The Paris Review Interviews

Deparei-me com isto na Waterstone's da minha terrinha inglesa cujo nome não vos vou dizer porque tenho medo de aparecer com uma mama de fora na capa do Sun. É uma vergonha eu, aos 25 anos (idade fictícia desta feita por causa do Daily Mail) nunca ter ouvido falar da Paris Review. Neste momento estou a ser violentamente castigado no meu quarto longe de qualquer CCTV. A parede está cheia de sangue das vergastadas que a minha colega da Jordânia me está a dar (ela não é da Jordânia - é só ser mais sensacionalista). Como é que é possível eu nunca ter ouvido falar disto? Como é que nunca ninguém me disse que isto existia? Como é que ninguém me avisou do quão maravilha é o site da Paris Review? O bom é que ainda faltam mais dois volumes.

Estas duas maravilhosas edições contam com entrevistas a: Dorothy Parker (1956); Truman Capote (1957); Ernest Hemingway (1958); T. S. Eliot (1959); Saul Bellow (1966); Jorge Luis Borges (1967); Kurt Vonnegut (1977); James M. Cain (1978); Rebecca West (1981); Elizabeth Bishop (1981); Robert Stone (1985); Robert Gottlieb (1994); Richard Price (1996); Billy Wilder (1996); Jack Gilbert (2005); Joan Didion (2006). Vol. 2: Graham Greene (1953); James Thurber (1955); William Faulkner (1956); Robert Lowell (1961); Isaac B. Singer (1968); Eudora Welty (1972); John Gardner (1979); aquele colombiano manhoso cujo nome me recuso a pronunciar mas que toda a gente sabe a quem me refiro* (1981); Phillip Larkin (1982); James Baldwin (1984); William Gaddis (1987); Harold Bloom (1991); Toni Morrison (1993); Alice Munro (1994); Peter Carey (2006); Stephen King (2006).

*Agora que me lembrei deste ser quase que tive sentimentos positivos para com os Vampire Weekend.

The Paris Review Interviews vol. 2

The Paris Review Interviews vol. 1

saussure

Tudo aponta para quem em Setembro deste ano o meu bigode esteja do mesmo tamanho do que o do Saussure.

uneventful

"Saussure is a fascinating and enigmatic figure because he lived in such an uneventful life... At the age of fifteen, after he had learned Greek to add to his French, German, English, and Latin, Saussure tried to work out a 'general system of language' and wrote for Pictet and 'Essay on Languages' in which he argued that all languages have their root in a system of two or three basic consonants. Though Pictet must have smiled at the extreme reductionism of this youthful attempt, he did not discourage his protégé, who began to study Sanskrit while still at school".

Jonathan Culler, Saussure, Fontana Paperbacks, 1979.

Apenas alguns pequenos pontos sobre o que está escrito em cima. Em primeiro, o disparate que parece ser descrever como uneventful a vida de um tipo que durante a tão absorvente fase da descoberta da estimulação anatómica localizada sabia já Grego, Francês, Alemão, Inglês e Latim. Em segundo lugar, o facto do gajo com 15 anos ter tido a nada megalómana ideia de escrever um tratado sobre todas as línguas do mundo. Não que mal viesse ao mundo do facto do jovem Fernando achar que todas as línguas do mundo partilham estruturas comuns. Não. O jovem Fernando, não satisfeito, decidiu escrever um ensaio sobre isso e ainda o enviou a um famoso filólogo. Para terminar, o tipo, ainda antes da Universidade, começou a aprender Sânscrito. Sânscrito! Eu perco a fé toda depois de ler coisas como estas. Tanto na humanidade como em mim. Mais em mim talvez dado que a humanidade não tem interesse nenhum nestas coisas, como nos avisa o nosso presciente presidente da república que, com 5 anos, no poço de boliqueime tentou também especular sobre uma teoria linguística que unificasse os dialectos de olhão a vila do bispo, sem qualquer sucesso.

