eccentric characters - you mean like us? - i ask snickering -
yes like us - Anders says chuckling
again - takes one to know one I guess - i say giggling in my drunken glee,
Anders chuckles in response and continues pushing me along. Soon we are at the
elbow where Prinsegracht makes a sharp northward turn. We amble across the
avenue toward the blue steel bridge that straddles the canal and walk across.
Then we turn right onto Zoutkeetsingle the street that runs parallel to the
canal. We walk for half a block along the canal and then cross the street to the
small alley and Anders' apartment. Once inside, i hobble as quickly as i can to
the bathroom and take a long, drawn out piss. After i'm done, i stumble out
into the main hallway and see Anders sitting at the kitchen table with a large
glass of water and a vial of painkillers - take a couple of these it will help you with the hangover tomorrow make sure you drink all the water i'm going to sleep see you tomorrow - he says tiredly and
walks away down the hall to his room. i wash down a couple of pills and after
finishing off the water stagger over to the guest room and close the door.
Sitting on the edge of the bed, i slowly take off my soiled clothes and throw
them on the floor in a corner and then lie down on my back in the darkness face
up toward the ceiling. In the midst of the dark silence, i hear the light,
intermittent sounds of scraping and tapping on the windowpane caused by the
branches of a bush outside moved by the breeze. As i slowly begin to drift away,
the scraping and tapping gradually becomes the gentle sound of a raspy voice,
at first distant, then growing closer - like yourself I'm a prisoner - it says softly - like
everyone else a prisoner in this
labyrinth the vast machine that
engulfs us protects and terminates
us while making us feel cozy in its embrace the entire city the entire world an abattoir - the voice
whispers hoarsely - i give myself these words these thoughts because i have nothing left to give nor am i able to receive anything i am satiated the thoughts
the words of others no longer penetrate my
mind my cup is overflowing the
sights i see the sounds i hear no longer reach me they seem distant all
i hear now is the mumbling the
ongoing mumbling this mumbling i
perform to comfort myself in the midst of so much nothingness to
keep it at bay lest it seep into my body
if I still have one into my
mind like a fog or mist taking over
everything smothering me my voice blinding me with its darkness turning
me gray from the inside erasing me there is a host of us now trying to keep the fog at bay mumbling
chanting like a chorus a crowd
in different rhythms and tempos creating a vast contrapuntal texture a weave of gentle sounds that extends in
all directions rustling into the boundless night or perhaps into less gloomy quarters seeking out the warmth the luminosity of stars wrong
again there is no content to lean
against no concept to lean on by the sounds listening to this kind of tactility where mutations first arise and permutations form with each new motion of the waves rocking me gently like flotsam all that's left us now are words our cries and words that stop our mouths
with silence death is the only
change permitted us now we head to
the sea to the dunes where the
bunkers are we adopt each other's
mannerisms the wind tosses us about in the tall
grasses and weeds speaking in
tongues our pain is unutterable no one can speak it it is only cries and sobs now as we lie in furrows carved out by the
North Sea wind near the bunkers
looking up at the gray rolling sky
the grasses and weeds leaning over us - the voice whispers raspingly -
at last i begin to listen as they
come and go lapping at my ears my mind my dry
arid bones belonging to no
one the cold earth perhaps yet still longing though shedding all hope to recover what
is lost as these are ancient cares and
the mind cannot always brood on the same cares without however vanishing completely for i feel myself drifting toward other
cares found linking the other which
receding finds the wind drifting among the tall grasses in the etiolated fields they glide off been not the they like in the mad writhing scribbles of a trembling hand
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left, aloof
in the dust
of so much
the rest can't
help themselves
shattering
alone on a roof top
at last
the least of which
begins to laugh
que lo parió,
la sputum mother!
