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State of unBeing 25
Living in such a state taTestaTesTaTe etats a hcus ni gniviL
of mind in which time sTATEsTAtEsTaTeStA emit hcihw ni dnim of
does not pass, space STateSTaTeSTaTeStAtE ecaps ,ssap ton seod
does not exist, and sTATeSt oFOfOfo dna ,tsixe ton seod
idea is not there. STatEst ofoFOFo .ereht ton si aedi
Stuck in a place staTEsT OfOFofo ecalp a ni kcutS
where movements TATeSTa foFofoF stnemevom erehw
are impossible fOFoFOf elbissopmi era
in all forms, UsOFofO ,smrof lla ni
physical and nbEifof dna lacisyhp
or mental - uNBeInO - latnem ro
your mind is UNbeinG si dnim rouy
focusing on a unBEING a no gnisucof
lone thing, or NBeINgu ro ,gniht enol
a lone nothing. bEinGUn .gnihton enol a
You are numb and EiNguNB dna bmun era ouY
unaware to events stneve ot erawanu
taking place - not -iSSuE- ton - ecalp gnikat
knowing how or what TWENTY-FiVE tahw ro woh gniwonk
to think. You are in 04/30/96 ni era uoY .kniht ot
a state of unbeing.... ....gniebnu fo etats a
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
CONTENTS OF THIS ISSUE
EDiTORiAL by Kilgore Trout
LETTERS TO THE EDiTOR
* STAFF LiSTiNG
* ARTiCLES
+ WHY THE REVOLUTiON WiLL FAiL by Nemo est Sanctus
+ MiND PROBE #3: I Wish My Name Were Nathan, Irrepressible
Youth and Conscience by Noni Moon
+ ME by Morrigan
+ DADA, NiETZSCHE, AND THE ASCETiC iDEAL by I Wish My Name Were
Nathan
* POETASTRiE
+ AD HOMiNEM by Kilgore Trout
* FiCTiON
+ POiSONPEN by CJ Hooknose
+ REQUiEM OF A DYING BOY by Kilgore Trout
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
LETTERS TO THE EDiTOR
[once again, we present more letters from our hearty readers.
unfortunately, my new mail program decided to strip the headers when i
saved them. not exactly my night at zine publishing, eh? quick
rundown: fuck 'em, sell 'em, mail 'em.]
* * * * *
i know you are not kilgore trout. vonnegut knows you are not kilgore
trout and if fools don't know who kilgore trout is- fuck em.
[i know i'm not kilgore trout, too. i doubt vonnegut knows i even
exist -- he doesn't like computers. as for fucking people who don't
know who kilgore trout is: i doubt they're my type.]
* * * * *
Kilgore,
I saw your listing in Labovitz's e-zine collection and
I thought you may be interested in doing a little
bit more in the zine business.
I know many zines prefer to remain an underground
organization and you may be one of them. But in case
you have higher aspirations, why do not you download
Web Buster, a free, HTML 3.0 compatible, fully
graphical Web browser and see what kind of an
online publication you could turn your zine into.
Web Buster is available from this Web site:
http://www.acdcon.com/
Web Buster is in the self-installing webbuste.exe file.
After installing Web Buster, call
http://www.acdcon.com/index.epb
to see with your own eyes what a regular Web site can
look like. Just a remark before you call: do not expect
slow Web pages that put you to sleep ...
The site is in its early stages yet, but it shows
very well the possibilities. It is constructed with
E-Publisher, a fully graphical Web authoring tool, which
is fairly simple to use. Depending on your enthusiasm and
imagination, you could set up much more amazing Web pages.
If you are interested in more, just write to me. If you
adopt this technology, I will link your site into mine.
My site will be heavily advertised, which means your site
gets a lot of extra exposure through the link.
Where else can you receive a free promotion like that?
Regards,
Laslo Chaki
*******************************
* lchaki@acdcon.com *
* ACD:Developer of Epublisher *
* and Web Buster *
*******************************
[ack. don't even know why i'm running this. guess i just thought it
was too damn funny to pass up. the beginning is the best, the part
about how want to be underground, but if you have "higher
aspirations," then this guy's product is for you. like i'm doing this
to be cool. i do it cuz i like it. and i actually took the time to try
out his free web browser, knowing full well that hardly anyone is
going to load up a separate browser apart from their main one just to
look at a zine. damn thing errored out in the installation. heh. i
like ascii. how about you?]
* * * * *
Well... I got issue 23 off a local board (the sprawl)..
its really good...
I too live in Austin tx..
Just wanted to say I like the zine, and to please add me to the
mailing list...
thats about it..
[glad to know some local folks are reading it. sorry i lost your
address. i'm also sorry to say that we don't have a mailing list. if
anyone wants to set one up for us, well, you'll like get your name in
big shiny letters in the zine or something. probably or something.]
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
EDiTORiAL
by Kilgore Trout
Heidi ho, boys and girls (and heidi, too, since her name is ALSO a
greeting). Welcome to issue #25, a big issue, and yet, we're still
such a quaint zine.
(Fucking right, eh, Clockwork? Just WHERE the HELL are your
SUBMiSSiONS? I've been waiting for AGES! Get them to me PRONTO or
I'll FIRE your ASS!!!)
Er, sorry, I always wanted to see what it felt like to be a
ruthless, cruel editor/dictator who ruled his writers with an
extremely large cat o' nine tails. Instead, I'm just a nice guy who
barely has time to spell check, as IWMNWN likes to point out all
the time.
Anyway, this issue has been rife with troubles for yours truly. It
was supposed to come out last night, but I discovered that a new
release of NetHack had been released, and, well, I ended up
pretending I was a Valkyrie all night long. And I still use the
ASCII mode too! No graphics tiles for this purist!
"Stop being a goddamn martyr!" yells Luke. "Get your ass to the
Falcon."
Seems this editorial is getting a tad bit TOO goofy, so I guess I
better wrap this sucker up. Noni Moon brings us another wonderful
interview with IWMNWN; Nathan writes about Dada and Nietzsche;
Morrigan is back after a long absence, which we are very happy
about; a first time writer puts a twist on serial killing; and I've
put in some literary trash of my own dealing with teen angst. I
never did that when I was in high school, but it's never too late
to start, eh?
Anyway, remember that the summer is coming up, and everyone knows
what happened last time that season rolled around. May looks real
nice, people send me stuff, and then it's dead in the summer. Make
Kilgore happy! Send me stuff, and I'll publish it. I tell ya, it'll
look good on your college application/job resume (only if they
can't actually get ahold of the zine).
Toodles and all that jazz.
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
STAFF LiSTiNG
EDiTOR
Kilgore Trout
CONTRiBUTORS
CJ Hooknose
I Wish My Name Were Nathan
Kilgore Trout
Morrigan
Nemo est Sanctus
Noni Moon
GUESSED STARS
Laslo Chaki
two lost souls who wrote letters
SoB HORNED GEEK OF THE MONTH
The Anti-Christ's accountant
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
[=- ARTiCLES -=]
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
Previous|Next
WHY THE REVOLUTiON WiLL FAiL
by Nemo est Sanctus
"The personal revolution is far more difficult Then the first steps
in any revolution."
-- the Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy
The Revolution -- this Revolution, in the hearts and minds of the
Western people of the '90's -- will fail. It will not fall to
superior arms or superior numbers. It will not fall from lack of
economic clout. It will fall because the people who claim to want
it have defeated themselves.
"In order for an enemy to defeat you," it has been rightly said,
"you must first defeat yourself." The Western version is similar:
"A house divided upon itself cannot stand." Luke 11:17. Do I mean
the Revolutionaries of today are not of one purpose? To an extent.
The Revolutionaries on the Left and the Revolutionaries on the
Right do not see eye to eye and will not see eye to eye, as they
blind each other in petty disagreements. They allow themselves to
be separated by the system, and, worse, they separate themselves.
But this is not the most important thing. The Revolutionary force
is splintered because of the Revolutionaries.
Those of the Revolution are of two minds. More correctly, they are
of one mind and one soul. The Revolutionary knows something is
wrong, but this Revolution is not Revolution; it is Reaction. The
Revolutionary today does not know what is right.
A Revolutionary knows he must die. The hobbyist and the whining
"oppressed" do not, but it is not of these that I write. For these,
I have barely a moment to dismiss them, I will not spend an hour to
address them. The Revolutionary knows he must die, because a
Revolutionary is dead the day he takes the name. He dies to himself
that he may live in the right, and that other may one day breathe
free. He dies that the Reactionary whiners may have life, of a
sort.
The Revolution today, though, will fail, because the Revolutionary
today does not know how to live.
How does one learn to live? That is the very difference between the
Revolutionary and the Reactionary. A Reactionary does just as the
name implies: he reacts. A Reactionary sees what is wrong in the
world, and he opposes it. In this morbidity he steeps and dies,
because one who dwells on evil cannot live. The Nihilist is the
ultimate Reactionary, saying, "Because there is some evil in the
world I know, I will oppose all the world." A Reactionary cannot
win a Revolution, for he cannot even see it. It is the inherent
Reaction that will dull the senses of the Constitutionalists and
the Militias, as they say, "When the government goes too far, then
we will react." They hope thereby to gain the support of the people
who feel less threatened by a supposed protector than by a true
liberator. They also hope to avoid the animosity of those who seek
to destroy us, but that is hopeless. To the Archons, the
Reactionaries are a potential, though drunk, obstacle. They see
that better than the Reactionaries themselves. They know that the
Reaction can make conquest slightly more difficult, and that the
right leader can turn Reaction into Revolution. The tolerance and
the patience of the Reaction will not be returned. The tolerance
and patience of the Reaction will be the destruction of the
Reaction. And the Revolution.
Every Revolution must have life. Every Revolution is a theological
Revolution. When the Americans cast off the British, they did so
with cries like, "No king but Christ." When the British rebelled
against their kings, they did so with preachers in their midst,
with benedictions like, "Lord give us thy strength to crush yet
another regiment of thy enemies, may they fall before thy soldiers
swords like wheat." When the Russians brought down their Tzar, they
put up icons of Lenin in the place of the saints, and worshipped a
system, a creation instead of the Creator.
A Revolutionary must fight for something. That something is his
god. The revolution today will fail because the gods for which the
agitators fight -- "freedom" to do anything that catches their
fancy, "justice" to take away another's property and life -- are
dead idols. What good is freedom without a code to tell one what is
good? One ends up blindly pursuing anything that takes one's fancy,
and slain. What good is "justice" without a measure to see what is
truly just? Those cannot exist without an ideal, without a god.
The one thing that all the gods which are fashionable today have in
common is that they are all centered on the selfish pleasures of
the individual. Freedom of speech, freedom of choice, without a
true ideal are simply selfishness. They are fashionable, and
tolerated, and even encouraged by the state, because they prevent
the people from unifying behind a true ideal and fighting for true
freedom.
Only when the agitators, the leaders, the Revolutionaries turn
themselves over to the good, to the just, in short to God, will
they be able to fight, and have something to fight for. Without a
clearly defined objective, no force can be expected to win.
Only when the souls and minds of the people are reunified to fight
for the true freedom, the true justice, will victory prevail. You
have been made free, will you make yourself a slave again?
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
"Dear Abby, You're a lying old-maid whore-slut. You dish out advice
for sick and naive people all across the nation without a thought
to their livelihoods. You haven't lived their lives. You can't play
God any longer, you bitch-slut. Put down your pen and curl up and
die, you old bag of pus. Concerned in Connaway
Dear Concerned, I'm going to act like I never read that."
