On My Convoluted Relationship With Walter Benjamin

 Walter Benjamin and Stephen Alexander illumined by

Paul Klee's blessed Angelus Novus (1920)

 

 

Readers familiar with this blog will know that I have a thing for writers whose names begin with the letter B: from Baudelaire to Baudrillard; and from Georges Bataille to Roland Barthes [1].  

 

To this list might also be added the name of Walter Benjamin, the German-Jewish cultural critic and theorist whose convoluted (unfinished) work about Paris as the capital of the nineteenth-century - known in English as The Arcades Project (1927-40) [2] - affirms the figure of the flâneur as having crucial philosophical significance. 

 

Often regarded as a seminal text for postmodernism, the Arcades Project also anticipates the world of blogging and I don't think it's too much of a stretch to say that, in some ways, Torpedo the Ark is my very own version of Benjamin's posthumously edited and published masterpiece [3].  

 

For example, like the Arcades Project, TTA relies heavily on compositional techniques including paraphrase, pastiche, and plagiarism [4] - affirming the idea of intertextuality and attempting to create a kind of literary-philosophical collage that defies any attempt to systematise ideas or enforce any kind of grand narrative.    

 

Like Benjamin, I dream of being able to simply stroll through the ruins and piece together found fragments of text from old works by dead authors, thereby creating something new and idiosyncratic, but not something that pretends to be an entirely original work born of individual uniqueness or any such Romantic fantasy. TTA is shaped by (functions and circulates within) a wider cultural history and a shared linguistic network of meaning.

And, like the Arcades Project, TTA has grown and mutated in a monstrous manner. Initially, Benjamin envisioned wrapping things up within a few weeks. However, as the work expanded in scope and complexity, he eventually came to view it as his most important achievement. 

 

Similarly, when I began TTA I thought it would provide a window on to a wider body of work. But it then became the work, absorbing huge amounts of time and energy and without any conceivable end point other than death (the final post may very well be a suicide note) [5].

 

Notes

 

[1] See the post dated 17 August 2022 in which I discuss these four French writers: click here.   

 

[2] Das Passagen-Werk consists of a massive assemblage of notes, fragments, and quotations that Benjamin assembled between 1927 and his death in 1940. The manuscript (along with additional material) for the Arcades Project was entrusted to Benjamin's pal Georges Bataille when the former fled Paris following the Nazi occupation. Bataille, who worked as a librarian at the Bibliothèque Nationale, hid the manuscript in a closed archive at the library where it was eventually discovered after the war. The full text was published in an English translation by Harvard University Press in 1999, having been first published in a German edition in 1982. 

 

[3] There are, of course, some important differences between Benjamin and myself and our respective projects. For one thing, my work has been influenced less by Jewish mysticism and Marxism and more by Jewish comedy and the punk philosophy of Malcolm McLaren.

 

[4] I know the idea of plagiarism is one that some readers balk at. However, it's one I'm happy to endorse; see the post entitled 'Blurred Lines' (21 January, 2016): click here. And see also the post 'On Poetry and Plagiarism' (13 December, 2018): click here. 

 

[5] Readers unfamiliar with the biographical details of Benjamin's story, may be interested to know Benjamin ended his own life, aged 48, on 26 September, 1940, in Portbou, Spain (a small coastal town just over the border with France). Fearing he was about to fall into the hands of the Gestapo, who had been given orders to arrest him, Benjamin chose to overdose on a handful of morphine tablets. 

 

 

This post is for Anja Steinbaum and Natias Neutert. 

 

 

Another Sponge Worthy Post

Alejandro Mogollo Art on X

@alemogolloart

 

 

I. 

 

Someone called me a human sponge the other day, implying that I simply absorb other people's ideas and information found online in order to produce posts for Torpedo the Ark; a blog that has, they said, 'almost no original or creative content'. 

 

That seems a bit harsh: although it's perfectly true that I regard Romantic concepts of originality and individual creativity as untenable, subscribing as I do to the idea of intertextualité; i.e., that every text is shaped by (and functions within) a cultural and linguistic network of meaning and that compositional strategies including paraphrase, parody, and plagiarism are not only perfectly legitimate, but unavoidable [1]. 

