The sinister energy, Crash, "profound" fiction, and Evelyn Waugh syndrome

Sinister energy, Crash final verdicts, the Evelyn Waugh funny or literary syndrome, and some thoughts on what fiction needs to do, why not

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Hello. I'm using a voice. Accent work. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome back. It's another episode. It's another week. Well, it's not a full week since you've last heard from me, since you've had my dulcet tones in your ears because last week, as we know, I was injured and slowed down. And I have an update on that front for everybody. It turns out it was not a staph infection. It was strep. It is strep, because I still have it. I didn't know you could get strep on your penis. Who knew? Who knew? Sorry, is that's the TMI section. I suppose this is Jack on Jack. You know, this podcast, we love segments. And this is the Jack on Jack segment. Jack on Jack's penis. Um yeah, it got strep. It got strep on the outside, so it's not sexually transmitted. I know a lot of you are out there thinking that this was related to oral sex activities. But no. No. No. No. Well, it was related to anal sex activity. But this resurgence, I think, is because well, it's because I was stressed, as I said, and overextended. Potentially also because I was doing these apple cider vinegar shots. You know, I'm all about microbiome. I'm all about microbiome right now. We all are. Who isn't? I'm late to the bandwagon. Party. Jumping on late. And I don't know. I feel like it like did something to like my skin? I don't know. I don't know, but you know it's all connected. You know it's all connected. You know that there's Parkinson's in my family, and apparently the microbiome is connected to the Parkinson's, too. So. Oh, but you know, plot twist. Apple cider vinegar apparently is a treatment for strep. Apparently it's very effective at killing strep. So now the question is: do I keep taking the apple cider vinegar shots, which may or may not be related to the strep on my penis, or do I stop? Am I just pushing through a reorganization of my microbiome on skin inside gut flora? Or do I press pause because things are going awry? I don't know. It kind of feels like I should push through. We'll see. I'm sure it's not related. Um you feel it? Do you feel the dark vibes? The bad vibes? Bad vibrational energy? I feel it. I feel it. The sinister energy. That's that's what it that's what I was thinking of. The sinister energy. The sinister energy abounds. It does. Maybe you feel it too. What am I talking about? What am I talking about? Just this kind of low vibrational person in media. That you know. I'm having a hard time placing it, which is why I feel like it should come here and I should talk about it with you all. The first name, the first thing just that comes top of mind, Jordan Fersman. Jordan Firstman, you're aware of him. Gay guy. A gay guy with like rancid vibes, no offense, if you're listening to this, Jordan. We're not on a first name basis, I don't know him, I've never met him in my life. But there's ever since I've seen him appear on my screen, it's just kind of it's just bad, it's bad vibes. It's low vibrational, it's very low vibrational. It's a sort of it's a sort of snark, it's a sort of glibness. You know, I think this is related to the glib slot miasma. It but it's a little different because the glib slot miasma has that kind of, you know, liberal sheen of of kindness and positivity or something while it's being glib. This is more like doomerism vibes. This is more like a little bit nihilistic, a little bit like let's just party, let's just like do whatever we want, and like it doesn't matter because like the world's end, you know, Charlie XCX vibes, who I think is friends with Jordan Firstman. It's just very like, uh, it's like brat sort of vibes. It's low vibrational, it's low vibrational for sure. It's it's gay guys in black tank tops and button-downs over them, I think. It's sort of dead in the eyes, it's very dead in the eyes. It's very dead in the eyes, you know. I think it's associated with like the truck stop sunglasses and like a trucker hat or like a camo hat, which we've we've talked about camo. We talked about camo, I think, in like the first or second episode a long time ago. So go back, it's a callback. Um, and not everybody, not everybody wearing this stuff is is is low vibrational, has the sinister energy. But but it's out there, it's out there, and you know, I think there's also just more of a reaction to it, because I think the sinister energy abounded for sure in like the post-2020 years, you know, sort of like counter woke impulse. A Dimes Square impulse. But not to defend Dimes Square culture at all. Not what I want to do. But at least or at least you know, Dimes Square energy was a little more forthright in in being antagonistic to progressive politics or whatever, you know? But I think the sort of the the sinister energy, you know, it's it's it wants to be non-political. It wants to be non-political, or it wants to appear non-political, and not care and just be la, you know, whatever, we're just doing something. Don't take it so seriously. Wow. Um but it is, obviously, you know, as we discussed before, everything is political, right? We all the political position. What's Jordan Firstman's political position in this world? What's the political position of that movie? I, you know, no hate to him for having this movie that is having success. We give love and light to everybody