we are who we say
we aren't,
blatantly balbuceando
a diver searches for,
come chingones
soplando la huella
de la my troka,
hashtag fans my,
discos readily apparent
where hope is
beside the point,
at the same time
escuchando la rola
what you are talking about
hablando de la nada
by the sounds failing
suppose that what not;
knots of discontent were
as if by dreams an intent,
staring in horror and
then again, some more
every day, you're
all the same, with a firm
grip, sonrisa metafora
what i means to tell you
is not necessarily the same
immersed in becoming
a babbling
by the sounds falling la huella se disipa dyspeptic speaking of which it
sounds very a lot of fun is often a whole lot of no more than rationalizations swerving by far more skeletons
in the shade embracing too late for
contact tracing the closet door now slamming shut flings us back to normal moving us forth
into amnesia did the poet laureate mentioned the war
criminals who sat behind her squinting in the sun ensconced in a comforting sea of expensive
suits and fancy dresses washing their hands minds
and faces are there no hinges on which to hinge on synecdoche cascading in the me again the thingliness of solid darkness where
the we here with
no more as soon as we call it in
us deep furrowed frowns i
keep going on like this around in circles repeating myself for fear of having the
act of into a moment are not the as a
kind where other complex connect possible includes an into laterally
exchanged disrupts us in the each sedimented seemingly primarily the babbling the
brain text pulsating with its own extraneous
turbubabulence tangentially bleeding
into
i hear an opens again gently folds the entire it the sand scribbling to burst the that is of itself over upon it no longer a
gleaming even linking and in able to
a stranger reading shards saying of
it through meanings consuming
myself nothing wants for broken
light and that art mumbling to
listening the darkness wanting waving
translucent then curtained the
edge the door long piss back to an array can say that again you
my apricot from over back from
about that the and walk to i take a walk with the door ok
i i mumble back lands am an infinite smashing shrubs it's a long unfathomable in the cold each telling every word talking about a wobbly picture splits into a sense of
highway days are aspects with a
border plus this from over back from about that world shifting gently describe a bout from over back from about that every word crossing out a world suppose knots of as if staring then every all the same what i is not immersed in by the is often embracing moving us in squinting hands again i can to see of these and of the by the sound of an everyone while whispers am i able all in the into my darkness a vast into the stars listening to of the that to the in the it is only looking at
last the last not
about but a bout an about face
without orders that disorders into off course an ebullient turbubabulence
the void folds itself over
from outside according to spacing
itself from a there is which is now
snow the entire it upon it plus
this with a light made anticipation stranger beneath forgotten it
is that in the sand no longer eyes stars
further patterns on and into swarming enfolded laterally exchanged text scribbling a
gleaming world passing like that the
tide after choked me up me
up from ready to burst reading shards shifting etched in a skin that i only myself into by the thought constructed ears saying of it knowing gently and describe abouts of disorders that splatter sense of a site even through meanings of
the while which i try articulation scratching for the intro the never linking consuming primarily discourse non-sense fixed
in and in moment seemingly bleeding not
even and in myself not myself orders that scatter what's it where? can't really beneath my being able to bridge a gap where there is not
what but just passing over which passes an
about face a stranger begotten reality speaking are
aspects of that unknown and breath alternating a bout the
that is its non-fixed surface hook up areas with a border splits into two which makes it so much
forested of which and between which also stretches across a sense of sight cascading on deeply furrowed lands my final
destination where words form me on rainy highway days a
dam constructed dot dot dot
am i words? am i worlds? a loving luminosity that pervades
everything even the darkness in
an infinite sea forming sentences writhing what to write what wobbly picture is i about? the wind smashing my agony nothing wants for i
escapes into obscurity bemoaning a moon for
the sake of shrubs twist me into broken light beneath awnings and trellises talking
about the and of course it's
inevitable and that art embodies a frown on my face every word crossing a world for
a long time it has lost its stop
briefly to catch my dreaming i'm a corpse buried six feet under snug in my coffin mumbling to myself so as not to see my
surroundings the solid darkness that engulfs me mumbling
and listening listening and mumbling
by turns listening to the mumblings of others like me
ensconced in the darkness their voices
perdendosi . . . perdendosi . . . into the
cold unfathomable blackness the
voices of young and old women
children and men muttering
each telling themselves their
stories each listening to my stories
and the stories of others in the unending darkness the the
the that the this that the is the it upon which the is upon which the
succumbing to the this the that can't remember which and and in what order that
which this signifies disappearing behind an endless fence made of its
disappearing behind an infinite fence made of ises can't remember which an
ongoing horizon alternating shifting horizons the sand the text scribbling me
i hear a knock at the door. The sound of distant
traffic reaches my ears. The knock comes again, the door opens and i hear
Anders say - hey man it's almost
noon do you want some coffee? -
yeah ok - i mumble barely audible
with closed eyes - how are you feeling? - Anders asks - i don't know - i mumble
back again. i hear Anders chuckle - i've got breakfast ready in the kitchen if
you want some - i hear the door close gently. After a few minutes i stretch my
body, open my eyes tentatively and lying on my side stare at the curtained
windows across from me. The translucent curtains gently filter the incoming
light. i slowly sit up on the edge of the bed rubbing my eyes and then notice i
have a splitting headache. i get up slowly and walk to the door, open it and step
into the hallway. i then amble down the hallway to the bathroom where i take a
long piss and then standing at the sink, begin splashing cold water on my face.
