The open air library is once again open!

The Open Air Library on the highest mountain of Buyukada is once again open. Kerem aka Argos Libertos managed to open it again after the police forced him to shut it down last year but they were no match to his persistance. Kerem cured well from his jump from 3 high in the centre of Istanbul and could walk well again after being operated, first half year with help of a stick. His library has now signed works of dutch poets Arjen Duinker, Tonnus Oosterhoff, K.Schippers and Alfred Schaffer who by means of Bart van der Pligt were kind enough to donate books. When you’re in Istanbul you should surely stop by and please bring a book or two!

De Ex Libris works of Serik Kulmeshkenov

The Kazakhstan born graphic artist Serik Kulmeshkenov is one of the few artists that keeps the ex Libris craft alive, a special genre within the arts. Ex Libris are special book seals people use to personify their person book collection. The works of Serik Kulmeshkenov are excellent examples of why this craft should never disappear:

Ex libris Natalya Chebotar / size 90mm x 90mm, 2005.

Ex libris Sergey and Irina Khrapov / size 80mm x 105mm, 2008

Ex libris Paul Elliott / size 65mm x 82mm, 2008.

These and many more magnificent Ex libris works you can view at the website of Serik Kulmeshkenov. Every serious book collector should have such an emblem, in my opinion.

An open letter to the Bush administration: Poetry as a hidden tool for Terrorists

Dear members of the Bush administration,

Yesterday I read an article about the possibility that terrorists could use games like ‘World of Warcraft’ to communicate with each other and spread hidden messages about plans and attacks. This theory was vented by one Dr. Dwight Toavs of the ‘Defense University’ on a conference in Washington Tuesday. I was in shock after I read the article. It suddenly dawned upon me that Dr. Dwight Toavs was not only absolutely right: but that this was just the tip of the iceberg, and that, far-fetched as his theory seems, he has overlooked the most obvious communication avenue for terrorists: poetry.

As you might know a ‘poem’ is a piece of coded text in which the writers uses so-called ‘metaphors’ to hide the real message of the poem. That already makes it a very useful medium for terrorists, as they, using poetry, can conceal their true message by pretending the text is about something else. A terrorist might write a line like ‘Oh wavering flowers of the city, where it that the bees could honk and loom’ and what he would be really saying to his fellow jihadists is ‘Guys, go take a cap and bomb those buildings flat’.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Arabic poetry has seen a suspicious rise in recent years. But please, let’s not forget that these terrorists could use any sort of poetry to communicate their message: what about avant-garde, Flarf, language poetry? They are all suspect. Dr. Dwight Toavs is right and wrong: writing poetry is dirt cheap while playing WOW costs 14 bucks a month, let’s not forget that’s a months salary in Afghanistan! So we can safely conclude that poetry is the tool par excellence for terrorists to communicate their hidden messages.

And it doesn’t stop with contemporary poetry, oh no. Who says these terrorists aren’t secretly reading Shakespeare to each other in those caves in Tora Bora? What did the Lithuanian poet Henrikas Nagys really mean when he wrote ‘I was awakened by the whistling sound of pigeons wings and the flood of sunshine rising in my eyes’? Is there really any end to the vile possibilities of misuse one can imagine such tools to have? Clearly, any society that is serious about combatting terrorism must do something about poetry.

What can we do? It’s clear that we have to scan the entire literary opus of humanity for hidden terrorist messages. But only experts can do that: a regular CIA trainee will have no idea what these poems mean. Therefore I must propose that the US government employs all currently known poets, domestic or foreign, to scan contemporary and past poetry for messages that seem, well, suspect. It’s a gigantic operation but it’s for the sake of World Security. While Dr. Dwight Toavs from the ‘Defense University’ has a minor point I would want to suggest he stops wasting tax payers money playing World of Warcraft and instead focus on the real dangers, the world of poetry.

Paradise

From Kafka in �Parables and Paradoxes�:

Since the Fall we have been essentially equal in our capacity to recognize good and evil; nonetheless it is just here that we seek to show our individual superiority. But the real differences begin beyond that knowledge. The opposite illusion may be explained thus: nobody can be content with the mere knowledge of good and evil in itself, but must endeavor as well to act in accordance with it. The strength to do so, however, is not likewise given him, consequently he must destroy himself trying to do so, at the risk of not achieving the necessary strength even then; yet there remains nothing for him but this final attempt. (That is moreover the meaning of the threat of death attached to eating the Tree of Knowledge; perhaps too it was the original meaning of natural death.) Now, faced with this attempt, man is filled with fear; he prefers to annul his knowledge of good and evil (the term, �the fall of man,��may be traced back to that fear); yet the accomplished cannot be annulled, but only confused. It was for this purpose that our rationalizations were created. The whole world is full of them, indeed the whole visible world is perhaps nothing more than the rationalization of a man who wants to find peace for a moment. An attempt to falsify the actuality of knowledge, to regard knowledge as a goal still to be reached.

Freestyling

The setup of this log allows me to post to it anywhere I go from my blackberry. At the moment I am sitting next to the seaside typing this. I can wander through istanbul and any moment I have an interesting idea just share it with the world. That’s principally what logging should be about – direct interaction with everything.Of course this means more typos and such will creep in – typing fast on a blackberry won’t produce perfect texts but the grammar fetishists will probably better look elsewhere anyway.

Journalism is a disease

I hate journalists. The journalist, by default, sees you as an article. He doesn’t listen to what you say, doesn’t read what you write. Words, to him, are news items. He never reads anything, he scans, scans your words like a hunting dog would, looking for an exhausted rabbit. And when he finds the exhausted rabbit, usually an imaginary one, he parades it in front of an imaginary crowd as some sort of hunting trophy. The imaginary crowd cheers as the old dog carries the half-dead, imaginary rabbit to his doghouse, the newspaper.

You might think I write this because I got negative reviews. I didn’t. My book was launched last month and got about 7 reviews, 5 from people one would call ‘common readers’ and 2 from journalists. All reviews were positive. However, what really struck me as relevant: even though the reviews were ‘positive’ the reviews that were laundered with observation failures were never the reviews of the common readers, but rather those of the journalists. A ridiculous statement is a ridiculous statement, no matter if the statement is ‘positive’. It’s a really mind boggling phenomenon: I am supposed to be ‘happy’ with a bunch of terribly incorrect statements because the review as a whole would be ‘positive’. I’d much rather read a negative review with correct statements than a positive review with incorrect statements. Does that make me weird? Am I the last of the Mohicans?

Journalism is a disease. It’s a relatively new phenomenon, hardly a hundred years old. The basic operative: propaganda. It’s hardly possibly to comprehend the modern day world without becoming an expert in propaganda techniques. Most people do not understand this. They don’t understand that there is a ‘Guantanamo Bay’ because these people want there to be a ‘Guantanamo Bay’. They want us to have a certain image of them. Guantanamo bay is the exhausted, imaginary rabbit they parade in front of us because someone, somewhere, thinks it will be to their advantage if the world is terrified.

Propaganda, by definition, is a lie. It’s the smiling facade, the fake smirk on the face of the Eurovision singer who wants to look happy when he’s deadly nervous. Propaganda is a mask. It doesn’t matter what the mask says – it can be a happy mask, a terrifying mask, it makes no difference. It’s an attempt to manipulate impressions. The journalist creates masks out of words. It’s the mask-crafting guild of terror, preying upon our world.

I don’t care what sort of mask anyone would put upon my book. What an incredible insult to suppose one should be happy to see ones work wear some idiotic, smiling mask meant to lure some imaginative audience. I was very happy with the reviews of common readers. Their reviews might not be ‘professional’ but they were at least reviews. Real people reading a real book. That is, in these sort of times, something to be really thankful for.

The inclusion of female poets in canons

There’s a discussion going on the Guardian site about the inclusion of female poets in the English canon, ignited by Frances Leviston, a member of good standing of the illustrious ‘Poetburo’ I’ve founded together with James Sheard. Of course my vows to the Poetburo compel me to come to Levistons defense. It’s the urgency of defending a comrade rather outweighing the painful male chauvinist tendency to be the rescuing knight, in this case, and I’m slightly disappointed that I’m the only member of the Poetburo so far that seems to have taken his vows seriously. Anyway, here’s the testament of my defense:

I think the whole discussion is somewhat silly, because it evades the essential point: that canons are on itself male forms of ordering reality. They are attempts at monopolizing literature – tribal manifestations based on the good old Ape Rock: the whole idea that anything should or shouldn’t be included there reinforces the whole idea rather than disband it. What person in his right state of mind would care about which monkey sits where; other than a few big publishers there’s really no one that’s being served by the monopolization of literature. One has to wonder why it’s always English Literature that seems keen on presenting itself this way: I hardly ever see any attempts of ‘forming canons’ in other language areas, including my own (Dutch). No one seems to bother, really. So what is it about English Literature that evokes this incredible urge to form ‘a canon’? I think that question is more relevant than any other one I’ve read so far.

The discussion can be read here

Evidence of my insanity, smalltalk only

I have dreams and visions. Sometimes I hear weird voices. I don’t necessarily believe in anything I hear or witness. I regard myself as a scientist regards a piece of measuring equipment. The bottom line is: I ‘experienced’ something. I severely trained myself not to attach any conclusions or beliefs to any such ‘experience’. Let me give you some examples.

A visionary dream: I had a dream when my wife was just pregnant last year where I met this cute little girl near the sea. She took my hand, took me to the sea and washed my feet with the seawater. I looked at the sea and it was alive and vibrant with hundreds of colored, magical spirals. After she washed my feet the little girl disappeared into the sea. Suddenly I was in outer space, drifting between the planets. Very pleasant feeling.

This dream obviously meant that it was gonna be a girl, so I did actually believe that and it did come true.

Example of a vision: if you want to have ‘visions’ theres a technique you can use. it’s all about quieting the brain and bring it into a state of sleep without actually losing consciousness. There’s a certain ‘area’ where the consciousness must be focussed to produce the visions. It’s like some sort of inner antenna, which just functions when you know how to focus your awareness on it.

One shouldn’t attach any definite meanings to such visions. They can sometimes be rather overwhelming. The main trick is simply to stop the mind. This is in fact an extremely hard thing to do. I still struggle with it every day.

A few months ago I had a vision where I was watching some deer graze in a forest, like white deer. It was an incredible peaceful scenery, but as soon as I began to be aware *that* i was watching I lost it again.

Another example: the seagulls here, I hear them talking in my dreams. Sometimes I wake up and they are still talking, in dutch. But that soon disappears, like some sort of after effect. One time I ’sensed’ that they are actually watching into my dreams and commenting on them. I was dreaming about something and the seagull on the roof was giving comments about my dream, I heard his voice loud and clear. Seagulls are weird creatures. I dunno if I like them a whole lot. They seem to have no sense of privacy, that’s for sure.

Last example: it happened to me a few times this year that in the morning I hear a soft voice that says something like ‘This is the time’ and then exactly after that voice spoke my alarm goes off. Quite absurd. I hear that voice quite clearly. There’s something weird about the whole thing, because it’s so exact. I could accept an ‘inner clock voice’ theory but this really has atomic precision. It’s like some sort of doppler effect of reality.

Het meisje dat te veel van lucifers hield

Toen ik deze korte roman uit had – ik heb elk woord wel twee keer gelezen -, zat ik verdwaasd op de bank en herlas de laatste zin met daarin de prachtige vergelijking over de witte ganzen die soms al vroeg in het seizoen vertrekken. Ze laten ons het ergste vrezen voor de lange winter die ons wacht. Zo gaat dat ook met gedachten aan geliefden die we koesteren, de hoop dat het mogelijk moet zijn ooit gelukkig in je eigen kleine beschermde wereld te mogen en kunnen leven.

Een bizarre melancholie grijpt je naar de keel, wanneer je gewend bent geraakt aan die absurde mengeling van het gedachtengoed van Spinoza, Saint-Simon en middeleeuwse ridderromans. Een gedachtengoed dat een jonge vrouw (of is het een man?) bijeensprokkelt om haar (zijn)leven houvast te bieden, nadat haar (zijn) vader zich op een ochtend, banaal als alle andere, heeft opgehangen. Meer verklappen over het plot van dit fascinerend werk van Gaétan Soucy `La petite fille qui aimait trop les allumettes’ dat kunnen Hollandse recensenten veel beter. Dat zijn dé nawouwelaars bij uitstek.

De achterlijkheid van religies gaat in dit verhaal van nog geen honderdvijftig pagina’s hand in hand met een diepe behoefte aan zingeving, aan liefde en oriëntatie in het leven. Rondom ons treffen we slechts een woestenij aan. Een woestenij, jà, maar wel een waar we van houden, omdat we geen andere kennen. Onze naasten springen er echter op een ongehoord barbaarse manier mee om. Ze offeren onschuldige lammeren voor hun eigen platte behoeften en wij zijn veroordeeld daarbij dadeloos toe te zien. Dadeloos? Diep van binnen janken we ons wezenloos, maar we nemen het tambourijn ter hand en dansen mee rond de brandstapel. Overal waar de dood zich breed maakt, daar wordt een god geboren, even bruut, medogenloos en overschillig als zijn voorgangers.

Soucy is een van de weinige schrijvers uit Québec die het gered heeft zonder ten onder te gaan aan het predikaat streekschrijver. `La petite fille qui aimait trop les allumettes’ is een prachtig, adembenemend boek, een speurtocht naar de ziel en door de taal. Soms dacht ik dat het Québequois, het Joual – letterlijk: paardefrans – niet goed begreep. Een paar pagina’s verderop bleek echter dat dat wat ik niet begreep uitgelegd werd. Een krakkemikkige uitleg, zoals te verwachten viel van mensen die woorden niet rationeel hanteren, maar intuïtief, als een onvolmaakt instrument om te duiden waar het in dit leven om draait. Voortdurend klinkt in de zinnen de grote achting door voor dit instrument. Dat maakt het verhaal in meerdere passages tot een vreemdsoortige liturgische tekst. En dat staat dan weer in schril contrast met de horrorwereld waarin je stapje voor stapje, met vallen en opstaan, wordt binnengeleid.

Er waren momenten dat ik dacht dit moeten jongeren lezen die zich identificeren met de gothic-stromingen, de black metal van Ulver of Sigur Ross. Het verhaal heeft zelfs lichte Buffy the vampire slayer-elementen. Maar er is niets `kemp’ aan dit boek. Het is van begin tot het einde doortrokken van een diepe, treurige ernst die als reuma in je botten kruipt. Tranen van levenspijn zijn me in de ogen gesprongen.

Houlala, c’est heavy par bout, zoals Gabriele, een Canadese lezer verzuchtte.

Jo Willems, Cultuurpaleis, 2008

A little love speech

I love animals. I even love insects nowadays. Insects are great. They’re better friends than most humans. I love wild animals. I love people who behave like wild animals. I don’t like domesticated people. I love new clothes. New clothes make me feel like a new person. I love sweat. Sweat is the language of the skin. I love fire. I love to see things burn. I love people with a smirk around their lips. I love girls with worn out nail polish. I love passports. Passports are works of art. I think everyone should have at least five passports. I love that pickles don’t grow in the sea. I love people with lights in their eyes. I love storms. I love girls that kick me when they disagree. I love to play with eyebrows. I love old money. I love the smell of money, old or new. I love disasters and I hate bureaucracy. I love people who answer letters. I love people who write letters instead of books. I love tension, difference, contrast. I love Hungarians. I love Istanbul. I love the difference between Hungary and Istanbul. I love views. Everyone should have a view instead of an opinion.

A little hate speech

I hate people who complain that the music in their teenage years was so much better than music is now. I hate people who still listen to the same things they were listening to as teenagers. They are braindead. Only a braindead person would never develop his taste. Once people start to need such musical or artistic tombs, they’re effectively mummified. Cocooned. Endless rehearsals of the same taste, the same tune.

I hate people for whom their wedding is the best day of their life. That’s pathetic. Weddings are annoying, official, puppet shows. Anyone for whom something like *that* is the best day of his life is completely wrong in the brain. Get a life.

I hate slow people and shopping dolls. I can’t distinguish them from each other. I’m the most efficient shopper in the world. Question of survival tactics. Get in, buy, get out. I can’t understand why some people love to doubt, compare, hesitate or even over proof anything in shops. In hell, you need to be efficient. I almost never buy something wrong.

I hate people who talk crap during sex. I hate boobs that are perfectly symmetrical. I hate poetry readings, because they’re symptoms of passivity. I hate that you can’t dance to poetry.

I hate dutch audiences. Dutch audiences are the worst audiences in the world. They stand in the back of the room with their hands in their pockets. I’ve seen great bands play in front of those dull pocketwankers. As an audience member you are part of the music. I always feel obliged to direct the band with my movements. I hate countries where people don’t sing together when they eat and the sun goes down. I hate the misinformed idea that entropy is somehow ‘individualistic’.

Proust again!

Proust, altijd weer Proust. La Prisonnière deze keer. De verteller, Marcel, ligt in bed na een nacht ruziën met zijn gevangen liefde. Onverhoopt heeft hij heerlijk geslapen. Volkomen verkwikt laaft hij zich aan de geluiden die van straat komen, de venters die in zijn rijke buurt hun waar te veil aanbieden: oesters, garnalen, makrelen (maquereaux = pooiers), asperges. De scharensliep en de voddenman wedijveren met de uien en sinasappels. Het is een groot koor, wiens gepsalmodieer M. terecht vergelijkt met gewijde gezangen. In Carol Reeds `Oliver Twist’ zit een scène, waarin Oliver, fris gered uit de handen van Fagin en Sykes, net als M. na een zoete nachtrust de blinden van het raam wegduwt om de straatventers, die hun waar uitzingen te kunnen zien. Ik ben een boon als het koor van Prousts straatventers niet model heeft gestaan voor het lied Who will buy uit Reeds musical. Proust heeft op deze pagina’s het lied in taal gecomponeerd, dat bij Reed gezongen kan worden. Toeval bestaat niet.

Jo Willems, Cultuurpaleis, maart 2008

Vel voor vel

Was het niet Friedrich Nietzsche die beweerde dat er niets verderfelijkers voor de mens bestaat dan zich ‘s ochtendsvroeg vol te laten lopen met andermans gedachtegoed? Ik kan het daar absoluut niet mee eens zijn. Wat een plezier verschaft mij mijn vroeg leeshalfuurtje. Alsof ik weer kind ben en de ochtendmis moet dienen. Het lezen in de vroege ochtenduren verzoent mij met de onafwendbare nieuwe dag, het lezen in de vroege ochtenduren is de onontbeerlijke warming up voor de enige spier die telt (behalve die andere dan): het verstand.

Hedenochtend vroeg was het weer eens zover. De lectuur was van dien aard, dat het leek alsof bovengenoemde spier een injectie van metabole-stereoïden ontving.

Zittend aan het aanrecht lepelde ik slaapdronken mijn kommetje Dokkumer vruchtenmuesli met magere yoghurt naar binnen om daarna, gewapend met een mok dampend hete koffie, mijn zetel aan het raam op te zoeken voor een herlezing van À la recherche du temps perdu. Bij de eerste regels was het al raak. In het laatste deel van Du coté de chez Swann, het deel getiteld Nom de pays: le nom, begint Proust voor de zoveelste keer te jeremiëren over al die slaapkamers in welke hij de slaap maar niet heeft kunnen vatten. En tussen al die mijmeringen door komt hij met de bewering dat echte schoonheid niet iets kunstmatigs is en niet voor Prousts eigen lol en comfort gecreëerd. Schoonheid is volgens Proust van een heel andere orde. Schoonheid is noodzakelijk, onveranderlijk, onontbeerlijk. Schoonheid is derhalve slechts aan te treffen in de natuur en in grote kunstwerken.