 

My critic may not like it, but there are no private language games or individual thoughts and experiences [2] and ideas are never created ex nihilo.   

 

 

II. 

 

As for being labelled a human sponge, that doesn't trouble me at all: I like sponges. 

 

Sponges are amazing aquatic animals [3] and I dislike the speciesism contained in the accusation, as if being called a sponge were something one should feel insulted by or as if actually being a sponge were something to be ashamed of. 

 

If I were told that in the next life I would reincarnate as a member of the phylum Porifera that wouldn't trouble me in the slightest and nor would I see it as an evolutionary regression. Who needs the complexity of organs when one's body is continually exposed to circulating currents of water which supply food and oxygen on the one hand, whilst removing waste on the other? 

 

Human beings have been around for approximately 300,000 years: which is a long time. But it's nothing compared to the 543 million years that multicellular sponges have existed and done their thing - which includes fucking with one another [4] and, in the case of carnvivorous deep-water sponges, catching and eating prey [5]. 

 

My critic might want to consider this before using the term sponge in a derogatory manner. Indeed, he might even question his own worthiness in relation to the sponge ... [6]

 

Notes

 

[1] There are several earlier posts on TTA discussing this idea of intertextuality: click here. 

 

[2] Wittgenstein famously examined (and dismissed) the idea of a private language in Philosophical Investigations (1953); see sections 243-271. For Wittgenstein, even if there could be such a language it would be unintelligible not only to others, but to its supposed originator too.   

 

[3] Many people think that because sponges lack organs and don't move they must therefore be a simple form of plant life - just as they mistakenly believe that sea cucumbers are vegetables - but they're not; sponges are animals, just like you and me, and we possess a common ancestor (which is why we share 70% of our genetic material and why, for example, the elastic skeletons of sponges are made from the same protein (collagen) that is found in human tendons and skin). 

 

[4] Most sponges are hermaphroditic and reproduce sexually by releasing sperm cells into the water current which are then carried to other sponges, where they fertilise egg cells (ova). If need be, however, sponges can also reproduce asexually - not something we can do.

 

[5] This includes the recently discovered harp sponge (Chondrocladia lyra) which use velcro-like hooks on external body surfaces to capture much larger prey than the typical suspension feeding sponges which simply filter bacteria and microscopic organisms from the surrounding water. Once a carnivorous sponge has ensnared its prey, it secretes a digestive membrane that surrounds and engulfs the captured animal, breaking down its tissue so that it can eventually be absorbed and digested. 

 

[6] Fans of the American sitcom Seinfeld will immediately recognise that I'm thinking here of the question that Elaine Benes once posed to potential lovers: So you think you're sponge-worthy? (Obviously, I'm aware that a contraceptive sponge - a soft, saucer-shaped device made of polyurethane foam and filled with spermacide - is not the same thing as a sea sponge.)

      Readers who wish to do so can click here to watch a clip from the season seven episode, 'The Sponge', dir. Andy Ackerman and written by Peter Mehlman (7 Dec 1995).  

 

 

If You Want Angels to Visit Your Home ...

Stephen Alexander (à la Jamie Reid): 

Taliban: Aniconism in the IEA (2024)

 

 

I. 

 

I can't say I'm a fan of the Taliban, but you have to admire their determination to actually practice what they preach and govern Afghanistan in accordance with Islamic law, which, as they rightly argue, is often unambiguous and needs only to be implemented and enforced rather than interpreted.

 

Take, for example, the teaching that prohibits the production and circulation of images not just of the prophet Muhammad, but of all living things. Some may pretend that this teaching is complex and point out that it allows exceptions. Others, for whom iconography is not such a major moral concern, will draw attention to the fact the Quran doesn't explicitly prohibit the visual representation of living beings (although it certainly condemns idolatry).

