Kudos to Adam Gorightly for uncovering a March 1976 feature in the Berkeley Barb about Robert Anton Wilson and the Illuminatus! trilogy. Many of the facts in the piece are ones that I've read elsewhere, but there are some cool nuggets, including a revelation about which part of the book was written first. (Click on the clipping to get a document big enough to read.) The Historia Discordia blog continues to offer interesting documents.
UPDATE: After I wrote the above, I glanced again at the Historia Discordia blog. The header apparently has a rotating collection of absurd Discordian quotes, and today I read a quote with the headline, "Grand Opera." The quote: "Wherefore my bowels shall sound like a harp for Moab, and mine inward parts for Kirharesh." Isaiah 16:11. I thought maybe it was a parody, but I looked it up, and it's Isaiah 16:11, all right. That Adam Gorightly, if you don't watch out, he'll turn you into a Bible scholar.
Friday, January 31, 2014
Thursday, January 30, 2014
Jesse Walker on 1970s conspiracy theories
Jesse Walker has a new article up at i09.com, the science fiction site, on the "10 Most Essential 1970s Conspiracy Thrillers." He writes about movies such as "All the President's Men," "The Parallax View" and "The Conversation." (The article is illustrated with vintage preview clips.) Interesting in itself, and also a look at the cultural milieux that helped produced Illuminatus!
Wednesday, January 29, 2014
Celebrating Mozart's birthday
I didn't realize that Monday was Mozart's birthday until Eric Wagner wished me (and the rest of y'all) a "Happy Mozart's birthday" in the comments for the day's post.
I pulled out an MP3 player, hooked it up to the stereo, and listened to two of my favorite pieces: The piano concerto No. 24 (featuring Murray Perahia in the version I picked) and the piano quartet in G Minor (with Peter Serkin and the Yale String Quartet). I did my best to listen to them without "doing" anything. Reading Oz Fritz has helped remind me that's OK.
I doubt that either piece, certainly not the piano quartet, would make it on a "greatest hits" Mozart album. One of the most remarkable facts about Mozart's output is how great much of it was, not just the most familiar and the most played pieces.
This was a point also made by Andrew Ross in his collection of music essays, Listen to This. The chapter on Mozart records how Ross took a 180 CD recording of Mozart's complete works on the Phillips label and transferred it to his iPod (9.77 gigabytes at the "minimum listenable bitrate," which unfortunately Ross doesn't specify) and then listened to all of it from beginning to end. "From the start, the music is astonishingly well made," Ross reports.
I don't have the financial wherewithal to own the complete works (and I don't know how I would find time, anyway, to listen to all of it if I did) but like any other classical music buff, I own a lot of Mozart. (Amazon makes it easy to do this; I own two very cheap, large Mozart collections, the Bach Guild's "Big Mozart Box" and a set called "Mozart — 100 Supreme Classical Masterpieces," put out by a Swedish music label that has pioneered making big, cheap music collections available on the Internet.)
The other day, I was reading an online biography of Jimi Hendrix, and I focused on the astonishment of many listeners when they heard him perform for the first time. Mozart seems to have had a similar impact upon listeners. (Robert Anton Wilson writes about this in the Historical Illuminatus trilogy,where Mozart appears as a character.) Both men died young, robbing posterity of a great deal of music. (For Oz Fritz's thoughts on rock's top guitarists — he ranks Hendrix No. 1 — go here.) Hendrix was only 27 when he died and it's painful to speculate on where his talents would have taken him. Mozart made it to age 35. Many of his best works were composed late in life and his last year was a good one; it's frustrating to wonder what else we'd have if he had a few more years.
I can't give a citation because I can't remember the book where I read it, but I came across a passage years ago about two famous musicians discussing composers. One asked the other who his favorite was, and he replied, Beethoven. The other said, "I thought you were going to say Mozart." "Oh, I thought you meant besides Mozart," replied the first.
Michael Walsh, in his Who's Afraid of Classical Music?, wrote, "Mozart was the greatest composer who ever lived, and who probably will live."
Rankings of the best composer are ultimately a little silly and undoubtedly subjective. If I were pushed, I'd probably go with Beethoven. But the statements about Mozart seem less silly after carefully listening to much of his music.
