My polemic with the review in Technopolis/Polityka.
It is possible then to think about SF not in the bourgeois terms of the novel, but as an experimental science. The object of study is not the ideological reproduction of SF, but a philosophical self-reflection upon these conditions of ideological reproduction. To read is to discover the absolute difference a novel has from its own ideological form, to the degree that it overcomes its own implication in bourgeois structures of generic reproduction.
Consequently, Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness, which imagines a human species without a sex drive, can be taken as a concrete, scientific suggestion to engineer a human society that is not warped by libidinal investments. In looking to the limits of a world of ideological reproduction, Le Guin engineers that shock and disgust of actual difference, and its possibility in the science of genetics. Reading Le Guin as a proposition of actual difference brings the experience of reading closer to us, without the distorting effects of interpretation and ideas of mediation. Althusser’s critique of ideology creates opportunities for discovering the experimental science that SF has in common with revolutionary consciousness. For Althusser, such science is the self-consciousness of capitalism, and enables a thinking of the conditions by which capitalism produces ideology. In Le Guin’s novel, for instance, the figuration of a world without sex reveals the ideology of a sexed world. This is revolutionary because, as that which eludes ideology, this world without sex does not repeat that which has gone before, but inhabits the contemporary moment of creation. In this, Althusser looks to the absolute difference that escapes historical repetition, that creates the consciousness that is of itself revolutionary. SF is, as a genre, a structure of ideological reproduction, but it also fosters a critical and revolutionary consciousness of absolute difference.
Darren Jorgensen “Towards a Revolutionary Science Fiction: Althusser’s Critique of Historicity,” 205.
I bring you life-with. It’s more than love. Love’s a hard, sad, dirty word, a cold word, an old word. It says too much and it promises too little. I bring you something much bigger than love. If you’re alive, you’re alive. If you’re alive-with, then you know the other life is there too—both of you, any of you, all of you. Don’t do anything. Don’t grab, don’t clench, don’t possess. Just be. That’s the weapon. (Cordwainer Smith “The Dead Lady of Clown Town”)
I feel greater than the sum of all my parts
A domestic beast with a hairy heart
Trapped within a walled suburbia
I found my taste is somewhat underground
Between the shadows and the cracks
I’m building my Utopia
I need to break free from all that binds
That makes me old before my time
In this world of dystopia
My love is like a bright, guiding light
Shining in the darkness of the night
The star of my Utopia
In the motion of the sea, in the air that we breathe
Can you feel me?
In the stars and in the trees, in the song of the bees
Can you hear me?
Caged, golden memories
Time has come to show your true feelings
I know it’s the only way to be
When the same old feelings come over me
I feel greater than the sum of all my parts
A space jockey from a distant star
Marooned upon dystopia
I found my taste is somewhat underground
Between the shadows and the cracks
I’m building my utopia
In the motion of the sea, in the air that we breathe
Can you feel me?
In the stars and in the trees, in the song of the bees
Can you hear me?
Literary forms that helped create the preconditions for the appearance of science fiction as a singular phenomenon in the late 19th century:
* utopian fictions
* fairy tales
* classical myths
* earthly paradises
* folk stories about cockaigne
* extraordinary voyages
* millenarian fantasies
* philosophical dialogues
* technological blueprints
* political manifestos and satires
* inventor stories
* historical novels
* gothic fictions
[Anamorphosis] is a philosophy of false reality, or, more precisely, a poetics of alternative realities. An anamorphic image posits the coded presence of an almost unimaginable reality that momentarily obtrudes on ideologically constituted reality, thereby rendering it arbitrary, ontologically inconsistent [. . .] The effect of anamorphosis, philosophically speaking, is therefore that of extreme relativisation. Anamorphic perspective radically subjectifies the act of seeing, and so exposes the fact that linear perspective, dependent on the notion that there is one, motionless point from which the subject can adequately perceive the object, is far from objective. [. . .] It demonstrates that the dominant perception of reality is not natural but cultural; and this, potentially, is politically enabling, because it reveals that reality can be altered.