 

However, the hadith - a major source of guidance for Muslims, elaborating on the principles set out in the Quran - is perfectly clear: making images of living things is haram (i.e., strictly forbidden as a sinful action) and image makers are threatened with serious punishment on Judgement Day, no matter how pious they may have been in other regards; until, that is, they are able to invest their image with life (which, of course, they'll never be able to do, for Allah is the sole creator of life).   

 

So, whilst it may appear crazy or extreme to many Westerners - and, indeed, to many Afghans (particularly those working within the media) - the Taliban are behaving with impeccable moral logic; images of living things are contrary to sharia and angels will not enter a house with pictures on the wall.

 

 

II. 

 

Obviously, aniconism is not going to be an easy policy to sell (or enforce) in a world awash with images. Thus, the new ban announced on any images of living things will be introduced gradually over time. 

 

And, apparently, even the Taliban seem to approve of photo ID cards, which, I have to admit, I find somewhat disappointing; as is the fact that members of the mujahideen have posed for portraits and Taliban officials have posted selfies and other snap shots on social media before now.

 

Well, I say disappointing but perhaps that's not the right word to use as it maybe suggests I'm sympathetic to what's going on in Afghanistan: just to be clear, I'm not. Having said that, I remain of the view that iconography is certainly not an innocent activity (albeit one which, in a digital age, is perhaps our most fundamental activity). 

 

Like Baudrillard, I think image-making plays a complicit role in what he terms the perfect crime [1] and by which he refers to the extermination of singular being via technological and social processes bent on replacing real things and real people with a series of images and empty signs. 

 

When this happens, we move beyond a game of mere representation towards a world of obscenity; i.e., a state wherein all living things are made "uselessly, needlessly visible, without desire and without effect" [2]. 

 

And that, philosophically, is a legitimate concern it seems to me ... [3]              

 

Notes 

 

[1] See Jean Baudrillard, The Perfect Crime, trans. Chris Turner (Verso, 1996). 

 

[2] Jean Baudrillard, The Intelligence of Evil or the Lucidity Pact, trans. Chris Turner, (Berg, 2005), p. 94.

 

[3] One that I have discussed at length in a two-part post entitled Film Kills (13-14 June 2013): click here for part one ('At the Pictures with D. H. Lawrence') and/or here for part two (On Images, Objects and Speculative Realism'). 

 

 

Reflections on a Sleeping Cat

And there is a sleeping cat, very quick! [1]

 

 

It is important to understand that the Lawrentian notion of peace does not imply inertia or a certain deadness. It's more a condition of the heart; a feeling of at oneness with one's surroundings; of being a creature in what he calls the house of life [2]. 

 

Like a cat asleep on a chair or stretched out in the sun, yawning. Cats, I suspect, have a much greater sense of peace than most people. 

 

Similarly, they have a certain quickness about them that men and women often lack; an invisible flame of impersonal presence that flickers in their every movement (even when they appear to be at rest) and which keeps them in a fluid and ever-changing relationship with all other objects.

 

Notes

  

[1] D. H. Lawrence, 'The Novel', Study of Thomas Hardy and Other Essays, ed. Bruce Steele, (Cambridge University Press, 1985), p. 183. 

      The photo is of Phoevos the Cat, asleep on the chair and so preventing me from being able to type this post whilst sitting comfortably at the desk.

[2] See the poem 'Pax', in D. H. Lawrence, The Poems, Vol. I., ed. Christopher Pollnitz (Cambridge University Press, 2013), p. 614. 

      This late poem is somewhat problematic for me by its use of the term God, but I share his thoughts on the peacefulness of a sleeping cat.

For a related post - 'On the Quickness and Allue of Objects' (28 August, 2019) - click here. 

The Wheel is the First Principle of Evil

 Rota est primum principium mali

 

I.

 

If, like me, you get much of your historical knowledge from the Carry On films, then you could be forgiven for believing that Hengist Pod, an ancient Briton, invented the wheel. However, if like most people you get your information from the internet, then you'll be of the view that it was actually the Sumerians who first came up with the idea sometime in the 4th millennium BCE [1].

