Mark Fuller Dillon's Blog, page 10

Against Ironic Disengagement

Human variety guarantees that no work of art can speak to every human being, and for this reason, I have no quarrel with anyone who engages honestly with something that I love, but cannot share my enthusiasm. As my brother would say, we are all wired differently.

What does anger me is ironic disengagement: the refusal to meet any work of art halfway. I disagree with anyone who comes to a story, a poem, a film, a piece of music, with a preconceived notion that this work does not deserve any full attention, that it can be picked apart from moment to moment without consideration of historical or aesthetic context, that it deserves to be mocked or dismissed right from the start.

I see nothing wrong with individual taste and thoughtful criticism; I see no reason to complain about a response that likes This and This and This about something, but really hates That. What I despise, instead, is the trendy Youtube illness that never gives a work of art time and opportunity to do its work.

At the very least, we should pay attention for a while, to see what can be found.

Garry Kilworth, WITCHWATER COUNTRY

Cover by Tim Gill. Click for a better jpeg.

An easy book to read but a hard one to assess, Garry Kilworth's WITCHWATER COUNTRY (1986) deserves a long review that I cannot provide, because even though several days have gone by since I finished it, the book whispers to me within my skull. In its many details, it offers a paradox.

For one thing, the book is written with utter simplicity and clarity, with a narrative so straightforward that a child could read it, yet at the same time, the story is about the perplexity of not knowing: of not knowing your family secrets, of not knowing your own parents, of not knowing your place in a shifting hierarchy of childhood friends.

The story is also about not knowing what might come next. The book seems unplotted: as in life, things happen, often out of the blue, yet the book is also structured with a series of set-ups and pay-offs that make the unexpected events feel inevitable after they occur. Halfway through the book, I knew that something terrible would happen, and then it did, but not in ways I could have anticpated. Nor could I have anticipated the chapters that followed, in which anxiety gave way to a looming sadness.

Not knowing what might come next leads to the challenge of dealing with what does happen, and for the story's young protagonist, coping is frustrated by his inability to process fears and complexities as an adult could. Halfway through the story, abruptly and without warning, someone dies; an adult would confront grief and shocked surprise head-on, but the child protagonist has no understanding of how to do this, and so he falls back on childhood fears, on the dread of ghosts and witches. Later, his true feelings erupt in ways that are unexpected but all-too believable.

Click for a better jpeg.

In WITCHWATER COUNTRY, childhood is a time of not knowing, and the setting of the story matches the shifting, uncertain moods of the protagonist. The firm landscape gives way to tides that come and go; droughts give way to floods; rainstorms give way to fire. The setting changes constantly while never quite changing at all, and matches perfectly the fears and doubts of the hero.

If that sounds abstract, the story is not: as in the best writing by Kilworth, the book thrives on physical detail, on the moods and colours, fragrances and textures of a place and its history. You can walk through this book to see it and feel it, but Kilworth never holds your hand, never explains more than he has to. In the simplest of ways, he has written a complicated book, and the result is unsettling, uncertain, as vivid as a dream and as baffling as life.

The Ebb-Tide: Opening Paragraphs

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From 1894, THE EBB-TIDE, by Robert Louis Stevenson and his stepson Lloyd Osbourne, opens with a passage worth analysis.

The writing is firm and graceful; it relies on subtle repetitions of consonants and vowels ("carry activity and disseminate disease"; "memoirs of the music-hall"), and on parallel structures ("less pliable, less capable, less fortunate, and perhaps less base"). Physical details might be scarce ("palm-leaf verandahs"; "a single eye-glass"), and verbs could be stronger ("vegetate" and "sprawl" stand out), but from one clause to the next, the writing moves quickly. Notice, too, that the longer, more elaborately constructed sentences appear at the end of the paragraph, built on a solid foundation of shorter statements ("Some prosper, some vegetate.").

I wish more of the books I try to read could start like this, with writing for the eyes and ears.

Or Else

"My country, right or wrong"? No. "My country, right or else," with a storm-wind emphasis on else.

Gods, Ghosts, and Burdens of Proof

My last girlfriend once asked what it would take for me to accept an apparently religious or supernatural experience as genuine. Being religious herself, she was unimpressed by my answer.

Over the decades, I have been startled and frightened by many strange events, but experience has taught me to consider these in the light of certain basic assumptions.

What I have seen are:

1) Normal events that I have observed poorly, or misinterpreted.

Especially at night in dark and isolated settings, the brain overcompensates for limited information by manufacturing monsters. And so I have watched UFOs that crossed the sky at alarmingly slow speeds become ordinary propeller planes. I have seen tiny bipeds in space helmets, or tall, impossibly thin humanoids, or strangely gliding "cone creatures" become ordinary deer backlit by the rising moon, or silhouetted while standing face to face with me, or cropping the grass in a park by the light of a distant lamppost that I had assumed was full size and far away, but which turned out to be not much taller than I am and very close. The brain's over-interpretation of uncertain events can keep us out of danger, but it can also give us false impressions of what is really going on.