Matthew Beaumont “Anamorphic Estrangements of Science Fiction”
artykuł w Technopolis/Polityce
Unfortunately, the stance of Islam on this issue has been grossly misunderstood. It is not true that Islam prohibits pictures and portraits in the absolute sense. Only pictures which cultivate sentiments of worship in people are prohibited. The bases of this view point are presented below:
By collecting and analyzing all the Ahadith on portrait and image making, the complete picture which emerges is that a particular category of pictures and portraits had acquired the status of idols and were worshipped. They were regarded as deities by the people of Arabia. As such, they used to consider them alive and capable of granting them their wishes. They used to bow down before them in adoration. Even in the Ka`bah, as a study of its history reveals, besides numerous idols, there were many sacred pictures drawn on its walls. Consequently, there is mention of the fact that the portraits of Abraham (sws) and Ismail (sws) were sketched on its walls. Moreover, A`isha (rta) has narrated some Ahadith in which it is stated that the portraits of Maryam (rta) and Jesus (sws) were suspended on the walls of churches and people used to bow to them.
In the light of these details, the prohibition of portraits can easily be understood: only portraits which possess religious sanctity and lead people into worshipping them are prohibited. Pictures, photographs and image-making, it is clear, is not condemned because of any intrinsic evil in them, but because they contribute to the polytheistic tendencies of people. The Qur’an regards monotheism as the fundamental article of faith, and the Prophet (sws) considered it his duty to eliminate any traces of polytheism in the society; therefore, he ordered for the elimination of portraits and images which had assumed the status of gods. Consequently, if these Ahadith are carefully studied, the words which cannot be missed are `such pictures.. ‘ and `these pictures…’, which point only to a certain type of portraits and not to all forms. In this regard, another Hadith often quoted in support of their total and unconditional prohibition, I am afraid, has not been interpreted correctly. The words of the Prophet (sws) as quoted in the Sahih of Bukhari are:
Creators of images shall be chastised and asked to inject life in them and they shall be unable to do so. (Kitab al-Libas)
These words actually point to what has been stated earlier. People used to regard these images as living beings and as such used to invoke their help. The Hadith warns such people and says that those who believe that these images are living creatures and will save them on the Day of Judgement from the wrath of the Almighty, shall actually be asked to inject life in them on that Day to redeem them of their punishment. This demand, of course, will only be meant to add insult to injury.
It is therefore evident that the prohibition of pictures pertains to a specific form. If the art of image making and sculpturing does not cultivate the sentiments of worship towards something, then it is certainly not disallowed. Islam has no objection against photographs, which, today, have become a social need as well in the form of identity cards, passports, etc, whether they are made by a still camera or a video camera. Similarly, pictures of one’s relatives and family bear no label of prohibition.
Pt. I, Ch. 2, “L.A. Noir and Forgetting”
“there are noir and apocalyptic scenarios that continually repeat in literature, film and the visual arts from Los Angeles. By the mid sixties, they take on an increasingly disengaged spirit, like a nightmare one watches through the windshield of a car” (81).
Pt. V, Ch. 12, “Suburban Noir and Cyberspace”
“in the chain of exurban extension, cyberspace is the next suburb. The best guided tour of suburban cyberspace is probably by architect and critic William J. Mitchell …. how ‘asynchronous’ it will be … with ‘fragmented subjects who exist as collections of aliases and agents.’ He could have been describing the imaginary L.A. freeway circa 1970″ (298).
Norman M. Klein, The History of Forgetting: Los Angeles and the Erasure of Memory (London and New York: Verso, 1997)
“I Re-wrote Those Motherfuckers From Scratch”
Posted by Marc Bousquet on 01/05/10 at 03:26 PM
Bérubé How many submissions did you receive for The Institution of Literature?
Williams 385, not counting the nine essays you submitted, eight of which sucked, if you don’t mind my saying so.
Bérubé Not at all. I totally respect your opinion when it comes to essays of mine that suck.
Williams Well, they did. As did many of the 65 essays I accepted, 38 of which I had to rewrite.
Lyon That sounds like a lot.
Williams Yeah. I take editing seriously.
Bérubé Well, how much rewriting did you do? We’re talking line edits, right?
Williams Fuck no. I rewrote those motherfuckers from scratch.
Bérubé Really? What did their authors say about that?
Williams I didn’t ask them. Why?