and success. So it's really not about tearing him down. It's just the first name that came to mind. I think the sinister energy abounds. It's a very much. It's very much sort of like angry white guy energy, disaffected white man energy. But sort of a sublimated anger. You know, okay. We're just we're just bipping and bopping, because that's what we're doing. Um If you don't know, this is all one take, this podcast, on my headphones, which I had trouble finding. So I finished Crash. I finished Crash, which we can circle back to. I liked it. I liked I liked parts of it. There's some there's some good lines, there's some banger lines, I can dig those up later. But now I'm on to American Psycho. Now we're on to American Psycho, which, you know, is obviously leaning into the sinister energy. Subconsciously, intentionally. But that's kind of. That's the kind of sinister energy, you know, that that Brett Eastanellus is parodying or trying to name that's just become normalized, I think. The sinister energy has become normalized. Because I don't think there's really a goal or optimism anymore, I think, especially for a lot of, you know, these. My air conditioning, sorry, maybe I should turn this one off. It's probably really bad. I don't think there's really a goal. I don't think there's really a goal for the sinister energy folks. And I think that's what makes it scary. I think it's what makes it a little bit scary and dangerous. Because what is it, people without hope or whatever, the most dangerous, nothing to lose, I don't know, blah blah blah. Bad vibes. Bad vibes. Something wicked this way comes. Don't like it. Don't like it, and I feel like people are reacting to it. Maybe I'm projecting too much, but I don't know if you've been following all the stuff about the wire festival online. Last week, last weekend. And um for whatever reason, on Twitter I think there was a lot more conversation about it being sort of a white gay nightmare. I did not go, I've never been. I didn't even know it was happening. Um I would have gone maybe. Sure. Why not? Oh no, but my my my strep. My strep penis. Could not bring my strep penis to a white gay nightmare. Um so there's a lot of like not even a lot, just it seemed like there were a couple posts about it being a white guy nightmare. And then I noticed a lot of like nightlife personalities chiming in and being like, actually, it's not that, and it's just a place for people to party. And if you don't get that, then you aren't part of it, and go whatever. And it's like, whoa, a lot of reaction, a lot of energy there. A lot of energy. And I don't know, I do wonder if there's if there's a vibe shift, maybe, that's in the works of people of people reacting away from the sinister turn, which does have a very warehouse party Berlin Dumerist vibe to it. It comes up sometimes in like these. I'm not on TikTok, though I'm getting on TikTok for personal whatever, promotional purposes, this year. This is my year. This is my year to go to TikTok, I'm on trend. But you know, the TikTok people, I see them on reels, Instagram reels, and it's a similar kind of it's a similar sinister energy that I think crops up on there, especially with some gay guys. There's these two gay guys in Berlin who dance and they do their little dances and things or like produce content, and there is a sort of sinister energy that comes across where it does feel like, oh, you're just gonna dance and take advantage of the system that's gonna bring you attention, but to what end? You know, you're sort of just it's sort of like, oh, I'm smarter than this, but I'm still gonna have fun with this and use it and not do anything else, and it's like kind of depressing. It's like, really? I don't know. This is so like just because you know that this is banal while you're doing it, doesn't make it less banal. Doesn't make it do anything else. I don't know. Am I being too hard? Love and light. Love and light, hashtag love and light. We're gonna get the merch. We're not gonna get the merch. I'm never gonna get the merch. But the merch is in your minds and hearts, and that's where it matters most. I don't know the sinister energy. I don't know the sinister energy. Crash though. Crash full of sinister energy. I do think my initial read on it, which is that it's too long, is correct. I stand by that. And it's not even that long as part of the thing, and yet it could be shorter. It could be shorter because nothing happens. Nothing really happens. Nothing really happens. Spoiler alert, in the end, the two guys have gay sex. They have anal sex, and you one puts his penis in the other one's butt, and it just like slides in magically, and it's like, oh, well that completely not realistic, but that's neither here nor there, Mr. Ballard. Um but there were some really good lines. Do I have some good lines? What are some good lines? Oh yeah, here we go. Here's where holding his buttocks apart with my hands so as not to injure his rectum. Still parting his buttocks, I watched my seemingly- Okay, that's realistic enough. His naked buttocks. I crouched behind Vaughn, forcing his thighs against my own. The jutting carapace of the instrument binnacle presided over the dark cleft between his buttocks, with my right hand at a parted his buttocks, feeling for the hot vent of his anus for several minutes as the cabin walls glowed and shifted as it was trying to take up the deformed geometry of the crash crashed cars outside. I laid my penis at the mouth of his rectum. His anus opened. His anus