-- Nathan's wandering mind
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
Previous|Next
MiND PROBE #3: I Wish My Name Were Nathan, Irrepressible Youth and
Conscience
by Noni Moon
Nate asked me to meet him at the Southwestern University campus,
where he attends classes. Although he showed up on time on the
veranda of the Student Building where we agreed to meet, I didn't
find him until I approached a fifteen-year-old boy sitting in the
corner and found out it was him.
NM: You look like a little kid.
IW: I'm twenty-one, you know.
NM: Kilgore said you had long hair.
IW: Oh, oh yeah, you haven't talked to him lately. I just got it
cut. It's fun to make people think I'm a tourist.
NM: A tourist? On campus?
IW: Yeah, like some kid who wandered here by accident. If I had a
skateboard it would help, I guess.
NM: I don't get it.
IW: Oh, kids ride their skateboards around here a lot. The
administration is looking into pest-removal options.
NM: Really? How?
IW: Don't worry about it, I was just kidding. I'm hardly ever
serious, you know. How about this -- when I say something gravely
important, I'll make a signal like this: <makes intricate signs
with his hands> After this is over, you can weed out the noise and
have a gravely important interview.
NM: <laughs> You're not going to make this easy on me, are you?
IW: No.
NM: All right, then. You're not going to make me listen to Tom
Swifties, are you?
IW: Oh, jeez, no. "I'd rather die," Tom croaked.
NM: Uurgh! You watch it, I have sharp nails.
IW: <laughs> I dislike saying those as much as you do hearing them.
NM: Good. Let's start an interview here, okay?
IW: Sure, go ahead.
NM: Everyone's dying to know: what's with the name?
IW: Nathan? I just like the name.
NM: No, do you wish your name were Nathan?
IW: Not really. It's an artifact of years past. Too late to change
it now.
NM: Painful subject?
IW: Nope, I still like the handle. It used to be the longest until
that bastard "Dark Crystal Sphere Floating Between Two Universes"
came along. Oh well, it's not the length of the name but the motion
of the notion.
NM: <laughs> Okay. Since you're twenty-one now, that means you must
have started writing for SoB when you were... nineteen?
IW: Eighteen, actually.
NM: All right, eighteen. Over the past two years, your writing
style has changed dramatically, from teen angst to more mellow
pieces. I'm speaking in general. Why is that?
IW: Oh, man... I want inconsequential questions! No, seriously,
I've changed a lot since I got into college. I mean, you're
supposed to, right? You may remember that I wrote for that
underground paper in high school? Yeah, well that's when I was
going rabid over politics --
NM: I notice that thread still running through your work.
IW: Certainly, certainly. The way I was introduced to the whole
concept was really jarring. I consider myself a really naive
person, you see, and I hardly even thought about politics until I
was seventeen, all at once, when I accepted being gay, and found
out that it wasn't merely something you got called names for.
NM: So you are gay. Why haven't you ever said that in SoB?
IW: Huh? I always think I'm writing about it. I just don't make it
obvious most of the time. I don't want to make SoB my personal
crying rag. You see, I did do that in WTAWTAA. In there I published
a story I'd written while dealing with my sexual feelings. It
started out all nice, boy meets boy and such, and then they both
end up dead. I had a lot of stories like that, but I didn't publish
those, much less show them to anyone.
NM: So your introduction to politics was centered around this?
IW: Absolutely. I'd kept everything to myself for a few years, and
then Clinton got elected and tried to lift the ban on gays in the
military. Then I find out how rabid an issue homosexuality was in
America. I remember writing a lot during that time.
NM: Was that a bad twist?
IW: Well, actually no. Before I'd been so centered around myself
and silent that it was easy to assume the being gay was my own
problem to deal with. But then I found out it was a lot more
widespread than that, and that was nice. But at my school, it was
still an open-and-shut topic. So I got courageous and wrote a
militant coming-out article in WTAWTAA. I didn't say who I really
was, of course; I wasn't that brave. But I saw some people reading
it, and the fact that they didn't pass it over -- even if only to
laugh at it -- that was cool.
NM: That's an inspiring story.
IW: Not really.
NM: Didn't SoB start a few months after WTAWTAA?
IW: About half a year later.
NM: Oh, okay. It strikes me as strange since you didn't mention
homosexuality for a long time in your writing for SoB.
IW: <thinks> No, I guess I didn't. I was thinking about other
things at the time. I'd been through a semester of college when SoB
started up. That was emotionally draining because I hadn't gotten
around to making any friends yet. So I rebelled against society in
general, la dee dah, et cetera.
NM: That's a nasty tone you have there. Are you ashamed of doing
that?
IW: What, all the teen angst? Yeah, I guess so. It's difficult to
look back at old stuff I've written because it's so entirely
negative. There's no hope in it. It's all about people getting
their naive mindsets blown away.
NM: Because that's what happened to you.
IW: Yeah. You see, in a span of a few months, I'd gone from being a
quiet nerdy type in high school to being a raging queer-rights
nerdy type, and I couldn't talk to anyone about it, not my family,
teachers, or friends. It was hellish. I internalized all the rage
and it tore me apart.
NM: You didn't tell your friends?
IW: No, no, I told them. But I always had the impression they were
just humoring me and not taking me seriously. It was an immature
thing for me to think. But hell, I was immature. I'm still immature
now. I have this habit of magnifying everything to gigantic
proportions and then reacting against it. I mean, I told one of my
friends I was gay and he laughed in disbelief. I took it as a
personal affront. Hell, I'd been denying it for years anyway; who
could blame him?
NM: Don't feel bad about it. I know what you mean. It's easier to
react than to stand back and consider things for what they are.
IW: NO IT'S NOT!!! <laughs> Just kidding, Noni. That was a joke.
NM: <looks around to see who's watching us now> You're a maniac,
aren't you?
IW: No. Seriously, I agree with what you said. I lifted the issue
of homosexuality to gigantic proportions. It's not as important as
I thought it was. It doesn't bother me anymore. I think the
militant queers still think it's much too important. They try to
equate our situation with, oh, the black civil rights movement. Gay
rights is nowhere near as important. Slavery, Reconstruction, and
festering racism led to loss of economic power and liberty for
blacks. That's something you need to fight against, since it makes
it difficult to survive. Gays, on the other hand... if no one knows
about it, you're just another person. Gays aren't a species of
animal that need to be protected.
NM: What about gaybashing? You don't want laws against that?
IW: Noni, look: there are already laws against hurting, killing,
and maiming people. Why have this extra layer of legislation that
says, if you hurt a gay person, it's worse? I think it's a
widespread self-image problem among us. We act weak and want all
this protection. I think it'd be much more bold to say, "We're
strong enough to defend ourselves, thank you very much." Begging
for more laws is just begging for more pain in the long run. You
can see effects of affirmative action -- although it's had positive
effects for many minorities, it only serves to keep the racial
wounds raw. Why provoke people? If they're bigots, they're not
going to undergo a miraculous change of heart just because a law
tells them to.
NM: You seem to have thought about this a long time.
IW: Indeed I have.
NM: I know you like to write about teenagers. What do you think
about gay teenagers? Should they be protected?
IW: Oh, certainly they should.
NM: Doesn't that contradict --?
IW: Not at all. High school is certainly not the real world, I'll
tell you that. It's really difficult to be gay there since <makes
hand gestures> Normal Heterosexual Relationships <stops waving
hands> are so important. It's drilled into your head. Why are gym
classes segregated by sex? They don't want boys and girls getting
all worked up around each other. Why are proms so important?
Because that's where you're supposed to get worked up. Even more
than that, there's such huge pressure to be normal and conform.
Homosexuality is still peripheral to high-school society, therefore
it's strictly off- limits. I swear, guys wearing long hair has only
recently been accepted at schools, although it's been a fad since
the sixties.
NM: And then there was that case where a school banned all clubs
rather than allowing a gay club.
IW: Pure idiocy. That club would be just the thing that would help
those kids make it through. The issue is made up to be so important
that kids think they have to commit suicide rather than live queer.
It's partly immaturity, I mean as in the way I was. I thought it
was so important, and it's made to be important in high school, but
really, it's just a biological happenstance. Who cares? That's the
kind of message high school society needs to accept. You see, I
just want some emotional protection for those kids, so they don't
think they're so abnormal.
NM: I see what you mean, then. I came from an Austin school that
was better about it. They had some gay teachers you could talk to
there.
IW: That rules, but I didn't go there, you know.
NM: True. Whew. Have we beat that topic to death yet?
IW: Probably not, but go ahead.
NM: Your story "No strings attached" --
IW: Aaaargh!
NM: -- what?
IW: Oh, nothing.
NM: "No strings attached" was the longest story you've published,
right?
IW: Uh-huh. It was 100k. I actually have an unfinished 200k story
from a few years back, but it sucks.
NM: I don't believe it. I think your writing has been consistently
good. "No strings attached" blew me away. Summarize it for those
readers who skipped it.
IW: You're sure some did, eh?
NM: Whoops, I didn't mean it to sound like that.
IW: Sure you didn't. <laughs> That story evolved into something
completely different than I expected. The main character, Jonathan,
was going to be a zoned-out druggie, and the story was going to be
a humorous piece about how the world appeared to him. I did keep
that feel in his perceptions of the world, but a different story
evolved. Anyway, Jonathan works at a convenience store, and he has
been for six years. During an ice storm in Texas (all fifteen
degrees of it) Jonathan walks home and meets this homeless kid
Jeremy and lets him live in his apartment to escape the cold. And
the reader soon finds out that Jeremy is gay and he and Jonathan
develop a warm friendship. A heartwarming tale! Excellent moral
lesson for readers ages 13-30.
NM: Don't be so sarcastic! I didn't think it was cheesy. It was
quite dark, if you looked past Jonathan's naive viewpoint and into
Jeremy's words.
IW: Are you some literary critic? <laughs>
NM: No. What is wrong with you? Can't you take compliments?
IW: No, I can't.
NM: Sorry about that, but I'll do it anyway. Tell about the end of
the story. That's the important part.
IW: I don't want to give it away, in case --
NM: Fuck 'em who haven't read it.
IW: Hee hee, okay. What turns out is that Jeremy is an angel.
Really a "spirit" but I forgot to search-and-replace. He committed
one of those trademark suicides of mine but he didn't die.
Apparently he's immortal. During an acid trip, after John realizes
what a boring life he has, he realizes he died a while back. He's
boring because Jeremy brought him back to life and gave him a shit
job. Ta-da! Oh, and of course, John realizes he's gay too. I don't
know why that had to be.
NM: Because he committed suicide and his soul was in torment,
remember?
IW: Oh yeah, that makes sense.
NM: You've written about suicide several times, such as in "Tell me
a story," "Here's what the human race can do," and "Ramblings of an
insomniac." Is it too personal to ask what you think about that
subject?
IW: Yes, it is. Right now it's not something I think about.
NM: Oh, okay, sorry.
IW: Oh, what the hell. I have this feeling that I'm a low-grade
manic- depressive or something. Sometimes I get depressed and think
about suicide for an inordinate amount of time. Each time it's a
different reason. I felt bad dredging up that
gay-person-commits-suicide theme in "No strings attached" because
it's so cliched to me and reminiscent of my teen angst period.
Lately the suicidal thoughts have accompanied general despair at
humanity. I might as well be a poet. <laughs sarcastically>
NM: I can see that concern with the fate of the human race in a lot
of your work. It seems though that you're getting more optimistic,
though.
IW: Oh really? That's news to me.
