From: sheilah@wam.umd.edu (Danny-Boy)
Subject: books lots of them. Re: After Neuromancer...then what?
Organization: University of Maryland, College Park
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 16:54:12 GMT

<1oeoVB1w165w@entropy.mcds.com> morpheus <morpheus@entropy.mcds.com> writes:
><BDA108@psuvm.psu.edu> writes:
>
[stuff deleted. discussion about what to read after _Neuromancer_]


Most of the poeple responding to this thread have only mentioned
Wm Gibson's other books or _Mirrorshades_.

Read some postmodern literature.

I dont know many pomo names, except Pynchon, but I feel stupid for
mentioning him since he is always mentioned and I should know more.

_The Crying of Lot 49_ is short. 
_Gravity's Rainbow_ is not.

(I'm a lovely critic)

If you check out _Storming the Reality Studio_ it has many excerpts from
pomo things. Use it as a guide if you like. I'll probably check it out
and read the books that are excerpted in it. 

I bought a collection of essays by J. Derrida and a work of his
on Neitzsche's styles and _PostCards. Felt overwhelmed, and thought it wise 
to read some of the philosophers that predate him in order to have a feel
for what he was rejecting or recreating.

Also bought some lectures by Noam Choamsky.

_The Mind's I_

Someone recommend or discommend M. Foucault for me. in particular
the history of madness, (can't remember the true title)

Lewis Shiner's _Slam_ could be pomo. I've read three of his books,
and some short stories. 
The first book, set on Mars, is obviously scifi. (sorry, lack of title)
The second, _Deserted Cities of the Heart_ not scifi.
_Slam_ Nice warm fuzzies if you miss Texas and lived slightly
near Galveston. Conspiracy (Lot 49 is conspiracy too. for that matter
so is _Foucault's Pendulum_) UFO'ers. Cat's. Skaters. 

(warm fuzzies is not the best phrase to be juxtaposed with _Slam_ but I am 
perverse)

Lewis Shiner and Bruce Sterling are Austin writers, which brings me to
mention, Howard Waldorp. Of his writing, I have only read short stories
from _Strange Monsters of the Recent Past_ ufo's rock and roll, monsters.
very fun. Would appreciate it if anyone would recommend a novel. He writes
alternative histories.

So does Philip K Dick. Good ideas. very good ideas. Just finished reading all
of his short stories. Personal opinion is that he does not write as well
as I wish he would. but I am a fool. and writing is hard.

other Austin writers, Pat Cadigan, three books, mentioned here before.
Short story collection, "Patterns" that I have only seen in the library.

I will always be one to encourage someone to read _Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern are Dead_ Tom Stoppard, in coherts with _No Exit_ by
Sartre. (waiting for godot, if you can stomach it.)

_Notes from the Underground_ Dostoevsky.

_Thus Spake Zaruthustra_ is very funny. plus, you can watch 2001 and
listen to the disco version of "Also sprac Zaruthustra" (misspellings!)
at the same time. (or buy your very own cd)

Trying to think of a book on writing. can't. maybe later.
I replied to some post requesting information about cp style writing
workshops by claiming it was a bad idea and a writing work shop was
better. Still think so. My idea is, write what you want to. Learn to
write well. Write what you want to well. Not that I can do this.
why force yourself to wrote what you perceive as cp? it is silly
and defeating. Write according to your own obsessions. (ref, for poetry,
_The Triggering Town_ Robert Hugo. ref for the word "obsessions" also
for writing your own)

Pat Murphy, three books, one collection of short stories.

Ian Mcdonald. four or five books out now. good writer. poetic prose.

Robert Haas. Poet. Prose Poems. prose poems pomo?

Lewis Shiner, ed. "When the Music's over" (misquoted Title, can't remember
it) I bought it but lost in when I broke up with someone a while back.
Remember a story by Bruce Sterling. Wish I coudl reread it. Enjoyed it.

The Years Best Scifi (from this year)  - I havn't read, 
but when I looked over the names, many attracted me.


Interesting informal essay from John True posted to rec.arts.poems 
recently:
[edited by me, to cut out parts to make it short]
[disclaimer, John would probably like to edit this on his own. John
will probably get mad at me for posting this for him.]