opened around the head of my penis, settling itself around the shaft, his hard detrouser muscles gripping my glands as I moved in and out of his rectum. See, there we go. That's. When does the anus open around the head of my penis? It's a quibble. It's a quibble, but I don't know that this man is really experienced with gay sex. I'm trying to- I'm just growing through because there were some really good lines. And oh yeah, where the bodies seem to be metallic. There were some good lines. It was just like it didn't go anywhere. It it was the whole thing. And um. It could have been edited down. Kind of like this podcast. It could have been edited down. It would be better tighter. It could have been a type 5. Crash could have been a type 5, I think. It could have been a slay short story. Slay short story. It's just like every paragraph is like Vaughn Siemen bathing the entire landscape, powering these thousands of engines, electric circuits, and private destinies, irrigating the smallest gestures of our lives. That was actually, I think, one of the better ones. Okay, this brings me to another topic. Another topic, the sort of like profound writing. Seemingly profound writing. This was what made me think of this was, I'm not gonna lie, a Tony Morrison clip that I saw on Twitter again. You know, Tony Morrison often spoke with great self-importance, which go off. You know, we stand, we stand people who take themselves seriously, clearly. Clearly, I could learn from that. But um it's just made me think of like why writers should be treated as though they're especially profound because they are eloquent. And I think there's a real there's a real danger in thinking that someone's profound just because they're eloquent. And I guess what's making me think of that is like Crash. Some of these lines are quite eloquent and quite beautiful, but what are they really saying? Also making me think of the the AI scandal. You saw this, that there's a short story, a Granta short story that won a prize, I forget what. And like a shortlisted for I forget what. I forget what. Not important. But this AI short story won a prize. And when you see the clips of what's in there, it is this kind of schmaltzy not flowery language, but the sort of pseudo-profound language that that sounds resonant with meaning on the line level, but is it really saying that much? And I I felt like there was a lot of that in Crash, where it is like a lot of really written stuff about bodies and cars just written over and over and over again to make it sound as though there's something profound being said. But aside from the basic idea that the bodies and the cars are sexually fusing and opening up new ways of having sex because machinery is taking over the sensual aspects of our lives, there's not that much else being said. Which is why I think it's a great short story, potentially, but I don't know. Like, there's only so many beautiful metaphors and similes that you really need. And just because you're speaking in metaphors and similes does not mean that you're speaking profoundly, right? Right. Right. So I'm just not reacting so well to that kind of writing. And you know I'm thinking about persuasive writing as I'm writing the book that I'm working on now. And I think, yeah, I do feel like there's a tide turning away from that kind of writing and that kind of posture of a writer to be this profound person and for the writing to be profound. You know, I was thinking about it along the lines of the big books conversation that we were talking about before. And um that being related, that the big book is kind of like a substitute Bible, you know, it's filled with a new way of seeing the world or something like that. And you think back to like Shakespeare, who was not trying to write a substitute Bible at all, and so didn't write a big book, just you know, wrote things that were entertaining, really. That's what the basic thing for his plays was to do, is to entertain. And they could be beautifully written, they could be profound in their own ways and have all these moments, but the core value is that they're entertaining. They had to entertain. And then I think some of these big books that people are writing, like Infinite Jest is really not too entertained, right? That's not the goal. Ulysses is not too entertained, I don't think that was the goal. They're self-conscious attempts to achieve an intellectual status. In the absence of religion, we need a big book to believe in. We need an infinite jest, we need a Ulysses. And I think these this way of thinking about writing just invests too much profundity in what these people are writing about. I don't think Ulysses. I don't think David Foster Wallace was that wise. We've already covered that. No offense to him. Love and light to everybody. I don't think he was that wise. I don't think James Joyce was that wise. Again, no offense to him. Is it really amazing how he played with the conventions of the novel as he knew it? Yes. Great. Does that book really does Ulysses, you know, shift in tone and and are these fun games? Does it take you to think about different things and these connections in your mind? Yes, sure, it's great. Is it necessarily that profound at all about human existence? I don't think so. Am I wrong? I don't know. I've only read it once, and I didn't, you know, read it with like a companion something, companion instructional, whatever. So I'm sure I missed 95% of whatever was happening. But it you know, he's sort of just like a lusty Irish guy.

SPEAKER_00 21:52

You know, he was that sort of they were all in that era, sort of like, oh, and her bosom heaved. Up like the spring blossom, and I felt the moist dew erupt from my loins.

SPEAKER_02 22:07

You know, it's very like okay. It's very DH Morris, it's very like sure, sure. You were these repressed modernist guys who were going to boarding school and wearing suits, and then you're rediscovering some atavistic impulses through literature, and you're, you know, projecting that onto women and nature. Great, go off. Do your thing, big. But I don't know that that's like super profound.

SPEAKER_01 22:41

I don't know. I don't know, am I wrong?

SPEAKER_02 22:45

Am I wrong? Probably. Am I wrong? Usually no. No, no, no, no, no. Um. Am I straying though from the I don't like this format? Is what I was sort of thinking about while I was saying all that. So, what is this? I don't like this sinister energy. Okay. I don't like what else did I say? Strep. Penis strep. I don't like that. Um this isn't an I don't like thing, but you know something I've been thinking about as I'm writing too? Maybe, maybe this is an I don't like this. Something that I think we can call the Evelyn Nois syndrome. And I hope actually that he's the right person to think about this. Because you know what? I'm just thinking of that off the top of my dome. But what I'm thinking is is. Okay, so I'm thinking about humor. Humor in books, because I'm writing my little book along. We've got the opening sequence, which is an action sequence, you know, because it's an action sci-fi book, so there's an action sequence, there's, you know, sex and all that, whatever. It gets everything set up. Then, once we have that, we go back into sort of what's sort of turning into like a workplace comedy kind of vibe. Which is fun. It feels weird, it feels tonally distinct. But so it just made me think of like, okay, again, let's think of like infinite jest. Infinite jest, people say, has funny moments in it. Are they funny ha ha moments? No. Are they funny, like waiting for Godot, intellectualized irony, humor moments? Sure, right? So that's the kind of humor that's in there. And I think that's the kind of like profound writing humor that we get from like a big book. So, okay, so what I was thinking of the Evelyn Lott is that he wrote really funny, like comic novels, like Scoop, Decline and Fall. Both Decline and Fall is really good. I really like Decline and Fall. Scoop. So these early, like funny, uh, funny, lighthearted romps. Decline and Fall, I think, is the campus novel. It's really good. Or I don't know, maybe I shouldn't endorse it that much. But I liked it when I read it a while ago. But then. So he has those funny books, but then he also has the Brideshead Revisited, this sort of serious, somber, you know, what he made his reputation as a canonical writer with, right? But there was that split. So it's either funny, it's either funny, haha, because Rise and Fall is, or Decline and Fall, is funny, haha, I think. I think there are LOL moments with the characters in there that are great.

SPEAKER_00 25:48

Mmm.

SPEAKER_02 25:48

Brideshead Revisited. I don't even know if I've read Brideshead Revisited, but you know, not so much. I guess I should read it before I make this whole big argument. But it just feels like that kind of real LOL humor gets excommunicated from like serious literary fiction.

unknown 26:11

I don't like that.

SPEAKER_02 26:12

I don't like that. I don't like it. I don't like what is this podcast called? I don't like this. I don't like this. Oh, I should have a little soundboard that says, I don't like this, every time we stumble on something that I don't like. Nobody sent me a voice memo. Just throwing that out there. Throwing that out there. Send me a voice memo. Send me something. Um I have to take you on the street. Not today because it's hot as all heck out there and I don't do well with the heat. I have to take you on the street. I'm gonna do an another, I'm gonna test another interview. I I want to test another interview so it can be a little two-person thing. You know, before when I started this, or before I started this, I wanted it to be with two people, me and somebody else, because I, you know, that's the sort of obvious podcast format. It takes the weight off one person. Give me something to bounce off, you know? I could use a little bouncy, I could use some bounce. And I couldn't think of anybody who would wanna do it who would also be good for what I'm thinking, which is the no effort format. So that dream died, as so many do. But I would still like to do interviews. I think for interviews though, I'm gonna have to get a better mic. And should I invest in an actual podcast mic? Will that degrade the integrity of the I don't like this podcast format? Which I know means so much to so many. Can we handle that change? Can I handle that change? I have to pay for that change. Although I think I could write it off. So though I think I've maxed out my deductions probably for this year. But can I use it? Can I think maybe can you write it off next year if it's in like the last six months of this year and it's used towards work next year? Is that something you can do? Someone from the IRS. Call in. I bet it I bet you can't. I bet you can't. So maybe I won't be here next year. Maybe I'll be in prison. Could be. Um, something I do like, these weird foam sticks of butter that are showing up on the shops on Mulberry Street and Canal Street. Don't know why they're there. I assume it's like a TikTok self-soothing thing. If anybody knows, call in and let me know. Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate it. Appreciate it, I appreciate you. We're not done. We're not done. I know this feels like a wind down, but we're definitely not done. Because I have so much more to say. I have so much more to say that you don't even know. I'm still reading Infinite Jesses You Can Gather. I have started with what? See, as soon as I sit down, I just sat down and immediately I can't think anymore. I have to be pacing. I have to be pacing out and about. I have to putter. Oh, putter patter is a whole segment. These segments, it's just getting loosey-goosey. It's just getting loosey-goosey. One's flowing into the other. It's just all flowing together. I should be puttering. Well, I should be pattering. I should be putter-pattering. No. No, American Psycho. American Psycho is starting strong, though I do wonder if it will also be one note boots the house down, because it does seem to be in that vein. We'll suspend judgment until we read it. Shocking. But the beginning I like well enough so far. I mean, all the brand stuff already is like a bit repetitive. You know, because he names. He names like all the brands of everything that the rich people are wearing to, you know, I guess convey how obsessive he is. It's also a little heavy-handed with the um. What is it? It's not the dedications, it's the quotes that come before the book. What is that called? What is what are those called? I don't know. Because probably because I don't like them. I don't like them. Things I don't like. I don't like I don't like this. I don't like those epigraphs, epigrams? One goes on your tombstone, right? Call in, please. I don't like those. It's hokey, it's corny. Just say what you need to say, unless it's like super built into the the novel in like a Nabokov kind of way. But if you need to just give me like a what did he do at the beginning of American Psycho, there's the Notes from the Underground, Dostoevsky passage, where he ostensibly spells out exactly what he's going to do, where he's going to report on he's writing from a fictional voice of a sort of person who exists in society in a sort of underground strain of thought that's that's haunting the society. Great, okay, you spelled it out for us. We get it. That was very clear. Um and then what's the second one? I'm just gonna check. I'm just gonna check. I'm just gonna check. Oh my gosh, the Kindle app is kind of a nightmare to use. Kind of a nightmare for me to get these new books. Okay, so what's the second one? Dedication. Nope, not the dedication. The second one, oh, is from Miss Manners, talking about manners and that there's different ways to do manner things, fine, blah blah blah. And the third one's from Talking Heads. Don't quote a band. Sorry, I know everybody do everything. Love and light, love and light, sports, sports, sport, sport, sport, sport, sport, sport, sport, sport. But that's so corny. Isn't that so corny? That is so corny. I'm sorry. I think it's so corny when people are like, I'm gonna quote a pop star.