NM: Yes, really. I cried at the end of "No strings attached"
because it was so spiritually redeeming. Also, that story about the
father telling his son about life and death last month --
IW: Yeah, the father realizes he's looked at it the wrong way all
his life. That's when I was rejecting rationality. "No strings
attached" made me cry when I was writing it too. Noni, I think
you're right. Maybe I am more optimistic now. I think I've just
become more well-adjusted, that's all. I tend to extrapolate my
personal feelings onto everyone else. That's why I was lashing out
against society at the beginning -- I was really lashing out at
myself. It wasn't forgivable to be like that back then because I
had very little knowledge about how the world worked. But in
college and outside I've read a lot of books that are giving me a
more realistic perspective.
NM: Like in "Evolution of a coward"? You said something about a
missing thirteenth amendment?
IW: Oh, geez, dredge that up, why don't you. Yeah, I was under the
influence of conspiratorial writings at the time. I thought I knew
how everything worked then, but I wasn't taking in all sides.
Everyone tells the truth and lies intermittently. Just because
someone claims to have underground knowledge doesn't mean he's
right. I've learned simply not to trust everything I read or hear.
You can't take one perspective as fact; it doesn't make sense.
NM: Aaah, "sense!" I wanted to ask you about that. But first, where
I first noticed it -- your series of stories about Ethan. Are you
going to continue that?
IW: Well, I'm not currently thinking about it much. I think I
topped out in the last story. Anything else I write is going to be
more social commentary, and I get tired of that. But I have a duty
to flesh out the story. It's too interesting to finish it as it is.
NM: Is Ethan gay?
IW: Actually, no. He does seem to get hit on a lot, though.
NM: All right, back to "sense." It struck me as almost fanatical
how much importance Ethan puts into "sense" -- such as saying "TV
doesn't make sense." What's with that?
IW: Oh, that's one of the big changes I've been going through. I
have the capability to be a really rational person, as well as
artistic, and I realized I'd been letting that control my mindset
for too long. Coming to terms with being gay was the first time I
saw that a lot of things -- opinions, laws, prejudices -- didn't
make sense. Then the conspiratorial viewpoint added to the feeling
that a lot of what I see and hear is lies or misinformation. And
then I did acid in January and that was the last straw. I believed
for a while that nothing at all made sense and I had only been
lucky enough to think there was some structure to the world, and
then I lost it. Ethan had basically the same experience I did,
except I recovered. I can delude myself into thinking the world
usually makes sense, but it doesn't surprise me anymore when
something goes wrong, because it's just proof that I know it's all
nonsensical. It's funny to me. I laugh a lot more now.
NM: That's good, I guess. Do you regret taking acid?
IW: No, not at all. I just regret my reasons for doing so. I had
this optimistic dream that doing it would stop my depression. I
thought it would be some sort of psychiatry. That was really
stupid, because, as I learned, it's all in my head. I mean, I knew
what I was trying to do, and I knew it wouldn't work. I was just
wishing for the stars. During the trip I was just fine, though; I
was having fun, laughing, seeing things, etc. But the next day I
thought about how I tried to eliminate my depression and how
pointless it was and I got really depressed again.
NM: Yikes, that sucks. Are you afraid of flashbacks?
IW: No, not at all. Nothing bad happened during, it was only the
next day. I don't think acid deserves being illegal. I mean, I
learned a helluva lot from it that I probably wouldn't have even
thought about in my life. People just have to be careful, because
it lets you see how you construct reality, and some people don't
know how fucked-up and deluded they are. I was ready for that,
although I wanted too much. Hmmm, I did get two stories out of it,
though. <laughs>
NM: Why do you think acid is illegal?
IW: The government just dislikes drugs -- ones that don't already
have multi- billion dollar corporations built around them, that is.
They thought LSD would become some sort of opium or marijuana and
turn the working force of the nation into zombies. Of course, it
was a lot of hype, as well; the congressmen complied with
"concerned so-and-so" groups and made it illegal, even as it was
being tested by psychologists, psychiatrists, and doctors. They
were coming up with amazing findings about the structure of the
brain, like how it sees and organizes thoughts, but of course,
their funding got revoked.
That's a problem with this so-called democratic government. It
cares nothing about the individual. It assumes no one can make a
choice and accept the consequences for it. If you think about how
litigious we are now, a lot of it's a result of people getting
themselves into bad situations a little foresight would have
prevented, and then suing to make up for the damage. Like fuckin'
old ladies with hot coffee in their laps. I guess our government
foresaw that as a reason to illegalize so many drugs -- they didn't
want to pay the consequences for people's stupid actions. Hell, I
wouldn't want to either. People don't take responsibility for their
actions anymore.
The way drugs should be is, people should be educated about their
effects -- the REAL effects, not this bullshit D.A.R.E. paranoia --
and they should be allowed to take it. If they get sick, they go to
a hospital and pay for it. If they don't, then who cares? It's a
personal issue. It's nothing the government needs to worry about.
Of course, it's that way now, basically. You take acid and have a
bad trip, you can't say anything about it. You're not going to dare
sue the dealer, because then you've stamped yourself as a drug user
and you'll go to jail. In a sick way, this prohibition is forcing
people to be responsible.
NM: As for smokers...
IW: Oh yeah, don't get me started. I personally loathe tobacco
companies for lying about the effects of smoking, but that's their
own problem. On the other hand, smokers have been warned for years
about cancer, yet now they're suing like crazy and trying to ban
cigarettes. C'mon, people, take responsibility for killing
yourself. I mean, I don't like smoking, and I won't even dare do it
recreationally, but that's my opinion. I don't have the right to
tell someone else not to, though. But anyone under the age of forty
shouldn't have the right to sue tobacco companies, since they've
had the information at hand, right on the damned label, telling
them it's a bad idea to smoke. To sue is just being too stupid to
admit you made a mistake. It's like what would happen if people
sued for losing the lottery!
NM: I agree, although I'm slightly offended. <puffs>
IW: Hell, I don't care. We're not friends.
NM: Fuck you, man.
IW: Yeah, bite me. <laughs>
NM: Were you kidding?
IW: No. But I don't think you should have taken that personally,
because I wasn't talking about you.
NM: All right. Just a second, I need a drink. Is there a vending
machine around here?
IW: Yup, go in those doors over there -- up the stairs then to the
left. Here, get me a Coke.
NM: Okay. <walks off>
IW: <mutters> Who else can I alienate? <pauses> Ssh ssh sssh... ta
ta ta... <sings> do de do, nothing's for free, do de do de do,
nothing's for free, do de do de do, take it away, boys... da da de
da, nothing's for free... <pauses> there's a hole in your head,
there's a hole in your head, la la la la lee la la... shaddup.
NM: <hands Nate a Coke> Here y'are. I thought they'd be more
expensive here.
IW: That's nice.
NW: Back to the interview. It seems like you have a mission to save
America's youth.
IW: Eh? Oh, I see what you're talking about. I usually write about
teenagers because I can't consider myself experienced enough with
the adult psyche to write about it. The same goes with women,
unfortunately. And since I'm usually thinking about political
issues, that comes into my writing as well.
Overall, I guess I do have a "mission." I sympathize with anyone
who's growing up because society treats kids like shit. It's no fun
to grow up, because every year is one more step toward being
shackled into adulthood. You can't have fun when you're an adult
unless it involves spending a lot of money or getting drunk. Adults
know they've lost their youth and make it a point to discourage
kids from having theirs. It's really sad. It's such divisive
resentment.
NM: I don't think that's entirely true. Judging by TV, it's
important to be youthful.
IW: Noni, look closer. Advertisements say that. They're fucking
hypocrites. They know that kids are an important demographic
influence on spending habits, so they want to attract kids to their
product just for money. Materialism itself is an adult disease but
each year it hits more and more kids as well. It's a calculated
plan of action. Aside from that, look at how money for education
and welfare and parks is falling. Look at the fucking youth curfews
popping up everywhere. Adults hate kids.
NM: What about gangs and guns in school? Isn't that a reason?
IW: You've got to look at cause and effect. It was kids in big
cities, neglected and bored, who started gangs. It's power. Kids
have no power in this society; that's the only way they could get
some. Then, the guns got into the schools. Then, they passed
curfews. Never did they try to solve the root of the problem, which
is sprawling urban development. Kids can't control any of these
factors. They're just getting crushed.
I may be exaggerating, because I haven't lived in a big city
before, so I don't usually tackle such topics. My "mission" is to
save youthfulness . That is the remedy for the anal-retentive
materialistic hatred that adults spew.
NM: So you're not an adult?
IW: Not the kind I'm talking about, but I already am whether I like
it or not. I consider myself to have adult virtues, like
responsibility, a sense of history, and humanitarian consciousness.
I respect people who deserve it. But I'm never going to be an
American adult. No way.
NM: Would you prefer that kids all grew up naive?
IW: Oh, no way, not at all. Because that's what happened to me.
It's too easy to topple that blissful ignorance. No, what I think
is that kids need to know how things work, and not be fed lies.
But, at the same time, they should never be discouraged from being
youthful, since that's one of the only ways to prevent rampant
cynicism. American adults are much too serious about things. It
makes it so much easier to put things into perspective when you
don't take everything so damned seriously.
NM: I know what you mean. What sort of books do you read?
IW: This year I finished a crusade to read all of Kurt Vonnegut's
novels. That was really fun. I find a lot of similarities with his
philosophy. He's cynical underneath, but he still has optimism.
Reading him is taxing though. Even with the humor, it's impossible
to miss the tone of his writing. It's so deadpan dark. There's only
so much you can take at once.
After that, Kilgore bugged me to read some Terence McKenna and a
book called The Holographic Universe . Those were fascinating. They
present entirely new perspectives about how reality is constructed.
I recently finished Steppenwolf and Notes from Underground , which
are where I took quotes for my stories from last month. Those
eerily mirrored my personality at times and that was disturbing
because I had randomly picked them out, not expecting to find what
I did. In ethics class here I read Aristotle, Kant, and Nietzsche,
and am working on Foucault right now. I can't begin to describe
what those are doing to me.
In my spare time, I'm reading The Language Instinct by Steven
Pinker. It's all about language and how we construct it and
understand it. It's particularly fascinating because I love
language so much. It's also fun to read a book that makes me happy
to be a person, with the gift of language.
NM: You sure read a lot!
IW: Look at Kilgore if you want a book-eater, Noni.
NM: Oh yeah. So how does your reading work its way into your
writing?
IW: It's a very direct influence. Lately every time I read
something, it astounds me so much that I immediately have to write
something about it. My reading has molded my writing, as well as my
mind. It's all very exciting. It's such a rush! I just wish classes
were over so I could write something.
NM: It's that time of year, huh?
IW: Yup, it sure is. A lot of us writers are at that time of year.
No one's going to be writing for SoB. Heads will roll.
NM: While I will get a nice pat on the back for submitting such a
long interview.
IW: <looks at sky> Whoa! We've been here a while, haven't we?
NM: Hell yeah, but it's been fun.
IW: Thanks a lot. I've had fun talking about myself.
NM: <laughs> Don't we all enjoy that. Say, anything in the works?
IW: I don't usually talk about what I'm writing because that kills
it. So, no, there's nothing in the works.
NM: I see. Well, good luck. Hope to see more in the future.
IW: Me too!
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
"Power told is power lost."
--Zuni Indians
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
Previous|Next
ME
by Morrigan
i sit in Physics class, tuning out the incessant droning of the
teacher's voice. i think of my mother, who says she loves me
dearly, whom i have abandoned by coming to school so very far away.
i think about how delighted she is to hear from me, how she sees me
as something so wonderful, so precious. Faced with my thoughts and
the subtle feeling of guilt that i have been conditioned to feel, i
write her a letter.
