You are here: Home > Archives for 2013

Archives for 2013

Told by an idiot, No. 4

29 September 2013 by 1 Comment

An artist’s reach must exceed his grasp, or what’s an artist’s statement for?

The enormity of our semiotic struggle with reality and truth far exceeds the capacity of mere human language to express; that is why we express it in language. If it merely exceeded the capacity of music, we would have been composers instead.

Only plebs and pikers actually say what they want to say. Real literature consists in saying that what you want to say cannot possibly be said.

    (signed)
    H. Smiggy McStudge

Filed Under: Foolishness Tagged With: , , , , ,

Told by an idiot, No. 3

26 September 2013 by 3 Comments

You must always know exactly what your work is about. If anyone asks, you must be able to express your theme in one sentence, like this:

‘This [novel, story, poem] is about the futility of life in a post-postmodern world of transvaluated values, and the radical failure of the spirit in the face of human cruelty and cosmic despair.’

If this exact sentence does not describe your work, you are writing the wrong story. Get it right, or throw it out.

    (signed)
    H. Smiggy McStudge

Filed Under: Foolishness Tagged With: , , ,

Told by an idiot, No. 2

23 September 2013 by 3 Comments

The true artist must always suffer for his art. If you don’t suffer for your art, you won’t know how to make other people suffer for it when it’s their turn.

As Robert Frost nearly said, ‘No cries of agony in the writer, no cries of agony in the reader.’

   (signed)
   H. Smiggy McStudge

Filed Under: Foolishness Tagged With: , , ,

Happy (Half a) Hobbit Day

22 September 2013 by 4 Comments

In honour of Bilbo and Frodo’s birthday, I wish to offer the following long-belated response to Bilbo’s famous compliment (or insult) at the Long-Expected Party:

I don’t know half of you half as well as I should like, and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve.

That’s all right, Mr. Baggins. If you knew me half as well as you liked, you would soon discover that I deserve to be liked less than half as well as you like more than half of the Hobbits that you like half as well as they deserve. And I say this, which is half of what I should like to say, on behalf of the other half.

Filed Under: Foolishness Tagged With: ,

Selections from the Octopus

21 September 2013 by Leave a Comment

Strange are the tongues of mortals: you say so much that you do not mean, and yet mean so much more than you say.

—Talanel, seeress of the yrani, in The Grey Death

Filed Under: Quotha Tagged With: , , ,

Told by an idiot

20 September 2013 by 2 Comments

As every real literary person knows, brevity is not only the soul of wit, it is the absolute sine qua non of the literary art. The most essential part of writing is cutting.

Some fools and philistines think the most essential part of writing is writing: on the silly grounds that until you have written something, you have nothing to cut. This is an error.

My latest manuscript consists of 500 sheets of blank paper, and I am cutting it already.

I am making it into paper dolls.

They are going to be the most critically acclaimed paper dolls in all of literature.

    (signed)
    H. Smiggy McStudge

Filed Under: Foolishness Tagged With: , ,

Sayers on Hell

13 September 2013 by 7 Comments

If we refuse assent to reality: if we rebel against the nature of things and choose to think that what we at the moment want is the centre of the universe to which everything else ought to accommodate itself, the first effect on us will be that the whole universe will seem to be filled with an inexplicable hostility. We shall begin to feel that everything has a down on us, and that, being so badly treated, we have a just grievance against things in general. That is the knowledge of good and evil and the fall into illusion. If we cherish and fondle that grievance, and would rather wallow in it and vent our irritation in spite and malice than humbly admit we are in the wrong and try to amend our behaviour so as to get back to reality, that is, while it lasts, the deliberate choice, and a foretaste of the experience of Hell.

—Dorothy L. Sayers, Introductory Papers on Dante

Filed Under: Quotha Tagged With: , ,

Jeremiah

26 August 2013 by Leave a Comment

A song I sing to cheer up when I’m tempted to feel sorry for myself. The music exists and could be made available, supposing anyone wanted it, but it’s not in machine-readable form and would be a bother to transcribe. It’s a ghastly tune, about halfway between a polka and ‘The Volga Boatmen’.

My notes don’t include any exact dates, but I wrote this about fifteen years ago.

 

Jeremiah

The day you left me, the war broke out;
I stubbed my big toe and it made me shout.
My next door neighbour took her husband’s life;
I lost my keys and my Swiss Army knife.

Oh, the shame! Oh, the pain!
All my life running down the drain—
And then it started to rain—
And then my goldfish died.

The day you left me, the markets crashed;
I had a hangover ’cos I got smashed.
A mad assassin tried to kill the Queen;
I lost a quarter in a vending machine.

Oh, the shame! Oh, the pain!
All my life running down the drain—
And then it started to rain—
And then my goldfish died.

[Spoken over bridge:

I’ll never forget the sight of poor little Jeremiah, floating belly-up in his bowl. Why didn’t anybody tell me Ty-D-Bol is not for use in cleaning fish tanks?

I think I’m gonna sue someone.]

The day you left me, the H-bombs fell:
Five hundred million people blown to hell.
Millions are homeless ’cos their slums got sold,
And I’m bummed out because my coffee is cold.

Oh, the shame! Oh, the pain!
All my life running down the drain—
And then it started to rain—
And then my goldfish died.

Oh, the shame! Oh, the pain!
Flushing Jeremiah down the drain—
And then it started to rain—

Filed Under: Verses Tagged With:

How to prevent writing

26 August 2013 by 27 Comments

It comes to my attention, as a difficult summer draws to an end, that altogether too many people (some of my 3.6 Loyal Readers among them — I will not hide the truth even to protect them) are still writing books, and even releasing them to the public, despite the very best efforts of the publishing industry to put a stop to this pernicious practice. It would appear that some of you out there have not yet mastered the art of not writing, and still leak wordage from time to time. Herewith, a few helpful tips gleaned from my own recent experience. If you are still writing and want to help stem the tide, here are some methods you might try:

[Read more…]

Filed Under: The Superversive Tagged With:

Tom Weller on Books

17 August 2013 by Leave a Comment

Books are like a magic arrow, an arrow by which poetry, literature, auto repair, indeed, all of cvltvre may soar from the minds of the artists and thinkers who created them swiftly to their final target – the remainder bin.

With books, we can travel in outer space, talk to Shakespeare, conquer the world, prop open doors and windows.

In them we can gaze on the faces, and wonder at the thoughts, of people from the remotest times, like in your high school yearbook. Through them, inhabitants of one part of the globe can understand the feelings and customs of those of another far distant, usually resulting in war. Indeed, it is just conceivable that through the unifying power of literature all peoples may yet come to live together as brothers and sisters: in continuous, squalling enmity.

—Tom Weller, Cvltvre Made Stvpid

Filed Under: Foolishness, Quotha
« Previous Page
Next Page »