SPEAKER_01 32:50

And it's gonna be ironic, because you're never gonna expect it. Because this is a highbrow literary novel, and I'm gonna do a pop star quote.

SPEAKER_02 33:01

It's like, oh lord. Oh wow, you're doing high low. Should we invite?

SPEAKER_01 33:09

Who's a high low person? Who's the who's who would you say?

SPEAKER_02 33:13

You know, I'm I'm referencing that meme. Should we throw a party? Should we invite Belahid? Who would you invite for Hilo? Who's the who's the canonical high low person? I don't know, I mean Zygmunt Bauman, because he wrote about Hilo. But he what himself wasn't Hilo. He just remarked on the move toward Hilo being the new kind of connoisseurship. Um yeah, okay. Should we invite Zygmunt Bauman? Um, though we stand Zygmunt Bauman, I think, unless somebody knows dirt on him. Was he cancelled? I don't know. Rest in power king. Tentatively. Um Yeah, I don't like that. I don't like that. I don't like that at all. And that's what kind of doesn't give me that much hope. Even though it starts out It starts out pretty fun, it starts out clear. You get in, you understand that you're dealing with New York assholes, boom, boom, bang, hitting you overhead with the New York assholes. Sure. Um but I'm already like, where is this going? It just seems a little one note, and I yeah, it's just reminding me of Crash, where it's just like we sort of get it. We sort of get it. You don't have that much maybe to excavate here. It's just the unpleasant terror of watching this all unfold, the horror of it. And you must we must not look away. And you're going to be some kind of truth teller about what kind of society we live in. This horror. This horrible society that we are in. Great. Go off kings. Wow. Never knew Wall Street bankers were bad people. That's that's something. That's something. That's something. Um it's hard. It's hard. It's hard. It's hard. It's hard. It's hard to write something that some a-hole on a podcast isn't gonna be snarky about, right? That's me. That's me. I don't know. I'm trying to write stuff that's not too obvious. Well, I think here's the thing. Here's the thing. Here's the lesson that I'm taking from these books is don't rely on shock to be profound. And don't think that what shocks you is gonna shock somebody else. And shock wears off. I think those are things to keep in mind. Oh, something I do like from blah blah blah psycho, American Psycho, is that he writes in, the author writes in like televisual transitions, like something fades, cut to, pan to, so that you can see the character protagonist seeing his life televisually. You know, he's seeing it through a camera. I think that is fun. I think it's fun. I think it's different. I get that. I get that, it's different. I don't know. I don't know that it's you know that profound, but I appreciate someone doing something new. I do. I think that's that's fun. That's just fun. That's just fun. Um so go off king. There's a lot of kings going off. There's a lot of kings getting off on these books, right? Not kings. Opposite of kings, sure. Um, I don't know. It's just it does set a high bar while you're writing to be like, oh, is this lame? Is this lame? But I feel like the trick is to just keep it moving. Do not become smug or self-satisfied. It's best to be subtle, I would say, and trust that the reader is smarter than you think, and maybe even smarter than you. So it's not about, you know, you're showing the reader some incredible insight that you, this profound writer, have access to. It's more like, I'm gonna entertain. I'm gonna entertain. I'm gonna entertain first and foremost, and while I do that, you know, I'll sneak in some profounder things, or I'll maybe heighten the entertainment by sneaking in some profounder things, give it more depth, give it more flavor, give it more richness. But I don't know. I think maybe because I'm writing this fiction book after writing a nonfiction book, which the nonfiction book can be didactic. In some ways, it should be didactic. Nonfiction book should be should have an argument, should have a clear political position, should in some way be persuasive, right? I think that all is there for nonfiction. Then it makes me wonder for fiction that tries to be shocking or something in some ways, or tries to be profound, it's like why? You don't have to do that. I think if you wanna write a profound think piece or whatever, make your statement about American society, you can just do that in nonfiction, or you can do that in some sort of literature form. But to try to do that through fiction, I think to me is reading corny, because