Cosmic Trigger survey

Daisy Campbell, second from left, and some of the folks who were involved with her Cosmic Trigger play. 

The folks who put on the Cosmic Trigger play are asking people to take an online survey. If you helped the play by attending it in Great Britain last year, or if you contributed to the crowd funding, or if you are new to the play but think you might want to support it, please take the survey. New performances are planned next year in both London and Santa Cruz, Calif. The survey has been up for a while and will likely go away soon, so if you want to help, take it now, or at least soon.

The literary award that honored Robert Anton Wilson

If you like to read science fiction and if you lean libertarian in your politics, today's blog post is aimed at you! The rest of you can skip it and wait to see what I write about tomorrow.

I have been a member for several years of a group called the Libertarian Futurist Society, which for more than 30 years have been giving out two literary awards: the Prometheus Award, for the best science fiction/fantasy novel of the previous year which deals with individual liberty, and the Hall of Fame Award, which honors a literary work published in the past. 

I have posted about the award in the past, and in fact there is a Robert Anton Wilson connection. As far as I know, the only literary award that RAW received when he was alive was a Prometheus Hall of Fame Award, given to him and Robert Shea for the Illuminatus! trilogy. (You can read Robert Shea's acceptance speech at the 1986 Worldcon in Atlanta. ( I attended the convention but missed the ceremony. It's a big
convention.)

I am pleased with the quality of the work we've honored in recent years.
Here are some recent winners:

2015 -- Daniel Suarez, Influx
2014 -- Cory Doctorow, Homeland and Ramez Naam, Nexus
2013 -- Cory Doctorow, Pirate Cinema
2012 -- Delia Sherman, The Freedom Maze and Ernest Cline, Ready Player
One
2011 -- Sarah Hoyt, Darkship Thieves
2010 -- Dani and Eytan Kollin, The Unincorporated Man
2009 -- Cory Doctorow, Little Brother
2008 -- Harry Turtledove, The Gladiator; Jo Walton, Ha'penny
2007 -- Charles Stross, Glasshouse
2006 -- Ken MacLeod, Learning the World
2005 -- Neal Stephenson, The System of the World
2004 -- F. Paul Wilson, Sims
2003 -- Terry Pratchett, Night Watch

Full list here.

I bring this up to issue an invitation. If you are interested in libertarian issues, and if you like science fiction, you should consider joining the Libertarian Futurist Society and participating on our award.

There are various levels of membership. For $60, the level of Full membership I would suggest, you get to vote for all of the awards. You will likely enjoy the process. Panels of judges select five or so Hall of Fame finalists and five or so Prometheus Award finalists. These finalists are selected from nominations by LFS members. While anyone can call a book to our attention, nominating a book for the Prometheus Award or the Hall of Fame Award is a right reserved only to LFS members. 

The Hall of Fame finalists this year are Manna by Lee Correy, Courtship Rite by Donald Kingsbury, "As Easy as ABC" by Rudyard Kipling, The Island Worlds by Eric Kotani and John Maddox Roberts and A Mirror for Observers by Edgar Pangborn. This year's Prometheus Award finalists will be announced soon. I can't drop any hints, but I've read all of the finalists, and they are good books.

On occasion, we also give special awards, after a vote by the membership. Lifetime Achievement awards have been given, for example, to writers L. Neil Smith, Vernon Vinge, F. Paul Wilson and Poul Anderson.

Please consider joining us, and see this page for more information. 

Aliens communicating through Finnegans Wake!

I usually only put up one blog post a day, but Derek Pyle of the Waywords and Meansigns project chose today, for some reason, to let me know his important discovery that extraterrestrials have been using Finnegans Wake to communicate with Earth. Today seemed like a good day to share this breaking news.

Michael Johnson on meeting writers you admire

I never met Robert Anton Wilson, although I did once meet Robert Shea at a worldcon in Boston. When I think about it, it seems odd, as I have been a lifelong journalist, that I never drummed up an excuse to at least interview RAW over the phone.

When you are a science fiction fan, you can go to conventions and meet many of your favorite writers. Most of those meetings have gone well for me, perhaps because writers go to these things knowing that they will have to interact with fans.

Michael Johnson has written a new piece on his encounters with writers, and I admire Michael's candor about how those encounters can be thrilling but also a little embarrassing. Read it to relive Michael's interactions with Robert Anton Wilson, Douglas Rushkoff, Erik Davis and others.

Festival 23 tickets available at 'early bird' price

Tickets for Festival 23 have gone on sale, with early ticket buyer prices of 55 pounds for festival members and 69 pounds for non-members. Second tier pricing kicks in on April 23, so if  you want to go, you should buy now, organizers say.