Bérubé Well, because most of the time, when editors make substantial changes to a manuscript, they run them by the authors, that’s why.
Williams Fuck that. If I ran things by people, do you know long it would take me to produce an issue?
Bérubé No, how long?
Williams Too fucking long, that’s how long. There’s no way I have time to send editorial suggestions back to people who’ll only sit on them for four or five months and then get back to me with a bunch of bullshit complaints about what I’ve cut. Besides, do you think that guys like Leitch and Kumar give a shit either way? It’s not like they’re going to notice. Hell, I stuck three paragraphs from the Grundrisse into your first essay and you didn’t say a fucking word.
Bérubé Wait, wait. That whole bit about how “the question of the relation between this production-determining distribution, and production, belongs evidently within production itself”? That wasn’t mine?
–excerpted from Michael Bérubé and Janet Lyon, The Early Years: An Interview with Jeffrey J. Williams
My contribution to the ongoing discussion “O co toczy sie gra” in Dziennika/Kultura. PDF here. Polish only
He wants to live long enough to witness a news, post-genomic fiction. one that grasps the interpenetrating loops of inheritance and upbringing so tangled that every cause is some other cause’s effect. One that, through a kind of collaborative writing, shakes free of the prejudices of any individual maker. For now, fiction remains at best a scattershot mood-regulating concoction - a powerful if erratic cocktail like Ritalin for ADHD, or benzodiazepines for the sociophobe. In time, like every other human creation , it will be replaced by better, more precise molecular fine-tuning. (Generosity 230)
“You’re going to make us all happy. Is that the plan?”
His eyebrows crumple and his lips sour. She’s hurt him, at least as much as he’s capable of being hurt by anyone. He shrugs off her mockery. “A little more capable of being well in the world. But not if you don’t want it, of course.”
“You folks have finally found the formula for soma. Damn.”
He breathes out a long-suffering sigh and leans against her car. “First, I really do hope that Aldous Huxley is burning in the pain-ennobling hell of his choice. That book is one of the most dangerous, hope-impeding, ideological rants ever written. Just because the author is stunted by some virtuous vision of embattled humanity, the rest of the race is supposed to keep suffering for all time?” (178)
(Richard Powers Generosity. An Enhancement)
Will I see you again? he wanted to ask. But he was afraid of ruining everything.
He left the circle, and after waiting a long time caught a bus on the road back into the city proper. Whatever I do now, he said to himself on the bus, staring out the window at the volcano in the distance, I cannot do for her. I cannot assume she’ll be mine. I must act on the assumption she’ll never be mine, that it will never be less impossible than it all seems at this moment. I must act on the assumption that I’ll never see her again, except for a passing moment in the street or the Market, and that love has been left hanging in the black space of a small room, and in the light, with a husband and a child, she’ll feel very different tomorrow., if she doesn’t already. Therefore, what I do now ultimately has nothing to do with her. It has to do with the life I’ve been living. It has to do with the man I’ve been and who I am now, without her, and what my life is now, without her.
He went home and left his wife.
She wanted him to say something. She wanted him to say it was alright, but more than that she wanted some ridiculous sort of reassurance that somehow it all didn’t matter. The enormity of what she’d done hadn’t sunk in. She hoped he wouldn’t hate her, and she could take some relief in that, because he didn’t hate her, there was nothing in his face like hatred, only disbelief; he stood up from the bed not looking at her at all; and she’d suddenly realized he was leaving, and she was simply astounded by it. It simply didn’t occur to her that whatever had been dome or said could mean he was going to walk away now and be gone from her. It never crossed her mind for a moment that these were the last moments she’d ever lay eyes on him. She reached for him as he turned to go, and he bent down and kissed her gently and quickly.