 

Either way, I'm not concerned here with the first solid wooden wheels attached to rickety old wagons pulled by oxen, nor even with the wheels used on horse-drawn chariots in Asia Minor, which, thanks to possessing spokes, represented a significant advance and allowed for the production of vehicles that were lighter, faster, and more reliable.   

 

What concerns me, rather - as a thinker troubled by the question concerning technology - is the fact that the wheel is the essential rotating component that allowed for the mechanization of agriculture, the industrial revolution, the becoming-robot of mankind, and the destruction of the natural world. 

 

 

II.

 

In other words, it isn't ithyphallic demons that we have to fear - for even "the double phallus of the devil himself" [2] never truly threatens - but, rather, the spinning wheel wherein mortal danger lies: for the spinning wheel is "the first principle of evil" [3], both within the external world of things and material activity and within the inner workings of the human psyche. 

 

Or, if you want to be a bit Heideggerian about this, you could say that the wheel is that which enframes being; that upon which Dasein is bound and broken and "absolved from kissing and strife" [4].   

 

And those who think the heavens rotate like a wheel are mistaken; the stars and planets may revolve, but they move in their movement, we know not where. Only a fixed wheel, whose centrifugal motion is denied by a stationary axis, spins round and round but never wanders or goes anywhere [5]. 

 

 

 

Notes

 

[1]  Of course, it's impossible to know for certain who first invented the wheel because records of such things were not kept in the ancient world. It's more than likely that the wheel was discovered independently by different peoples at different times. 

 

[2] D. H. Lawrence, 'Doors', in The Poems, Vol. I, ed. Christopher Pollnitz (Cambridge University Press, 2013), p. 624.

 

[3] D. H. Lawrence, 'What then is Evil?', The Poems, Vol. I ... p. 626.

 

[4] D. H. Lawrence, 'Death is not Evil, Evil is Mechanical', The Poems Vol. I ... p. 627.

 

[5] See D. H. Lawrence, 'The Wandering Cosmos', The Poems, Vol. I ... p. 627.

 

Note that the above four verses were originally published in the UK in D. H. Lawrence, Last Poems (Martin Secker, 1933).

For a related post to this one on D. H. Lawrence and the poetry of evil (published on 27 May, 2019), click here. 

 

Chaos Continues to Reign

Stephen Alexander: Chaos Reigns II (2024)

 

 

Long-time readers of Torpedo the Ark might recall a post published on a sparkling ice-cold morning in December 2018, just days before Christmas, and which featured a horrific photo of a disembowelled fox ...

 

The post - which can be accessed by clicking here - was what my artist friend Heide Hatry would term a memento mori  (i.e., something that acts as a stark reminder of the inevitability of death).

And, like it or not, what I said then is just as true today; pain, grief, and despair remain ever-present in this world and fundamentally determine the tragic (if extremely rare and unusual) phenomenon that people call life. 

 

In other words, chaos continues to reign - and the obscenely mutilated bodies of red foxes (and other native creatures) continue to litter the roadside [1], reminding us that the wheel is the first principle of evil [2]. 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] An estimated 100,000 foxes are killed on UK roads each year (i.e., about 274 foxes per day). 

 

[2] See the verse 'What then is Evil?' by D. H. Lawrence, The Poems Vol. I, ed. Christopher Pollnitz (Cambridge University Press, 2013), p. 626. 

And Then This: More Random Thoughts on Samuel Beckett

Stephen Alexander: God Save Samuel Beckett (2024) 

(à la Jamie Reid) [1]

 

 

There are many reasons other than his dark humour and finely crafted words to admire the esteemed Irish writer Samuel Beckett; not least of all the fact that he was stylish, courageous, and free from the spirit of revenge ... 

 

 

Samuel Beckett: Style Icon 

 

With the possible exception of Albert Camus, Sam Beckett was the best-looking of all those twentieth-century intellectuals troubled by questions of nihilism, absurdism, and existentialism. 

 

Already as a sports mad teen, he'd adopted the classic sharp haircut that he was to favour for the rest of his life. I'm not quite sure whether we should refer to his Barnet as coiffed or quiffed, but, either way, it's inspired generations of stylish young men ever since (although as one commentator notes, a thick head of hair is a prerequisite if you really want to achieve the look) [2].  

 

And then there are the glasses: once Beckett found a small, round, steel-rimmed pair of specs that perfectly suited his face and signalled his fierce intelligence, he again stuck with them for life.

 

As for his clothes, Beckett initially liked to wear suits that appeared just a little too tight and ill-fitting, but he eventually settled for a look featuring a simple pair of slacks worn with a turtleneck sweater and a sports jacket. Beckett also had a penchant for raincoats, French berets, and soft suede shoes: "In fact, such was the staying power of this particular ensemble that to this day Beckett continues to be cited as a paragon of uniform dressing." [3]        

 

Ultimately, despite claiming he had no interest in fashion, Beckett was something of a dandy who understood the importance of style and who blurred the line between smart casual and shabby chic. He may have picked up some pieces from the local charity shop, but he matched them with expensive silk scarves and famously liked to be seen carrying a Gucci shoulder bag in the 1970s. 

 

 

Samuel Becket: Hero of the Resistance

 

Unlike that cowardly toad Jean-Paul Sartre - who basically sat out the German Occupation of France during the Second World War and whose role in La Résistance was, at best, what might be described as modest rather than fully engaged - Beckett, a resident of Paris for most of his adult life, was an active member of the Resistance (working as a courier) and he was awarded the Croix de Guerre in March 1945 by General Charles de Gaulle [4]. 

 

It has to be remembered that, as an Irishman, Beckett could have easily returned to Dublin from Paris when the Germans invaded in 1941. But he didn't. He stayed. And he joined the Resistance, frequently risking arrest by the Gestapo. After his unit was betrayed in August 1942, Beckett was forced to flee to the South of France, seeking refuge in the small village of Rousillion. Here, he worked on a farm, but still took part in operations against the German forces when called upon to do so.

 

After the Germans were defeated and France was liberated, Beckett returned to Paris. After the War, he rarely spoke of his experiences and would often downplay his role in the Resistance (again, cf. Sartre), describing his activities as no more than boy scout stuff. 

 

Samuel Beckett: Overcoming the Spirit of Revenge

 

In January 1938, Beckett was almost fatally stabbed when he refused the services of a notorious Parisian pimp who went by the (slightly ironic) name of Prudent. 

 

After recovering in a private hospital room - generously paid for by his former mentor James Joyce - Beckett attended a preliminary court hearing at which he asked his assailant why he had not only pulled a knife on him, but plunged the blade into his chest. 

 

Prudent replied: Je ne sais pas, Monsieur. Je m'excuse. 

 

Taken aback somewhat by Prudent's honesty in admitting that he lacked any explanation for his actions (i.e., any logical motive) - coupled to his well-mannered request for forgiveness - Beckett decided he no longer wished to press charges and the case was dropped. 

This story is open to a very obvious Christian interpretation. Only Beckett, of course, was not a Christian. In fact, according to one commentator: "Christianity is Samuel Beckett's fundamental antagonist: his thought, his aesthetics and his writing cannot be fully understood in isolation from his lifelong struggle with it." [5]

 

Beckett was thus a writer working within the shadow of self-proclaimed anti-Christ Friedrich Nietzsche, rather than the shadow of the Cross (although I'm sure that there are significant differences to be drawn between the two authors) [6].

 

And so I think the tale of Beckett and Prudent the Pimp might best be understood with reference to Nietzsche; a philosopher who wishes to have done with judgement and conceives of revenge as something that should only be found in the souls of venomous spiders, not men. Only a human tarantula who lives in a cave of lies and deals in hidden revengefulness mistakes the latter for justice. 

"'That man may be freed from the bonds of revenge: that is the bridge to my highest hope,'" says Zarathustra [7]. 

 

And it seems that Beckett shares his arachnophobia and mistrusts all in whom the urge to punish is strong.   

 

 

Notes

 

[1] This portrait - done in the style of Jamie Reid's 'God Save ...' series of posters for The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle (dir. Julien Temple and starring the Sex Pistols, 1980), features a teenaged Sam Beckett in 1920, looking like a punky link between Arthur Rimbaud and Shane MacGowan.