If you've missed our previous posts, Festival 23 is planned for July 22-24 this year in northern England. (If the exact location has been announced, I've missed it; the official website says only "northern Albion").

Here is a list of some of the attractions, from the latest official communique:

Legendary DJ Greg Wilson & Ruthless Rap Assassin Kermit Leveridge's Super Weird Substance

Writer, speaker & all round catalyst John Higgs presents Ziggy Blackstar & the Art of Becoming

Psychedelic ray-gun spray from Kavus Torabi's Knifeworld

Author, singer/songwriter and Sony-award winning Dr Bramwell

Life affirming musical experimentation from the gorgeous Bloom

Map 71 bring their blend of words, sinister ritual percussion & sparse electro textures

Conceptual rock band G I B L E T manifest their debut album ‘Holding The Egg’

Ian 'Cat' Vincent brings us DADA 101: An introduction to Defence Against the Dark Arts

Crisp off-kilter electro pop from the wonderful Barringtone

World renowned producer & DJ Richard Norris shows us what's up his wizard's sleeve

Question the very fabric of reality with guru, teacher & cosmic thinker Puppet Alan Watts

Dance, psychedelia & shenanigans a'plenty from our very own DISCO boy Horton Jupiter

Artist, activist and ex KLF member Jimmy Cauty bringing his Aftermath Dislocation Principle (ADP)

Mindfuckery and Erisian delight as the cast and crew of the ‘Cosmic Trigger Play’ and ‘Find the Others Conferestival’ close proceedings with the Cosmic Trigger Cabaret

Try clicking some of the links, for example for "Puppet Alan Watts" and "DADA 101." The word "unique" is perhaps overused in the English language, but if this festival doesn't present unique opportunities, I don't know what the word means.

New 'Eris of the Month'

Adam Gorightly has posted the latest Eris of the Month, Part Two of Cpt. Bucky Saia’s Erismorphing Project. For more depictions of Eris, please see Adam's Historia Discordia website.

Reminder: Cosmic Trigger reading group begins soon

A quick reminder that the Cosmic Trigger I online reading group will begin here in two weeks, using the new version put out by Hilaritas Press (although the old editions will work most of the time.) More details here. 

Sandusky: The Illuminati lose a round!

I live in the Cleveland area in Ohio, but I work in Sandusky, an old city about halfway between Cleveland and Toledo on the northern Ohio Lake Erie coast.

The city recently came up with a new official logo, one that incorporates the city's heritage as a place originally designed by a Freemason. I was quite amused by the logo, which incorporates the symbol, and even had a pyramid in the middle:

 Alas, a backlash developed against the new seal, and the city decided to keep the old one. The old seal is below:

RAW Festival planned in California in 2017

Robert Anton Wilson

The  latest RAWTrust newsletter, announcing the publication of the Prometheus Rising ebook, also has an announcement from Christina Pearson: She is trying to to put together a RAW festival in July of 2017.

Excerpt:

In honor of July 23rd being Robert Anton Wilson Day in the town of Santa Cruz, CA (the Mayor of Santa Cruz announced this at the Santa Cruz premiere screening July 23rd, 2003 of Maybe Logic, the documentary that focused on Bob’s ideas and perspectives), and of course also in honor of the Dog Days of Sirius, which seem to envelop July 23rd in most calendars… 

We (right now I think it is mostly me) would like to create some kind of Investigatory / Celebratory / Transformatory / Interactory (hey, my new word!) multi-day process, not only to bring together in fun and friendship those who knew Bob personally, but also to inspire, cultivate, interconnect, and perhaps even showcase some of the creativity of the wonderfully wide spectrum of individuals around the world who have been touched in some way by his work.

Ideally, we would love to also see the British stage production of Cosmic Trigger (developed and produced by Daisy Eris Campbell) brought here to the USA and performed onstage for our delight during the festival…

Christina will be setting up a crowdfunding effort in a few weeks to try to make this happen, and of course I'll let everyone know here when that is announced.

Revival set next year of Cosmic Trigger play in London

Lots of news from a newsletter issued by Daisy Campbell, text attributed to "Mich," including the fact that the Cosmic Trigger play will be revived for 23 performances in London in May 2017, and that plans are advancing for performances in Santa Cruz, California, in July 2017. There's other news, too.

A couple of bits:

The plan for Santa Cruz July 2017 (the ten year anniversary of Bob's death and the day named Robert Anton Wlson day by Santa Cruz's mayor) is now looking like the ultimate Discordian holiday-caper. A holiday in which we entice as many Bob enthusiasts as possible to work together HEROICALLY to stage Cosmic Trigger in ten gloriously chaotic days of rehearsals, set building and music making madness.