Deze stelling vulde mij aangenaam met allerhande behaaglijke gedachten. Totdat de koffie zijn werking liet gelden en mijn nog rustende ingewanden het ‘ontwaakt, ontwaakt’ begon toe te schreeuwen. Spoorslags begaf ik mij naar het toilet om mij aldaar mijn zondig door veel vlees eten verontreinigd lichaam weer te reinigen. Terwijl ik daar op Gods alziend Oog – de Wc-bril – druk doende was met mijn ochtendritueel, begon ik de wanden van mijn nauwe heiligdom te betrachten. Bij het aanschouwen van het door mij zojuist gebracht offer voelde ik mij waarlijk een hogepriester. Totdat de rol closetpapier mijn aandacht trok. Ineens, in een flits, was ik ervan doordrongen dat die Proust eigenlijk ook alleen maar wat voor zich heen fantaseert.

De goed gevulde rol was voor mij als de brandende braamstruik was. Ik hoorde het Ehejeh asjer ehejeh – Ik ben die ik ben en ik zal zijn die ik zal zijn. Wat een schoonheid. En dan nog een schoonheid zonder meer kunstmatig en louter gemaakt was voor mijn lol en comfort. Als in een visioen zag ik de wonderbaarlijke werkelijkheid achter elk van die grijze kringloopvelletjes (nergens is dit woord meer op zijn plaats). Ik zag de duizend zachte, maar o zo sterke, dubbele vloeien, die enerzijds dun genoeg zijn, zodat je ze in elke bilinkeping kunt inbrengen, maar anderzijds dik genoeg, zodat je er niet met je tastende vingers doorheen glijdt.

Van de ene overweging kwam de andere. Wat voor hollanders (niet het volk, maar het werktuig), welbakken en machines waren voor het vervaardigen van dit papier ontworpen? Hoeveel mensen hadden niet de beste tijd van hun leven gegeven om na te denken over de procédés om deze onontbeerlijke attributen van onze beschaving de juiste vorm en maat te geven? Wie had zich niet allemaal het hoofd gebroken over het meten van de scheurweerstand, trekvastheid en het opzuigende vermogen van de voor mij hangende velletjes?

Wat ik aanschouwde mocht waarlijk een wonder heten. Maar was het Prousts natuur? Was het Prousts kunst?

Istanbul poetry festival

It’s a good year for poetry here in Istanbul. In May there’s the ‘Istanbul poetry festival‘, a brand new attempt to create an international Turkish poetry festival, this time including Dutch poet Arjen Duinker, who will also perform in Perdu, Amsterdam today. Other poets performing include John Ash and Sergey Gandlevski, a russian poet and novelist who has a dutch article here

And, last but not least, The Man is coming to Istanbul to perform here in August. This time I won’t skip the occasion.

Mark Twain quotes

“The very ink with which all history is written is merely fluid prejudice”
Mark Twain

“Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of congress. But I repeat myself.”
–Mark Twain

“Irreverence is the champion of liberty and its only sure defense”
-Mark Twain

“The easy confidence with which I know another man’s religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also. I would not interfere with any one’s religion, either to strengthen it or to weaken it. I am not able to believe one’s religion can affect his hereafter one way or the other, no matter what that religion may be. But it may easily be a great comfort to him in this life–hence it is a valuable possession to him.”
-Mark Twain

“We have a bastard Patriotism, a sarcasm, a burlesque; but we have no such thing as a public conscience. Politically we are just a joke.”
-Mark Twain

“Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heal that has crushed it.”
-Mark Twain

“It now seems plain to me that that theory ought to be vacated in favor of a new and truer one…the Descent of Man from the Higher Animals.”
-Mark Twain

“No sinner is ever saved after the first twenty minutes of a sermon”
-Mark Twain

“Statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception.”
-Mark Twain

Sebastian Horley refused admission into the US

Sebastian Horley, a British author whose book, Dandy in the Underworld recounts his life of “sex, drugs and finely tailored clothes” has been barred from entering the US for a book tour, on the grounds of “moral turpitude.”

Sebastian Horsley was deemed “not admissible” by U.S. customs agents.

Horsley said he was questioned for eight hours Tuesday by border officials at Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey before being denied entry on grounds of “moral turpitude.”

Read the whole article