GLOBAL CULTURE
means A.) American Imperialism; megaconglomerate dominance; B.) the destruction of American identity; C.) both.
The U.S. boozh-why-zee sitting in comfortable armchairs in Manhattan or Connecticut empathizing with people halfway around the world-- or with mad terrorists in Guantanamo-- is an excuse for them to ignore the triumphs and tragedies in their own country. The subject of American literature is AMERICA-- a big enough topic for anyone.
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Rightists and Leftists
In the same way the Right was taken over by empire-minded neo-cons, America's Left is compromised by elitist globalists with no interest in their own nation's working class, which is how they're able to support policies and beliefs (illegal immigration; global warming) destructive of that class. It's been no surprise to discover that many self-proclaimed liberals have never purchased an American union-made car. They're disdainful of anything which reeks too much of "America": American identity; American culture.
Solzhenitsyn pointed out that the first victim of Russian Communism was Russia itself. Likewise, the first casualty of American-spurred globalism is America. This is seen in our literature.
Which brings us back to the jet-set lit-journal N+1. It's not an American literary journal at all. In the words of one of their contributors, Gloria Fisk, they write for "the global audience of privileged citizens of comfortably secular nations."
Sorry, but my grandparents didn't come here simply to be part of the globe. They were escaping the globe. Like so many others, they came to transform themselves into Americans. Americans! A word which once meant something special, something unique. The task of American writers is to recapture that glorious uniqueness.
Solzhenitsyn pointed out that the first victim of Russian Communism was Russia itself. Likewise, the first casualty of American-spurred globalism is America. This is seen in our literature.
Which brings us back to the jet-set lit-journal N+1. It's not an American literary journal at all. In the words of one of their contributors, Gloria Fisk, they write for "the global audience of privileged citizens of comfortably secular nations."
Sorry, but my grandparents didn't come here simply to be part of the globe. They were escaping the globe. Like so many others, they came to transform themselves into Americans. Americans! A word which once meant something special, something unique. The task of American writers is to recapture that glorious uniqueness.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Folk Lit
THE FIRST STAGE
of publishing from the literary rebellion-- which I fully applaud-- through authors like Wred Fright, Carl Robinson, Steve Kostecke, Bill Blackolive, Jack Saunders, and others, represents the best of American folk lit NOW.
Folk art has always been the life force, the renewing stream, for the best art. This has been seen even in the realm of classical music. One hundred years ago the best modern composers like Vaughn-Williams and Respighi returned to the roots of their art for inspiration.
Folk Lit is the necessary foundation for the next stage of the literary art-- the step, in styles and products, which will be truly revolutionary.
of publishing from the literary rebellion-- which I fully applaud-- through authors like Wred Fright, Carl Robinson, Steve Kostecke, Bill Blackolive, Jack Saunders, and others, represents the best of American folk lit NOW.
Folk art has always been the life force, the renewing stream, for the best art. This has been seen even in the realm of classical music. One hundred years ago the best modern composers like Vaughn-Williams and Respighi returned to the roots of their art for inspiration.
Folk Lit is the necessary foundation for the next stage of the literary art-- the step, in styles and products, which will be truly revolutionary.
Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Where Goes the Underground?
THE SALIENT POINT
to be made about the literary underground ("Resistance"; "Rebellion"; et.al.) as it's currently being managed at entities like the ULA and OW is that it does everything ass-backwards. In this respect it mimics the literary world as a whole. It makes me wonder if writers by nature are congenitally incapable of having a contemporary understanding about business, instead wanting to operate as if this were still 1820.
The problem is and has always been a MARKETING problem. The Underground Literary Alliance was founded to address this-- not to engage in the same-old same-old. Undergrounders, instead of using new tactics which I proved work, operate with the same baby-step way toward guaranteed failure; producing modest quantities of product; spending enormous amounts of energy in distributing it, without understanding the context within which it's placed, which demands ways to move it. Underground writers themselves are well-satisfied to have their books published, or poems placed on-line, without understanding it means nothing if new ways aren't found to attract readers TO that product.
Creating more supply isn't how the literary rebellion was intended to operate. The plan was always to first create DEMAND for that supply, to a great extent, into which the product could be fed. 90% of activity, if not 99%, was intended to go toward creating demand. Instead, 99% of effort is now spent on the other end. In this loud, media-saturated society, this is senseless.
to be made about the literary underground ("Resistance"; "Rebellion"; et.al.) as it's currently being managed at entities like the ULA and OW is that it does everything ass-backwards. In this respect it mimics the literary world as a whole. It makes me wonder if writers by nature are congenitally incapable of having a contemporary understanding about business, instead wanting to operate as if this were still 1820.