Rather than this being a poor cousin of a more professional tour of our show, we see this as the perfect way to bring together the Bob communities from both sides of the pond in a way that will bond us in Erisian-brother-and-sisterhood and seed many more future adventures.

Full scoop here.  Don't miss the Festival 23 news.

New Prometheus Rising issued as ebook

Hilaritas Press has continued its efforts to publish definitive editions of Robert Anton Wilson's works by issuing the new ebook version of Prometheus Rising, with a paperback edition to follow soon. It follows the publication of Cosmic Trigger.

The new Prometheus Rising features an afterword by Richard Rasa.

Here is the planned publication schedule for the Hilaritas Press reprints; the publication of Quantum Psychology is expected soon.


1 ~ Cosmic Trigger I: The Final Secret of the Illuminati (1977)
2 ~ Prometheus Rising (1983)
3 ~ Quantum Psychology (1990)
4 ~ Email to the Universe (2005)
5 ~ Coincidance: A Head Test (1988)
6 ~ The Earth Will Shake (1982)
7 ~ The Widow’s Son (1985
8 ~ Nature’s God (1988)
9 ~ Cosmic Trigger II: Down to Earth (1992)
10 ~ Cosmic Trigger III: My Life After Death (1995)
11 ~ Sex, Drugs and Magick: A Journey Beyond Limits (1988)
12 ~ The New Inquisition (1986)
13 ~ Ishtar Rising (1989)
14 ~ Reality Is What You Can Get Away With (1992)
15 ~ Wilhelm Reich in Hell (1987)
16 ~ The Walls Came Tumbling Down (1997)
17 ~ TSOG: The Thing That Ate the Constitution (2002)
18 ~ Natural Law, or Don’t Put a Rubber on Your Willy (1987)
19 ~ Chaos and Beyond (1994)

Brian Dean on the 'RAW Resurgence'

To learn more about "framing," you can read Brian Dean's book.

At Disinformation, Brian Dean posts a piece on the resurgence of interest in Robert Anton Wilson. He mentions the new RAW biography that's in the works and John Higgs' book, Stranger Than We Can Imagine. But he doesn't mention the Cosmic Trigger play, Hilaritas Press, the thriving RAW community on Facebook at Robert Anton Wilson Fans and Discordian Libertarians (and Jake Shannon's FnordU), Adam Gorightly's barrage of books and  his website,  and so on. I'm sure I've leaving out something obvious. [UPDATE: But see the comments. Apparently, he turned in a much longer piece.]

Dean seems particularly interested in exploring the parallels he sees between RAWs ideas and George Lakoff's ideas: "My enthusiasm for RAW’s ideas precedes my interest in the somewhat drier linguistics work of George Lakoff by about 20 years. I owe my appreciation of the importance of Lakoff’s Frame Semantics to those two decades in which I internalised RAW’s multiple-model neurosemantics approach."

Michael Johnson also has written about Lakoff. James Taranto, the right wing pundit, has argued that liberals hurt themselves if they follow Lakoff's advice. 

UPDATE: Jesse Walker also offers a skeptical take. 

Tim Lott on Alan Watts

Alan Watts

A few days ago, Michael Johnson called my attention to an article by Tim Lott in Aeon, "Off-beat Zen: How I found my way out of depression, thanks to the writings of the English priest who brought Buddhism to the West," a piece about Alan Watts. 

Michael remarked, "Watts was a huge personal influence on RAW."

You can see evidence of that in Lott's essay. Here are the first couple of paragraphs: 

Ever since I was a child, I have been acutely sensitive to the idea — in the way that other people seem to feel only after bereavement or some shocking unexpected event — that the human intellect is unable, finally, to make sense of the world: everything is contradiction and paradox, and no one really knows much for sure, however loudly they profess to the contrary.

It is an uncomfortable mindset, and as a result I have always felt the need to build a conceptual box in my mind big enough to fit the world into. Most people seem to have a talent for denying or ignoring life’s contradictions, as the demands of work and life take them over. Or they fall for an ideology, perhaps religious or political, that appears to render the world a comprehensible place.

The bit about falling for an ideology sounds a lot like getting trapped in the reality tunnels that RAW wrote about.

Here's the end bit:

My personal ‘enlightenment’ came and went — but I hope it might return. Perhaps this article will be the first step in that direction. It feels like it is. It might be in my hands or it might not. But if I can find the path again, then I will stay on it — until I lose it. And, as the Zen saying instructs, if I see the Buddha, I will kill him. Because the moment you start thinking of yourself as ‘enlightened’, you are not.

The last sentence sounds like the Cosmic Schmuck principle, no?

Thanks, Michael!

Tim Lott is on Twitter.