#303: Botched Sphinx Experiments (feat. Iain Sinclair)
I'll be goddamned. The greatest living writer of English meets me inside Videodrome to talk about Jeremy Prynne, Iain's piece about Prynne in the LRB, William Blake, Epsteinium, Burroughs's prophecy of an insect named Elon Musk, and whether John Dillinger's cock is really in the Smithsonian.
Comments (37)
oh shit! whata get!
Oh hell yes! I need to set aside a couple of hours of doing nothing else but listening, except perhaps walking, which would be the Sinclairian way to go. I have you MSJ for giving me impetus to finally read Downriver, which led in due course to Rodinsky's Room, Radon Daughters, and others. This is a terrific 'get' and well earned. I recall tripping out when I tracked down a copy of Scenarists of Europe and saw his encomia 'pon it. I can't say as I've ever seen a blurb from him on any other book, ot even on those of his friends and frenemies like Moore, Moorcock, Self, or Ackroyd.
It's criminal how under-read his novels are, except for DOWNRIVER – his grasp of what's coming in RADON DAUGHTERS, the combination of total surveillance and coercive control giving way to control via impoverishment of imagination, is fucking uncanny, and Norton, Prisoner of London, the protagonist of the superbly-titled SLOW CHOCOLATE AUTOPSY, a man who can access any time or event in London but can never leave the city, is probably the best literary anticipation of what the internet would make of "access to information." You can learn goddamn anything, and all it costs is your ability to get the fuck out
Fuck this ep opened a huge can of works for me. First I'm not familiar with Iain works and now I'm dreading to jump in. Suggestions for a first timer? Then, I searched some of the names drop here and why Gunslinger by Ed Dorn sounds like the Westerdardman part in GR? Must read that too. And then I found that Dorn translated from Spanish and that reminded me that I have to read Cesar Vallejo. I'll be damned
It's a good deal more stoned than The Westwardman, which is already pretty stoned – basically a cowboy and a talking dog have to fight Howard Hughes for the future of the human brain
Off topic but I thought of you and your description of amps blowing speakers when this came across my feed https://youtu.be/PHOcTXYaMfg?is=2gzyTieUf4Qt89nd
gotta do the Gunslinger ep at some point, your boy needs some help with The Cycle
Anyone who hasn't seen Iain's Charles Olson Memorial Lecture should check that out: https://youtu.be/iN4CGK4bZ20?si=TXXy8FSxWRtygpZ8
The unattributed Suicide Bridge epigraph you ask about is probably related to this: "The thing that puzzled Joe most after his illuminization was John Dillinger's penis. The rumors about the Smithsonian Institute, he knew, were true: even though any casual phone-caller would get a flat denial from Institute officials, certain high-placed government people could provide a dispensation and the relic would be shown, in the legendary alcohol bottle, all legendary 23 inches of it. But if John was alive, it wasn't his, and, if it wasn't his, whose was it? "Frank Sullivan's," Simon said, when Joe finally asked him. "And who the hell was Frank Sullivan to have a tool like that?" But Simon only answered, "I don't know. Just some guy who looked like John."" - The Illuminatus! Trilogy
I once wrote Prynne some fanmail asking about his methods saying I really wanted to do something similar, and within 3 hours I got a very curt but well-meant "good luck" which went a long long ways for me.
lol that sounds exactly like the couple brief exchanges I had with Prynne. I wanted to ask him if he minded my using a chunk of a poem as the epigraph for a novel, and I said I'd be happy to send the manuscript if he wanted to gauge its connection to him. He wrote back, "No, that's quite alright."
🤯 if Ian sinclaire thinks that self publishing and hanging out with book readers is still possible that just almost kinda gives me hope
Best in the biz. Thank you, that was outstanding.
Man, I was on the verge of blacking out from one of the worst weather migraines I've ever had, all through the night, and then Iain started talking, and you can't really pay attention to anything else when that man is speaking, even pain. The migraine actually faded back in like it was on a dimmer switch when we were finished, like "Wow, holy fuck, I can't believe I got to AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH"
NO SHIT? GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!