Poor observations can also distort perception. Tricks of light and shadow, failures to gauge speeds or directions accurately, can make people suddenly vanish between one glance and the next, remove airplanes from the sky, or turn bright autumn shrubs on the pathways ahead into looming monsters of the night. The most initially-convincing UFO I have ever seen turned out to be a blimp lit up like a christmas tree, observed over a long period at sunset, when the soft light made everything magical.

2) Optical illusions, visual or auditory hallucinations, hypnopompic or hypnagogic dream states.

Especially when I am hungry, alone and isolated, or coming out of sleep, these imaginary perceptions can seem completely and often terrifyingly real. And so my bedroom has been invaded by strangers. I have heard voices call my name. I have seen statues move with menacing intent, and the planet Venus flutter like an alien spy-ship on the prowl.

3) Pranks and frauds.

What if my observations have been accurate, my perceptions unclouded by fear, fatigue, or unfamiliar circumstances? What if I saw what really seemed like a ghost or a god? Then I would most likely assume that someone was trying to fool people.

In the same way, if I had carefully observed, at length, a bizarre object in the sky, I would be less likely to think of an alien presence than the appearance of a new and perhaps military craft, but something otherwise down to Earth and human. (Unless, of course, that craft was a christmas tree blimp at sunset -- automatically alien!)

Finally, if I had eliminated these three possibilities, what I would I assume next?

4) I have gone completely crackers.

What is more likely: that Earth has been invaded, that the dead have risen from their graves, that the gods have spoken to me in person, or that I have lost my mind?

As I have mentioned, my last girlfriend was unimpressed by my standards for proof, because I seem to have none. But is that really the case?

If I were to be convinced that a religious or supernatural event was real, I would need to witness a spectacular display. After all, even a verified monster might be nothing more than a severely-deformed yet otherwise familiar animal; even a clearly-extraterrestrial ship would be a technological device, and therefore perfectly natural. Gods and ghosts remain stuck in a category of their own, and for me to believe in their existence, I would need Earth-shattering proof.

"So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day." That would be a start. Add a parting of the Red Sea by visible godly fingertips, and I might begin to wonder.

Vomit Sonnet

[Inspired by the insipid Canadian poets of the 19th Century, except for Archibald Lampman; he's cool.]

O daisies! greet the skyey welkin high,
God's goldfish bowl so sunshiny and blue,
As polar bears might greet the glaciers, too,
As moose might greet the green of prancing rye;
Let posies of the prairies touch the sky,
Let springtime swarms of blackflies, caribou,
And salmon that would capsize my canoe
Redeem this heathen wildernessy sty.

O sullen Queen divine of Empire grand!
Ever shall we mine for Thee, and toil,
And chop down trees, and slice up beaver hide,
Exploit ourselves as markets will demand,
Extract our riches, make the rivers boil,
And in Thine endless wars, kill for Thy pride.

[Monday, September 18, 2017]

Cut For The Readers, Dammit

How many stories have I read that could have been rescued by mere cutting?

Cut that adverb. Cut that clause. Cut that repeated information. Cut that present-participle afterthought. Cut that parasitical statement of the obvious.

Cut for the readers, dammit. Do you think we have endless hours to waste on your garbage?

The Fireshirt

"Igor Stravinsky's Hawaiian Shirts Declared Illegal in Australia."

-- An actual headline from one of my dreams this week.

The Many Lives and Countless Deaths of Daniil Ivanovich

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Writers are often told to "write what they know," but what does it mean, to know? We know our own imaginations, our own obsessions, and whatever heritage we choose.

For example, Jason E. Rolfe knows the heroes of the Russian avant-garde, although he has never met them; he knows the moods and complexities of their iconic city, Saint Petersburg, although he has never been there; he knows and loves the heritage of Absurdist literature that informs his work.

All that he knows comes together in his latest collection from Black Scat Books, THE MANY LIVES AND COUNTLESS DEATHS OF DANIIL IVANOVICH. Whether you find this book maddening or hilarious will depend on your sensibilities, but it made me guffaw like a sick-hearted hyena.

If we recognize absurdity and pointlessness in life, we can greet it with anger, sadness, compassion, or laughter. Rolfe has chosen to laugh:

"'Perfect nonsense goes on in the world,' the nose of the statue of Nicholas I formerly disguised as the nose of the statue of Nikolai Gogol whispered, as if reading Daniil’s thoughts. 'Sometimes there is no plausibility at all....'