Before i start, i painstakingly remove the mask named "student",
returning it to its hook on the wall, being careful not to tear its
fragile design. In its place i don the mask labeled "mother" and
begin to write. This person is one whom i portrayed throughout my
childhood, for the many years when i lived with my family. It is a
person who could never break a rule, betray a trust, put herself
before others. A portrait of the perfectly dutiful child that
parents everywhere seem to want. Quiet and obedient, unobtrusive
and caring. Humble. The sort of child for whom parents never set
rules, because they trust the child completely. The sort of child
who is so instinctively well-behaved that it needs no rules to
conduct itself appropriately.
i finish the letter and close it with an insipid quote about joy
and families and love. The words seem wonderful to this person,
written in a tone that would have filled most of my personae with
overwhelming revulsion. After i address the letter and sign it, i
once again become a student, putting my family persona back on the
wall. i don't read the words that i have written, for they have no
relevance for the student, focused on studies, on knowledge for no
end.
The bell rings and class ends. While gathering my books, yet again
i switch my appearances. Now i am my social self. i stride jauntily
out of class, with a grin on my face and light quip for a passing
classmate. i compliment a freshman on her clothes, causing her to
glow with pleasure. Across the lawn, i shout a greeting to one of
my many friends. i am confident and witty, flirtatious, on top of
the world with no path downwards.
Later, at dinner, i have changed once more. i am now a
conscientious young woman, concerned about the environment and
politics. The faculty member's pride and joy, the model person that
my boarding school wants all of its students to become. i am
careful to not say anything overly offensive to anyone, yet stay
lightly controversial, to be interesting. i have an opinion on
everything, still remaining open minded and rational, willing to
listen.
Only once i reach the sanctuary of my room do i tenderly remove
that countenance from my brow. Now i am the me that i reserve for
private occasions. Bitter and cynical and sarcastic and pessimistic
and most of all antisocial. A bored genius with no homework to do
and no computer to play with. i sit and contemplate deep thoughts,
thinking about space and conspiracies and the meaning of life and
religion and weather and politics and scientific theory and the
possibilities of the human mind and oh so many things. And then i
ask myself the one question for which i have no answer neatly
prepared.
who am i? beneath the masks, neatly labeled and hung on their
corresponding hooks; beneath the masks which i am never without -
who am i? is one of the facades more true than the others? is one
of them more false?
what would happen if i wore no mask?
i am too afraid to find out.
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
"Taking seriously -- In the great majority, the intellect is a
clumsy, gloomy, creaking machine that is difficult to start. They
call it ``taking the matter seriously,'' when they work with this
machine and want to think well: how onerous they must find thinking
well! The lovely beast, man, seems to lose its good spirits every
time it thinks well: it becomes ``serious.'' And ``where laughter
and gaiety are found, the quality of thought is poor'' -- that is
the prejudice of this serious beast against all ``gay science.'' --
Well, then, let us prove that it is a prejudice."
-- Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
Previous|Next
DADA, NiETZSCHE, AND THE ASCETiC iDEAL
by I Wish My Name Were Nathan
At the end of On the Genealogy of Morals , Nietzsche
parenthetically proposes that the lone antagonist to the ascetic
ideal is art, in that "the lie is sanctioned" and "the will to
deception has a good conscience". Art's denial of Truth is its
advantage over Christianity and science, institutions grounded in
the ascetic ideal. In his short comment, he contrasts Plato and
Homer as archetypal scientist and artist. This suggests that
Nietzsche's concept of the artist stems from more ancient roots
than the artists who were dominating Europe in his day. Indeed,
trends as the institutionalization of art and tiptoeing advances in
modern art suggest that the modern artists of the 1880's did not
suggest nearly as heroic an ideal as Nietzsche would have wanted
for the future of humanity.
Thirty years after the Genealogy was published, however, an
aspirant for Nietzsche's legacy emerged: Dada. Dada, an art
movement, began as a protest both against World War I and the
formalization of modern art. More precisely, Dada was an anti-art,
or simply an "anti-" movement, devised to cripple the institutions
of art while also challenging institutions of society. With Dada
came the earliest and clearest answer to Nietzsche and the ascetic
ideal.
The origin of the ascetic ideal
The birth of the ascetic ideal is owed to the slave revolt in
morality, a change in value systems most notably associated with
the advent of Christianity. The slave revolt was an incrimination
of the power wielded by strong "nobles," people strong in will,
body, and character. "Priests," non- nobles with only strong minds,
devised the concept of free will to insinuate that the nobles' use
of power, especially against the weak, was wrong or "evil," in that
the nobles had the choice not to use their strength. The priests
persuaded the masses to rise against the nobles and value the
antitheses of the noble persona -- humility, forgiveness, and
altruism. With this successful revolt, Nietzsche said, people broke
their ties with nature, rejecting strength, prowess, and animal
sensuality for resentment against the strong. Indeed, the
definition of the word "evil" was coined by slaves to define any
noble who did not subvert his strength in deference to slaves.
With such an inversion of values, people deemed themselves weak and
their natural impulses wrong. This mindset was the precondition for
the move into societies. In societies, one finds protection from
the strong, and codes of behavior repress the animal instincts in
man, both to prevent the tendency to become "evil" and the tendency
to disrupt the stability of the society. (Obviously, the noble
personality would not stand for any of this.) Societies, in
allowing for organization and control of people, did have their
benefits, which accounts for their prominence on earth.
The confines of society required people to use their "weakest
organ," reason, rather than their spontaneous animal instincts,
like fish out of water. Nietzsche says that the human in society is
burdened with a "leaden discomfort" at the constant judgments and
corrections she/he is forced to make in order to properly fit in.
With this repression of instinct, people lost the ability to
physically cope with natural tendencies such as anger and
aggression. Such tendencies were then turned inward upon oneself,
creating the world of the soul, whose value is based on how
well-repressed its owner is. Knowledge of one's deficiencies of
self-control against animal outbursts works to create the bad
conscience. Nietzsche sees the advent of the bad conscience as an
startling indication that man has turned against itself, since he
believes humans are simply glorified animals and should not aspire
to reject their nature.
The final blow, Nietzsche says, was the ascetic ideal, in that it
answers the eternal questions, "What is life for?" and "Why do I
suffer?" The first question was answered by religious leaders:
"life is a series of temptations toward animal impulses that must
be rejected; the state of the soul at death is one's key to real
existence in heaven." The second question can no longer be answered
by blaming the nobles; they have all but disappeared. Now the
priests offer the answer that will keep their followers firmly in
control: "suffering is your own fault." In Christianity, this is
the concept of original sin. The bad conscience evolves into
religious guilt, and the priests -- spiritual healers -- gain
eternal tenure.
Nietzsche's call for opposing ideal
In the last essay of the Genealogy , Nietzsche laments the poor
state of man and debates whether science opposes the ascetic ideal.
Popular opinion is that science and religion are different, since
science does not rely on irrational spirituality to defend its
motives, instead deriving its power from strength of fact.
Nietzsche, however, denies that this is different from the ascetic
ideal. In fact, both are the same at the core, in that they each
rely on the unquestionable authority, Truth.
Nietzsche's concern is that Truth is an ideal. He asks, why do
people seek the ideal of truth? For the nobles, such an interest
was absent, for they created truth as they saw fit, for example, in
language: the meanings of "good" and "bad" -- therefore who
deserves respect. The slaves had no power to create language. After
the slave revolt, priests recreated truth from the viewpoint of
religious guilt. To maintain power, priests interpreted "how to
live," "what to do," "why we exist," as handed down from God. This
knowledge is deemed Truth. However, even the move into rational
science retained this meaning: scientific "experts" have sole right
and privilege to discover "truths" and disseminate them to the
masses. Instead of spiritual guidance, people adapt to scientific
guidance.
Nietzsche does not question whether science "makes sense" -- it
satisfies rational curiosity as well as religion satisfies
spiritual curiosity. Nietzsche wonders, what if the very basis of
scientific knowledge -- the assumption that there is an
unassailable truth -- collapses? Then everything people have based
their understanding of reality is voided. Recent theories such as
quantum mechanics and chaos theory are major upheavals in thought
-- it is clear to see how fragile the assumption of "truth" can be.
The ineffectuality of "modern" art
So, if "art" is to conquer the ascetic ideal, where does one look?
During Nietzsche's time, modern art was becoming important. It is
natural to assume that he might have seen the tradition-breaking
trends of modern art as a possible adversary to the ascetic ideal.
However, one can see that early modern art lacked the strength to
do so.
The first important years of modern art in the 1880's had come
about due to the politicization of issues such as the declaration
of independence from tradition and the role of artist as social
commentator. The first modern artists rejected the classicism and
realism which had previously dominated commercial art and strived
to liberate themselves from its confines. By its thirtieth
birthday, however, modern art was still taking only hesitant steps
away from tradition. Impressionism, the first major movement in
modernism in the 1880's, defied the strict illusionism of painting
by breaking up images into tiny dots of color, suggesting the
process of vision in the human eye. The subject matter was
naturalistic, depicting hills, valleys, and sometimes street
scenes. In the 1890's and 1900's, Van Gogh, Gaugin, and Matisse
brought attention to the use of color, provoking the next major
advance in art, Fauvism. Again, paintings depicted ordinary human
subject matter or still lives. With the Cubist revolution of the
1900's by Braque and Picasso, an effort was made to depict "four
dimensions" in a painting by blending several different viewpoints
of a scene on one canvas, disguising the elements of the picture by
drawing with sharp angles and straight lines. Still, ordinary
subject matter was at the core of the paintings.
In addition to the hesitant nature of these advances toward true
abstraction, the modern artists' oath of independence and breaking
from tradition was further subjugated by the institutionalization
of modern art. Although the advances of Impressionism, Fauvism, and
Cubism had originally shocked the art world, schools were soon set
up to teach and formalize the new methods. What courageous artists
had invented in protest was soon reduced to fashionable art.
Considering the state of modern art in the 1910's, it could only be
a reluctant opponent to the ascetic ideal in Nietzsche's eyes.
While artists sought to express their own truths by the way of new
painting styles, they were as a whole still restricted by
classicism and the backwards pull of tradition. Also, the fact that
art had become greatly commercialized also played on the artists'
consciences; they were unwilling to boldly assert themselves for
fear of not being financially successful. As a result,
"innovations" in modern art were still baby steps forward. Clearly,
Nietzsche's mention of Homer shows that his ideal of the artist is
much different.
Historical setting for Dada
In 1916, during the tumultuous first World War, poet and artist
refugees from France, Germany, Russia, and elsewhere converged in
Zurich. These men and women discovered they shared disgust toward
both their society, which would allow such a senseless war to go
on, and toward the institution of art, which had been shackling
their creativity in the mire of tradition and formalization. There,
Hugo Ball, Marcel Janco, and Jean Arp organized the Cabaret
Voltaire and put on a series of amateur poetry recitals and musical
performances. Soon after, seeking something more effective, they
created Dada.
Dada's roles against and for art
What was Dada? It was at the core an anarchistic, nihilistic
philosophical movement. It called for the destruction of society,
protesting the sociopolitical conditions that led to World War I,
and for the destruction of art, which limited their ability to
express themselves. These demands were not unrelated. Even with the
"shocking" advances of modern art up to that time, artists still
faced great opposition to innovative ideas, namely, societal
approval. So, rather than an art movement, Dada called itself an
anti-art movement. A successful overthrow of art and society would
allow these artists to proceed boldly forward without fear of
reprisal. From a Nietzschean perspective, Dada's goal was to return
art to a Dionysian state; it was clearly against the ascetic ideal.
