The Second Apocalypse

Other Titles => Light, Time, and Gravity => Topic started by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:36:23 pm

Title: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:36:23 pm
Quote from: Madness
Just letting everyone know that Bakker posted a selection of Light, Time, and Gravity[/u] (http://rsbakker.wordpress.com/2012/05/30/light-time-and-gravity/) at Three Pound Brain.

I cannot wait for this book. But then I seem to mesh with everything Bakker has written.

Cheers, Bakker. Can't wait to read more.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:36:35 pm
Quote from: Jorge
The excerpt posted is quite good. I mean, who knew reading about irrigation could be compelling? IRRIGATION!

It's interesting to note that according to Bakker the story is highly autobiographical, so "Dylan" largely stands in for the author himself.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:36:48 pm
Quote from: Madness
Lol, I think Bakker makes everything compelling. His perspective on experience is just so mint - slang round here for good or interesting or cool :) - and his writing skill is unparallelled.

Did you watch the recording of his reading of another LTG excerpt and a Q&A in the other thread?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:36:59 pm
Quote from: dharmakirti
Quote from: Madness
Lol, I think Bakker makes everything compelling. His perspective on experience is just so mint - slang round here for good or interesting or cool :) - and his writing skill is unparallelled.

Did you watch the recording of his reading of another LTG excerpt and a Q&A in the other thread?

I watched it.  I like the passage that he read.  I didn't much care for his reading, though (or his pacing around while reading).  If he's going to do more public readings, I think that is something that needs to be worked on. However, I was a competitive speech geek throughout school so I tend to be a bit critical of these things.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:37:14 pm
Quote from: Madness
I think he'd agree with you. I'm there for his words, not his voice ;). Oratory is another skill, neh?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:37:32 pm
Quote from: Jorge
He posted a second excerpt today. It's pretty sweet. It includes his short story "The Long Held Breath"  as part of the narrative.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:37:44 pm
Quote from: dharmakirti
Quote from: Madness
I just want to keep reading.

Part 3 has been posted.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:37:58 pm
Quote from: Jorge
keeps getting better

methinks he's gonna post the whole thing
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:38:09 pm
Quote from: Madness
I hate screens! Lol, I am not an e-reader. Otherwise, blowing my mind. IV is up. I actually love the idea of serial release :). Have much more to discuss. Later.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:39:05 pm
Quote from: Curethan
Read the through the second part so far - my smart phone holds the emails so I can read them at home between my small windows of internet access.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:39:15 pm
Quote from: lockesnow
isn't it pathetically easy to publish stuff on Amazon as a kindle book?  Why not publish it serially for $0.99 each, rather than giving it away for free.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:39:27 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
Well, he got paid a grant to write it already.

And in a way, it's like bombing another country, but only if they pay you for the bombs first...
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:39:41 pm
Quote from: Reek
Something about the tone of the piece that very much reminds me of Camus' "The Fall."

That somehow I am becoming an accomplice to the acts of the protagonist merely by the act of passively witnessing them. 

Definitely a lot to think about in these selections.  Very well done so far (up to part X).
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:39:58 pm
Quote from: Jorge
It reminds me of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest a bit.

Except backwards. Instead of finding sanity on the inside, Bakker finds insanity on the outside.

The whole thing is fantastic. I really do wish it could be physically published so I could hand out copies. I know more than a few scarf wearing fuckers who could use a dose of Dylan.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:40:08 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
Quote from: Reek
That somehow I am becoming an accomplice to the acts of the protagonist merely by the act of passively witnessing them.
I wonder if the reference to Dylan witnessing 'Re-Todd' beating to apparent death a homeless person ties into what you're saying?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:40:20 pm
Quote from: Madness
I would just remind everyone this isn't over. And that we are the unique experiences of something pretty novel - I mean, there can't have been many times in history that an author has released a book in serials, over the course of a number of weeks with an active commenting audience. Not to mention, the literary boundaries he's pushing writing a novel that explicitly references the cognitive experience of reading.

But hey, maybe he's just gonna fuck with us and he's got an alternate, print version ending coming!?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:40:34 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
I don't enjoy reading from a screen either.

Anyway, blown away. Yeah, taken by surprise in the end by the original Cutter foreshadowing - but who's handwriting was it on the manuscript? The 'it'?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:40:46 pm
Quote from: Murphy
I really liked it. Some things didn't go the way I expected at all. I really thought the editor's "forward" was going to turn out to be written by Dylan. Also I fell for Dylan's demonizing of Cutter, and took it all at face value until the penultimate section, so the ending worked well on a surprise level, when you realise the whole thing is about justifying the fact he killed a perfectly ordinary guy for no real reason.

