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The Warp 1 - The Storm's Howling Through Tiflis
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
March 14, 2020
Neil Oram's sequence of plays collectively known as The Warp is famous as the longest play ever performed, and the original production, overseen by the legendary Ken Campbell, featured noted performers such as Jim Broadbent and Bill Nighy. The script has never been published, but Oram novelised his decathlon into a trilogy, of which this volume covers the first three plays. The Sphere Books blurb describes the work as being in "the bestselling psychedelic tradition of ILLUMINATUS!", referring to Campbell's previous adaptation (with Chris Langham) of Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson’s 1975 tour de force.
Alas, however, there are obvious reasons why ILLUIMINUS! (reviewed here) remains an influential underground classic while the Warp – despite periodic theatrical revival – has never been reprinted. The text is impenetrable, interminable, and without much evidence of any editorial hand (there's at least one passage where quotemarks-within-quotemarks ends in a muddle). While ILLUMINATUS! sparkles with imaginative flair and assimilates all kinds of cultural and historical threads, this novel spends much of its time plodding through what the blurb optimistically calls "the vortex of the Bohemian scene" in London, but which mostly means some tedious travails running a café and art venue (the Krays get a reference). The main similarly with the ILLUMINATUS! trilogy is actually an aspect that is a flaw in the American forebear: a series of crude, tasteless and objectifying sex scenes. The last part of the work is a bit more engaging, as the main character (Philip Masters – a stand-in for the author and sometimes presented in first-person, at other points in third-person) heads off on a trip to India, but even there we have the annoyance of the repeated use of the word "swarthy" to describe foreigners.
The "psychedelic" colour promised by the blurb, meanwhile, refers to ponderous spiritual ruminations that appear scattered throughout the work, with certain words and concepts portentously presented in all-caps. Much of this is derived from Gurdjieff and Ouspensky, and the main character encounters Krishnamurti in Paris. The book, then, may be of some interest to anyone interested in the reception of alternative spirituality within counter-cultural currents.
The next installment promises UFOs and Aleister Crowley, but I doubt I’ll be up for it for a long time.
Alas, however, there are obvious reasons why ILLUIMINUS! (reviewed here) remains an influential underground classic while the Warp – despite periodic theatrical revival – has never been reprinted. The text is impenetrable, interminable, and without much evidence of any editorial hand (there's at least one passage where quotemarks-within-quotemarks ends in a muddle). While ILLUMINATUS! sparkles with imaginative flair and assimilates all kinds of cultural and historical threads, this novel spends much of its time plodding through what the blurb optimistically calls "the vortex of the Bohemian scene" in London, but which mostly means some tedious travails running a café and art venue (the Krays get a reference). The main similarly with the ILLUMINATUS! trilogy is actually an aspect that is a flaw in the American forebear: a series of crude, tasteless and objectifying sex scenes. The last part of the work is a bit more engaging, as the main character (Philip Masters – a stand-in for the author and sometimes presented in first-person, at other points in third-person) heads off on a trip to India, but even there we have the annoyance of the repeated use of the word "swarthy" to describe foreigners.
The "psychedelic" colour promised by the blurb, meanwhile, refers to ponderous spiritual ruminations that appear scattered throughout the work, with certain words and concepts portentously presented in all-caps. Much of this is derived from Gurdjieff and Ouspensky, and the main character encounters Krishnamurti in Paris. The book, then, may be of some interest to anyone interested in the reception of alternative spirituality within counter-cultural currents.
The next installment promises UFOs and Aleister Crowley, but I doubt I’ll be up for it for a long time.
May 11, 2017
This book is terrible. I was about to stop reading it then I saw I would be the first person to rate and review it on goodreads and my sense of moral duty overcame my sense of acute disgust. I didn't make it to the end.
This book flails for deeper meaning, nothing is beyond its frenetic writhing for a sense of superiority; Freudian relationships, vulgar sex, mysticism, conspiracy theories, mafia, police corruption, Freemasons, the Catholic Church, the Royal Family, art, poetry nothing is left untouched in the fruitless search for the high ground and appearance of genius. The prose is unreadable with random words in capitals, the poetry is even worse it a pretentious way. The start of the book takes far too long to get going and at no point are you rewarded with any conceptual unity or anything resembling a coherent plot.
This is weirdness not even for its own sake but for the sake of a feeling of superiority for those who pretend to see the absent greater meaning. In writing this I have discharged my duty, you have been warned.
P.S. I considered not reviewing as perhaps I was out of my area of expertise after all I only picked up these books because they were a full set. Perhaps I didn't understand the aims of the work? Then I realised that I didn't care and if you are the sort of person who enjoys this nonsense then I probably don't like you anyway.
This book flails for deeper meaning, nothing is beyond its frenetic writhing for a sense of superiority; Freudian relationships, vulgar sex, mysticism, conspiracy theories, mafia, police corruption, Freemasons, the Catholic Church, the Royal Family, art, poetry nothing is left untouched in the fruitless search for the high ground and appearance of genius. The prose is unreadable with random words in capitals, the poetry is even worse it a pretentious way. The start of the book takes far too long to get going and at no point are you rewarded with any conceptual unity or anything resembling a coherent plot.
This is weirdness not even for its own sake but for the sake of a feeling of superiority for those who pretend to see the absent greater meaning. In writing this I have discharged my duty, you have been warned.
P.S. I considered not reviewing as perhaps I was out of my area of expertise after all I only picked up these books because they were a full set. Perhaps I didn't understand the aims of the work? Then I realised that I didn't care and if you are the sort of person who enjoys this nonsense then I probably don't like you anyway.
August 24, 2017
it's read it in my early 20s. i found it, and the sequel, tough going but thought it was me that was the problem. From what Charles has written i feel a bit better about my 20-something reading capabilities.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews