Roundup
Let’s All Go Through the Wide Open Gate of Mount Holyoke College to Our Wednesday Roundup
Joshua Cohen on Paper Cuts! This is very exciting. Weirdly, his book wasn’t reviewed on Sunday–I’m holding out for this coming weekend, though.
This is really interesting. Thanks to Rachel Fershleiser for passing it along.
from Jeremy Schmall- the Crimethinc. guide to what to do when you are stopped by a cop.
Zizek Zizeks on the Iceland volcano.
Nathaniel Rich on Ray Bradbury at Slate.
Tao Lin interviewed on Chuck Palahniuk’s The Cult, a website I did not know existed and now am kind of wigged out by. They’ve got their own whole universe over there, apparently, with a writing workshop and tee shirts. Live and let live, I guess. Oh also, if you’re in the city, homeboy’s in an art show on Friday.
Last thing: this month’s Harper’s is fantastic. Readings opens with a commencement speech Barry Hannah gave at Bennington in 2002. Also includes an excerpt from Padgett Powell’s “Manifesto,” the long wild piece that was published in Little Star #1, and a collection of slang terms for methamphetamine. Why not? I don’t know if people realize this, but a subscription to Harper’s costs $16.97. Seriously. That’s it. Newsstand price per issue is $6.95. So basically, if there are decent odds that you might buy an issue of Harper’s three times over the course of a calendar year, you might as well just sign up and have it all the time.
Tags: chuck palahniuk, Paper Cuts, Ray Bradbury, the cult
If renewing, Harper’s is only $14! Just got my invoice.
maybe the times needs an extra week to read the thing, heh… glad you’re “all over it” re: the news roundup, justin. nice to see the use of the word “homeboy” re: tao.
p.s. can u or anyone describe what padget powell’s “manifesto” is “like”?? i am intrigued.
to answer my own question: http://ireadashortstorytoday.com/2005/07/padgett-powell-manifesto.html
sounds markson-ish, or beckett-ish.
And don’t forget that a subscription to Harper’s includes access to the online archive.
Justin, this is the bump I needed to actually get a subscription to Harper’s (I’ve bought two issues off the newsstands in the past six months, so in addition to supporting a good cause, I’d be saving myself money.)
This was an especially awesome roundup, JT. The Beinhart article was definitely interesting. But I sort of think it kind of suggests an oxymoron when it calls for a left Zionism. While there is a liberal Zionism, it isn’t Left, it’s mentality is ‘independent’, and I think it’s almost as much an obstacle to justice in contemporary Israel, particularly in its ‘brokerage’ role and its willingness to ‘democratically’ self-criticise without embracing concrete consequence. The thing is the “humane, universalistic Zionism” actually does wield power, of a contested, cultural sort especially in the US – in parliamentary terms, the power of the opposition, which, of course, sometimes wins government – and it’s this hardly leftist ‘opposition’ that provides the real data that informs the knee-jerk mainstream Israeli/right-wing American Jewish belief that criticism of Israel is the ‘consensus’. Of course, the right misses the point (out of ideological necessity)for the liberal ‘Zionism’ is not its enemy per se but the enemy of its enemy (the left) which is thus its clandestine friend. That is to say, the liberal opposition performs a contested but essentially committed role that ends up shoring up the complicated web of Israeli state power – it’s a great example of what Jodi Dean calls in another context ‘communicative capitalism’, except here applied to the consensus of a democratic discourse around Israeli itself, which is, in turn, the first thing used to justify the inherent good of the Israeli state as it is currently composed, despite all indications to the contrary. I’m thinking particularly of Tom Segev’s work that does, indeed, venture into the history of atrocity but is masterful at parsing that history into the indiction of a state that has failed to be neutral – or universalist – in keeping with its foundations, when, in fact, those foundations were themselves an seizure (though not quite a coloniation, this would miss the point) and to try and establish a just settlement now – in this regard, much like with Australia and the Aboriginal peoples – requires serious thinking of a transformation of the very definition of the state itself. Which is absolutely not what liberal Zionism would be willing to entertain at all, for it too, basically, is committed to the concept of a Jewish ark, rather than the notions that informed Arendt, Einstein et. al of a sort of disapora nation – offering to all the world’s displaced a new home of their own, a cosmopolitan nation in keeping with the secular history of Judaism after the expulsion. The first test of that interpretation was, of course, the Palestinians – and liberal Zionism has been an impediment to settlement’s realization, not the summons to a new way forward.