And the last line goes to Scarface! Pop culture won.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:41:00 pm
Quote from: Madness
Welcome, Murphy. Good to see you that dose of Light, Time, and Gravity brought you here. I have a feeling LTG's little subforum is going to boom a little.

I always laugh when I read titles within books. Fucking Family Guy.

I've got a quick philosophy paper to write but I'm probably going to start rereading LTG again this aft as I have three days off from work and I intend on ignoring them for that long. So expect some posting from me - especially on Light, Time, and Gravity and Neuropath.

By the way, Murphy - a little food for thought - I can imagine an interpretation of this tale suggesting that Cutter doesn't exist, that he is nothing more than Dylan's It.

You know... I wonder if Bakker took the last two week absence from the blog - as LTG's been written so he has just been posting cuts - to polish up the TUC excerpt ;). Perhaps, we're still waiting for the left hook.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:42:37 pm
Quote from: Murphy
Hi! Thanks for having me.

"By the way, Murphy - a little food for thought - I can imagine an interpretation of this tale suggesting that Cutter doesn't exist, that he is nothing more than Dylan's It."

Ooh! That is even better.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:42:49 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
Well, I'm not sure the demonising was missplaced. It's probably an apt evaluation that Cutter is obnoxious.

Quote
I always laugh when I read titles within books. Fucking Family Guy.
What's that one? I don't think I've seen it?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:43:45 pm
Quote from: Murphy
But what is so bad about Cutter, once you take away Dylan's comments on him? This punk kid bangs his friend's wife. Even though for work reasons, he gets irritated by Jerry, in the end he's loyal to his friend and tells him. The punk kid takes a swing at him and Cutter beats the crap out of him (the only really harsh thing he does). Hardly lives up to all the machiavellian malice Dylan ascribes to him. The whole depiction of Cutter seems to be a way of setting him up as a deserving victim - Dylan's rewriting of history to suit his own purposes.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:43:57 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
What's so bad about Cutter when you keep the comments on him? Yeah, he got mowed down. That doesn't mean the charges are false and he's angelic. Nor does it mean he deserved mowing down somehow.

Quote
By the way, Murphy - a little food for thought - I can imagine an interpretation of this tale suggesting that Cutter doesn't exist, that he is nothing more than Dylan's It.
I was thinking about that and if I were to go that way I'd reverse it - Cutter is nothing more than Dylan's Human. And It kills him. That'd tie into the lack of a chimpanzee scream of rage or any such, as well.

One of the things I love is the sheer deviousness of the presentation. Who is Dylan talking to...it so looks like he's talking to the real life readers/real life academics. But the preface creates a world where collegues and fictional academics read this manuscript. So it's like a trap - the moment a real life academic argues with it (so as to dismiss it) - well, the whole things just fictional, ol' chap! So the RL academic is stuck with this argument in his craw. Or he has to take it seriously in order to argue, which removes the capacity for dismissal. Every time a RL academic thinks they can own the direct to reader passages - well, they aren't direct to reader and it's all like "Well buddy, what, are you gunna take this fiction seriously, or try and argue with a fictional character as he argues with other fictional characters, as if that's gunna dismiss this?". It sort of takes the bullshit 'these thoughts are just my performance' stuff and either leaves an argument lodged in someones throat, or they have to take it seriously and can't just fall onto a dismissal method. He scares me.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:44:09 pm
Quote from: Murphy
"What's so bad about Cutter when you keep the comments on him?"

Sure, fair enough. It's a question of why Dylan would choose to represent him in that way, though, surely?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:44:21 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
Well (for now treating the observations as facts/factual), it's "why did he present those particular facts?" 'choose to represent' seems kind of like it just refers to his opinion.

No doubt he focused on facts that help a particular view. But you don't get to choose your facts (you only get to choose which ones you fail to mention). Maybe Cutter helps raise funds for the poor and it's never mentioned. But if his obnoxiousness is a fact, then it exists even if this other fact remains unmentioned.