Obviously, Dada could not hope to overthrow society; however, its
founders felt such extreme demands mirrored the insanity of the
war. And in the style of such rampant insanity, they took action.
Specifically, Dada aimed to achieve its goal through the subversion
of tradition and of sense. Dada claimed that truth did not exist
whatsoever, giving it the power to reject all authority. Throughout
its short history, Dada participants used several techniques to
express its messages. The loudest and most raucous technique was
Dada performances. The elite in Zurich, Paris, and Berlin (to which
Dada later spread) were attracted to announcements of exhibits and
lectures on emerging trends in modern art. At the "lectures," Dada
artists screamed insults at the audience. At the "exhibits," the
artists performed nonsense dances and recited sound poetry:
Dada activities... constituted a direct attack on the staid
morality and sentiments of the public, which raged and swooned at
such candor.... Opposites were brought together: the art-lover that
lies hidden in every man was either outraged or forced to submit to
so much imbecility, so much genius. A trusting and hopeful
audience, gathered together for an art exhibit or a poetry recital,
was insulted beyond endurance. [1] It should be understood that
Dada was not complete nonsense. The "sound poetry," or bruitisme,
was actually a new style of art, wherein an artist spoke in strings
of nonsensical vowel and consonant sounds to convey a primitive and
spiritual message. At one performance, Ball was dressed up in a
costume resembling "some kind of Cubist High Priest", a
brightly-colored cardboard tube with wings attached to his
shoulders. When he came up on stage, he recited some sound poetry,
initially to the explosive laughter and derisive applause of the
audience. He soon found, however, his voice taking on the "age-old
cadence of priestly lamentation, the liturgical chanting that wails
through all the Catholic churches of East and West," [2] and his
chanting hypnotized the audience into submission. While the costume
provoked laughter and scorn, the intended effect of the bruitisme
made its way through. Such juxtapositions of opposites were the
means by which Dada was allowed to experiment: expressing new ideas
under the guise of nonsense.
Another effective technique Dadaists used was the printed word. In
Germany, Raoul Hausmann created the magazine "Der Dada," containing
transcripts of sound poetry, meaningless slogans, and manifestos,
with words wildly typeset in all imaginable sizes, styles, and
directions across the page. This "print collage" style was a new
technique, boldly appropriating and expanding on the stylistic
painting collage of Cubism.
Dada's role against society
Throughout the movement from 1916 to 1924, however, the clearest
points Dada made were through its various writers' manifestos.
While manifestos for earlier art movements where used to announce a
new school of painting or literature, Dada used them to deny that
it was an art movement at all. In fact, through its manifestos it
made its clearest political messages. Herein one finds more clear
ties to Nietzsche's philosophy.
Hugo Ball, one of the core leaders of Dada, was in fact a devote of
Nietzsche. In the university he wrote "A Polemical Treatise in
Defense of Nietzsche" as his dissertation. Ball didn't complete his
schooling, but did continue working on the dissertation afterwards.
Ball was engrossed with Nietzsche's "dionysiac theory of art" and
his sympathy with the philosopher indicates the clearest roots of
Dada, both philosophically and artistically:
Ball not only agreed with Nietzsche's contention that society could
be regenerated only through a return to the forces of instinct and
emotion and a repudiation of Socratic rationalism, but, perhaps
even more important, was sympathetic to the iconoclastic
philosopher's call for a revolt against traditional morality and a
denunciation of the Church, the state, and any other external
authority which might interfere with individual freedom. [3] Hugo
Ball and Jean Arp, in the periodical "Dada" and elsewhere, wrote
rabid and often nonsensical manifestos to promote Dada's agenda. In
retrospect, Arp wrote:
Dada aimed to destroy the reasonable deceptions of man and recover
the natural and unreasonable order. Dada wanted to replace the
logical nonsense of the men of today by the illogically senseless.
That is why we pounded with all our might on the big drum of Dada
and trumpeted the praises of unreason. [4] Quick to join the
movement after its conception was Tristan Tzara, who best expressed
Dada in his numerous manifestos. An excerpt from "Dada Manifesto
1918" demonstrates this:
Dada; knowledge of all the means rejected up until now by the
shamefaced sex of comfortable compromise and good manners: Dada;
abolition of logic, which is the dance of those impotent to create:
Dada; of every societal hierarchy and equation set up for the sake
of values by our valets: Dada...; abolition of memory: Dada...;
abolition of the future: Dada; absolute and unquestionable faith in
every god that is the immediate product of spontaneity: Dada... [5]
Both excerpts strongly echo Nietzsche, who believed that reason and
logic, man's "weakest organ[s]", had replaced man's natural animal
playfulness and instinct. Neither Tzara nor Arp is directly linked
to Nietzsche in Dada anthologies, however, although one must assume
that Nietzsche's influence was felt in the academic community at
the time.
In avidly calling for the abolition of logic and sense, Dada
thereby promoted the destruction of truth. Dada called for people
to rely on instinct, spontaneity, and playfulness, hoping to
reshape the minds of people who protested their ultra-rational but
senseless world and who had no clear means by which to change it.
Therein Dada attempted to jolt people away from their reliance on
reason and truth, seeing clearly that such continued reliance would
only breed more confusion.
Where is Dada today?
In 1923 the members of the Dada movement lost momentum. News of
their trademark performances had spread around Europe and were no
longer shocking. Also, members started to fight among themselves,
an inevitable clash of egos. The philosophical side of Dada had
stagnated; but on the other hand, artists who had been part of the
movement, such as Andre Breton, Francis Picabia, Marcel Duchamp,
each found success in artistic innovation. Importantly, each had
turned to abstractionism, in poetry, music, theater, painting, and
sculpture, meaning these artists had lived up to Dada's artistic
aim to progress beyond traditional limitations. Breton later
introduced Surrealism, suggesting that one of the twentieth
century's most interesting movements has its roots in Dada as well.
[6]
Although the original movement had withered away, Dadaist ideals
proved their timelessness, re-emerging strongly for brief periods
after World War II and in the 1960's. (It is no accident that Dada
has coincided with tumultuous events in recent history.) The
invention of Abstract Expressionism, Pop Art, and Happenings are
attributed to these "Neo-Dadas."
In each case, including its birth, Dada has receded into the
background shortly after a flurry of activity. By nature it is a
short-lived movement, requiring the collective energies of many
people to organize and make noise; therefore, it is also taxing.
Also, Dada calls for its own destruction, or as Nietzsche would
say, it is "self-overcoming." Dada never wanted to be an "- ism,"
relegated to a formal school of art. Indeed, by definition there is
no art style called "Dadaism;" although artistic innovations have
sprung from it, these were pursued independently. Dada is more
properly a philosophical movement, raising eyebrows and
consciousness wherever it pops up.
The Dadaist ideal has left strong impressions on our culture, both
through its artistic contributions and its philosophical ties with
Nietzsche. Perhaps this is how Nietzsche's ideal of art will most
naturally work to revolutionize our society -- through Dada, both
in its short loud bursts of activity and in its lingering effects.
In a culture so strongly dependent on rationality and truth, such
gradual change is probably the best Nietzsche could have hoped for.
Footnotes
[1] Georges Hugnet, "The Dada Spirit in Painting," appearing in
Dada Painters
and Poets , p. 131
[2] Grossman, p. 118
[3] Grossman, p. 50
[4] Jean Arp, appearing in Dada Painters and Poets , p. 25
[5] Tristan Tzara, "Dada Manifesto 1918," appearing in Dada
Painters and
Poets , p. 81
[6] Hans Richter says in Dada Art and Anti-Art , p. 194:
"Surrealism devoured
and digested Dada. Similar cannibalistic methods are by no means
rare in
history, and as Surrealism had a strong digestion, the qualities of
the
devoured were transferred to the invigorated body of the survivor.
So be it!"
Bibliography
Grossman, Manuel L. Dada: Paradox, Mystification, and Ambiguity in
European
Literature . New York: Pegasus, 1971.
Lippiard, Lucy R., ed. Dadas on Art . New Jersey: Prentice-Hall,
1971.
Motherwell, Robert, ed. Dada Painters and Poets: An Anthology , 2nd
ed.,
Boston, Mass.: G.K. Hall, 1981.
Nietzsche, Friedrich. On the Genealogy of Morals . Trans. Walter
Kaufmann
and R.J. Hollingdale. New York: Random House, 1967.
Richter, Hans. Dada Art and Anti-Art . Germany: Thames and Hudson,
1965.
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
[=- POETASTRiE -=]
"The poets? They stink. They write badly. They're idiots you see,
because the strong people don't write poetry.... They become hitmen
for the Mafia. The good people do the serious jobs."
--Charles Bukowski
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
Previous|Next
AD HOMiNEM
by Kilgore Trout
fuck you.
you're an idiot.
yeah, i'm talking to you.
you're an idiot.
i'm not attacking your ideas.
i'm just gonna beat your face in.
i don't care what you think.
i just don't like the way you look.
dumbass.
(works better live, i'm sure. use in hipster, pretentious coffee
joints during cool scene teen poetry slams. involve the audience.
either that, or read poems in russian. now you see why i write
fiction...)
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
[=- FiCTiON -=]
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
Previous|Next
POiSONPEN
by CJ Hooknose
I crouched in the shadowed depths of an ocean of night, letting its
tides wash over me and carry me wherever they would. The
streetlights were sullen fireflies fighting pointless battles
against the murk. A few shaggy young men stumbled down the side
streets, belching and furtively pissing in the bushes. I didn't
care. I just waited, patient and silent as my old friend the
serpent, the solitary traffic light gleaming furtively off my
knife.
Most everyone had forgotten me. Anyone who still remembered called
me Poisonpen. It wasn't completely accurate, but I liked it all the
same. Always did have a weakness for literary allusions, especially
the dark and nasty kind. They fit. It's my job to make things fit.
It's more difficult than you think.
Take the wind, for example. It was cold, too damn cold and sneaking
down the front of my trenchcoat if I did so much as breathe. And
breathing is such a difficult habit to break. I ignored the wind as
much as possible and watched the sidewalk. College students and the
people around them were more chaotic in their lives and habits than
ordinary folk, which sometimes interfered with my schedule. Those
who believed and lived a world of random events and impulses
reacted... differently when one of those impulses reached out and
bit them. It was all part of the game, but all the same, it
interfered with the aesthetic pleasure I took in my work.
Of course, someone had to do it, even on a night like this. It was
such a dismal, desolate, cold and dark thing, with mucky slush and
water slopped everywhere. Dog shit rotted on the sidewalk, and
faraway cars growled through the snow--it almost made me want to
write bad poetry.
That awful urge passed as I looked down the street. A woman was
approaching from the south. The old familiar heat coursed through
me. Casually, without even meaning to, I pulled out my knife and
began to stroke its edge. A quick glance as she came closer told me
all I needed to know. The woman was Nicole, someone I knew almost
too well. I'd seen her a million times in the daylight, as she was
walking or laughing with her friends or lounging in the green space
on the Quad. I had her marked and watched, and she never seemed to
notice. Of course, I would have been surprised if she had--I was
nothing, invisible as the wind and less than a face in the crowd.
"Not very smart, girl. A coed was raped and strangled a few blocks
from here three weeks ago. Don't you know enough not to walk alone
late at night?" I muttered to myself Not that I minded, of
course... it would make everything so much easier.