After drying my face i walk back to my room and put some clean clothes on and
head for the kitchen. Anders is sitting at the table with an array of food
stuffs laid out before him. i see a coffee pot, mugs, plates with slices of
aged Gouda cheese, and roggebrood, a butter dish and a jar each of apricot
marmalade and strawberry preserves. i also see the bottle of pain killers he
gave me last night before i went to sleep. i immediately reach for the
painkillers and sitting down, open the bottle and take out a couple pills which
i then wash down with a few mouthfuls of strong black coffee - I thought you
might need those - Anders says chuckling - you really tied one on last night -
you can say that again - i mutter back softly, wincing from the pain in my
head. i take a slice of roggebrood, my favorite Netherlands bread, my favorite
bread ever, and begin applying butter to it after which i dab apricot marmalade
on it with a spoon and immediately stuff it into my mouth. Still chewing, i
take another drink from my coffee mug - I was thinking about what you said
yesterday about the supremacy of the
visual over sound over listening in
our culture - Anders says - yes? what
about it? did I say that? - i answer
back while still munching on the slice of roggebrood with marmalade - well -
Anders says after taking a sip from his coffee - I seem to recall in Attali's
book Noise in the chapter called
Composition that he talks about the
technology of recording images as one of the soon to be main technologies of
composition he felt that this new
technology the recording of
images would become an essential
tool for composition - yeah well - i
mumble back - he wrote that book back in the late seventies he had no idea what direction technology
was really going to take no one that I
know of back then anticipated the development of the internet laptops and cell phones . . . why? do you believe what he said about music
being able to anticipate developments in society? that music has a premonitory function in
society? - he said that music was once again functioning in a premonitory way -
Anders continues - that it foreshadowed a mutation in technology as evidenced
in the expanding proliferation of new musical instruments like your various electric
instruments of that time which he
compared to the development of new instruments in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries predating the industrial revolution your synthesizers tape machines electronic studios and the growing use of
computers to generate music and so on and that the herald of this mutation was
the recording of images which he saw as eventually becoming one of the
essential technologies for composition
despite the fact that the recording of images was still a tool for
stockpiling and repetition - Anders pauses to take another drink from his
coffee - it still is - i mutter back with skepticism after taking another bite
from my roggebrood slice and then continue with a bulging cheek - the
technology of recording images your
ever ubiquitous digital cameras phone
cameras and so on has multiplied the
stockpiling and repetition to a degree such that it's suffocating we are buried in a flurry of images bombarded from all directions through the various media especially so-called social media I think what's really going on is that
we are burying ourselves alive in useless information we have been doing this for a very long
time actually - my attention returns to
my marmalade covered slice of roggebrood as Anders says - he thought that the
new technology would allow people to transition from being mere passive
consumers to becoming more active producers of what they listen to and would
derive just as much satisfaction from the process of manufacturing itself as
from the object produced he felt that the new emerging technology
would find it's true usage in the production by the consumer herself of the
final object - Anders pauses and lights one of his hand rolled cigarettes and then continues - in his conception
of composition Attali envisioned a
different political economy he said
that production blends with consumption and that the stockpiling of labor which
simulates sacrifice is replaced by
the investment of violence in the act of doing as opposed to channeling it into
an object in this manner violence is
no longer channeled into sacrifice it
is no longer a threat as it was in repetition it no longer mirrors itself in
representation each person then
assumes the imaginary and violence individually through the pleasure of making creating constructing and in this situation each person can
dream up his or her own criteria in
this manner time is liberated by
composition it is lived time not
stockpiled it is measured by the