Or you can assert they are personal opinion/personal preferences expressed rather than facts, but that's another approach.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:44:30 pm
Quote from: Murphy
I'd be inclined to hestitate before calling Cutter's obnoxiousness a fact. Is anyone's obnoxiousness or lack of it a "fact"? Is it different for a character? Perhaps it is.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:44:41 pm
Quote from: sciborg2
So it ends with murder....interesting. Might have to go back, as somewhere in there I just gave up on this as some new form of hand wringing and whining.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:44:57 pm
Quote from: Madness
I feel like this commentary could quickly get divided between the two threads. Pertinent thoughts only:

Callan, there is episode of Family Guy where Peter says he gets super excited hearing actors say movie titles in the movies. So I always laugh whenever I encounter this in any entertainment medium now. It happens in LTG XIII, I believe. One of the best lines in the book too.

A lens to consider is psychopathy. This is a subject that arises again and again in Bakker's writings, as something central and antithetic to the human commons.

Cutter, by Dylan's narration throughout the book, seems like a textbook psychopath. The only issue with this is that no instance of action by Cutter actually validates that diagnosis in the book's entirety.

Also, as Murphy suggests, nothing except Dylan's narrative suggests that Cutter is anything but Joe Blow Dickhead from down the road.

The one thing that Dylan does pine for is Cutter's confidence. Dylan seems to wish to be as Cutter is, to act and speak as he does, despite rejecting this numerous times in the narrative.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:45:11 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
Quote from: sciborg2
...and whining.
and it never goes anywhere...

Heh, got that one in first!  :mrgreen:


Madness,
Quote
seems like a textbook psychopath. The only issue with this is that no instance of action by Cutter actually validates that diagnosis in the book's entirety.
Well, how does he seem like a textbook psychopath, and yet also it seems he conducts no actions to forfil that 'seems'? It's probably worth grappling with the idea we got primed. Why lay it all on Dylan - assuming Cutter did shit in the baggie, then Cutter did shit in the baggie? So Dylan reported that (fact) after priming the reader with the idea that Cutter is a psycho. How is this 'choosing a representation'? It's not - it's merely working the readers capacity to become primed, with accurate facts. The readers involved in any such 'seems' as well - a third party to this. Did Dylan rewrite history, or does being primed rewrite history? What are we primed to in regard to Dylan, now? What does that make of all the prior text/history, suddenly?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:46:42 pm
Quote from: sciborg2
Don't get me wrong, take out a good deal of the telling and you have a good novel in there. But even stuff like that one odd guy out they don't want quoting Scarface, that didn't the teleprompter commentary as far as I could see.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:47:08 pm
Quote from: Madness
Callan, listening - excuse the sensual metaphor - to Dylan describe Cutter's manipulations is like listening Achamian describe Kellhus'.

If you take Dylan's word for it all the narrative of Summer '84 would seem orchestrated entirely by Cutter - on nothing but a whim - simply because Cutter, from Dylan's perspective, is a force of nature, a thunderstorm, a hurricane. A rewrite ;).

As Jorge mentioned in the other thread, it was Cutter, right from Susan Fennel's damned prime, that reminded me of Adaption.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:47:25 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
Quote from: Madness
If you take...
I know, I'm just saying how can you blame him for what you (the reader) do? Indeed, he has that problem with Cutter. Don't necessarily make Dylan your own/the readers own Cutter.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:47:43 pm
Quote from: Madness
"From Dylan's perspective, the narrative of Summer '84 seems orchestrated entirely by Cutter."

Now what, Callan?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:47:53 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
I'd ask who's saying that, but more to the point, what does it change about the events described? You could say Dylan lays a tone upon his descriptions, trying to lean them toward his prefered conclusion. But in the end, perhaps even pitifully (as in, he just can't bring himself to lie, not even to dress up his case) he speaks accurately - Cutter did shit in the baggie. Cutter is obnoxious and unpleasant. The question is, did these seem the attributes of a villain at the start of the text? Why so? And if not, then all we have is Dylan's pathetic attempt to lean facts, but otherwise perhaps a quite accurate anthropological evaluation of the social scenario.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:48:10 pm
Quote from: Murphy
I suppose, though, we're even faced with the question of whether or not that was, in fact, Cutter that he hit. "A dusty figure at the side of the road, shadowy for the brilliance of the sun, stark for the blocks of vegetation and bands of linear dust, coming nearer, thumb held out, trying to peer through the white windshield glare…" Doesn't sound like a slamdunk identification, especially when followed by "Forgetting to check the papers afterward." In other words, no written confirmation of Cutter's death. Or even that if he hit someone, they definitely died. Maybe, maybe not. I don't see anything definitive so far. (It's only an implication, after all, that Dylan even kills himself at the end - we only have the editor telling us that he's gone missing to go on.)
If he did kill Cutter, then one way of looking at it might be that he kills the guy who told the truth. He did fuck Harley and Cutter told Jerry.