Nicole was more careful than she seemed at first glance. I knew she
wasn't reckless, which was part of the reason I'd chosen her. She
walked briskly, confidently, as if she were in full daylight
instead of these dim times when things were about. Every so often,
she looked behind her and to both sides, and then her long brown
hair caught what little light there was. It was attractive--hell,
she was attractive, though that was neither here nor there. I knew
drag queens who would kill for those dark, smoky eyes, and she
moved with an unconscious grace that not even the uneven slush
underfoot could spoil. I guessed she had just come from a party, as
she was wearing a short black skirt under her leather jacket. It
was almost too bad her carefree life would have to end. Why did she
have to have so much talent? But no, she had to put herself in
harm's way by picking up a pen and tasting the heady power of
words....
Nicole walked past the alley, her breath steaming out in delicate
feathers. I seamlessly slid up behind her. I crept into position
and was on the verge of striking out when the flutter of wings
directly above startled me. Dammit! I looked up, scared past all
reasoning for a second. If they had found me... but I relaxed as
soon as I saw it was only a restless pigeon. I knew I shouldn't be
so on edge--after all, I'd done this twenty times before. Of
course, the interruption had broken my timing, and Nicole was too
far away. I gritted my teeth and advanced carefully, picking my way
through the icy crusts winter had left on the sidewalk.
Nicole walked on a little more quickly, breaking the unconscious
rhythm she had before. I could have made some noise, after all...
it would ruin everything if she looked behind her now, that was for
sure. I knew it had to be soon, soon or never, as she was almost to
the street corner and only a block from the dorms on Douglas
Street.
I thumbed the knife's edge. It was sharp as the north wind. I moved
silently, invisibly, behind her again. I needed to get it done in
one swift slice, so Nicole would never know what hit her until it
was too late. It had to be soon, and it had to be in the cold and
lonely dark--anything else would spoil the artistry. Others I'd
heard of made their victims suffer, and some even worked in public,
but I was a rare breed of perfectionist. I had pride, and as a
result, my work was true art. If certain elements didn't appreciate
it, that was their problem.
Everything fell silent as Nicole approached the crosswalk. The
traffic light flashed dumbly for the benefit of no one at all.
Nicole stepped off the curb. I coiled up, waiting for the perfect
moment, feeling the adrenaline rush and the mounting joy. I tensed
and counted silently... 3... 2... 1... now! As Nicole's foot
slipped in the slush, she stumbled, and I sprang, knife upraised
and snapping forward. Nicole turned involuntarily at the last
moment, probably more out of surprise at slipping than anything
else. In that instant, she looked directly at me. She was beautiful
at that moment, as beautiful as anything I have ever seen. Her last
expression was not quite fear or shock, but a vast puzzlement as
the knife slid home. It was all over in a second. She fell forward,
eyes dark and muscles slack.
"Perfect," I said with a smack of satisfaction. I let go of the
knife, leaving it jammed into the soft flesh under her jaw. Not the
best place to leave it, but it was necessary... to make things fit.
I turned and loped back, casually confident and pleased with a job
well done. My drift into the cool dark night halted abruptly when
the red and blue lights began to howl.
"Freeze!" a voice shouted from the street. The noise upset the
pigeons, who took off and flapped and hooted in a great mass. I
ran, heedless of the lights, shouts, and sirens. Surrender was
unthinkable. It had been going so well... and how had they even
known? I had always been careful, covering my tracks, keeping low,
and now this had to go and happen. I wished I'd brought more
knives.
The police car screeched to a halt in front of a small Chinese
restaurant. Two cops jumped out, waving pistols and shouting. I
braced for the unthinkable, yet the cops... ran inside the
restaurant.
Something wasn't quite right here.
"Freeze, dammit!" another, smaller voice shouted from directly
overhead. I did as I was told, more out of curiosity than anything
else. The sound of flapping wings gradually grew louder as one
pigeon descended into view. But since when did pigeons carry
flaming swords in their beaks? I realized what had happened, and
fear and chagrin roiled up in a sick wave inside me.
"All right, Poisonpen. You coming along quietly, or what?" the
pigeon squawked in a weary voice.
"What? The cops... what about the cops?" I jabbered, pointing at
the police car. "What about em? Just coincidence a secular crime
happened right in front of us." The pigeon tried to grin. "Now
what'd you do to the girl?"
I gave the pigeon a flinty stare. "I refuse to answer any questions
without a lawyer present." With luck, if I could distract him, I
could get away.
"Nice try. I saw everything that happened. Backup'll be here any
second. A GL-202 Satanophonic Idea Knife, wasn't it? She'll wake up
with a headache and a new theory of particle physics or something.
Never happy unless you're stirring up trouble, are you, you
sonofabitch?" The pigeon swaggered forward, nearly brushing me with
its sword.
"No! Nothing like that, I swear! You've heard of Dostoevsky? Arthur
Miller? H.P. Lovecraft?" The pigeon snorted in contempt. Cops have
no respect for the classics. "All my work. Everything. It's...."
"Can it," the cop hissed, brushing me with the flaming sword. Pain
shot through me, and I buckled to the ground with a heavy splat.
"We've got our own PR going now. Seen a bookstore lately?"
"So that's where all those damned books about angels came from...."
I croaked into the slush.
Before I could follow that thought any further, the sky fell in and
two huge, white-winged forms fell in with it. They were not happy.
They took off with me pinned solidly between them. As we rose into
the sky, I saw Nicole stagger to her feet. She brushed idly at her
throat, dislodging the Idea Knife, and then looked upward. She
must've caught a glimpse of something, because I faintly heard her
say, "Ohmigod! I've just seen angels."
And instead of the poignant, powerful, and thought-provoking novel
about urban life that I'd planted, she wrote some piece of tripe
called "Messengers From Beyond: One Woman's Story."
At least it made the bestseller lists.
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
"The dumber people think you are, the more surprised they're going
to be when you kill them."
--William Clayton
--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-
SoB-SoB--
Previous|Next
REQUiEM OF A DYING BOY
by Kilgore Trout
PROLOGUE
This hotel room will be the last thing I see for the rest of my
natural life. Things have taken a bad turn for me, things which I
never anticipated happening. I thought I had it all planned out,
that I had foreseen every single problem that might come my way.
Unfortunately, I was wrong. Now I'm just waiting for the police to
show up.
I'm not really sure why I was so obsessed with her anymore. Maybe
it was just desperation on my part. I don't remember half of the
things I've done in the past six months, and that scares me. Holing
up in this hotel room has really brought reality's ugly head
crashing down. If I knew that I would be sitting in a Motel 6
wrapped up in faded green sheets waiting for my demise, I'm not so
sure that I would have committed the actions that have made up my
entire existence for half of a year. The three weapons sitting on
the bed don't make my situation any better, either.
But that doesn't really matter too much anymore. I've gone past the
point of being able to say, "I'm sorry" and have all the people who
despise me forget about this whole episode. Forgiveness is not an
option anymore. If they catch me, they'll hang me for my crimes.
I'd rather go out fighting. That's just the type of guy I am.
I've tried to take my mind off what is going to happen to me, but
nothing seems to help. At four in the afternoon, all that's on
television are talk shows and disreputable newsmagazines depicting
the messed-up lives of people who are almost as messed-up as I am.
I've got one thing still going for me. I'm still sane, and that,
too, scares me.
Whenever I picked up a newspaper and read about some psycho killing
ten people in a fast food joint, I figured that he would have to be
insane to do the horrendous acts that he committed. I always
thought that for a sane man to murder someone, he would have to
contain within himself a great deal of animosity and hate towards
the person he wanted dead. Sure, men kill men all the time in war,
but they are doing it for their country, so it can't be wrong,
right? And cops kill criminals, but they are doing it to protect
the public. I guess when they come and shoot me down, they'll be
doing the public a big favor by eliminating a danger to their
fragile society. Not that I personally like the idea, mind you, but
I can see that I would probably want to do the same in their shoes.
Now, after having been through the worst six months of my life, I'm
not so sure that I understand myself as clearly as I once did. I
never would have thought that I could ever bring myself to kill
another man, and I was right about that.
I killed a woman.
CHAPTER ONE
1.
The bed was old and sweaty. A fan slowly stirred the stagnant air
around the small bedroom, yet it was a futile attempt to cool off
the room. Zach lay in the bed, barely asleep. His damp hair was
matted to the sweat-stained pillow. Zach's mouth opened and closed
intermittently like a dying fish's, gasping to take in any cool air
that he could. A half-empty tea glass sat on the broken stereo
speaker beside his bed, a once cool and refreshing drink now turned
hot and rancid.
Zach slowly awoke from his shallow slumber, his closed eyes now
narrow slits. He moaned and swung his feet off the bed, raising
himself into a sitting position. Zach ran a hand down his bare
chest, showering his thighs with cold sweat. As he stood, a
coughing fit overtook him, and he hacked up a ball of phlegm in his
mouth, which he promptly spit on the carpet. Taking his left foot,
he rubbed the spit into the carpet with his heel.
The light switch evaded Zach's grasp, but he finally managed to
flick it on. The swift illumination of the room caused his pupils
to shrink down to small, black holes. He walked into the bathroom,
still half-asleep, and stared at his pathetic reflection in the
mirror.
Zach wasn't bad looking, just unkempt. His black hair fell to his
shoulders in wispy strands. The pale skin that covered his body
didn't look so bad in the bathroom due to the soft lighting. He
never tanned during the summer, just peeled. He ran his hand across
his face, feeling his rough, unshaven skin. Zach sighed and turned
away, as he did every morning.
He stepped into the shower and turned on the faucet, feeling relief
as the icy water resurrected him from the dead.
2.
A box of Frosted Flakes was the only appetizing thing that Zach
could find in the pantry for breakfast. He poured some into a bowl
and replaced the box back on its shelf.
Zach peered into the refrigerator and dug behind last night's
leftover meatloaf to get to the milk. He checked the expiration
date on the side of the carton. May 27. Today was May 27, and Zach
let out a grunt of disappointment as he put the milk back into the
refrigerator. He had a rule of never drinking milk on or after its
expiration date, even though his mother said that the date was just
to tell stores when to stop selling it. Zach didn't trust his
mother too much.
He sat down at the kitchen table and began to eat his Frosted
Flakes. Today's paper was sitting on the table, as it was every
morning. For every day since he could remember, his mother had
always brought in the morning paper for his father before she left
for work. Now, since his father had died of cancer four years ago,
she did it out of habit.
The rubber band holding the paper closed was blue. It was always
blue. Zach had wondered why the newspaper only used blue rubber
bands. Maybe they got a special discount to use the colored bands,
or the owner had holdings in some company that manufactured the
blue rubber bands. Whatever the reason, Zach was pretty sure that
one of the signs of the apocalypse would be the morning when he
would get a newspaper with a real rubber band around it.
The newspaper opened as Zach rolled the rubber band off and threw
it in the trash can. He used to keep them to see how many he could
collect, figuring that blue rubber bands wouldn't be very common.
After he had a whole desk drawer full of them, however, he decided
it was time to stop.
Zach didn't really bother reading the articles in detail. After
all, they were just variations on murder, scandals, and world
problems. He flipped through the pages mindlessly, scanning the
headlines and stopping only to read a few articles while slowly
eating dry cereal.
After the bowl was exhausted of its contents, Zach stood up from
the kitchen table and washed his bowl out in the sink. He threw the
paper in the wastebasket and left for school.
3.