 

[2] See Jane Hardy, 'Stand aside, David Beckham - now Samuel Beckett is turning heads', in the Belfast Telegraph (6 July, 2012): click here. 

 

[3] Theo Coetzer, 'Bibliophile Style: Samuel Beckett', on the menswear blog Habilitate (17 April, 2023): click here. 

      As Coetzer rightly goes on to point out: "The ostensible disregard for appearance implied by wearing the same thing day after day can arguably be rooted in precisely the opposite impulse - a careful consideration, in other words, of what one looks like and the desire to control the messaging of one's clothing."

 

[4] The Croix de Guerre is a French military decoration, created in 1915, and commonly awarded to  foreign fighters allied to France who distinguish themselves by acts of heroism. Like Beckett, the American-born singer, dancer, and actress Josephine Baker was also awarded this medal for her wartime efforts with the Resistance - not something that Simone de Beauvoir could ever boast of. 

      Baker and Beckett were also both awared the Médaille de la Résistance by the French government for their efforts in fighting the German occupation. 

 

[5] Erik Tonning, 'Samuel Beckett, Modernism and Christianity', chapter in Modernism and Christianity (Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), pp. 104-123. Lines quoted are on p. 104. 

 

[6] Richard Marshall explores the complexity of the Nietzsche-Beckett relationship in his essay 'Beckett the Nietzschean Hedonist' in 3:AM Magazine (21 April 2013): click here to read online. 

 

[7] Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, trans. R. J. Hollingdale (Penguin Books, 1969), p. 123.    

 

Click here to read what is effectively part one of this post: And Then What: Random Thoughts on Samuel Beckett (09 October 2024).  

And Then What: Random Thoughts on Samuel Beckett

Fig. 1: Photograph of Samuel Beckett by Roger Pic (1977)  

Fig. 2: Arthur Atkinson as Hogg in Beckett's one-act play And Then What 

 (BBC Television 1972)

 

 

When it comes to the Irish writer Samuel Beckett - last of the great modernists, etc., etc. - the strange thing is that whilst I'm fully on board with his absurdist philosophy and think him a hugely attractive figure and daring as an artist - one possessed of the courage to both wander and squander - I've never been a fan of his work and often wonder why that's so.

 

Similarly, I've never been a fan either of Beckett's one-time mentor James Joyce (whose daughter, Lucia, Beckett may or may not have fucked) [1].

 

Perhaps, like Joyce, Beckett is just a bit too intellectual and experimental for my tastes; too rooted in psychoanalysis and avant-gardism. One is almost tempted to say of Beckett what D. H. Lawrence wrote of Joyce; "too terribly would-be and done-on-purpose, utterly without spontaneity or real life" [2]. 

 

Almost, but not quite and it's possible that Lawrence would have found more to admire in Beckett than he did in Joyce [3]. 

 

At any rate, I certainly prefer Beckett to Joyce - as evidenced by the fact that there are several posts published on Torpedo the Ark that refer positively to Beckett's work: click here, for example, to access the post from 2013 on Beckett's idea of failure in Worstwood Ho (1983); or here, to read the post on Beckett's short story 'Dante and the Lobster' (1934). 

 

Finally, I've just recently read Beckett's one-act play Krapp's Last Tape (1958), which, again, I very much like as an idea, but didn't much care for as a short drama. 

 

However, I did love Beckett's little known play entitled 'And Then What', which was filmed by the BBC in 1972, starring the legendary music hall performer and comic actor Arthur Atkinson in the role of Hog - 'a lonely, bitter, pinched, wizened git' - a role written especially for him by Beckett, a lifelong fan of Atkinson's, as he was of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and other vaudeville clowns.    

 

A short clip can be viewed on YouTube by clicking here [4].

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Beckett was introduced to Joyce in Paris in the late 1920s and the meeting had a profound influence on the younger man. Afterwards, he served as a research assistant for Joyce, who was then working on Finnegans Wake (1939) and Beckett's first published work (1929) was an essay defending his master from accusations of wilful obscurity. 