One way of extending that further would be to say that Dylan, who has learned nothing from blabbing to Cutter in the first place, then tells us the truth (as he thinks it is) so there's a symmetry if he kills himself.

I'm also intrigued by how little he says about his second ex-wife. Perhaps she's a candidate for the mystery hand-writing on the manuscript?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:48:23 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
Well, it's a bit hard to write down that you've definately killed yourself! Okay, just being cheeky!

I'd wondered if it was Cutter. Really to me it seems like you can travel down various avenues - I'd prefer to go with a straight Cutter run down. But if someone else goes for an innocent bystander run down, I wouldn't try to argue them out of it. It's interesting to see the avenue someone else went down. Heck, sometimes someones avenue is so compelling on hearing it, you wanna switch avenues! Anyway, to me Dylan wanted to run down Cutter - if it was someone else, it kind of doesn't matter. That's why I stick with the straight Cutter run down, cause that's what he wanted. BUT, did he want him to die - if he didn't check the papers? He does seem to become schismed latter, both shuddering (in mortal horror) yet not connected to his shuddering and laughing at it. So it might be better to talk about the motives of two Dylans.

On another subject, what's up with Missy? Was that just a straight up female empowerment role (with just a bit of 'but she starts falling for a dofus when he shows a bare minimum of kindness' cautionary tale)? I really like her "When you sign my fucking checks!" line, cause it wraps so much of the complex issue of demurement of personal will for money, forcefully showing it's not demurement for any old fucker. She even goes to quit instead of taking shit. Anyone else think Missy is cool? :)
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:48:37 pm
Quote from: Armitage
Apropos of nothing, I just read a university job posting in which the search committee chair is named Dylan Wiersma.

I would be terrified to interview with that guy.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:48:48 pm
Quote from: Madness
That is awesome...
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: What Came Before on April 19, 2013, 01:49:08 pm
Quote from: Callan S.
So looking back, was it bad of me to think of Dylan with that guys wife having some future? I know it's sad that his romantic attribtue was to actually have read books. But still?
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: Aural on May 15, 2014, 04:28:41 pm
Quote
What is the meaning of a deluded life?

I ask this question the first day of all my undergraduate classes, as a segue to discussing the ‘Purpose of Literature.’

Someone in the class always laughs–or at the very least smiles. Perhaps they’ve confused ‘delusion’ for the passing of gas.

So, I liked the title and thought this one might have less semen/fart/urine/anus jokes, but no, he opens with one... It's like he didn't learn anything from his DotD failure.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: Wilshire on May 19, 2014, 05:12:59 pm
I think he just writes what he likes. Sure everyone wants to make money and be successful, but some aren't willing to conform to outside pressures and just do what everyone wants.

Which is basically just saying: he likes to make fart jokes *shrug*.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: Madness on May 19, 2014, 08:27:54 pm
I don't think DOTD was a failure. And I actually think it important to include the "human" elements in fiction. Not only does the mundane provide a good contrast to the epic, but it can't be movies all the time.

I fart.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: Aural on May 19, 2014, 08:56:44 pm
I don't think DOTD was a failure. And I actually think it important to include the "human" elements in fiction. Not only does the mundane provide a good contrast to the epic, but it can't be movies all the time.

I fart.

I meant that DOTD is failure in terms of sales. Also,  filling every story you write with gratuitous fart and semon jokes that are not even funny (like the one above) is really not necessary, in fact it lessens his works. And as someone who likes Bakker and wishes him all the success that he deserves it's kind of sad to see him keep repeating the same mistakes over and over.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: Wilshire on May 19, 2014, 10:54:20 pm
"Mistake", "funny", "failure" are all relative. Perhaps he has accomplished exactly what he wants with each word he has written. Maybe sales just aren't as important to the writer as telling what, in his opinion, are hilarious jokes.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: Aural on May 19, 2014, 11:40:31 pm
Yeah, you're right humor is subjective. But there is no doubt that the book is at the very least a commercial failure, and the idea that sales aren't important to Bakker seems unlikely. But forget it, sorry for derailing the thread. I actually look forward to this title and will definitely buy it if it's released.
Title: Re: Light, Time, and Gravity Excerpt
Post by: Wilshire on May 20, 2014, 01:05:19 am
Haha its fine, derail away. He must care about sales to some degree since I've heard him mention it in several different interviews/appearances.