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On Victory, Part 1
This is the first installment in a four-part series on Joseph Conrad’s novel “Victory.” “I have managed to refine everything away. I’ve said to the Earth that bore me: ‘I am I and you are a shadow.’ And, by Jove, it is so!’” Axel Heyst, the reclusive protagonist of Joseph Conrad’s “Victory,” will, along »
On Mental Separations
Speaking to ourselves, we tend to use the second person – “Why are you doing this?” we might rage after a petty error, or on an inert night say, “You should be working”; and we will say these things quietly, sometimes out loud, dividing our consciousness into the parts that seem easiest to manipulate. »
On Political Silences
1. It’s a room that’s quiet and you’re also very quiet as he pours you milk against the window. The milk as a detail is disarming, very innocent; he has an expression on his face that says I want to turn your body out onto the table. But he won’t say it. And you »
On Necessary Evils
This has been such a long stretch of conceptual writing without narrative that I’ve developed a strong craving for fiction. But that’s not what I’m here for. Evil doesn’t make a good story; I mention it because it’s interesting, because I spent an hour on it fully clothed and wet in the midday sun. »
On the Turkish Language
I’ve spoken two languages for as long as I can remember. I regard both with infinite tenderness. I use English rather more often, for discourse and science and poetry; I am familiar with its twists and oddities and revel in every one – there is no better language to write in if you’d like »
On What It Means To Be Human
I am a human being, genus Homo species subspecies sapiens sapiens; I have a large brain and swollen eyelids and want to change the world. Lately my hair’s been looking quite wild, ancestral enough to feel like I’ve baked in the sun. My skin is tender. All of this seems familiar to me, the »
On the Meaning of Existence
It seems to be rather a large, important thing, but the meaning of existence is essentially a dead question. What do we mean by meaning? The meaning of a word is what it communicates. The meaning of an action is its interpretation. When I do something as concrete as touching someone’s head, the sweet »
On Life and Its Future
I have a friend who’s a great proponent of the mechanization of the human body. Eyes gleaming, he tells anyone who’ll listen about this new, invulnerable self, exquisitely constructed, free of death. Sometimes he’ll talk about the end of humanity in general, mouth wide in enjoyment; I’ve heard it so often it feels punched »