magnitude of the time lived by people which takes the place of time stockpiled in
the commodity - all that sounds great on paper as they say but has that really happened? it may have happened with a very small
group of individuals like
ourselves but which remain utterly
marginalized - i say with skepticism, abruptly interrupting Anders' monologue
after which he continues unabated, mechanically - he saw most of commodity
production changing to the making of tools which would allow people to create
the conditions for taking pleasure in the act of composing he felt that the essential usage of the
image recorder was in the private use of the manufacture of the consumer's
own gaze upon the world and more importantly upon
his or her self-directed gaze and the self-pleasure this brings as I seem to recall Attali himself saying Narcissus after Echo eroticism as an appropriation of the body -
to a degree he was right - i answer back with a shrug - I mean isn't
this what has happened with cell phones and the profusion of selfies? and people posting their selfies online
everywhere in social media and so on? I'm
not so sure that's such a good thing though that it has had such a liberatory function
as Attali seemed to think it would have I mean
what's so great about all
that? the consumer has become an
active participant in the spectacle
the society of the spectacle as Debord would have it where he or she the consumer is completely subsumed absorbed into the society of the
spectacle that doesn't strike me as
liberating at all more so considering
that a lot of what is being produced is imitation of the stuff your pop stars
are already doing which itself is derivative
in other words they are reproducing what is always already in the system the entertainment industry which
is a limit cycle and are thus
participating in the economy of repetition and stockpiling that the technology
of recording images according to
Attali was supposed to liberate us from all
I'm seeing really is that the technology permits the average person on the
street to play at being a pop star
their fifteen minutes of fame as Warhol put it while keeping him or her stuck in place in the
class system in the production
consumption machine while leading
them to believe they're exercising some kind of freedom it creates the illusion of empowerment an illusion that perpetually postpones the
real thing - i say snidely turning my attention to the aged gouda and then
continue - it seems to me that the body
and the mind for that matter
have been caged imprisoned in
the grid of the production/consumption machinery and mutilated by that grid as has the
subject the subject and his body sacrificed to the
production/consumption machinery
the consumer is the ultimate object of consumption snagged and mangled by the machine's gear
wheels devoured by the system the body and whatever interiority it may
have has been neutralized and
de-realized in the virtual realm . . . by the virtual realm and therefore rendered socially and
politically impotent while at the same time the subject is hypnotized by his
own products he or she sees posted in
the media the subject is hypnotized
by its own gaze in fact the ultimate
self-surveillance whose ultimate
effect is paralysis we may be seeing
that depersonalization and derealization you talked about last night but on a
massive scale it seems to me that
the body is lost rather than appropriated by the consumer turned producer abstracted in the realm of virtual
reality the flesh replaced by a
digital representation we've all
been replaced by avatars . . . maybe that's not such a bad thing though maybe that's one way to recover some of our
privacy by going completely anonymous masked by our digital representations - i
mutter as i bite into a slice of roggebrood and cheese - but as Debord said somewhere the spectacle's domination has succeeded in
raising entire generations molded to its laws ourselves included I mean
this idea of Attali's composition turns out to have been overly optimistic
it seems to me naive even this notion in which people will begin to
compose for themselves and shift from being mere consumers to being
producers which to some extent has
occurred given that digital technologies have made the production of music
easily possible for those who don't know how to play an instrument and it has made it possible for people to
record their own music and affordable and able to distribute it online but the fact still remains that
overwhelmingly most people in our
society today are consumers of music rather than producers rather than composers - well - Anders
cuts in - but as you know there is an
international group of musicians performers
and composers who gather informally to create music a kind of nomadic crowd producing