The parking lot was full of automobiles as Zach pulled into the
high school parking lot. His Seiko watch said he had twenty minutes
until first period began, so he turned off the engine and waited
for Julie.
He scanned the people filing into the building, but his girlfriend
was nowhere to be seen. The interior of his car began to heat up
after a few moments, so he rolled the driver's side window down to
let in some fresh air. A hot gust of wind collided against his
face, but it was better than no breeze at all.
After ten minutes of waiting, Zach still had seen no sign of her.
She was very late today, but it wasn't unusual for Julie to
oversleep. Still, he always felt that a day started off badly when
he and Julie did not get to see each other before school started.
He decided to wait another five minutes.
4.
Mrs. Jackson began the lecture on the Watergate scandal, but Zach's
mind was focused elsewhere. Julie hadn't shown up this morning, and
Zach had no idea where she could be. She always called him in the
morning if she wasn't going to make it to school, so Zach had
started to worry if something might have happened to her.
The idea that Julie might be hurt scared Zach. She was the only
thing that he really loved. Before they had met, he had no real
direction in life. He was always causing trouble at school,
vandalizing the bathrooms and fighting for no real reason other
than to just see how badly he could hurt someone.
Julie was his savior from that lifestyle. She had given him
something to live for, something to cherish. Under her wing, he had
slowly broken ties with his old friends, the ones he had hung
around with just because there was no other group who would take
him in. It had been a long process, and a painful one, too. His old
buddies had given him a hard time, telling him that he was going
soft and letting some girl control him. Zach knew differently after
seeing his friends' true faces unmasked, but a part of him still
did not want to let go of the people he had known for so long. It
took a great deal of Zach's willpower to hang up his old way of
life, yet he knew that if he did not change, he would lose the only
meaningful thing that had ever come into his life.
Zach was lucky to have made such a "fine catch," as his old friends
would have called Julie. Under normal circumstances, the chances of
a guy with the reputation of Zach's and a girl considered as
popular as Julie were practically nil. She was very pretty, just on
the underlying side of gorgeous. Her long, brown hair stopped just
beneath her shoulders, the curls rising and falling in a chaotic
manner. Most people at the school were very surprised, some jealous
and some horrified, that these two completely different people from
opposite positions in society could be dating. And even though Zach
received a lot of flak from his friends, it was Julie who took most
of the heat.
If Zach thought that it was annoying to be harassed by a few
friends, then he didn't fully understand the taunting Julie had
been through. On the day after their first date, Laura Anderson,
one of Julie's best friends, cornered her in one of the hallways.
"Hey, Julie! There's been some rumor going around that you went out
with Zach Dillard," she said.
"Oh, really?" Julie asked, giving her friend a surprised look.
"Yeah," Laura answered. "Do you have any idea who would want to get
back at you by doing something like that?"
Julie looked her friend straight in the eyes. This was the first
test of her relationship with Zach. She had known things like this
would happen if she went out with him, but she thought that she was
prepared for these types of situations. Now, she wasn't so sure,
but there wasn't much she could do about it.
"Laura, that's not a rumor," she stated. "It's true."
Laura Anderson's days were usually uneventful. She had a good life,
good friends, and little hardship. Her biggest worries had to do
with what she was going to wear and where she was going to go on
the weekend. Julie's admission sent her whole, stable world away.
Her face became red, and she couldn't think of what to say. She
just stood there, stammering for words. "How could you?" were the
only things that escaped her lips.
Now it was Julie's turn to get red-faced. She knew her friends
wouldn't be totally accepting of Zach at first, but she did not
think that they would be angry at her. Disappointed, maybe, but not
angry.
"What do you mean, 'How could you?'" Julie yelled a little too
loudly. A few heads in the hall turned, and someone screamed, "Cat
fight!" Julie put her hand on her forehead and tried to calm
herself down.
"Look," she said, trying to control her raging emotions. "I don't
want to discuss this here, but it's my choice and my life, and you
don't have any right to condemn my actions."
A small crowd had begun to form around the two girls, hoping to see
two girls claw each other until the principals arrived. Fights
among boys were no big deal at the school, but fighting among girls
was considered a special treat to behold. Julie walked off, leaving
Laura standing in confusion and disbelief.
Zach had never seen this nor any of the other episodes that Julie
had to endure. He assumed that the same kinds of things that
happened to him were happening to her as well, but he had no idea
of the magnitude of the situation. Julie was on a first-name basis
with practically everyone in their senior class, and she had hoards
of good friends. During the next few days after their first date,
her school life consisted of going to class and telling people that
she was, in fact, going out with Zach.
Nine months later, though, the gossiping finally diminished. People
came to accept their relationship, even though most thought it was
a mistake. He still received some hateful stares from Julie's close
friends when he was by himself, but when they were together,
nothing major ever really happened.
Zach considered all of this behind him now. In four more days they
would graduate from this small-town high school and be off at
college, where they wouldn't have to deal with all of the cold
stares and talk behind their backs.
The bell rang, and Zach gathered his books up. He left the class,
wondering exactly where Julie was.
5.
The school cafeteria buzzed with life and laughter. Students ate
and talked, enjoying their break from the monotonous school day.
Zach sat at a table by himself, gnawing on a buttered roll. He
mindlessly listened to the inane conversations of a group of
freshmen sitting at the table next to him. Their talk consisted
mostly of how they were ready for summer so they could sleep in.
A hand tapped Zach's shoulder. He looked up and saw Laura towering
over him. She had never really liked him, primarily because he was
with Julie more than she was. Her resentment of him still blazed in
her eyes even though she was smiling. She always smiled when she
talked to Zach, no matter what the topic of conversation happened
to be. Zach guessed she was afraid of him, and he was correct.
Laura thought that Julie made the biggest mistake of her life when
she started dating Zach. She had always seen Zach as a creep and
low-life degenerate, and nothing, even the fact that he was dating
her best friend, could ever change her mind. Her fear of Zach also
added greatly to her dislike of him, as she had seen him take down
guys twice his size with no effort at all. She feared that if she
got on his bad side, she would end up with a broken jaw.
"Hi, Zach," she said, trying to sound cheerful. "Do you know where
Julie is?"
Zach shook his head. "I haven't the slightest idea." He took
another bite of the roll and dropped it on the table.
"Oh. Well, do you know where she might be?"
"My guess is that she is at home," Zach said coldly. "She didn't
call me this morning, so I have no clue where she is."
Julie's best friend stared at Zach for a minute. He was Julie's
boyfriend. How could he not know where she was? Didn't he care
enough about her to find out where she might be?
"So, you don't know where she is?" Laura asked redundantly.
Zach shot her a cold stare and picked up the roll again. He tore a
piece off, put it in his mouth and chewed on it, ignoring Laura.
"Hello, Zach? Are you gonna answer me or not?"
"Look, Laura, I don't keep a leash on Julie," Zach angrily said.
"If I say I don't know where she is, then I don't. It's not like I
have total control over what she does. Do you think I keep tab on
her at all times? I don't sit outside her window all night to make
sure she doesn't leave when we don't go out. I don't--"
"Okay, okay. You've made your point. Sorry." Laura turned away and
stormed off. He watched her walk down the hallway until she was out
of sight. If he saw her again today, Zach felt sure that he would
punch her.
6.
A violent temper was something that Zach always had. It got him
into trouble with his mother, his teachers, and a lot of students
who annoyed Zach. And yet, amazing as it sounds, he never harbored
one violent thought against Julie. They had been through a number
of fights, but things that would normally set Zach off never did
when he was around her.
He had never understood why this was. Zach had pondered this enigma
many times, but no answer had ever been revealed to him. In
reality, however, the answer was quite simple. Julie had Zach
wrapped around her finger, or, more precisely, Zach had wrapped
himself up around her. He had become very dependent on her for his
emotional and psychological needs. Whenever Julie was not around,
Zach felt depressed and unwanted.
Julie never became aware of this, and even at the end of their
relationship, she had a hard time coming to the realization of just
how much he needed her to survive. During the times that they were
together or talked on the phone, Zach acted normally, and no one
could have guessed that after their dates or talks on the phone he
would sit in his room and just stare at the stucco walls for hours.
His only waking thoughts were of Julie.
7.
The phone nested by Zach's ear rang for the fourteenth time. His
index finger felt cramped from redialing her number for the past
hour. If she wasn't at home, then where was she? This was the first
time during their entire relationship that he did not know of her
whereabouts. Contrary to what he told Laura, he did keep track of
Julie when they weren't together. He always knew where she was
"just in case I need to get in touch with you." But now, he had
absolutely no clue.
A ball of rage started to build in the back of his throat as he
depressed the reset button on the phone and dialed again. His fear
had ballooned into anger and desperation. The phone rang another
two minutes before he slammed it down into its cradle.
Zach stretched out on his bed and put his hands over his face. He
fought to struggle a scream that welled up in his belly. The one
thing that he loved was lost, and he did not know where to start
looking.
He pulled his hands away and looked up. The room was hazy and
started to spin. The ceiling seemed close enough to reach out and
touch. Crawling off of the bed, he slowly made his way to the
bathroom where he bowed to the porcelain god and vomited. It did
not make him feel any better. Zach propped himself up against the
bathroom wall, his hands pushing against the cold tile floor. He
wiped his mouth with his arm, leaving a brown residue. Zach lowered
his head between his knees and wept.
CHAPTER TWO
1.
The shrill noise of the telephone ringing reverberated throughout
the house. Zach stretched out from the fetal position he had been
lying in and attempted to stand. He propped himself against the
bathroom door as the phone continued to ring. The carpet cushioned
his feet as his stiff legs carried him into his room. The phone sat
on the mahogany desk, daring him to answer. Did he really want to
talk to her? Was he in the right frame of mind to speak with Julie
without blowing up on her? Zach grabbed the phone and held it up to
his mouth. "Hello?" he heard himself asking.
The monotone sound of a dialtone scornfully laughed at him. His
mouth tightened as he grimaced in disgust. Zach knew it was her. It
had to be her. He kicked himself mentally for falling asleep in the
bathroom. Being strong was one of Zach's better character traits,
or so he thought. Now, holding a lifeless telephone and feeling
miserable, he felt like a child. The sound of the phone changed to
a series of annoying beeps, electronic instructions ordering Zach
to hang up the phone. Both Zach's mind and body were frozen, and
only one word circled through his confused mind.
Helpless.
2.
When Zach was eight years old, his father beat him for the first
and only time. He had found a box of matches in one of the kitchen
drawers and headed into the backyard with a handful of napkins as
fuel.
He seated himself on a swing hanging from a tree and stared at the
matchbook, trying to recall how "Howling Mad" Murdock had lit
matches the night before on The A-Team. Before he successfully got
one of the matches flaming, though, his father came home from work.
Zach, enticed by the prospect of fire, never noticed him coming
into the backyard.
"Hey, son, what are you doing?" his father asked. The caring
expression on the face of his father soon changed into one of both
fear and anger as he realized what his son was trying to do.
"Put those down now!" he yelled, running towards Zach. When his son
still had not dropped the matches, he hit his son on the chest,
knocking Zach off the swing. Zach landed on the ground with a thud,
scattering napkins all around him.
"Don't you know that these things aren't toys?" his father
screamed. "Don't you know you could hurt yourself?"
Sobbing emerged from Zach's motionless body. The blow had knocked
the wind out of him. He tried moving around some, but it took too
much effort. His father stepped forward and pulled Zach to his
feet.
"Son, I'm very disappointed in you," he scolded as he undid his
belt. "I'm going to have to punish you for this."