I love the ashes. I love the endless smoky twilight of Los Angeles. I love walking along Sunset Boulevard past the bistros where the Hollywood trash have to brush the black soot off their salmon linguini in white wine sauce before they can eat it. I love driving across one black ring after another all the way to the sea, through the charred palisades past abandoned houses, listening through the open windows to the phone machines clicking on and off with messages from somewhere east of the Mojave, out of the American blue. I’ve been in a state of giddiness ever since the riots of ten years ago, when I would take a break from finishing my last book and go to the rooftop, watching surround me the first ring of fire from the looting. I still go up there, and the fires still burn. They burn a dead swath between me and my memories. They burn a swath between me and the future, stranding me in the present. reducing definitions of love to my continuing gaze across the smouldering panorama as Viv, my little carnal ferret, devours me on her knees. I love having nothing to hope for but the cremation of my dreams; when my dreams are dead the rest of me is alive, all cinder and appetite. (Amnesiascope 5)
Because Beau, the only one she would have stayed with, was unclaimable - not all the nights she had spent by his side had let her into him, he would stop at her frontiers, always, or gently stop her at his own - and it was so painful and disorienting that she thought she had better find out if it was because of something that was in her or something in Beau or something in all men, something that wouldn’t couple with whatever it was in her, as though she were threaded wrong, or they were (230).
He had never made his general happiness, the furtherance of his goals or the fulfilling of his needs, a condition of his love for anyone, certainly not any of the women he had been with. He had tried to find and supply what they needed; hadn’t asked anything for himself but that they would not go, not tire of him, not discard him. He’d never learned - who could have told him, if he simply didn’t know? - that one thing you can do to keep her by you, given a general good disposition toward you, is to give her something to do for you: something that, maybe, would take a lifetime. That way she’d remain, maybe. And the thing you asked for would be done for you, too, to some degree, in some way, which would be heartening and lovely even if it wasn’t always or entirely successful. I need your help (238).
At the dawn of cinema these two tendencies were already evident in the split between the brothers Lumiere and George Melies, for whereas the former concerned themselves with realist spectacles such as the arrival of a train at a station or people sitting around playing cards, Melies invented the special effect as a tool by means of which he was able to render spaceships, robots and dragons in a way that would be convincing, at least, to the average theater goer.
It was precisely Melies’s concern with what we refer to as the “Visionary” tendency in cinema–its Carnival cultural residue–to be the true and proper use of the medium. In this sense, film is closer to the spirit of the delighted rabble depicted watching The Magic Flute in Milos Forman’s Amadeus , than to the stiff-necked upper classes shown patronizing The Marriage of Figaro. For it is in the Visionary modality that myth functions as the telescope for viewing into the deepest reaches of the human soul, ironically transforming the movie camera from a mere optical device for recording consensus reality to a pulsing organic machine capable of peering with its intrusive Eye into our dreaming skulls.
from “The Visionary Movie: a Manifesto”
This is the way movie reviews should be written. Or any kind of reviews. In fact, why don’t you go on and check out the entire website - it’s funny, informative and scary-smart to boot.
Scary.
God, he thought, and felt ill. Was this what Tanya Lee had called the “aquatic horror” shape? It had no shape. Nor pseudopodia, either flesh or metal. It was, in a sense, not there at all; when he managed to look directly at it, the shape vanished; he saw through it, saw the people on the far side — but not it. Yet if he turned his head, caught it out of a sidelong glance, he could determine its boundaries.
It was terrible; it blasted him with its awareness. As it moved it drained the life from each person in turn; it ate the people who had assembled, passed on, ate again, ate more with an endless appetite. It hated; he felt its hate. It loathed; he felt its loathing for everyone present — in fact he shared its loathing. All at once he and everyone else in the big villa were each a twisted slug, and over the fallen slug carcasses the creature savored, lingered, but all the time coming directly toward him — or was that an illusion? If this is a hallucination, Chien thought, it is the worst I have ever had; if it is not, then it is evil reality; it’s an evil thing that kills and injures. He saw the trail of stepped-on, mashed men and women remnants behind it; he saw them trying to reassemble, to operate their crippled bodies; he heard them attempting speech.
I know who you are, Tung Chien thought to himself. You, the supreme head of the worldwide Party structure. You, who destroy whatever living object you touch; I see that Arabic poem, the searching for the flowers of life to eat them — I see you astride the plain which to you is Earth, plain without hills, without valleys. You go anywhere, appear any time, devour anything; you engineer life and then guzzle it, and you enjoy that.
from “Faith of Our Fathers”
Spontaneous perception of connections and meaningfulness in unrelated things.
“—You is from hunger, Mr Bones”
Intense.