nonidiomatic music largely improvised using
computers and analogue synthesizers in combination with traditional instruments
as well as new instruments some of the composers and performers build themselves they operate locally in local venues as well as globally using
video conferencing and have created an
international network this has been
going on for quite some time now for
several decades in fact you and I have
participated in this sort of thing ourselves - well yes that's true - i utter
back now chewing on a slice of roggebrood with butter and strawberry preserves -
but not only are they a small
minority in the world they are also
largely if not totally marginalized what they do has not been accepted in society at large it
has not had the great
transformational and liberatory effect Attali predicted it
may have a liberatory effect on those few musicians who practice this informal kind
of music you are referring to but it
seems to me that society at large is mostly indifferent to it if it is aware of it at all most of these musicians who practice this
sort of musicking have receded into
anonymity they hide in
anonymity and share their work which remains largely in the fringes mostly with other composers and musicians
like themselves most people most consumers are completely overpowered
by commodity music by consumerism by the products the entertainment industry
forces on them through the various media
you said this yourself last night at the Grote Markt in fact
their entire lives their sense
of identity is completely dependent
on consumerism their sense of self and their self-esteem is completely dependent
on what they buy and own and this serves an existential an ontological function it provides meaning and purpose the way
religion used to in centuries past - i say dabbing more strawberry preserves on
what's left of my slice of roggebrood - that's just scratching the surface -
Anders says - well isn't that what
we're always doing? - i mutter back, as i chew on a new slice of roggebrood,
this time with aged Gouda on top - I mean
just when we think we've got something figured out there's another surface below or behind
that one it's like a fucking onion
man - i say, my cheek bulging with a mouth full of bread and cheese - the
surfaces the layers never end man -
i hear Anders groan as he rolls his eyes while i take another drink of coffee -
are you saying there is no objective reality
no cold hard facts? - he asks
visibly irritated - that is a cold hard fact - i retort amused - reality
is layer upon layer of surfaces man
just when you think you understood it
something else shows up or . .
. uh . . . surfaces as it were - i
say giggling lightly as i stare intently at what's left of my slice of
roggebrood - something that eluded our perception our imaginations maybe your scratch is deeper than
mine but it's still just a scratch - i
say distractedly while dabbing some butter on another slice of roggebrood -
man this roggebrood is sooo good I can't get enough of it - i say with
enthusiasm licking my fingers while anticipating putting a layer of strawberry
preserves on it - well no - Anders answers - what I'm trying to say is not as
hopeless as the things you were saying last night - I didn't say that the
situation is hopeless although that
may very well be the case - i answer back - what I said is that hoping is
hopeless the act of hoping is
obsolete to continue hoping is a
waste of time and energy a different
kind of action is needed - i utter while licking my lips and dabbing strawberry
preserves on my piece of roggebrood after which i continue with vehemence - it
seems to me that now I mean today in this day and age this age of totalitarian capitalism and its attendant absolute nihilism and the fanatic consumerism with which
people try to compensate for the emptiness brought on by that nihilism which is an existential an ontological problem an embodiment problem where the body has been sacrificed to the
system it seems to me that if there is to be music I mean
if one is to write music a
kind of music that takes a critical position vis a vis absolutist capitalism
and its entertainment machinery and a music that is authentic meaning
one that truly arises from us
the people as opposed to being
merely the product of conditioning and imposed from above by the entertainment
industry if there is to be any such music at all silence must be the most important aspect
of it a music that is made up
primarily of silence and incompleteness consisting also of unfulfilled
gestures gestures which are
discontinuous out of context a music made up largely of absence this silence this absence is the most important aspect
of it the most expressive aspect of