I pulled out an MP3 player, hooked it up to the stereo, and listened to two of my favorite pieces: The piano concerto No. 24 (featuring Murray Perahia in the version I picked) and the piano quartet in G Minor (with Peter Serkin and the Yale String Quartet). I did my best to listen to them without "doing" anything. Reading Oz Fritz has helped remind me that's OK.
I doubt that either piece, certainly not the piano quartet, would make it on a "greatest hits" Mozart album. One of the most remarkable facts about Mozart's output is how great much of it was, not just the most familiar and the most played pieces.
This was a point also made by Andrew Ross in his collection of music essays, Listen to This. The chapter on Mozart records how Ross took a 180 CD recording of Mozart's complete works on the Phillips label and transferred it to his iPod (9.77 gigabytes at the "minimum listenable bitrate," which unfortunately Ross doesn't specify) and then listened to all of it from beginning to end. "From the start, the music is astonishingly well made," Ross reports.
I don't have the financial wherewithal to own the complete works (and I don't know how I would find time, anyway, to listen to all of it if I did) but like any other classical music buff, I own a lot of Mozart. (Amazon makes it easy to do this; I own two very cheap, large Mozart collections, the Bach Guild's "Big Mozart Box" and a set called "Mozart — 100 Supreme Classical Masterpieces," put out by a Swedish music label that has pioneered making big, cheap music collections available on the Internet.)
The other day, I was reading an online biography of Jimi Hendrix, and I focused on the astonishment of many listeners when they heard him perform for the first time. Mozart seems to have had a similar impact upon listeners. (Robert Anton Wilson writes about this in the Historical Illuminatus trilogy,where Mozart appears as a character.) Both men died young, robbing posterity of a great deal of music. (For Oz Fritz's thoughts on rock's top guitarists — he ranks Hendrix No. 1 — go here.) Hendrix was only 27 when he died and it's painful to speculate on where his talents would have taken him. Mozart made it to age 35. Many of his best works were composed late in life and his last year was a good one; it's frustrating to wonder what else we'd have if he had a few more years.
I can't give a citation because I can't remember the book where I read it, but I came across a passage years ago about two famous musicians discussing composers. One asked the other who his favorite was, and he replied, Beethoven. The other said, "I thought you were going to say Mozart." "Oh, I thought you meant besides Mozart," replied the first.
Michael Walsh, in his Who's Afraid of Classical Music?, wrote, "Mozart was the greatest composer who ever lived, and who probably will live."
Rankings of the best composer are ultimately a little silly and undoubtedly subjective. If I were pushed, I'd probably go with Beethoven. But the statements about Mozart seem less silly after carefully listening to much of his music.
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Supergee, Discordian activist (promoted from the comments)
Although I knew that Arthur Hlavaty, aka Supergee, had been involved with the Golden APA, I did not realize he had been a Discordian activist and produced Discordian business cards until I put up Sunday's blog post about Adam Gorightly's cache of Discordian materials. To my surprise, Arthur responded by putting up a comment: "In case you didn't know, those cards were one of my contributions to OM."
I put up comments asking for more information and sent Arthur an email, pointing out that this was cultural history and he couldn't just say, "Oh yeah, I did that" and wander off to the con suite for more bheer*. He obliged with a followup comment: "I read Illuminatus! when it appeared in 1975, and when I was trying to get up the nerve to do a zine of my own. I finally did so on 5/5/77. I started the Illuminatus! Nut Cult shortly thereafter because no one else had done it. Sometime around then, I got the idea for the cards. As is probably obvious they were technologically primitive, done on a typewriter (you remember typewriters), with little star stickers. Later I did a more modern version, designed by that excellent fan artist and underappreciated novelist Alexis Gilliland. If I can find one, I'll send it to you."
Can't wait.
* Fannish spelling of the word "beer." Arthur is a famous fan, so one assumes he doesn't drink mere beer, assuming he drinks at all.
I put up comments asking for more information and sent Arthur an email, pointing out that this was cultural history and he couldn't just say, "Oh yeah, I did that" and wander off to the con suite for more bheer*. He obliged with a followup comment: "I read Illuminatus! when it appeared in 1975, and when I was trying to get up the nerve to do a zine of my own. I finally did so on 5/5/77. I started the Illuminatus! Nut Cult shortly thereafter because no one else had done it. Sometime around then, I got the idea for the cards. As is probably obvious they were technologically primitive, done on a typewriter (you remember typewriters), with little star stickers. Later I did a more modern version, designed by that excellent fan artist and underappreciated novelist Alexis Gilliland. If I can find one, I'll send it to you."