Zach's crying decreased into a whimper as he tried to tell his
father that he was sorry. His pleading did not do any good,
however.
"Zach, you know that this hurts me more than it hurts you," his
father rationalized. "I'm only doing this because I love you."
His father doubled the belt up and swung, landing the blow squarely
on Zach's buttocks. Tears flowed from Zach's eyes, but he did not
cry. He was too weak to make a sound.
The beating lasted for a few more minutes, the belt hitting Zach on
his back and legs as well. His father was too filled with rage to
take careful aim. Zach remained standing throughout the entire
ordeal.
Finally, his father dropped the belt on the ground. "I hope you've
learned your lesson, son. Remember that this was for your own good.
Now, go wash up and I'll treat you to some ice cream. Okay?"
Zach slowly nodded, still facing away from his father. After a
couple of seconds and having made sure his dad was gone, he turned
around and slowly limped back into the house. His skin burned as he
took each step, the heat from the redness rising through his
clothes. The tears on his face had dried up, and his eyes stung
from the absence of moisture.
To this day, Zach still did not understand the words his father had
spoken as he whipped him with the belt. What did the words "I love
you" have to do with beating one's own son? This paradox of actions
forever changed the way he viewed those three words, and he vowed
never to say them unless he truly meant it. To say those words
without feeling was to defile all the emotion and love that they
were supposed to convey.
At the Baskin-Robbins, his father watched him eat every bite of his
ice cream. The chocolate tasted cold and sweet, flavored with his
father's bitter love.
3.
The ten o'clock news blared from the television set. Zach's mother
sat on the couch, reading one of the numerous tabloid magazines she
gets when she goes to the grocery store. As Zach walked through the
living room to the kitchen, he smirked to himself as he noted the
headline about aliens abducting a midwestern farmer's cat.
He opened a cabinet, pulled out a glass, and filled it with water.
The tabloids had always amazed Zach because people actually read
them and believed them. Whenever he did pick up one of his mom's
tabloid's, it was just to get a good laugh and not because he was
looking for reputable news. Still, Zach thought it would be funny
if the tabloids actually did print the truth and everything else
was a lie. He laughed again as pictures of flying saucers and
three-headed cows ran through his mind.
Back in his room, Zach flopped down on his bed and turned on his
stereo. A loud buzz emanated from the broken speaker while the
other one came to life with the sound of the Dead Kennedys.
The phone still sat silent on his desk. By now, Zach had given up
on getting in touch with Julie tonight. He was angry and worried at
the same time, yet his anger was slowly overpowering him. As the
night grew longer, his desire to talk to Julie diminished. Maybe in
the morning he would feel better. Sleep always seemed to be the
best remedy for all of his troubles.
4.
The night air played with Julie's hair as she sat on the hood of
her car. Her phone had been ringing constantly all afternoon, but
she feared that it might be Zach. Actually, she was positive that
Zach was the one who had been making the majority of the phone
calls, and guilt had forced her to call him. When Zach hadn't
answered, waves of relief swept over her. The bad news wasn't going
to make Zach happy, and she wanted to postpone telling him for as
long as possible.
She gazed upwards to the sky, looking to the blackness of the night
for answers. Julie had known about this for about two months now,
but she just could not bring herself to tell him until the very
end. Zach depended on her too much, and when she told him, he would
be devastated.
Julie understood Zach better than he understood himself, and even
though he was always calm and docile around her, at times she
thought she caught glimpses of Zach's old self in his eyes, like
some imprisoned beast trying to escape its chains. She was not sure
how he would take the news, but she was not scared of him.
Now, the time had come for her to tell Zach. There was no place to
hide, no place to run away. If she did not tell him soon, she would
just end up leaving without saying anything, and she knew that that
would be too much for Zach to handle. Maybe she should go back
inside and try calling again. He deserved at least that much. She
owed it to him.
Julie slid off the hood of her car and went back inside.
5.
The bright-red LED display on the alarm clock read 11:00 as Zach
woke up, the ringing of his telephone blaring in his ear. "Who
could be calling me this late?" he asked himself, realizing the
answer before he finished the question. He flung out his hand and
drug the phone over to him.
"Hello, Julie," he said.
"How did you know it was me?" Julie asked.
"I'm psychic," Zach explained.
"Oh, yeah? So, when's the world gonna end?"
"If I told you, it would spoil the surprise."
They both laughed. Zach detected a sense of uneasiness in Julie's
laugh.
"So, where were you today?" he inquired.
"Yeah, I'm sorry about not calling you this morning. I was really
sick and threw up. It wasn't the best of times to be talking on the
phone."
"Wouldn't want to ruin your phone, would you? I can just picture
hearing you talking and then hearing this really wretched sound
come through--"
"Zach, stop it," Julie laughed. "That's pretty sick."
"I know, I know," he apologized.
"Listen, do you want to go out tomorrow night?"
"Are you sure you feel alright? You think you ought to be at school
tomorrow?"
"Oh, I'll be fine," assured Julie. "I feel a lot better now. It
must have just been some quick virus or something. So, are we on
for tomorrow night?"
"Yeah, sure. That'll be great."
"Okay, well, I'm going to go get some sleep so I'll be all rested
up for tomorrow. I'll see you tomorrow."
"Bye."
"I love you."
"I love you too."
Julie hung up. She was lying, and Zach knew it. He didn't see how
anyone could be fine one day, utterly sick in the morning, and in
the evening making plans to go out the next day. This date didn't
look like such a good idea anymore, but Zach knew he had to go. He
had to find out what was wrong with her.
CHAPTER THREE
1.
Friday night rolled around sooner than Zach had wanted. Julie had
come to school today, but they hadn't spoken of their conversation
last night or Julie's absence. It was just another boring day of
the next to last week of school, the way Zach wanted it to be.
Tonight, however, was not going to be boring. Now, at five o' clock
with just an hour until he was supposed to pick up Julie, an
incessant gnawing began to chew away in the back of his mind. His
intuition told him that Julie was going to tell him something that
he did not want to hear, but he had no clue as to what it was.
Breaking up with her never entered his mind at all.
Zach buttoned his shirt and put on cologne. He had never used
cologne until he started going out with Julie. Personal hygiene was
not one of Zach's major concerns before he met her. If he didn't
mind the way he smelled, he was sure that no one else did, either.
Having finished getting ready, he went into the kitchen and popped
a batch of frozen chicken in the microwave for supper. Zach always
insisted on paying for everything he and Julie did. It was one of
those macho acts that society had imbedded in his psyche, and Julie
was a big eater. So, he always ate before they went out and just
ordered something small to save himself some cash.
Ten minutes later, the chicken finished cooking and he sat himself
down at the table for another cheap meal. Zach could live off of
frozen chicken for the rest of his life. It was inexpensive, easy
to cook, and easy to clean up. It also came in many
varieties--chicken tenders, chicken patties, chicken strips, and
chicken nuggets. What more could a single guy want?
After the meal, Zach cleaned up and noticed that it was time to get
Julie. He locked the house and left. He hoped tonight would be
boring. Surprises were something Zach hated greatly.
2.
The restaurant was excellent--nothing happened. They talked about
the things they usually talked about when they went out--school
life, teachers they liked and hated, other people's relationships,
and just the normal happenings of everyday life. The evening was
turning out to be okay after all. And Zach was sure that nothing
would happen during the movie.
When they arrived at the theater, Julie was mortified by the long
queue of people waiting to get tickets.
"I don't really want to wait for half-an-hour to see this film,"
Julie said impatiently.
"Well, what do you want to do then?" Zach asked.
"Why don't we go down to that little coffee house downtown? It's
been a while since I've had a good cappuccino. How does that sound
to you?"
Zach's confidence abruptly crumbled away. He had been counting on
the movie to eat up most of the evening so he could escape the
night unscathed. However, there was not much he could do without
seeming inconsiderate.
"Sure, that sounds fine," he said, forcing a smile.
"Good. We haven't been there in so long. It should be fun."
Zach had a much different opinion.
3.
Mookie's Coffee & Cappuccino had been a favorite hangout of Zach's
before he met Julie. It was located near the local university and
was frequented by much of the college population. As they entered,
Zach took a deep breath, inhaling the succulent fumes of dark, rich
coffee grinds emanating from behind the counter. Mona smiled and
waved when she saw them.
"Hey, guys, what are you doing here?" she asked.
"Hi, Mona," Julie greeted. "We didn't want to wait in line for a
movie, so we decided to come down here."
"Yeah, you know how impatient Julie is," Zach piped in. Julie gave
him a playful slap on the shoulder.
"I take it you want two giant caps?" Mona asked.
"The usual, of course," Zach confirmed. "By the way, I like your
nose ring. When did you get it?"
"Oh, a couple of weeks ago. Didn't hurt too bad, but it itches like
crazy."
Mona turned and made their cappuccinos. "Here you go. Have a good
night."
"Thanks, Mona. See you later." Zach grabbed their glasses and
headed to a table. Julie followed him.
They sat down at a corner table. Zach took about six packets from
the sugar bowl on the table and proceeded to dump them all into his
cappuccino.
"I don't see how you can drink that," Julie wondered.
"Well, I like my coffee sweet. None of that straight black stuff
that you drink." Zach made a grotesque moan.
"Listen, Zach, there's something I've been meaning to tell you for
a long time, but I just couldn't bring myself to."
Zach's face went completely blank. His pupils shrank instinctively,
and his flesh started warming up. "Oh, really? And exactly what
might that be?"
"About two months ago, Zach, I got a letter in the mail from up
north. I should have been honest with you when I got it, but I
wanted us to be happy for as long as possible."
What is she talking about? Zach asked himself.
"I'm sorry, Zach. I really am. They want me to go up north to
college, and it's the best chance I've got." Julie began to cry.
The sudden realization of the weight of her statement hit Zach like
a hollow-point bullet. She was leaving. Forever.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Zach yelled. A few heads turned in his
direction, but Zach's angry glares forced them back into their own
conversations.
Julie reached out to grab Zach's hand, but he shied away. "You have
every right to be upset," Julie said, trying to console him. "It's
all my fault for waiting until the last minute. Will you forgive
me?"
"How could you do this to me? I thought we were going to go to the
same place together. Wasn't that the plan? If you had told me
sooner, I could have made other arrangements and possibly gone up
there with you. It would have been fine if you hadn't waited. Why
did you wait?"
Her eyes poured forth tears as she spoke. "I didn't think you could
get in. They have a strict admission policy, and I didn't want to
be torn between you and college. I know I messed up, but I did what
I thought was best at the time."
Zach jerked himself onto his feet in a rage. For the first time,
Julie was terrified of him. He slowly bent down towards her until
their faces were only inches apart.
"I trusted you," he said. "I gave myself to you. I told you all of
my secrets that no one else has ever heard. I loved you. And this
is the thanks I get? There's never been anyone else that I've loved
except for you. I guess I didn't mean anything to you. I guess I
was just the messed up boy that you took pity on and decided to go
out with just to make me feel like I had something to live for. I
even believed that for a long time, but now, I know it was an
illusion I created to protect myself." Zach closed his eyes for a
second and reopened them. "Come on, we're going," he ordered.
"Zach, wait, it's not what you--"
"No, Julie, it is what I think. Now let's go before I decide to
break something... or someone."
Julie sullenly stood up and followed Zach back to the car. The ride
home was blanketed in total silence.
[to be continued...]
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State of unBeing is copyrighted (c) 1996 by Kilgore Trout and Apocalypse
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and all incidental material. All individual items are copyrighted (c) 1996 by
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