We've been in correspondence for years – erratically, because I'm me, but a long time – and Iain actually did a blurb for the first book I got published, at the urging of Brian Catling, who did the OTHER blurb and (to my utter fucking astonishment) read the thing and told Iain "You gotta see this thing." Both utter princes. I've thought about trying to line this up since the moment I started D/C, but a man needs some time before he can email one of the greatest living artists with "So uhhh I have a ... I'm doing ... well it's like a radio show, but ... it's a podcast. It's a podcast"
Whoa
well goddamn dr strangely strange fucking rips thanks Iain
What the hell is this I wanted to hear about the Bluekakki
Jump in Talarico's DMs. He'll text you coordinates to the freak-off
this was splendid MJ. was actually rereading Lud Heat recently and will be rereading Suicide Bridge soon (seeking a certain emanation that I am hoping will radiate from reading that in a very specific context), which makes it all the more excellent to have hear him speak a little for himself. He truly sounds like the wonderful guy one gets from his work and from how you've described him. If you don't mind, I had two follow up questions really for you but if there was anything gleaned from Sinclair that you both would be open to sharing as well. First off is that I actually haven't read any Prynne. A shame (I'm sort of late to poetry). But you have been such an enormous help with my discovering later modernist work (I'm currently in the late stages of reading all of Geoffrey Hill's work thanks to you) I was wondering if you had any recommendations on what of his to start with? Also, I have to say that hearing about the movement and the space that Sinclair is still honoring and Prynne helped to foster makes me a little sad for the lack of that now, and while it might be structurally impossible to resuscitate anywhere now, I would love to know if there are any newer artists you or he see as trying to do, if not work influenced by the lineage of Pound through Olsen and Prynne and Catling towards Sinclair and yourself, at least with the same spirit and quality. I'd like there to still be something worth caring about there artistically. The closest I've found these days personally is some alternative hip hop (ELUCID and billy woods specifically) Anyway thanks again, great episode.
For the first one, I think the only real way to read Prynne is chronologically, partly because the only way you'll *find* Prynne is via the big anthology just called POEMS – I think what "Prynne" means to a lot of people is largely contained in the 3-volume series of KITCHEN POEMS, THE WHITE STONES, and BRASS, in which you really see and hear this guy go from the Olsonian rebuilding-reality modernist project to fucking disgust with what became of it. A lot of my favorite Prynne is mid-’70s – WOUND RESPONSE, HIGH PINK ON CHROME, NEWS OF WARRING TRIBES – but that early stuff is "Prynne" the metonym. And don't worry about "getting it," because nobody in history has "gotten it" on the first run, just read. The second: I really don't know. Not too long ago, I would've said "There must be, I just don't know who they are," but at this point there's no "must be." And if there are such people or nuclei of people, my guess would be that they're in countries that don't speak English and have extensive firsthand experience on the dying end of everything I see, as an accomplice, from the killing end.
WHOA
Woah
Are you kidding me, dont fuck with me bro
For my sins I’ve still not read Iain Sinclair, I will correct that after this
ohhh fuck yes
Amazing stuff Mike
Ooooh wow❤️Bro iam amjad
goddamn dude
!!!!
Noooo waaaaay!
Fuuck i love this song
Holy shit dude. Had to stand up and take a lap when I saw this notification
This is wonderful, thank you. It’s lovely to hear him sharp as ever. I’ve only read Lud Heat but this is the perfect nudge to pick up his other books I’ve got lying around. Prynne as well—I’ve picked around in his collected works and remain baffled, but what I have read hasn’t stopped humming around my head. I particularly love the prose poem/essay(?) “A Note on Metal” and the satirical research paper about plant perception that I can’t recall the name of
Goodness! I have Lud Heat nearby right now. What a coup.
Oh wow! 😮