Manifesto and Mystery

Yesterday I meant to talk about my first real attempt to start an art movement. I think that I may have gotten somewhere at Waterloo, but I'm starting to think that my hometown can be a much better place to start because I know more writers and artists here.

Basically, I'm working on a Manifesto, a Magic Naturalist Manifesto. I don't want to get to involved just yet, but I already talked to two friends. Let's call them Roger and Rowan. Roger is a painter I've known for awhile and when I showed him what I have done for the Manifesto he was very impressed. We then ran into Rowan, who's a retired actor and a sort of elder statesmen of the local poets, at least in my opinion. He didn't like the idea of a Manifesto as such, so I doubt he'll sign it. I appreciate that, since in the Beat Generation of my life, Rowan fills a posistion somewhat akin to William S. Burroughs, except without the drugs and the homo-sadism, which is a good thing.

I'm not going to get to much into Magic Naturalism, except that it is my first attempt at a form of Remodernist Literature. In the end it will probubly only apply to myself, but Roger is pretty interested in it and I think I may have set something off. I've been interested in writing a Manifesto ever since I read the Remodernist one, and if I ever get this into a legitimate movement with people in it besides me and Roger, I may try setting up a magazine. I may just end up editting a major magazine as "The Magic Naturalist Issue," which according to a podcast I liseaned to on starting your own poetry movement should have four really good poets or writers, which can (and will) include me, as well as commentary. The commentary may just be my copy of the Magic Naturalist Manifesto. But again, this is only being made as a pattern that I can follow. Remodernism, while a great idea, lakes the neccesary structure that I find neccesary, not that Magic Naturalism is structured, it's just a list of ideas about writing and art and things like that.

I am thinking about writing in the mystery genre, at least as a format, but I'm not sure I want to write murder mysteries. I have a few ideas for murder mysteries, but I'd like to try something more like Chesterton's "The Man Who Was Thursday," which isn't really a murder mystery, no one is murdered, but I would like to do something that is pretty heavy on the metaphysics. To do this I realize I need to read a lot of mysteries. I'm going to try and read as much Chesterton as I can. So far I've only read seven Chesterton stories, one book "The Club of Queer Trades," which was amusing and a Father Brown story called "The Resurrection of Father Brown." I think that Chesterton's prose can be a bit...Edwardian let's say, so I may just try reading other things. I still have two Rex Stout novels I need to read, and I do enjoy Rex Stout's writing style.

Concerning Billy Childish

I have never been this interested in an artist my father has not perviously heard off. This musical artist is one Billy Childish, who I discovered in my reaserch into Remodernism. He's one of the guys who wrote the Stuckist Manifestos, and has painted, written novels and poems, and plays really good garage rock style music. The next album I buy off of Itunes if going to be a Billy Childish album, and if I get two I'm throwing "Frank's Wild Years" in there. It's a Tom Waits album, probubly my favorite Tom Waits album. My dad has it on vinyl.

Anyways, to fix my Billy Chilldish fix I searched Youtube for videos of him in concert. In responce I have put up these two videos of Billy Childish, live in concert. He's British.

I Am Remodernist

Better make this quick, since there is going to be an outage at 2:00 AM in California. As many of my readers may know I am looking into the art movement Remodernism, which is in protest against conceptual art and spritually bankrupt postmodernism. As I am a writer, and most Remodernists are painters this causes some problems, but thankfully Remodernist is a do-it-yourself movement. I imagine that if I am writing something then it should have a plot and get an emotional reaction and have something interesting to say about humanity and the world it inhabits.
Anyways, awhile ago I wrote an email to the folks down at Stuckism International, which is the head-quarters of the first Remodernist movement. They're British. Anyways, They gave me a reply today about getting involved in their movement. This just has contacts I should make, with some guys called Jesse Todd Dockery and Bill Lewis, who I will contact as soon as I can. They're involved in Remodernist literature or at least interested in it. I'll be sending them emails as soon as I can. I might even send them copies of my work, or at least tell them if they're interested I'll send over a few short stories or poems. I really hope that this could liberate my voice as a writer, because if I am to be a truelly great writer then I'll need my own voice, something that people will read and say "Oh, they're is Dylan C.G. Thomas. This is a Dylan C.G. Thomas book." I want my last name to be an adjective. Also, it is about time Postmodernism was taken down and we put up another major theory for a few decades. Remodernism seems as good a movement as any. Also, one of it's major proponents, Billy Childish, has a few novels and poems out. I'll have to get them and see if there any good.
In other news I am slowly getting my outlines for my English exam statred. I have finished one, and worked a bit on two today although I only got any meaningful detail done on one, mostly because I would like to write that one so I can complain about David Antin, who I think is a smug bastard who dosen't know what it really means to be a real wordsmith. If Remodernist painting is against conceptual art, then Remodernist literature is against David Antin, and John Cage to, because that whole "Writing Through the Cantos," thing I had to attempt to read was just a trick and one I am not amused by. So Ezra Pound is odviously seen through his art. So what? Art should have ego in it and if your so obsessed with the elimination of the ego then don't get involved in art.

Well, that's about it. Have a nice day.

Going Home

I'm going home today. I'm going to come back two more times for school, maybe more for the Changeling LARP. They've finally called me about it, and I hope I can get in on it.

Well, what can I say about my first term. It had it's ups and downs, but I'm a bit worried about were it is going. Mom is talking about it like it's work, which I don't think University should be. I think University should be more fun, because I'm learning all kinds of new things. I'm not even sure that I should think much about work after reading Pieper. I think I'm going to keep my copy of "Leisure, the Basis of Culture," since I think it has some good points. My religion books and the Plato Dialouges I'm going to give to the Campus Used Bookstore. I'm also keeping all the English books I got. Which would be "The Green Man," by Kingsley Amis, "Anglo-Saxon Attitudes," by Angus Wilson, "The Rebel Angels," by Robertson Davies, "Maus, Vol 1" by Art Spiegelmen, and "The In-between World of Vikram Lall," by M.G. Vassanji, because my mother would like that one. One thing I can say about University, by the time I'm out of here I'll have a much more varied library.

Now of course, there is the issue of finding a job. I'm not going to completely bang that idea, because I don't have much experience with jobs and as such can't be called to make any large judgements on them, and it would give me something to do and money. I don't really have much drive to be a working man however. I want to be a writer and that is all. I'm also starting to wonder if being a career writer is a goal. That isn't to say that I don't want a career as a writer, but I also don't want to have a career as anything else. It's a bit confusing, I know. I've been reading alot of Remodernist Manifestos recently. Remodernism is a theory of art that is against conceptual art because of it's spiritual bankruptcy. I've been studying this and am trying to figure out if this applies to my work, or how I can become a Remodernist. I've never been involved in an actual art movement before, and I think Remodernism has some good ideas. The problem is it seems to be mostly made up of painters, so if anyone is going to figure out what Remodernist Literature looks like it's going to have to be me.