      Meanwhile, he was also (allegedly) involved with Joyce's daughter, Lucia. However, after making it clear to her that he really wasn't interested in a serious romance - not least because he was seeing another woman at the time and she was already showing signs of mental illness - his relationship with the girl's father also cooled somewhat, though they remained close and when, in 1936, Beckett was almost fatally stabbed in the chest, it was Joyce who paid his hospital bills and made regular visits. 

 

[2] D. H. Lawrence, letter to Harry Crosby (6 September 1928), in The Letters of D. H. Lawrence, Vol. VI, ed. James T. Boulton and Margaret H. Boulton, with Gerald M. Lacy (Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 548.

      The (non-)relationship between Lawrence and Joyce is fascinating. Although very much aware of one another in the 1920s, the two men never met and each disparaged and dismissed one another's work. Readers who are interested in knowing more might like to see the essay by Earl Ingersoll entitled 'D. H. Lawrence and James Joyce: The Odd Couple of Literary Modernism', in The D.H. Lawrence Review, Vol. 38, No. 2 (2013), pp. 1-20. It can be accessed on JSTOR: click here. 

 

[3] Not that Beckett was overly enthusiastic about Lawrence's writing. Having read the latter's short novel St Mawr (1925), Beckett wrote in his journal: 'Some lovely things as usual and plenty of rubbish'. As Lawrence died in March 1930, he had no opportunity to read any of Beckett's work. 

 

[4] For those who might otherwise be confused, please note that this is a clip from The Fast Show (S3/E8), dir. Mark Mylod and first broadcast on BBC Two (29 December 1997). It features Simon Day as Tommy Cockles and Paul Whitehouse as Arthur Atkinson.

 

 

For more random thoughts on Beckett - in relation to fashion, bravery, and overcoming the spirit of revenge - please click here. 

Unbearably Beautiful: Why I Love the Photographs of Rachel Fleminger Hudson

An untitled photo by Rachel Fleminger Hudson 

rachelflemingerhudson.com

 

 

I.

 

As someone who grew up in the 1970s and remains amorously fascinated with the period - the music, the TV, the fashion, the football, the girls (not necessarily in that order) - of course I'm excited by the work of British photographer and filmmaker Rachel Fleminger Hudson ... 

 

 

II.

 

An ultra-talented graduate of Central Saint Martins and winner of the 2022 Dior Photography and Visual Arts Award for Young Talents, Fleminger Hudson's highly-stylised images recreate the aesthetics of the period within a contemporary cultural context, thereby loosening the "aura of necessity and sanctity surrounding categories of the present" [1].

 

Although often playful, her images are meticulously researched, carefully staged with authentic objects and outfits, and invested with ideas drawn from her intellectual background in cultural studies and critical theory; we can tell this by the fact that, when interviewed, she prefers to speak of hauntology rather than mere nostalgia [2], although, clearly, Fleminger Hudson is yearing for something in her work; if not for the past or for home as such, then perhaps for the intimacy of touch in a digital age. 

 

III.

 

People of a certain age - like me - might remember the '70s and even publish posts on their glam-punk childhood: click here, for example.

 

But nobody reimagines the decade better than Fleminger Hudson and it's this creative reimagining rather than a straightforward recollection that somehow best captures the spirit of the times and, more importantly perhaps, projects elements of the past into the future, so that we might live yesterday tomorrow - as Malcolm would say - rekindling sparks of forgotten joy [3].    

 

Although she's not a fashion photographer per se, it's the fashions of the 1970s that most excite Fleminger Hudson's interest; a true philosopher on the catwalk, she clearly believes that clothes maketh the period and express not only the individuality of the wearer, but embody the socio-cultural conditions of the time [4].

 

Why Fleminger Hudson has a particular penchant for the 1970s, I don't know. Arguably, she might have tied her project to an earlier decade, or even the 1980s [5].

 

Perhaps because the 1970s were a uniquely transitional time; one that was marked "by a change in values and lifestyles" as "modern society and its cult of authenticity gave way to a postmodernism based on reproduction and simulacra" [6]. 