Can't wait.
* Fannish spelling of the word "beer." Arthur is a famous fan, so one assumes he doesn't drink mere beer, assuming he drinks at all.
Monday, January 27, 2014
Michael Johnson on the Fifth Circuit
If you are interested in the Eight Circuit Model of Consciousness as conceived by Timothy Leary and developed and popularized by Robert Anton Wilson, have a gander at Michael Johnson's "Improvisations Off Leary and Wilson's 5th Circuit," over at his blog. (Michael modestly calls his piece "improvisations," but everything he posts seems to be based on books by Harvard professors, stacks of articles, out of print books that stuff in the shelves of his personal library, etc.)
See also the comments, where Eric Wagner talks about activating the Fifth Circuit with classical music.
See also the comments, where Eric Wagner talks about activating the Fifth Circuit with classical music.
Sunday, January 26, 2014
'And Now Available with NEW & IMPROVED FNORDS!'
Adam Gorightly's latest blog post advertises his Historia Discordia site thusly, "Now Available with NEW & IMPROVED FNORDS!" And indeed, the Fnords section of the site has been enhanced with a number of new brief handwritten documents, including a "Discordian Guerilla Ontology" advertisement for the Illuminatus! trilogy and a handwritten version of a famous Discordian saying. I can't link to Adam's site every time he puts something new on it, but keep an eye on it. It is invariably interesting.
To see how many of these documents were rescued for posterity, go here.
Saturday, January 25, 2014
Chasing Eris, around the world
An Australian guy named Brenton Clutterbuck is traveling around the world to meet with Discordians and to document his trip in a book. Bobby Campbell created a picture to support his effort.
Follow him on Facebook. He also is on Twitter.
I've posted his video from the place where the KLF burned a million pounds.
You can also visit his fundraising page and read this interview with him.
Friday, January 24, 2014
Cosmic Trigger play update!
Daisy Eris Campbell has released a new official update on her efforts to stage Robert Anton Wilson's Cosmic Trigger I: The Final Secret of the Illuminati. Some of the news flashes: There will be an event in Liverpool on Feb. 23 featuring Daisy and John Higgs and others; the official crowd funding campaign launches April 23, but if you donate now, you'll be invited to an exclusive party; volunteers are needed for various tasks. Complete details here, and don't forget to note that you can sign up for Daisy's email list or follow her on Twitter and Facebook.
Wait, there's more: Daisy is the subject of a nice write-up in Liverpool Confidential.
Wait, there's more: Daisy is the subject of a nice write-up in Liverpool Confidential.
Thursday, January 23, 2014
Is the Mgt. over in England these days?
One of the most memorable characters in Illuminatus! is Markoff Chaney, the midget, who posts puzzling signs designed to sow confusion. He signs that The MGT, which is assumed by many to mean "the management," although in fact the signature means "the midget."
Someone over in England has been leaving clever signs in the London subway. I've posted one of the photos; for more, go here.
Hat tip, Adrian Reynolds.
Wednesday, January 22, 2014
Will Wilkinson on what's wrong with liberals and libertarians
Libertarians tend to suck on environmental issues (hence this snark about the West Virginia chemical spill). On the other hand, they often go a great job discussing civil liberties issues, more so than any other identifiable political group.
I don't know that my opinion on those two issues seems terrible insightful. It seems banal or obvious to me, but it's apparently not allowed in the current ideological atmosphere to admit that reality has the kind of complexity that caused Robert Anton Wilson to talk about "model agnosticism." Apparently, you're supposed to stick to the idea that your side "rules" and everyone else's "sucks."
Sean Wilentz thinks libertarians suck, so he's become part of a long line of current writers attacking Glenn Greenwald for sounding too much like a libertarian. (I'm not going to link to his piece, but it's not hard to find.)
Will Wilkinson has a nice piece up on what's wrong with liberals and libertarians, focusing on the problem that many "liberals" seem to be abandoning their classical liberal roots as defenders of civil liberties. Here is a good passage excised from a slightly longer sentence:
Too many “liberals” are really conservative apologists for the status quo political order, just as too many “libertarians” are really conservative apologists for the status quo economic order.
