The British in France: Visitors and Residents since the Revolution
November 29, 2008
He sees them through the eyes of Britons who settled in France or tourists who trod its soil for a brief holiday
He’s bringing sexy books
November 29, 2008
Bookkake is publishing print-on-demand editions of classic… well, I’m a bit stuck for the word.
Burroughs on Addiction, Miller on other type of drug: possessions
November 29, 2008
As a result of my good habit of browsing the Paris Review interviews archive, I came across The Art Of Fiction, Issue 35, Fall 1965. William S. Burroughs interviewed by Conrad Knickerbocker.
Burroughs admits, with blunt honesty, that he didn’t start writing out of a strong desire towards it. “I had nothing else to do. Writing gave me something to do every day.”
He talks a great deal about addiction, about people’s deformed interest towards this phenomenon and somehow dethrones the myth that drugs and art go together. “They are absolutely contraindicated for productive work”, Burroughs argues, because he says they “decrease awareness of inner processes, thoughts, and feelings”.
He rejects the idea that drug addiction is an illness. In his perception, the process that leads a person to succumb to drugs is similar to the one that leads a cop to exercise his authority.
Burroughs talks at large about drugs. Fame came to him after writing Junky, a novel based on his experience with addiction. Even more interesting are his theories on “wordless state” being more desirable, or his visionary image on the future merge of arts and science. Religion and cults – Scientology. Nova Express. Sex and utopia.
Insults from all over
November 22, 2008
“Tell us, Bint Majzoub, which of your husbands was the best?”
Tribes of clutter. The Comfort of Things
November 22, 2008
A new study of contemporary Londoners’ possessions and the values they attach to them reveals a shift of allegiance away from wider society and towards the individual household