that's not what I'm coming to fiction for. If I wanted to, if I wanted to be making a statement with my fiction, or with my writing, I would do it in nonfiction. The fiction is entertaining, and it wants to be entertaining in a way that you know maybe isn't normative, maybe isn't falling into tropes that I don't like, you know, has fiction that has a political position that I believe in. But I don't know that it needs to be making some super profound statement about society because I kind of feel like I'm happy with the profundity of the statements that I made about society in my nonfiction book. So maybe that's just me reacting to some of this stuff. But I don't know if that's totally true. I don't know if that's totally true because you know what I did like that I read last year was Parable of the Sower and the sequel, which I forget what that was called. I forget what that was called, but then also I do feel like those books were trying to be entertaining. Those books had a conventional plot that moved along, had a sort of world building, had dialogue and character development and action and all those things. Those books I feel like were written by a science fiction author, so keep that in mind. Stan science fiction authors. Um obviously those books are saying something about society. There's a political position there, there's a sort of profundity. Well, I don't know if there's a profundity, but there's sort of insight about the way society works being portrayed there. But I do feel like they also read primarily entertaining. They read primarily as a story that you can immerse yourself in, get sort of lost in. The magic of storytelling. And I think that helps them in my mind, at least at this place in my life. And maybe your life too. I'm just talking about myself. I'm just going on, I'm just yakking and yakking on about myself. But I feel like that helps. I don't know, is that just for me, or is there something broader going on? I do feel like there is something in that. Yeah, I think if we come back to this idea about the big book being a kind of Bible, this kind of profundity where we're sort of making pseudo-political statements and it's all couched and blah, blah, blah. Instead, let's just be more up front. Just give me your political position, get it out there in a non-fiction kind of way. Tell me what you want to think about the world, tell me what we need to think about the world. I don't know that we need to put all that into fiction. I think it's great if writers have a political position and are clear about it and are conscious of it and are clear about how their book intertwines with certain political aesthetics, you know, thinking about what is that the Project Hail Mary writer saying that he he tries to avoid politics at all costs in his book, and it's like, well, there you go. That's you being conservative. Um, or even reactionary by pretending that you can be non-political or that I don't just want to be involved in politics, right? Obviously, that's that's bunk, and we all know that. So I'm not saying that's what authors should be doing. I think it's good if you're aware of it. I think it's a little bit fraught if you assume the mantle of profundity through these stylistics without actually saying that much. I think you can work with complex aesthetics and complex political ways that can't necessarily be expressed in other ways. But if you're going to sort of wave this wand of depth and profundity by giving us these sentences, you uh should have something super profound to back it up, which you probably don't. Or just be straightforward and clear about what you're saying, because why not? Why not? Just be as clear as possible. If you really need fiction in some way to hide or this or to explore some ineffable political sentiment, okay. But then I'm so curious, I'm so curious what that is. I'm so so so so so so so so so curious what that is. I don't know that I've seen it. I don't know that I've seen it. So, yeah, I guess that's why I'm just feeling like we shouldn't. It's it's kind of like looking to comedians, looking to podcasters for for that that profound dimension that I don't think they can provide. I think, you know, religious. Is good at some things, which is exploring the more profound topics. It's also good at what's something I think religion goes off for is developing over thousands of years a system of thought so people can be in dialogue, so it can build. So it's not just one writer sitting down and giving a book. You know, the Bible or whatever book is written by a lot of people to the point where there's no single