The problem is and has always been a MARKETING problem. The Underground Literary Alliance was founded to address this-- not to engage in the same-old same-old. Undergrounders, instead of using new tactics which I proved work, operate with the same baby-step way toward guaranteed failure; producing modest quantities of product; spending enormous amounts of energy in distributing it, without understanding the context within which it's placed, which demands ways to move it. Underground writers themselves are well-satisfied to have their books published, or poems placed on-line, without understanding it means nothing if new ways aren't found to attract readers TO that product.
Creating more supply isn't how the literary rebellion was intended to operate. The plan was always to first create DEMAND for that supply, to a great extent, into which the product could be fed. 90% of activity, if not 99%, was intended to go toward creating demand. Instead, 99% of effort is now spent on the other end. In this loud, media-saturated society, this is senseless.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Total Disgust
THE LATEST
bad news is the Republican stance against the auto companies. They're blithely willing to allow America to lose its manufacturing base-- to have our industries owned by Japan! The unfortunate truth is that both major parties are anti-American at their core-- due to a privileged and centralized intellectual class embedded and nurtured in and around New York. The New York Times and Wall Street Journal follow different strategies for achieving the same end-- the obliteration of America. This is why the campaign to take back our literary culture is fundamentally important.
bad news is the Republican stance against the auto companies. They're blithely willing to allow America to lose its manufacturing base-- to have our industries owned by Japan! The unfortunate truth is that both major parties are anti-American at their core-- due to a privileged and centralized intellectual class embedded and nurtured in and around New York. The New York Times and Wall Street Journal follow different strategies for achieving the same end-- the obliteration of America. This is why the campaign to take back our literary culture is fundamentally important.
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
The Rejection of Palin
The instant fear and hatred of Sarah Palin by the intelligentsia, on first sight and beyond, in a real sense is a rejection by this crowd of America itself-- "Fifties" America if you will, or America Past. It's a rejection not just of America's mistakes, but of everything that was truly great about this nation; its earnest striving, values, character, and wholesomeness. I don't know how anybody could see Sarah Palin, baby in arms, and not recognize a good person. Maybe that's the problem.
We're seeing the failure of the ideology of the global economy-- which has not served this country well-- but there's also a failure for us of the notion of a globalized culture, including globalized literature as represented by the intellectually bankrupt N+1 and other such outfits.
I advocate for roots-based new American literature.
We're seeing the failure of the ideology of the global economy-- which has not served this country well-- but there's also a failure for us of the notion of a globalized culture, including globalized literature as represented by the intellectually bankrupt N+1 and other such outfits.
I advocate for roots-based new American literature.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Wrong
AS WRONG-HEADED
as to believe that America is never wrong is to believe that America is never right.
as to believe that America is never wrong is to believe that America is never right.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
The Rootless
THE TRAGEDY
of America's white liberal intelligentsia is that they've been raised without roots in their own land and authentic culture. Since 1968 they've been bombarded by the educational system with the notion that they're responsible for all the crimes of history, and should be ashamed to be white. Simultaneous with this they've been hit by the anti-American "citizen of the world" ideology. They've been imbued with false nyths and disconnected from legendary American cultural figures like Davy Crockett. The name embarrasses them if it means anything to them.
But real culture by definition IS rooted and has to be rooted in a land and people. This has been denied to America's most pampered and affluent class of people, who walk around like living tragedies. This is part of the tragedy of lost soul David Foster Wallace, whose art floated in the air in a disconnected way and whose ideas were disconnected from reality, the man so out of touch with the brutalities of life and society that he worried more about the boiling of lobsters-- giant cockroaches-- then the plight of human beings. A true representative he was, though, of his literary class and intellectually bankrupt time.
of America's white liberal intelligentsia is that they've been raised without roots in their own land and authentic culture. Since 1968 they've been bombarded by the educational system with the notion that they're responsible for all the crimes of history, and should be ashamed to be white. Simultaneous with this they've been hit by the anti-American "citizen of the world" ideology. They've been imbued with false nyths and disconnected from legendary American cultural figures like Davy Crockett. The name embarrasses them if it means anything to them.
But real culture by definition IS rooted and has to be rooted in a land and people. This has been denied to America's most pampered and affluent class of people, who walk around like living tragedies. This is part of the tragedy of lost soul David Foster Wallace, whose art floated in the air in a disconnected way and whose ideas were disconnected from reality, the man so out of touch with the brutalities of life and society that he worried more about the boiling of lobsters-- giant cockroaches-- then the plight of human beings. A true representative he was, though, of his literary class and intellectually bankrupt time.
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