it its refusal to say anything in a sea of
meaninglessness and utterly boring expressions like those produced by the
entertainment industry - i now bite into my piece of roggebrood relishing the
combined taste of bread, butter and preserves and then continue speaking
obsessively while still chewing - it must be arid stripped of its usual expressivity I mean
expression in the traditional sense
as in the so-called classical tradition and it's modernist reaction the avant-garde etc. as well as the kinds of expressions or
expressive clichés one hears on a daily basis in the products of the pop music
machinery the utterly boring and
mind-numbing ocean of inanities one is exposed to through the various media on
a daily basis arid aridity is the word I'm thinking of music must be desert-like barren
with very little to offer at least in terms of the old habits of
listening and thinking are concerned
the constant repetition that keeps us from learning anything new keeping the listener stuck in a
psycho-emotional limit cycle - but to a great extent that's already been done - Anders says in a
matter-of-fact tone of voice looking me in the face - you could say
Feldman Cage and Lachenmann have
already made silence and absence part of their musical aesthetic - yes well
I was getting to that - i answer back still munching on my slice of
roggebrood with strawberry preserves - the problem with all that music is that
it is still about art with capital "A" it's artsy it's still about status and saving face about competition about winning and being right and
this is especially true in academe it's still about mastery it’s romantic in the sense that it is heroic and all the
nastiness and violence that comes with heroism we need a music that is not afraid of
falling flat on its face a music
that is not afraid of making a fool of itself a music that is not about mastery and
saving appearances - i mutter under my breath eyeing the apricot marmalade - this
reminds me of the relation between resistance and creation Agamben or possibly
Deleuze can't remember which spoke about somewhere - Anders says - I
like what he or possibly they said about potential and impotential -
yes? what did they say what did they mean by that? - i ask taking
another drink of coffee - according to Deleuze or possibly Agamben can't remember which there is something in each act of
creation that opposes and resists expression - Anders says between puffs from
his cigarette which he then sets down in an ashtray - either Agamben or Deleuze
or possibly both said that to resist etymologically means to hold down to stop to stop oneself this power that stops or withholds
potential in its movement toward the act is impotential - he says emphatically
as he serves himself another cup of extra strong coffee - the potential not-to possibly Deleuze or Agamben said that
impotential the potential not-to is the power that stops or withholds
potential in its movement toward the act
Agamben or Deleuze can't
remember which or possibly both said
the act of creation is a field of forces that stretches between
impotential and potential acting and
resisting being-able-to and being
able-not-to - Anders says now taking a slice of roggebrood and dabbing it with
butter and marmalade - either Deleuze or Agamben said we human beings are
capable of having mastery of our potential but only through our impotential can we
have access to it though because of
this in the end there is no mastery over potential and
being an artist means being at the mercy of one's own impotential - oh cut the
crap man! creation! creativity! blah dih blah dih blah! - i spit out annoyed
- as I said before the whole idea of
creation and creativity is highly problematic it seems to me all we can do anymore is
take the materials we already have at our disposal in our society our so-called culture and rearrange them perhaps in collage-like fashion recontextualize them and thus change their
significance their meaning did they really use that worn out and
loaded over romanticized word when they talked about art? I
can't believe they were so naive - i say again annoyed and then pick up Anders'
hashish laced cigarette and take a long drag from it after which i place it
back in the ashtray - be careful with that! - Anders exclaims - you're going to
make yourself sick again! - i shrug and then continue - I can't believe you
still believe all those myths about art and creativity we were raised on what people care about today is buying
stuff and being part of the machine that tells them to buy stuff it serves an ontological function it has replaced the ontological function
religions and other spiritual practices once had it's really a kind of secondary
satisfaction - i say biting into another piece of roggebrood and apricot
