Very much agree. The only reason to write is to write for oneself. Most people are very retarded. Why stoop to their level-- if you're an interesting person, the things you write for yourself will also be interesting.
Also, a single paragraph of this piece would cause the entirety of 'booktok' to drop stone cold dead. 🏆
(The word booktok feels so unpleasant in my mouth. The word 'romantasy' brings me to convulsions. I feel strongly about these things because I heavily advertised my first book on tiktok and therefore was directly exposed to all that poison)
Peak NP. However, I must add that all this applies not only to readers. See: the existence of the redditor. This is the age of pseudointellectualism and pseudoculture - what happens when the high is accessible to any and everyone for consumption, for anything consumed must come out digested.
"Nothing is happening," says the reader, when reading the first hundred pages of Fellowship of the Ring.
"Nothing is happening," says the reader, when reading that weird stuff between lines of dialogue.
"I can't follow what's going on," says the reader, when narrative steps away from the plot for a paragraph.
But I feel like anything I say at this point is futile. The reader is a symptom of the disease not the cause. Literature has been infested by the consumer class and the managerial class, yes, but so has everything else. It's downstream from broader economic forces. Mercenary corporatism and their exponential growth mindsets. Algorithmic consumption. That sort of thing.
The state of literature can't be saved by us, though we can preserve the embers of a once burning flame. Otherwise, it's going to take a complete societal overhaul. Destruction of the data centers. The oligarchs put up against the wall and shot, perhaps, preferably by their own robots. Then we'll have our books back.
I think all serious readership is going to evolve into secret exchange of printed books, for what is merely online, is anathema to the qualitative process of reading. And in the future, the possession of books will be outlawed, like in Fahrenheit 451. Incidentally, rejecting the curriculum I was presented with at 15yo, I was given F451 to read. Many years later, my F451 teacher got syphilis, which is testament to his audacity and libido, and , I have to say, integrity and honesty. The head-down classes, guaranteeing a supply of patients to the chiropractors, who are gods in their own right, are going to whither into a stooped and calcitrant posture, unable to critique, unable to question, unable to reason. And we the few , the band of GenX brothers, with the highest cognitive potential, even in our 80s, will Rule with a menace and cruelty that is spoken of for centuries thence.
As for your last paragraph, be sure that if I am still alive, I shall gladly shoot in the back of the head the builders of the 'Data' Centres, and Gladly burn those centres down. Gladly eviscerate the writers and editors of The Atlantic, Gladly execute the revolting creatures of the New York review of Books, because they all turned literature, writing, reading , into a slurry of virtue signalling. Do let me know when you have them captive, and I shall travel at my own expense to torture them , without joy.
Join in. We can drop some MDMA while we get AI to read their own articles to them in the voice of Tiny Tim . Or read them Kerry Hulme’s “The Bone People” in the voice of John Cleese doing Basil Fawlty.
Most readers are fucking morons. Most writers are readers.
Most writers, even or especially those that write about moronic readers, are fucking morons, obviously. These truisms are not debunked by any of these articles.
P.S The writers that don't read are extra retarded.
Very much agree. The only reason to write is to write for oneself. Most people are very retarded. Why stoop to their level-- if you're an interesting person, the things you write for yourself will also be interesting.
Also, a single paragraph of this piece would cause the entirety of 'booktok' to drop stone cold dead. 🏆
(The word booktok feels so unpleasant in my mouth. The word 'romantasy' brings me to convulsions. I feel strongly about these things because I heavily advertised my first book on tiktok and therefore was directly exposed to all that poison)
Peak NP. However, I must add that all this applies not only to readers. See: the existence of the redditor. This is the age of pseudointellectualism and pseudoculture - what happens when the high is accessible to any and everyone for consumption, for anything consumed must come out digested.
"Nothing is happening," says the reader, when reading the first hundred pages of Fellowship of the Ring.
"Nothing is happening," says the reader, when reading that weird stuff between lines of dialogue.
"I can't follow what's going on," says the reader, when narrative steps away from the plot for a paragraph.
But I feel like anything I say at this point is futile. The reader is a symptom of the disease not the cause. Literature has been infested by the consumer class and the managerial class, yes, but so has everything else. It's downstream from broader economic forces. Mercenary corporatism and their exponential growth mindsets. Algorithmic consumption. That sort of thing.
The state of literature can't be saved by us, though we can preserve the embers of a once burning flame. Otherwise, it's going to take a complete societal overhaul. Destruction of the data centers. The oligarchs put up against the wall and shot, perhaps, preferably by their own robots. Then we'll have our books back.
I think all serious readership is going to evolve into secret exchange of printed books, for what is merely online, is anathema to the qualitative process of reading. And in the future, the possession of books will be outlawed, like in Fahrenheit 451. Incidentally, rejecting the curriculum I was presented with at 15yo, I was given F451 to read. Many years later, my F451 teacher got syphilis, which is testament to his audacity and libido, and , I have to say, integrity and honesty. The head-down classes, guaranteeing a supply of patients to the chiropractors, who are gods in their own right, are going to whither into a stooped and calcitrant posture, unable to critique, unable to question, unable to reason. And we the few , the band of GenX brothers, with the highest cognitive potential, even in our 80s, will Rule with a menace and cruelty that is spoken of for centuries thence.
As for your last paragraph, be sure that if I am still alive, I shall gladly shoot in the back of the head the builders of the 'Data' Centres, and Gladly burn those centres down. Gladly eviscerate the writers and editors of The Atlantic, Gladly execute the revolting creatures of the New York review of Books, because they all turned literature, writing, reading , into a slurry of virtue signalling. Do let me know when you have them captive, and I shall travel at my own expense to torture them , without joy.
How much to add joy to the torture? I'm on a budget but still looking to splurge
Join in. We can drop some MDMA while we get AI to read their own articles to them in the voice of Tiny Tim . Or read them Kerry Hulme’s “The Bone People” in the voice of John Cleese doing Basil Fawlty.
Most readers are fucking morons. Most writers are readers.
Most writers, even or especially those that write about moronic readers, are fucking morons, obviously. These truisms are not debunked by any of these articles.
P.S The writers that don't read are extra retarded.