Another bit I liked:
That anyone spurred to action against the illiberal security state by the democratic justificatory ethos of mundane liberalism has come to seem a little “libertarian,” and may even therefore confess some personal “libertarian” sympathies, suggests to me a problem with “liberalism” as it is embodied in actual political discourse and practice. It suggests that liberalism is effectively a corrupt form of statist institutional conservatism.
I don't know that my opinion on those two issues seems terrible insightful. It seems banal or obvious to me, but it's apparently not allowed in the current ideological atmosphere to admit that reality has the kind of complexity that caused Robert Anton Wilson to talk about "model agnosticism." Apparently, you're supposed to stick to the idea that your side "rules" and everyone else's "sucks."
Sean Wilentz thinks libertarians suck, so he's become part of a long line of current writers attacking Glenn Greenwald for sounding too much like a libertarian. (I'm not going to link to his piece, but it's not hard to find.)
Will Wilkinson has a nice piece up on what's wrong with liberals and libertarians, focusing on the problem that many "liberals" seem to be abandoning their classical liberal roots as defenders of civil liberties. Here is a good passage excised from a slightly longer sentence:
Too many “liberals” are really conservative apologists for the status quo political order, just as too many “libertarians” are really conservative apologists for the status quo economic order.
Another bit I liked:
That anyone spurred to action against the illiberal security state by the democratic justificatory ethos of mundane liberalism has come to seem a little “libertarian,” and may even therefore confess some personal “libertarian” sympathies, suggests to me a problem with “liberalism” as it is embodied in actual political discourse and practice. It suggests that liberalism is effectively a corrupt form of statist institutional conservatism.
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
Richard Jackson on RAW's list of his 100 favorite movies
A view from above: The Hollywood Bowl, foreground, Hollywood, and the LA skyline.
[My son, Richard Jackson, who teaches English in South Korea, is on vacation with me in Hollywood, California.
Richard have never read anything by Robert Anton Wilson, but he is a big film buff. After I posted the list of RAW's "100 Favorite Movies" (thanks again, Jesse Walker), Richard posted in the comments and then dashed off a series of emails to me. I thought they'd be worth putting together in a blog post. I've added a few comments. -- The Mgt.]
I noticed he didn't have that many science fiction movies on his list: 2001, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, A Clockwork Orange, King Kong are the ones I can see.
It's a good movie, but The Man Who Would Be King may have had special appeal for Wilson since he wrote about conspiracy theories. One of the plot points in the film is that the would be kings are Freemasons and they come across a cult that worships Freemasonry and it selects Sean Connery as its king. It turns out the cult was founded by Alexander the Great, an ancient Freemason.
Going through the list, it seemed Wilson tended to favor films where the protagonist was a loner, iconoclast, anti-hero, or straight up villain. Does that theme play out in his work? [Iconoclast, you bet. A good observation. -- The Mgt.] You'll notice Casablanca and The African Queen are NOT on his list, but Bogart's roles where he played less sympathetic protagonists are on the list, such as The Maltese Falcon, Treasure of the Sierra Madre, and The Big Sleep. [May be relevant that RAW was a big Raymond Chandler fan -- The Mgt.]
Not a lot of happy endings. A lot of the films are cynical and unsentimental. That was the case for Orson Welles, John Huston, Stanley Kubrick, Richard Brooks. He really favors their films.
Because of his choice in taste and directors, many of the films at are quite atmospheric.
He seemed to like films about Hollywood, were both satire and love letters. Like Ed Wood, Barton Fink, Singin in the Rain.
You may think I'm reaching, but if I had time I could write more about it. A lot of the films involve quests, people who find themselves in a sort of a hell (both lower and upper case "hell"), characters stumbling on secret societies, finding out conspiracies, and ending up in a culture completely different from their own. Do these themes play out in his books? [Pretty good observation, no? -- The Mgt.]
With his choice in film, I'm surprised he didn't have Chinatown (conspiracies, f'ed up characters, hell), Apocalypse Now (the quest, different culture, hell, atmospheric) or Hellboy (2004, before RAW's death) (the works). Hellboy is very Lovecraftian. I don't know if RAW was unaware of the film, wasn't interested or maybe he did see it and didn't love it. [I suspect that he did like Chinatown, as he referred to it in the Schroedinger's Cat trilogy. In fact, when I took Eric Wagner's course on SC at Maybe Logic Academy a couple of years ago, I watched it for the first time because Eric assigned us to. -- The Mgt.]