"The five characters stood around for several minutes, silently studying their surroundings. It seemed as though each one expected something further, but when nothing else happened they shrugged and walked off, each in their own direction until only Daniil remained -- Daniil and the statue of Gogol. After several additional moments in which nothing significant occurred, Gogol’s statue stood, stretched, and walked away."

What makes life absurd? Politics.

"'Gogol was a pre-revolutionary writer,' the First Policeman said. 'He wrote political satire that was counter to the pre-revolutionary Czarist government and therefore revolutionary in its nature.'

"'Is it not still revolutionary in its nature regardless the fact that the government upon which it shines its satirical light is a post-Czarist, post-revolutionary, post-Soviet one?' Daniil asked.

"'Of course not,' the First Policeman replied, 'If Gogol truly were a post-Czarist, post-revolutionary, post-Soviet writer that would make him a neo-Czarist writer imbibed with neo-post-revolutionary ideas and would therefore be allowed under the current administration.'

"'But what if Gogol’s neo-Czarist, neo-post-revolutionary ideas were misinterpreted by a pre-post-Czarist sympathizer?' Daniil asked.

"'Don’t be absurd,' the First Policeman snapped. 'There is no such thing as pre-post-Czarism, it’s a myth, a hoax, a bad rumour started by post-revolutionary, pre-Stalinist neo-Bolsheviks looking to stir up trouble.'"

Also, business.

"Daniil’s primary role with The Company involved the writing, filing, and shredding of reports. He was greeted each and every morning by the same list of forty-two required reports. He spent the first three hours of his day writing them, the next three filing them. Between the fourth and fifth hours he took a brief lunch and, as discussed in another story, stared out the office window while his mind wandered along Nevsky Prospekt. When his mind returned from its brief jaunts, Daniil attended the Old Man’s meeting. The reports were never discussed. The Old Man preached the need for a passionate, enthusiastic workforce willing to surrender its life to The Company and its glorious ideals. He said these things in such a way that each and every employee understood them as unquestionable commands rather than encouraging prosaicisms. After the meeting, Daniil finished filing the forty-two reports, and then spent the final three hours of his day shredding them (for reasons known only to the Old Man)."

Also, bureaucracy.

"Daniil Ivanovich Yuvachev first learned of his death while at work. He had spent the first three hours of his day writing forty-three reports -- the same forty-three reports he wrote every day -- and the next three hours filing them.Between the fourth and fifth hours he paused for a brief lunch. It was during this pause that Daniil read the memo announcing his death. There were no details, merely a sentence stating that Daniil Ivanovich Yuvachev had died, and that no replacement would be necessary as the reports he wrote, filed and shredded on a daily basis were superfluous.

"Needless to say, he was stunned by the news. He felt more alive than dead. Surely there had been some mistake! While he sat contemplating his unexpected demise, his friend and fellow writer Alexander Ivanovich entered the small corner office. He carried with him a box of personal belongings, which he promptly began setting up on Daniil’s desk. In order to make room for the various photographs and knickknacks, Alexander had to push Daniil’s photographs and knickknacks aside. Once the box was empty, he filled it with Daniil’s belongings and carried it from the room. Daniil watched him leave in stunned silence.

"Several minutes later Yury Nikolaevich walked into the office carrying a box of his own photographs and knickknacks. When he saw Alexander’s photographs and knickknacks on the desk, he sighed and said, 'He beat me to it.'"

Also, death.

"Daniil Ivanovich Yuvachev stepped into the street and was instantly struck and killed by a trolleybus. He immediately regretted not looking to his left before crossing the street. Fortunately for Daniil, the trolleybus hit him so hard it actually knocked him back in time fifteen seconds. His foresight thus enhanced by time-displaced hindsight, Daniil looked left before stepping back into the street, saw the oncoming trolleybus and waited for it to pass before crossing. Unfortunately for Daniil, he neglected to look to the right and was promptly struck by a swiftly moving cube van before reaching the safety of the far curb. It can only be described as remarkable that the cube van hit him hard enough to send him back in time twenty seconds. Armed with the knowledge that he ought to look both left and right before crossing the street, Daniil managed to reach the far side of Nevsky Prospekt with his life intact. He is, however, a man both blessed and cursed with good and bad luck in equal measure, for as he stood on the sidewalk feeling quite pleased with himself, a piano fell from above and struck him on the head. Needless to say, he died almost instantly. To his continued surprise, the piano hit him so hard it knocked him back in time almost thirty seconds...."

Whether you find this funny or frustrating, I would recommend a few sips of this book from day to day. Taken all at once, it can induce mental chaos, but taken one story at a time, it can promise wide smiles. Jason E. Rolfe might be the most specialized of specialist writers, but he deserves a wide, non-specialized readership.

The Most Patient and Forgiving People on Earth

The people of the United States are the most patient and forgiving on Earth. For this, I offer proof: Americans have not yet burnt down the Pentagon, the White House, and Wall Street.