2,039 words
Alexander Adams
Masters of Art: Dalí
Munich: Prestel, 2023
Take me. I am the drug; take me, I am the hallucinogenic. — Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, 1st Marqués de Dalí de Pubol (more…)
2,242 words
Tom C. McKenney
Jack Hinson’s One-Man War
Gretna, La.: Pelican, 2009
Pitting oneself against the modern world can be a lonely endeavor. Sure, we can find company on the Internet. But if any of us has fellow travelers in our day-to-days lives, then we should consider ourselves lucky. I am sure we all can appreciate the lone person who stands athwart history, yelling “Stop!” and meaning it at the same time. It’s a rough road, but if you do it well, it can be a splendid thing. (more…)
Peter Cook
Peter Cook
2,020 words
Originality of thought and a command of words give him a maturity of style beyond his years. In speech or essay he is never dull and his work should always be interesting. — Peter Cook’s school report, aged 14
I know I’ve been destructive. What I do reflects the idiocy and chaos within myself. — Peter Cook
In the self-congratulatory world of show business, the word “genius” is used casually and often, and “comic genius” more than most, but in its original sense it is occasionally appropriate. (more…)
John Alan Coey
John Alan Coey
3,828 words
John Alan Coey
A Martyr Speaks
CPA Book Publishers, 1994
White racialism is demonized in Western countries today, but this was not always so, and will not always be so. Our race consists not only of the millions of white people alive today, but also includes our ancestors and descendants, who live today in us, for their blood flows through our veins. They are relying on us to do the hard work of building a better future for our people. (more…)
5,133 words
Part 2 of 2 (Part 1 here)
Nero was only 16 when he became Emperor. His coming to power had nevertheless been enabled by several murders and/or suspiciously timely deaths. Claudius may or may not have died accidentally, but Narcissus, who favored Britannicus and the Senator Silanus, were poisoned almost certainly on the orders of Nero’s mother. (more…)
4,287 words
Part 1 of 2 (Part 2 here)
Alexander Bätz
Nero: Wahnsinn und Wirklichkeit
Hamburg: Rowohlt Buchverlag, 2023
Among those able to name any Roman emperors, Nero is likely to be on their list. Although he was Roman Emperor for only 14 years, from 54 to 68 AD, he is widely viewed as one of the most famous or infamous of all of them, strongly associated with the persecution of the Christians and the murder of both his mother and wife, and he is widely seen as the embodiment of tyranny. (more…)
Thomas Mann: breakthrough Black [sic] author?
Thomas Mann: breakthrough Black [sic] author?
Part 1 of 2 (Part 2 here)
Thomas Mann: New Selected Stories
Translated and with an introduction by Damion Searls
New York: Liveright, 2023
“It is really curious that a life of playing games and dreaming can — if only you go on with it long enough — lead to your being treated like royalty.” — Thomas Mann, author of Felix Krull, Confidence Man
“What a royal gift the imagination is, and what pleasure it affords us!” — Felix Krull, confidence man (more…)
2,156 words
“Have you accepted Jesus, Agent Starling? Do you have faith?”
“I was raised Lutheran.”
“That’s not what I asked.” — Thomas Harris, Hannibal
I am a sick man. I am an angry man. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes from Underground
“I am one thing,” wrote Friedrich Nietzsche, “my writings another.” Although a few decades after his death this aphorism would chime with the Derridean, post-structuralist dictum that there is “nothing outside the text,” a hermeneutic approach to philosophy excludes the philosopher’s life to its detriment. (more…)
Putin meeting with families of the victims of the Kursk submarine disaster in 2000.
Putin meeting with families of the victims of the Kursk submarine disaster in 2000.
4,319 words
Part 2 of 3 (Part 1 here, Part 3 here)
In the several chapters which deal with Russia’s transformation from a state-run to a mixed economy, Putin is described as frequently involved, but only indirectly: never the main mover and never in the spotlight. (more…)
Salvador Dalí, Perpignan Train Station
Salvador Dalí, Perpignan Train Station
5,557 words
Part 3 of 3 (Part 1 here, Part 2 here)
With Young Virgin Auto-Sodomized by Her Own Chastity, Dalí returned to his paranoiac-critical concerns (i.e., autoeroticism), but now transformed. The paranoiac origin is Dalí’s obsession with Vermeer’s The Lacemaker, which in turn he believed to “consist” in rhinoceroses’ horns. (more…)
Salvador Dalí, The Persistence of Memory
Salvador Dalí, The Persistence of Memory
5,672 words
Part 2 of 3 (Part 1 here, Part 3 here)
This excursus has prematurely broached The Gala Situation, so let’s go back to where we started, with Dalí beginning to apply his method: “For the next few years Dalí’s paranoiac process remained preoccupied with fetishist obsessions, including masturbation and his fear of heterosexual sex.”[1] (more…)