 

 

IV.

 

Whether we think of Fleminger Hudson's work as a form of theoretically-informed fantasy, or as magically-enhanced realism, doesn't really matter. Because either way, her images are fabulous, relaying a narrative that is truer than truth [7] and revealing more about the past than historical facts alone.  

 

  

Portrait of the artist 

Rachel Fleminger Hudson

 

 

Notes

 

[1] William E. Connolly, Political Theory and Modernity (Basil Blackwell, 1988), p. ix.  

 

[2] See, for example, the interview with Gem Fletcher on wetransfer.com (8 July 2024), in which Fleminger Hudson says: "I think about the work as anti-nostalgic. Nostalgia, for me, is about being homesick for a distant past. I'm not homesick for the past because I exist in the material world of the 70s now through my relationship with objects."

 

[3] See the post on retrofuturism dated 10 June 2024 entitled 'I Wanna Live Yesterday Tomorrow': click here. 

 

[4] On her website, Fleminger Hudson says that clothing is "an often overlooked symbolic language" and that one of her aims is "to engage with our psychological entanglement with our garments". Click here.

 

[5] Fleminger Hudson recognises this in the interview with Gem Fletcher on wetransfer.com (8 July 2024): "My work isn't a glorification of the 1970s. [...] In truth, I could be using any era."

 

[6] I'm quoting from a text on the Maison Européenne de la Photographie website showcasing some of Fleminger Hudson's work. She had her first solo exhibition at the MEP in 2023, curated by Victoria Aresheva, bringing together pictures from several different series of works. Click here.  

 

[7] The Jewish proverb that suggests that stories (fables) are truer than the truth is one I first heard being spoken by the South American writer Isabel Allende in a TED talk (March 2007): click here. 

 

In Memory of Leonard Rossiter (1926-1984)

 Leonard Rossiter as Rigsby in Rising Damp (1974-78)

and as Inspector Truscott in Loot (1984)

 

I. 

 

As a Rising Damp aficianado, I was pleased to find family, friends, and fellow actors - including Don Warrington and Gabrielle Rose - sharing memories of Leonard Rossiter in today's Guardian.

 

As Catherine Shoard writes: 

 

"Four decades after Rossiter's death, his singular style - manic energy, machine-gun delivery, splenetic intelligence - continues to carry remarkable currency." [1]

 

And continues to make laugh. 

II. 

  

Rossiter died from a heart condition (hypertrophic cardiomyopathy), aged 57, whilst waiting to go onstage at the Lyric Theatre, London, where he was playing Inspector Truscott in a production of Joe Orton's dark farce Loot (1965), directed by Jonathan Lynne.

 

As Orton was a scandalous playwright much admired by Malcolm - and I was a fan of Rossiter's - I naturally felt obliged to attend a performance of Loot - which I did on Tuesday 2 October, 1984, just three days before Rossiter's death. 

 

I recorded in my diary at the time: 

 

LOOT: very good; very funny; very well-acted. Leonard Rossiter's performance was particularly enjoyable. I can see why Malcolm loves Orton: virulently anti-authority and all forms of moral hypocrisy; like an angrier (more contemporary) version of Oscar Wilde.

 

And on Monday 8 October I noted (somewhat prosaically, I have to admit): 

 

Distressing news: Leonard Rossiter died backstage a few days ago. A hugely talented comic actor, he'll be much missed.     

Thanks to TV and YouTube, however, we can still enjoy his work - although I smiled to see that Rossiter - who could be a deadly serious and impatient individual, who hated wasting time - had once described the former as merely: 'An advanced technical method of stopping people from making their own entertainment.'

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Catherine Shoard, '"It was hard not to stare at him all the time": inside the remarkable rise and shocking loss of Leonard Rossiter', The Guardian (5 October 2024): click here. 

 

 

Readers who enjoyed this post might like to see an earlier post (dated 15 October 2022) discussing the character of Rupert Rigsby, as played by Leonard Rossiter: click here.