Robert Anton Wilson's 'Wild sex freaks'

One of the illustrations from "Wild Sex Freaks of History."

Martin Wagner has uncovered yet another (probable) Robert Anton Wilson piece, "Wild Sex Freaks of History."

For context, this is one of his "schlock" pieces (see this essay, "The Anatomy of Schlock"), but as Martin points out, the article does have this rather Wilsonian observation: "While some of these sexual eccentrics are distinctly ugly and even dangerous, some of them, there is no denying, are rather attractive, and history would have been duller without their presence. Except for those of sadistic inclination, these people did less harm that the average politician; and even the sadists actually caused less bloodshed than many an idealistic statesman. Although we could do without another Messalina, it is to be hoped that the future will not cease to provide Cleopatras and Eleanors."

Literary tastes change

Over the years, literary tastes tend to shift. This was brought home to me a few weeks ago when I was hanging out with Bobby Campbell and Gregory Arnott at Confluence in Pittsburgh, and Gregory remarked that he expects interest in Ezra Pound to fade in university English departments. Pound's interest in fascism just doesn't play well, Gregory explained.

I've been reading a new book about an obscure modernist-surrealist poet, Charles Henri Ford (1908-2002) who I've long been interested in. (The book is Charles Henri Ford: Between Modernism and Postmodernism (Historicizing Modernism) by Alexander Howard, and so far, I think Howard is doing a great job.)

I've noticed that although Ford has never had a big following, the way he is "marketed" by the people who are interested has changed. He used to be billed as America's first surrealist poet. Nowadays, the focus tends to be more on The Young and Evil, an experimental novel originally published in 1933 in collaboration with Parker Tyler which depicts gay life in New York City, and on Ford's early role in publishing queer literary works. This fits, I guess, with the general tendency now to give more space to marginalized groups.

So the question I would pose is this: Are there any current trends that could be used to promote renewed interest in Robert Anton Wilson and/or Robert Shea?

Roman Tsivkin's 'Feeling Bookish'

Roman Tsivkin, currently active in our Beethoven discussion group, has launched a new podcast on Soundcloud, "Feeling Bookish." The first episode is devoted to Tao Lin's new book on psychedelics, Trip: Psychedelics, Alienation and Change. Roman is joined on the show by book critic Robert Fay. 

Topics covered include Terence McKenna (Roman says the book is a good primer on McKenna), James Joyce, raw milk and how cannabis affects dreaming. It was very interesting.

There are two more episodes of the show that have been released so far. You can stream it for free fro Soundcloud's website or smartphone app. I'm hoping that at some point there will be a downloading option somewhere.

Bobby Campbell's Patreon account

Via Steve "Fly" Agaric's Patreon efforts, I discovered Bobby Campbell's Patreon account. 

Just $1 a month gets you access to a bunch of comix, with a promise of more to come.

Beethoven Quartet and Kerman reading group, Week Three

Kerman Week 3 – Op. 18, No. 2 – The Second Half of Chapter 2

By Eric Wagner, guest blogger

Joseph Kerman

[If you arrived late, Eric is leading us in a discussion of Joseph Kerman's book, The Beethoven Quartets. Not too late to get caught up and join in! -- The Management.]

This week please read section three of chapter 2 (pg. 44 – 53) and listen to Op. 18, No. 2. Please comment on this week’s chapter and continue to comment on previous weeks’ chapters.

Pg. 44 – 45. Kerman refers to Haydn’s Op. 33 string quartets.  These quartets play an important role in Charles Rosen’ The Classical Style. Maynard Solomon’s Late Beethoven has a interesting survey of attitudes towards Beethoven and the Classical and Romantic periods. Some see Beethoven as a protoromantic. Rosen convincingly shows how Beethoven’s music remained rooted in the classical language of Haydn and Mozart even as he stretched that language to its limits in his late music.

Please post your musical biography this week.