25 de Abril

Há algo no 25 de Abril que me deixa deslumbrado. Não me interessa o antes nem o depois. Não quero saber o que o antecedeu, o que lhe sucedeu. Não me interessa qual foi a causa, quais foram as causas, quem o fez quem não o fez ou porque o fez. O que me deslumbra são as pessoas. As imagens de tanta gente na rua. Houve ali, por certo, um momento único, aquele momento único que apenas existe nas revoluções. Houve ali um momento em que toda a gente caminhava sem rumo mas crente que na direcção certa. Ninguém sabia porquê, ninguém sabia o que ia acontecer, ninguém tinha controlo. Era o domínio da ausência. Ninguém era um, eram todos tudo e todos todos. Por um momento que seja, não mensurável no nosso tempo normal - não revolucionário - cada um foi todos e todos foram um. Todas as possibilidades abertas, tudo por definir. E isso, esse momento, esse momento assustadoramente profundo em termos da sua capacidade articuladora tanto do passado, como do presente como futuro, é algo único e que duvido que volte a acontecer.

"B" Movie

Barack V Clinton V McCain

Well, the first thing I want to say is…”Mandate my ass!”

Because it seems as though we've been convinced that 26% of the registered voters, not even 26% of the American people, but 26% of the registered voters form a mandate – or a landslide. 21% voted for Skippy and 3, 4% voted for somebody else who might have been running.

But, oh yeah, I remember. In this year that we have now declared the year from Shogun to Reagan, I remember what I said about Reagan…meant it. Acted like an actor…Hollyweird. Acted like a liberal. Acted like General Franco when he acted like governor of California, then he acted like a republican. Then he acted like somebody was going to vote for him for president. And now we act like 26% of the registered voters is actually a mandate. We're all actors in this I suppose.

What has happened is that in the last 20 years, America has changed from a producer to a consumer. And all consumers know that when the producer names the tune…the consumer has got to dance. That's the way it is. We used to be a producer – very inflexible at that, and now we are consumers and, finding it difficult to understand. Natural resources and minerals will change your world. The Arabs used to be in the 3rd World. They have bought the 2nd World and put a firm down payment on the 1st one. Controlling your resources we'll control your world. This country has been surprised by the way the world looks now. They don't know if they want to be Matt Dillon or Bob Dylan. They don't know if they want to be diplomats or continue the same policy - of nuclear nightmare diplomacy. John Foster Dulles ain't nothing but the name of an airport now.

The idea concerns the fact that this country wants nostalgia. They want to go back as far as they can – even if it's only as far as last week. Not to face now or tomorrow, but to face backwards. And yesterday was the day of our cinema heroes riding to the rescue at the last possible moment. The day of the man in the white hat or the man on the white horse - or the man who always came to save America at the last moment – someone always came to save America at the last moment – especially in “B” movies. And when America found itself having a hard time facing the future, they looked for people like John Wayne. But since John Wayne was no longer available, they settled for Ronald Reagan – and it has placed us in a situation that we can only look at – like a “B” movie.

Come with us back to those inglorious days when heroes weren't zeros. Before fair was square. When the cavalry came straight away and all-American men were like Hemingway to the days of the wondrous “B” movie. The producer underwritten by all the millionaires necessary will be Casper “The Defensive” Weinberger – no more animated choice is available. The director will be Attila the Haig, running around frantically declaring himself in control and in charge. The ultimate realization of the inmates taking over at the asylum. The screenplay will be adapted from the book called “Voodoo Economics” by George “Papa Doc” Bush. Music by the “Village People” the very military "Macho Man."

A theme song for saber-rallying and selling wars door-to-door. Remember, we're looking for the closest thing we can find to John Wayne. Clichés abound like kangaroos – courtesy of some spaced out Marlin Perkins, a Reagan contemporary. Clichés like, “itchy trigger finger” and “tall in the saddle” and “riding off or on into the sunset.” Clichés like, “Get off of my planet by sundown!” More so than clichés like, “he died with his boots on.” Marine tough the man is. Bogart tough the man is. Cagney tough the man is. Hollywood tough the man is. Cheap stick tough. And Bonzo's substantial. The ultimate in synthetic selling: A Madison Avenue masterpiece – a miracle – a cotton-candy politician…Presto! Macho!

“Macho, macho man!”

Put your orders in America. And quick as Kodak your leaders duplicate with the accent being on the nukes - cause all of a sudden we have fallen prey to selective amnesia - remembering what we want to remember and forgetting what we choose to forget. All of a sudden, the man who called for a blood bath on our college campuses is supposed to be Dudley “God-damn” Do-Right?