...
There's a lot of stuff in PoMo critical literature about the "decentered self,"
the concept that the human individual can no longer be discretely defined
by drawing a simple physical (or intellectual) line around the conventional
self-contained mind+body (something like that).  Not only have our physical
bodies been invaded by prosthetics and permanently altered by all kinds
of surgery (serious and elective), but what we think of as "us" has expanded
or at least changed in configuration such that things that are outside
of us get identified (by us) as us.  For example, our net persona(e), which
would seem to be a lot different (at least as others perceive them) than
our persona(e) in person (My sample size here is about 4.  I'm not going to do
any statistics.)  But I consider even things as how I arrange my tape
collection at home or my file hierarchy on my hard disk as aspects or extensions
of myself.  This is especially true if I'm the only one who can make
sense of something (i.e. the construct is inaccessible to all others).  Now,
what does this have to do with automotive fluids?  Good question.  The way

	[my note - I kept goading John to write an essay for me about
the use of modern surroundings for imagery instead of flowers and birds
and old things. read the first sentence in _Neuromancer_ "The sky was
the color of television tuned a dead channel" (misquoted in all likely
hood) a good example. I don't have a vocabulary for what I want to talk
about but it probably involves metal gears, plastic, pavement, cooking
grease (recylced), population genetics, bosons, fermions, mechanical 
pencils, broken pencil leads, metal, hot or cold, plastic seat covers,
rolling office chairs, car odours, office odours, sick building syndrome,
malls, people, cars cars cars, wheels]

I see it, the world I walk around in is me.  Things I consider interesting
and important in that world are mine.  Uninteresting and unimportant things
in that world essentially aren't in that world.  They don't exist.  When
I write, I am free to appropriate anything I want and use it however I like.
I have realized that I am rich.  There are objects all around me.  I work
in a biology laboratory so many of the objects are arcane.  So much the better.
The automotive fluids probably result from my years at the gas station, but
I could as well have used other kinds of fluids (food, bodily fluids, chemicals,
Xerox machine fluids, whiteout).  What does it mean when I talk about automatic

	[another one, printer toner cartridges. the smell of toner. it is
like rotten fruit or something. I am so sick of it, I hate changing
the toner cartridges in the computer lab. vomit vomit vomit. because
of the smell]

	[another one, pulp paper. it dries out skin]

transmission fluid?  Most of the time I can't remember.  The poem is a
wholistic, mindset thing.  And meaning isn't fixed in time.  The mindset
may be somewhat fixed, but it's flexible.  Three years down the road I can

	[flexible is very important. location is not fixed. everything
is fluid. space is fluid. all subjective all melting clocks]

read it again and like it again but for a completely different reason (unless
it was one I did 6 years ago that rhymes, then I either throw it out or 
rewrite it without the rhymes).  The meaning isn't fixed from reader to
reader.  When I write a poem I'm not trying to indoctrinate you.  I don't
really know what I'm trying to do.  I expect most people to skip it.  For most
readers it's not going to click.  For some it will, just as some poets
I read really click with me. I think I've taken up enough bandwidth tonight.
I could go on.  Further topics would include:
	(a) cool word -> hermetic  my definition -> something that is so obscure
that only one person knows about it.  a fascinating concept

	[somewhere I read about 'private language,' a discussion on it's
existance or non-existance, but I can't recall the book right now.]

	(b) modern humans and machines - if you're < 40 years old and live
in or near civilization, there probably has always been whitenoise in the
background; the noises and dynamics of machines affect our art, especially
music (can this be why modern music has such a regular and prominent beat?)
This ISN'T bad.  It just is.  ...

	[go into the spectral domain. 1/f noise. everywhere]

(c) WHY IS THE RIGHT ANGLE DISAPPEARING FROM CONTEMPORARY DESIGN???  Anybody
want to have a seance?  Let's see if we can communicate with Wright or
Moholy-Nagy or somebody.

OK enough I'm leaving.
-jtrue   

with apologies to John.
-- 
I am always wrong. Don't believe me ever.
stark raving sane  sheilah@wam.umd.edu
Newsgroups: alt.cyberpunk