I learned to play piano in third grade, acoustic bass in fourth grade, and flute in fifth grade. I wish I had continued with flute, especially when carrying around acoustic basses for decades. I started guitar in ninth grade, and I played viola de gamba a bit in college. In first grade a teacher played us the slow movement to Haydn’s Surprise Symphony, and I loved it. I grudgingly liked Beethoven because he had studied with Haydn. In fourth or fifth grade I discovered Wagner’s “Flight of the Valkyries” in a collection of light classical music my parents owned. I liked that he had the same last name as me. In junior high I had an eight-track tape of famous Beethoven piano sonatas.

The summer after my first year of college I had a cold and stayed home from work one day. I put on Toscanini’s recording of Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony. I don’t think I’d ever heard it before, and it blew me away. That fall I started hanging out a lot with pianist Jai Jeffreys, and he really deepened my understanding of Beethoven. A year and a half later I started reading Robert Anton Wilson, and his writings on Beethoven changed me forever.

Steve Fly launches Patreon account

Steve Fly's fine video, above, an illustrated reading of Robert Anton Wilson's "Tale of the Tribe" outline at the back of TSOG: The Thing That Ate the Constitution, is a "free sample" for his new Patreon account. Lots more goodies from Mr. Pratt if you throw him a few bucks, including books and music.

There's also a Patreon account for Bobby Campbell, which I'll write about soon. 

A Discordian podcast

Jo Sims (Facebook photo) 

Eris Radio recently did a podcast on "Music For Discordians- Stylings Of Jo Sims."  The host, Sean Lawless, read quotes from Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea and played Sims' music. She is a singer and has performed with Planet Nine and Dorothy's Ghost, which I believe is her current group.

I liked her voice and the songs. My favorite tune was "Close To Me" by Dorothy's Ghost, available here. 

Robert Anton Wilson on Frank Capra

Frank Capra (Columbia Pictures public domain photo, via Wikipedia)

Young people supposedly don't like old movies, but those of us who enjoy classic cinema love Frank Capra, who directed It Happened One Night, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, It's a Wonderful Life and many other well-remembered films. 

Jesse Walker -- author, pundit, Reason magazine editor and serious film buff -- recently went through his emails looking for something and ran across a Robert Anton Wilson comment on Capra, which he is kindly sharing with us.

This quote dates to 2004, and RAW is reacting to an article Jesse that sent him called "The Two Capras -- and My Capra" by Ray Carney. 

On 'tother hand, my Capra combines both sides -- a genuine love for American/Jeffersonian ideals and an urgent, at times terrifying clarity about the reality of fascist power in this country... That 'dialectical' vision gives his films their unique intensity, I think...his 'villains' really scare me and I really love his embattled heroes...

Perhaps SILENCE OF THE LAMBS comes closest to Capra in our time. Remove Clarice and it becomes merely depressing; remove Dr Lecter's super-powers and it becomes sentimental. But,  like Capra, Demme sees both sides: wise  innocence and intelligent evil...

-- Robert Anton Wilson

More on Jemisin, etc.

I am swamped today and can't manage a long blog post, but if yesterday's post interested you, see Supergee's follow-up post. 

Hugo Award news

N.K. Jemisin (Creative Commons photo) 

As there is some associational interest in science fiction at this blog, I thought I'd pass on some interesting news: N.K. Jemisin won for best novel for The Stone Sky. She had also won for the previous two novels in the trilogy, which as I understand it as unprecedented. (I really liked The Fifth Season, but I got kind of tired of them with The Obelisk Gate and The Stone Sky.)

Full Hugo results here. (I didn't read any of the other "best novel" finalists.) You can read some of Jemisin's reflections on Twitter. 

Anyone who is paying attention will notice the prominence of women in the current wave of emerging science fiction and fantasy authors. Ann Leckie is obviously a major writer, too, although my favorite new writer (of any gender) is Ada Palmer.

Brenton Clutterbuck news update

Brenton Clutterbuck, author of Chasing Eris, has released a free new mini ebook, United We Fnord: More Discordian Stories from the UK and Ireland that's a supplement to Chasing Eris. It won't be around forever.  Brenton explains,

When Cat Vincent was kind enough to write a review for my book Chasing Eris, he said one thing that stood out to me; my UK chapters focussed on history and were notably lacking in the kind of in-depth description of the people and scenes that are the lifeblood of other chapters.