marmalade - it's an attempt to find substitutes for a primary satisfaction of
wholeness which we somehow lost and which left a large hole in its place it's an attempt to recreate a state of
undivided consciousness an attempt to
recuperate the primary satisfaction of unity with our environment with the earth with the cosmos itself - i utter with
difficulty while chewing my roggebrood with marmalade - all of our culture is a
form of substitute satisfaction an
attempt to console ourselves for the loss of kinesthetic wholeness the loss of primary unity we once had
with the world - or that's some sentimental false nostalgia for a time and a
state of being that never really was - retorts Anders taking another drag from
his cigarette - yeah well maybe
you're right - i answer back feeling lightheaded - in any case going back to music it must be reticent a stuttering music in a very real sense the unmusical the malformed the fragmented the
broken that which doesn't work that which functions poorly is most relevant here because it doesn't
readily lend itself to being assimilated and used by the system - but for how
long can one sustain this? - Anders asks - well I
don't know - i answer back already feeling high and beginning to giggle - I
mean no one can live in a perpetual
state of resistance a perpetual
state of combativeness - i say between giggles - I mean I can't you burn out - yeah - Anders cuts in
beginning to laugh - that's why I've been telling you to take a break - what
are you talking about - i exclaim laughing out loud - I've been on break for a
long time now! for years! I stopped composing I
stopped writing I hardly ever listen
to music I haven't read much of
anything for years I try watching
films but I fall asleep in the middle
I find it hard to suspend disbelief
it all seems so obvious to me
so transparent none of all
that helps me deal with the grief I've been feeling seeing year after year decade after decade the barbarism of egocentricity and the
I's the me's compulsion to impose
itself on the world the brutality of
power and all the senseless wars the
slow death of our world about which most of us don't do anything I'm seeing death everywhere there won't be any art any music if we don't have a livable
planet what I find highly
problematic truly disturbing is this existence in which we can't
change anything we're not allowed
to there no longer are any
transformational poetic experiences
the arts have lost their critical
confrontational power nor are
there any truly satisfactory political experiences either people have become inured to what
imprisons them they find it easier
to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism they can't imagine the end of what oppresses
them they dare not all of which leads to a generalized state
of existential boredom a kind of calm
before the storm - i say giggling nervously, licking marmalade from my fingers
-
Acknowledgement
Some sections of Song
of Anonymous are composites made of bits and pieces taken
from other texts, whether in the form
of a direct quote or as paraphrases, which when put together in collage or
bricollage fashion, constitute the narrator’s voice or rather, his many voices.
A list of these sources is provided below.
1) Adorno, Th. W., “La
posición del narrador en la novela contemporánea,” Notas Sobre
Literatura, Obra Completa, 11, De la edición de bolsillo, Ediciones Akal,
S.A., 2003, Sector Foresta, 1, 28760 Tres Cantos, Madrid, España. My translation.
(Adorno, Theodor W., “The
Position of the Narrator in the Contemporary Novel,” Notes on
Literature, Complete Works, 11, From the pocket editions, Ediciones Akal,
S.A., 2003, Sector Foresta, 1, 28760 Tres Cantos, Madrid, España. My translation.)
________________, “La
forma en la nueva música,” Escritos Musicales III, Escritos
Musicales I – III, Obra Completa, 16, Ediciones Akal, S.A., 2006, Sector
Foresta, 1, 28760 Tres Cantos, Madrid, España. My translation.
_______________, “Form
in New Music,” Musical Writings III, Musical Writings I – III,
Complete Works, 16, Ediciones Akal, S.A., 2006, Sector Foresta, 1, 28760
Tres Cantos, Madrid, España. My translation.).
2) Andrews, Bruce, Paradise and Method: Poetics and
Praxis, Northwestern University Press, Evanston, Illinois 60208-4210, 1996.
3) Artaud, Antonin, “Artaud
the Momo,” Watchfiends & Rack Screams: Works From The Final Period,
Ed. And trans. By Clayton Eshleman and Bernard Bador, Boston, Exact Change,
1995.
4) Ashbery, John, April
Galleons, Viking Penguin Inc., 40 West 23rd Street, New
York, New York, 10010, U.S.A., 1987.
---------------------, Collected
Poems 1956 – 1987, ed., Mark Ford, The Library of America, Literary
Classics of the United States, Inc., New York, N.Y., 2008.