“You go give them liberals hell Ronnie.” That was the mandate. To the new “Captain Bly” on the new ship of fools. It was doubtlessly based on his chameleon performance of the past - as a liberal democrat – as the head of the Studio Actor's Guild. When other celluloid saviors were cringing in terror from McCarthy – Ron stood tall. It goes all the way back from Hollywood to hillbilly. From liberal to libelous, from “Bonzo” to Birch idol…born again. Civil rights, women's rights, gay rights…it's all wrong. Call in the cavalry to disrupt this perception of freedom gone wild. God damn it…first one wants freedom, then the whole damn world wants freedom.

Nostalgia, that's what we want…the good ol' days…when we gave'em hell. When the buck stopped somewhere and you could still buy something with it. To a time when movies were in black and white – and so was everything else. Even if we go back to the campaign trail, before six-gun Ron shot off his face and developed hoof-in-mouth. Before the free press went down before full-court press. And were reluctant to review the menu because they knew the only thing available was – Crow.

Lon Chaney, our man of a thousand faces - no match for Ron. Doug Henning does the make-up - special effects from Grecian Formula 16 and Crazy Glue. Transportation furnished by the David Rockefeller of Remote Control Company. Their slogan is, “Why wait for 1984? You can panic now...and avoid the rush.”

So much for the good news…

As Wall Street goes, so goes the nation. And here's a look at the closing numbers – racism's up, human rights are down, peace is shaky, war items are hot - the House claims all ties. Jobs are down, money is scarce – and common sense is at an all-time low on heavy trading. Movies were looking better than ever and now no one is looking because, we're starring in a “B” movie. And we would rather had John Wayne…we would rather had John Wayne.

"You don't need to be in no hurry.

You ain't never really got to worry.

And you don't need to check on how you feel.

Just keep repeating that none of this is real.

And if you're sensing, that something's wrong,

Well just remember, that it won't be too long

Before the director cuts the scene…yea."

“This ain't really your life,

Ain't really your life,

Ain't really ain't nothing but a movie.”

Coubert

Appropriately enough, the picture had an active, if secret, life. It was originally painted for Kalil-Bey, Ottoman ambassador to Paris in the 1860s. The ambassador had tried to buy Courbet's Venus and Psyche of 1863, yet another controversial piece because of its lesbian undertones. This had already been sold (and has subsequently disappeared from view). Courbet offered to paint a sequel to it, Le Sommeil (before and after the love act), and then threw in the Origine as an extra. It adorned the ambassador's palatial bathroom, hidden behind a green baize curtain. Kalil-Bey was eventually forced to sell his substantial collection to meet his more than substantial debts.

In the following decades the painting was presumably viewed furtively; then in 1913 it traveled to Budapest, to be housed once more in an opulent bathroom, that of Baron Ferenc Hatvany. It was now in a specially designed frame, which meant that when not being enjoyed the Origine could be shielded under a harmless Courbet winter landscape. At the time of World War II, when the city was threatened by advancing Russian forces, the picture was placed in a bank vault, only to be looted by the invaders. It was subsequently restored to its owner and eventually passed into the hands of the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan, who kept it in his study masked by a quasi-abstract painting by his friend André Masson of the same subject, but veiled and opaque.

Depois não me digam que não há aí uma força qualquer superior a nós todos que regula o funcionamento do universo. Chamem-lhe deus, o espírito santo, a providência, jack bauer. Há algo. Ou então alguém me explique duas coisas sobre este maravilhoso quadro: a primeira é como é que um tipo chamado Thierry Savatier escreveu um livro (que vai na terceira edição) apenas e só sobre este quadro; a segunda, é como é que este quadro, depois de todas as voltas que deu, foi parar às mãos do rebarbado do Lacan. Na verdade eu nunca li Lacan, mas já li (e vi) Zizek, o seu mais famoso apóstolo, e o gajo passa horas a falar de sexo, e de drives, e do subconsciente e de sexo outra vez. Todos os filmes do David Lynch se resumem a sexo, repressão e drives subsconscientes . Os do Hitchcok também. E este quadro vai parar às mãos do Lacan. Alguém que se informe e que me diga. Cordialmente vosso.

Girl You Need a Change of Mind

Aqui (é favor verter lágrimas de tão magnificamente boa que a canção é. Eu estou a sangrar do nariz à vigésima quarta audição consecutiva. Se não sangrarem do nariz à vigésima quarta audição consecutiva é porque não gostaram. Até porque ninguém espera pela vigésima quarta audição consecutiva se não gostar só para ver se vai estar a sangrar do nariz. Embora eu seja um génio da filosofia da ciência nem o parvalhão do Hempel podia considerar isto um método científico. Bem, isto podia decorrer durante dias).