While it was very neat to wrap up some of the more historical elements of Discordianism in quick succession by following the KLF from England to Scotland, and dealing with Robert Anton Wilson just outside of the UK, in Ireland, I always felt a little bad for not including more of the more personal interviews I completed while in the United Kingdom. So, here’s a short collection of the UK stories published previously in blogs, magazines or not at all.

More news: Chasing Eris has become more widely available. Originally only offered through Lulu.com in a paper edition and also as an ebook (ePub format), it's also now available from Barnes and Noble, from Apple iTunes and from Amazon (but no Kindle, and not if you live in the U.S.). There's also a Barnes and Noble ebook. 

Kerman's 'Beethoven Quartets' reading group, Week Two

Portrait of Beethoven as a young man by Carl Traugott Riedel (1769–1832)

Kerman Week 2 – Op. 18, No. 1 – The First Half of Chapter 2

By Eric Wagner, guest blogger

Rest in peace, Aretha Franklin.

This week please read sections one and two of chapter 2 (pg. 30 – 44) and listen to Op. 18, No. 1. Please comment on this week’s chapter and continue to comment on last week’s chapter.

Pg. 34. Kerman refers to Mozart’s Symphony in E flat, also known as Symphony 39, K. 543, one of Mozart’s great three final symphonies. Mozart did not give his works opus numbers. A scholar named Köchel (1800 – 1877) catalogued Mozart’s works and originated the K numbers. (Thank you, Wikipedia.)

I tend to think of Beethoven’s quartets by their opus numbers. When Kerman refers to them by their keys, I usually have to double check the table of contents to figure out which quartet he means. On classical radio they might refer to a quartet as “Quartet X”, as in one through sixteen. This would confuse me, except they mostly play the early six quartets Op. 18, making it easy to figure out which quartet they mean.

Pg. 37. Casta diva refers to an aria from the opera Norma by Bellini.

I listened to this quartet while following along with the score on Thursday, which I hadn’t done for years. It helped me hear the different personalities of the four parts. In classical quartets the first violin usually has the melody, and the second violin often plays this role as well. As a bass player, I often gravitate to the cello part. The viola part fascinates me more and more as I get older. The viola rarely gets the melody, and when it does, it usually only gets it briefly. The novelist Edgar Pangborn said of Bach, “Listen to the inner voices.” I think that also holds true for Beethoven.

A Prometheus winner accepts his award

Travis Corcoran

Travis Corcoran won the Prometheus Award this year for his novel, The Powers of the Earth.

When I read the book, I not only enjoyed it, I was sure he would win. I haven't had that experience since Cory Doctorow's Little Brother. 

Corcoran received his award on the ongoing Worldcon in San Jose. He could  be there, but sent an acceptance speech posted on the Libertarian Futurist Society's blog. 

It's an interesting piece which argues (among other things) that leftists have largely taken over science fiction, to the exclusion of other voices.

My feelings about "PC culture" in fandom are more mixed than Mr. Corcoran's. I actually think it's mostly a good thing. I'm not a fan of racism and sexism.

I think it's good that women can come to conventions with an expectation of safety. I don't pine for the "good old days" when women had to be warned not to get into an elevator with Isaac Asimov.

At the same time, I do sometimes see signs that Corcoran has a point, that fandom and SF publishing is not exactly in a "let 1,000 flowers bloom" mode.

Mary Robinette Kowal, a science fiction writer (I don't believe I've read her yet), recently published a Twitter thread on how to do proper programming at conventions.

Although the ostensible subject is "inclusion," she also is obviously concerned with making sure wrong thinking people aren't allowed to take part.

It's necessary to have a "strong and appropriate moderator" who can weigh on on panelists "who would be good fits." If someone volunteers for a panel and they aren't known to the organizers, it's important to vet them to prevent doubleplusungood thought from wandering in: "Sometimes no one on the committee knows them, but research solves that."

Some people simply should "never get on programming":

"We also, honestly, have a Red Flag and Caution field. Red flags will never get on programming. Caution means that we are very careful about the topics that person can go on because they've gone off the rails before, but with the right moderator have things to contribute."

Is this sort of vetting common at conventions? I don't really know.