5) Attali, Jacques, Noise: The Political Economy of
Music, University of Minnesota Press, 2037 University Avenue Southeast,
Minneapolis, MN 55414, 1987
6) Austin, James H., Zen and the Brain, MIT Press
paperback edition, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, London, England,
fifth printing 2000.
7) Barthes, Roland, “Writing
and the Novel,” Writing Degree Zero, trans. Annette Lavers and Colin
Smith, Hill and Wang, 1977.
8) Bataille, Georges, “Oresteia,”
The Impossible, trans. Robert Hurley, City Lights Books, San
Francisco, 1991.
9) Beckett, Samuel, “The
Unamable,” Volume II, Novels, The
Grove Centennial Edition, series editor, Paul Auster, Grove Press, 841
Broadway, New York, NY, 10003, 2006.
10) Berman, Morris, "Coming
to Our Senses: Body and Spirit in the Hidden History of the West,"
Echo Point Books & Media, Brattleboro, Vermont, 2015.
11) Bernhard, Thomas, Gargoyles, trans. Richard and
Clara Winston, The University of Chicago Press, 1986.
__________________, Gathering Evidence: A Memoire
and My Prizes, translated from the German by Carol Brown Janeway, Second
Vintage International Edition, November 2011.
__________________, Old Masters: A Comedy,
translated from the German by Ewald Osers, The University of Chicago Press,
Chicago 1992.
__________________, The Loser, translated from the
German by Jack Dawson, Afterword by Mark M. Anderson, Vintage International,
Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, October 2006.
12) Bernstein, Charles, “Artifice of Absorption,” A Poetics, Harvard University
Press, 1992.
_______________, “Hearing
Voices,” in The Sound of Poetry, the Poetry of Sound edited by
Marjorie Perloff and Craig Dworkin, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and
London 2009.
13) Bernstein, J.M., The Fate of Art: Aesthetic
Alienation from Kant to Derrida and Adorno, Polity Press, 65 Bridge
Street, Cambridge CB2 1 UR, UK, 1997.
14) Bonca, Cornel, Don Delillo’s White Noise: The Natural Language of the Species, in White
Noise: Text and Criticism, Don Dellilo, ed. Mark Osteen (New York: Viking
critical library, Published by the Penguin Group 1998).
15) Cope, David, Computers and Musical Style, A-R
Editions, Inc., 801 Deming Way, Madison Wisconsin 53717-1903, 1991.
16) Debord, Guy, The Society of the Spectacle,
translation, Donald Nicholson-Smith, Zone Books, 1226 Prospect Avenue,
Brooklyn, New York 11218, 1994.
17) Deleuze, Gilles, The Fold: Leibniz and the Baroque,
translated by Tom Conley, University of Minnesota Press, 111 Third Avenue
South, Suite 290, Minneapolis, MN 55401-2520.
18) Deleuze, Gilles, Guattari, Felix, “Becoming Intense, Becoming Animal, Becoming Imperceptible,” A
Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia, Translation and Forward by
Brian Massumi, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, 2009.
19) Dickinson, Emily, "Emily Dickinson's Poems: as
She Preserved Them," edited by Cristanne Miller, The Belknap Press of
Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, London, England, 2016.
20) Dworkin, Craig, “The
Stutter of Form,” in The Sound of Poetry, the Poetry of Sound edited
by Marjorie Perloff and Craig Dworkin, University of Chicago Press, Chicago and
London 2009.
21) Ehresman, David E., Wessel, David L., Perception of
Timbral Analogies, IRCAM, 31 rue Saint-Merri, F-75004, Paris and,
Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan
48824, U.S.A.
22) Flowers, Brandon, “Spaceman,”
Day & Age, The Killers, Island Records, 2008.
23) Gallup, Smith, Tolhurst, “Charlotte Sometimes,” Standing on a Beach, The Cure,
Elektra Records, 1986.
24) Goldsmith, Kenneth, “Introduction,” in Uncreative Writing: Managing Language in the
Digital Age, New York: Columbia University Press 2011.
_______________, “Language
as Material,” in Uncreative Writing: Managing Language in the Digital
Age, New York: Columbia University Press 2011.
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