The Naked Now
For the last week, I’ve been thinking about Adorno who I haven’t thought about for a long time. There are a number of reasons for this, many of which are personal and banal (e.g. I’ve been reading Aesthetic Theory again along with Robert Hullot-Kentor’s brilliant Things beyond Resemblance which I’ve only just discovered.) However, over … Read more
Desert Air
My father died two months ago. He died of cancer after a long, terrible year in which his mind and body deteriorated in one of those dignity-stripping, theodicy-confounding horrors whose only saving grace is that they are terminally interrupted. If he’d lived, last Monday would have been my Dad’s 62nd birthday. I loved him. Unequivocally … Read more
And all your thoughts end in Oedipus:
Life passes The way the traffic does – For a child in the back of her parents car, For a bored, stoned, Long-boned Teen Magician, Looking down at the highway from an Suburban overpass; Stretching his dreams beyond fandom and towards flight. In the end, Everything disappears Like clock-time and Like Sunday afternoon; Like small … Read more
“You’ll start believing you’re immune to gravity and stuff…”
The night before last, I had the extraordinary pleasure of seeing the divine Ms. Amanda Palmer playing a not-quite-impromptu, and not-quite-secret gig at the Brunswick Hotel with the amazing, soulful, and almost offensively talented Melbourne duo “The Jane Austen Argument.” The fact that someone of my congenital uncoolness managed to be present at something like … Read more
And dance upon the surface of the moon
…And dance upon the surface of the moon Feigning Fathomlessness, We look past each other, Away from each other, Towards the Interior:– Towards that place where the Wild Things aren’t. Do you promise not to eat each other If one of you dies first In the snow? I know I did, but then my promises … Read more
Ghost of a Chance
[THE SCENE. INT. NIGHT-TIME. Adorno's flat. Max Horkheimer is present, dressed as a WOOLY MAMMOTH...Alban Berg plays Beethoven's "Apassionata" in the background in a way that makes Teddie happier than usual. ] Adorno, thumbing idly through his copy of Lucretius’s Rerum Natura and as if dictating: The goal of enlightenment is to emancipate ourselves from … Read more
Nudge-winking or How not to protest an obvious injustice
On Monday afternoon I signed Overland editor Jeff Sparrow’s open letter regarding Wikileaks founder Julian Assange I suppose I should be pleased (but not, obviously, surprised) by the fact that over the last two nights almost everyone in my Twitter feed (and the articles, blogs et cetera referenced by these people) seems to share my … Read more
A modest proposal to declare Brian Leiter and Michael Rosen philosopher Kings
Today, dearest and fairest, I have something a little different for you. Today’s post is largely a transcript of a fan letter that I’ve just written with the intention of showing my inveterate admiration for Brian Leiter and Michael Rosen. If you have the misfortune not to know who these gentlemen are, I am here … Read more
Fear and Loathing in the Academic Agora
Musings from my recent conference experience at the University of New South Wales. Contains some discussion of me [passim!] my attitudes to the ‘analytic continental divide’, the reading of Platonic dialogues, the similarities between Socrates and Christ, censorious-finger waggings at certain bad trends in ‘conservative’ philosophy, odd responses to “Decline of the West” style scenarios and other fun fruit flavours…
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