author. And, you know, they're annotated, they're evolved, and they're appended, and all these different things, and it it takes the burden or it frees you from the idea that one single person is going to be this Christ-like enlightening Messiah prophet figure, you know? I think that's just something to move away from. And I think it's something to move away from in literature, but not to apolitical literature. So I don't I don't know. It's hard to express this. Maybe I should express it through fiction. No, I think this is the right way to just try to say it and get it out there. Because I think, yeah, that's part of the problem, is when people wear the mantle of profundity, they are often using that to hide the fact that they don't have a strong political position and that they are avoiding clear and present truths about what needs to change in the world. Very basic and obvious things. And you know, instead they can use these elaborate sentences and beautiful metaphors to make it seem like they're saying something more profound, but I don't think most are. I I would dare say none are, and that there's a modern cult of fiction writers to be somehow profound prophets. And they're not, they're just people who know how to weave together metaphors and similes. And half the time not even that well. So that's kind of what I want to move away from. Yeah, let's do that. Let's do that. Let's do that. Let's be brat. Let's be brat about literary fiction. It's kind of over. That kind of dream is over. I think it needs to be redone. We need to just throw it away. And I feel like that's already kind of happened because I think that's part of the thing where it's like contemporary fiction is so moribund and everyone's so down on contemporary fiction. Part of it is because I don't think anybody really does believe in contemporary authors to be especially wise. I think that illusion is kind of already gone, but I don't think. But I think people still crave the meaning from literature. So they're disappointed by what they're not getting. Get rid of the craving. Get rid of the craving. Stop looking for it there. Be upfront that it's got to come from other, more deeper cultural wells shaped by traditions over many lifetimes of lived experience and intelligence and wisdom, and not like David Foster Wallace sitting at his desk. No offense. No offense. Love and light. Love and light. I'm waving my arms in a loving and lightful gesture. You all are lovely. You know what I do like? I like you. I like you. I like you. You, you, you, you, you. I like you. Um, we're gonna go upstate again. And this time we're gonna go upstate for a few weeks. So what that means is that you're gonna get a podcast episode or two or three from upstate. What's gonna happen? What's gonna happen to the format? Will our fingers be on the pulse from there? I won't be out and about in the streets. I will be in the mountains. Fingers on the pulse of the rocks and stones, and also my desk. I'm gonna use it as time to write because I'm a little bit behind of my goal of where I wanted to be with the book. The book's going great. Don't worry, I'm having fun. I'm gonna sit down and write after this. I'll have dinner. Um, but we're winding down. We're winding down, my little children. Keep up what you want to do, keep up your cultural wisdom, traditional lessons built up over thousands of years. Don't throw that away. That's never coming back. That's never coming back. That's also why, like, the genocide is such a huge thing. Anyway, but um because you once you lose all that stuff, it's not coming back. I mean, what are we left with? What are we left with? We're left with some techno-progressive nitwit who's decided a hundred years ago that they develop some strategy for how to rebuild. Anyway, um that's neither here nor there. My skepticism of modern political ideology abounds. But because that's because this is the thing. Sorry, sorry, we gotta say this. We gotta say this before we go, but um, Western intellectual canon is uh not a substitute for deeper cultural wisdom that relates to many other things that's much older and that uh relates to things that you know the Western academic tradition doesn't touch on or hasn't really resolved on. Anyway, there's so many limitations there. But so just you just uh don't replace your god with with Karl Marx, is what I'm saying. Sorry. Sorry, um that's controversial. It's controversial. We're just throwing grenades. We're throwing grenades. I adore you. I I even love you. Even you. Even you. Even you. That's true. I don't know who you are. Send me a voicemail. I like this. Goodbye.