If renewing, Harper’s is only $14! Just got my invoice.
maybe the times needs an extra week to read the thing, heh… glad you’re “all over it” re: the news roundup, justin. nice to see the use of the word “homeboy” re: tao.
p.s. can u or anyone describe what padget powell’s “manifesto” is “like”?? i am intrigued.
to answer my own question: http://ireadashortstorytoday.com/2005/07/padgett-powell-manifesto.html
sounds markson-ish, or beckett-ish.
And don’t forget that a subscription to Harper’s includes access to the online archive.
I used to go through that wide open gate. Nostalgia. Parking tickets. Nice stacks.
Justin, this is the bump I needed to actually get a subscription to Harper’s (I’ve bought two issues off the newsstands in the past six months, so in addition to supporting a good cause, I’d be saving myself money.)
This was an especially awesome roundup, JT. The Beinhart article was definitely interesting. But I sort of think it kind of suggests an oxymoron when it calls for a left Zionism. While there is a liberal Zionism, it isn’t Left, it’s mentality is ‘independent’, and I think it’s almost as much an obstacle to justice in contemporary Israel, particularly in its ‘brokerage’ role and its willingness to ‘democratically’ self-criticise without embracing concrete consequence. The thing is the “humane, universalistic Zionism” actually does wield power, of a contested, cultural sort especially in the US – in parliamentary terms, the power of the opposition, which, of course, sometimes wins government – and it’s this hardly leftist ‘opposition’ that provides the real data that informs the knee-jerk mainstream Israeli/right-wing American Jewish belief that criticism of Israel is the ‘consensus’. Of course, the right misses the point (out of ideological necessity)for the liberal ‘Zionism’ is not its enemy per se but the enemy of its enemy (the left) which is thus its clandestine friend. That is to say, the liberal opposition performs a contested but essentially committed role that ends up shoring up the complicated web of Israeli state power – it’s a great example of what Jodi Dean calls in another context ‘communicative capitalism’, except here applied to the consensus of a democratic discourse around Israeli itself, which is, in turn, the first thing used to justify the inherent good of the Israeli state as it is currently composed, despite all indications to the contrary. I’m thinking particularly of Tom Segev’s work that does, indeed, venture into the history of atrocity but is masterful at parsing that history into the indiction of a state that has failed to be neutral – or universalist – in keeping with its foundations, when, in fact, those foundations were themselves an seizure (though not quite a coloniation, this would miss the point) and to try and establish a just settlement now – in this regard, much like with Australia and the Aboriginal peoples – requires serious thinking of a transformation of the very definition of the state itself. Which is absolutely not what liberal Zionism would be willing to entertain at all, for it too, basically, is committed to the concept of a Jewish ark, rather than the notions that informed Arendt, Einstein et. al of a sort of disapora nation – offering to all the world’s displaced a new home of their own, a cosmopolitan nation in keeping with the secular history of Judaism after the expulsion. The first test of that interpretation was, of course, the Palestinians – and liberal Zionism has been an impediment to settlement’s realization, not the summons to a new way forward.
I used to go through that wide open gate. Nostalgia. Parking tickets. Nice stacks.
Big YES on Harper’s. But dooood, you didn’t even include the always illuminating and chuckle-inducing front and back pages with the infamous Index and often beyond-surreal Findings. I’ve subscribed to Harper’s since high school, I think, or early college… with good reason.
Surprised you didn’t know about “The Cult.” It is a strange world over thar. Care to deconstruct it?
Big YES on Harper’s. But dooood, you didn’t even include the always illuminating and chuckle-inducing front and back pages with the infamous Index and often beyond-surreal Findings. I’ve subscribed to Harper’s since high school, I think, or early college… with good reason.
Surprised you didn’t know about “The Cult.” It is a strange world over thar. Care to deconstruct it?