The Big Knife is also a satire on Hollywood movie. Surprised he didn't have Sunset Blvd. (1950) or The Last Command (1928). The first is a Billy Wilder movie about a screenwriter who becomes a kept man for a aging screen star. The latter is about a former Tsarist general in Los Angeles who is reduced to working menial jobs and appearing in films as a bit player or extra. But I guess his list can't be comprehensive.
Furthermore, I notice he didn't put down any films about social conscious issues. I don't know if he viewed those as overly didactic or if the messages in the film clashed with his libertarian beliefs. He had zero films by directors Stanley Kramer, Elia Kazan, 1 film by Norman Jewison, 2 films by Sidney Lumet. The Jewison film was And Justice For All, which shows the broken American justice system. That's appealing to most people of all political stripes. The two films by Lumet are Dog Day Afternoon, which dealt with homosexuality and the other is The Verdict, which is another broken American justice film. [I explained to Richard that RAW was in fact socially conscious and was arrested and jailed once in Ohio for protesting segregation at a barbershop, an incident discussed in Cosmic Trigger 2. -- The Mgt.]
Interestingly, he didn't list any films by Martin Scorsese, George Lucas, Oliver Stone or Francis Ford Coppola.
By decade his favorite films:
1910s-2
1920s-3
1930s-8
1940s-20
1950s-13
1960s-10
1970s-16
1980s-13
1990s-15
Richard Jackson with a Hollywood star honoring a RAW favorite.
The Blossom Ballroom at the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood, site of the first Academy Awards.
Monday, January 20, 2014
An effort at astral projection
Oz Fritz has a new blog post up about an effort by several Robert Anton Wilson fans to use astral projection to learn something about the Kennedy assassination and the Library of Alexandria. (I was invited to participate -- probably not because I actually know anything about astral projection -- and I've started reading a book Oz recommends on the subject, The Art and Practice of Astral Projection by Ophiel. It's available for Amazon Kindle.)
Oz is one of the members of the group who knows the most about this sort of thing, but Steve "Fly Agaric" Pratt has weighed in with a new blog post inspired by the effort. Steve asks skeptics to try to keep an open mind:
You may have noticed that i am talking about Astral Projection as if i know for sure that it works, which may bring much contention from armies of skeptics, critics and the ignorant who, as with the argument against full legalization and availability of drugs, would never try, and have never tried, the things they are so certain are so dangerous and threatening to life.
Anybody who has an active imagination and a healthy inquisitive mind can bypass this kind of bigoted ignorance, and recognize it in most authority figures and systems of control. Some may see how the language used to project the authority of knowing, itself, is a mechanism used to distort the picture, frame the information and prevent those trapped in linguistic cells from realizing the infinite flux of being, out there, beyond language...ish
Oz has promised to report on further developments.
Oz is one of the members of the group who knows the most about this sort of thing, but Steve "Fly Agaric" Pratt has weighed in with a new blog post inspired by the effort. Steve asks skeptics to try to keep an open mind:
You may have noticed that i am talking about Astral Projection as if i know for sure that it works, which may bring much contention from armies of skeptics, critics and the ignorant who, as with the argument against full legalization and availability of drugs, would never try, and have never tried, the things they are so certain are so dangerous and threatening to life.
Anybody who has an active imagination and a healthy inquisitive mind can bypass this kind of bigoted ignorance, and recognize it in most authority figures and systems of control. Some may see how the language used to project the authority of knowing, itself, is a mechanism used to distort the picture, frame the information and prevent those trapped in linguistic cells from realizing the infinite flux of being, out there, beyond language...ish
Oz has promised to report on further developments.
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Hurray for Hollywood
I'm taking a vacation of a few days in Hollywood and LA for a meetup with my son, Richard. Our hotel is a short walk away from the heart of the Walk of Fame, so I went and took some photos this afternoon. Here is my shot of a star honoring just one of the great performers from the golden age of cinema:
Unfortunately, I got ill with the flu before I came out here. I was so sick Friday that I did not do the normal social networking I'd otherwise have pursued to publicize Friday's post about the upcoming Illuminatus! group discussion. If any of y'all could help me spread the word, I'd be most grateful.
Unfortunately, I got ill with the flu before I came out here. I was so sick Friday that I did not do the normal social networking I'd otherwise have pursued to publicize Friday's post about the upcoming Illuminatus! group discussion. If any of y'all could help me spread the word, I'd be most grateful.
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