Book Review: Anxious Nothings, Vol. 1
Anxious Nothings, Volume 1 (Anxiety Press) is a collection of short fiction, non-fiction, poems about sex, and, as the title suggests, the attendant anxiety often surrounding it in all its forms. The introduction by editor and publisher Cody Sexton, places the collection into context with an explanation of what inspired this volume, involving a teen’s discovery of Hustler Magazine, among other things. It’s dedicated to Larry Flynt and porn impresario Al Goldstein, and while the works collected here are wide ranging in tone and topic, the intro makes for a center the way a metal framework within a clay sculpture holds it all together.
Before I read this book, I’d stumbled onto The People Vs. Larry Flynt on cable, the scene where Larry (played by Woody Harrelson) returns to the offices of Flynt Publications for the first time following his shooting. He wheels into his office, much to the chagrin of the suits looking to tone things down, and instructs the receptionist to announce on the loudspeaker, “The pervert is in the building.” This book seems to suggest the pervert is indeed in the building, and to paraphrase Walt Kelly’s comic possum, Pogo, “We have met the pervert, and he is us.”
If sexuality is an integral part of being human, and if it really does take all kinds to make the world go around, every one of us could be considered perverts to some degree, seen through the lenses (or technological keyholes) of the censorious forces present in society, especially in the U.S., which has a much more puritanical culture than the land of “freedom and liberty” is usually willing to admit.
Depending on one’s personality and mindset, these works may prompt laughter, (Grayson Lagrange’s “Feeding the Ducks” and Jason Gerrish’s “Slaw”), a sense of horror or dread (Paula Deckard’s “Girl’s End”), disgust (Sebastian Vice’s “Ass Eating”), and even pity tempered with cool satisfaction that the bad guys/chicks in the story got what was coming to them (Paige Johnson’s “Ruffled Feathers” and Kristin Garth’s “Jungle Rules”). Snacking on this collection of literate pornographic bon-bons is a liberating experience in many ways, acknowledging the pervert within one’s own psyche, and meeting it with a high five of recognition thus subverting any authority threatened by the anarchic freedom of thinking for oneself, reading what one pleases, and engaging in life, liberty and the pursuit of pleasure between two—or more—consenting adults.
The transgressive behavior found in Anxious Nothings is unfiltered and unadulterated save what judgements the reader brings to it, which gives each piece in the collection certain qualities of a Rorschach test administered in a quiet corner at a wild party. No therapist here, though, only the intermittent palate-clearing snippets of sage words by the likes of the Marquis de Sade, Karl Marx, Mark Twain, and Gertrude Stein, with text graphics for these made to look like cut-out ransom notes, heightening the illicit nature of the content and grounding it within the wisdom that there is nothing that threatens you from between these covers, only modern stories, poems and essays about age-old cornerstones of human nature. The characters herein may be anxious, but you, dear reader, need not be. You are in good hands. You are human. Fear not.
However.
Right before I wrapped up this review, I was flipping through channels and again stumbled upon The People Vs. Larry Flynt. This time, it was near the ending, where Larry wants to take his case against Jerry Falwell to the U.S. Supreme Court. Larry’s lawyer, Alan Isaacson (played by Edward Norton), resists, afraid that Larry will make a mockery out of an appearance in front of such of an august institution, but Isaacson finally acquiesces, and prevails. In light of recent rulings, I have to wonder what the future now holds for free speech in America, and for other freedoms most have long taken for granted.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt famously said that we have “nothing to fear, but fear itself,” yet now more than ever we seem to be a nation in the grip of fear and loathing. Writing hobbled by fear, tempered by prevailing opinion about what is “acceptable” makes for a lukewarm experience through which nothing is learned, gained, no fun is had, and time is wasted. This one is worth the time, whether as a left-handed bon-bon of ballsy entertainment or thought-provoking starting point for a conversation with yourself about why something makes you feel the way it does. This is a strange, bold book for even stranger times, a post-modern Whitman’s Sampler of fearless writing. It is a literary anthology that contains unapologetic, unvarnished, explicit sexual content. You may love it, or you may be offended, but if books like this get banned, you’ll never know.
Be bold. Be fearless and support others who are.
Freedom depends on it.
Review: In Filth It Shall Be Found
It’s been a while since I’ve written a review and this is the first of many I'm about to share. I’ve been undergoing my own personal transformation for the past couple of years and this is the perfect book with which to resume my literary musings. In Filth It Shall Be Found, the first volume of transgressive fiction from Outcast Press (ed. Paige Johnson) is a carnivalesque tour of the of the human spirit's darker side, and in keeping with its Jungian title, invites readers along on a Bahktinian journey through the netherworld of consciousness where the “It” of the title is discovered.
Russian philosopher and theorist Mikhail Bahktin identified and described 4 hallmarks of the carnivalesque world view that can be found in literature, and these pinged around in my mind immediately after I’d finished the book . While this isn’t meant to be an academic analysis or anything other than my own experience reading Filth, the fact that the ping was loud and persistent shows there is order in chaos, sanity in madness, and that this collection exemplifies the transformative power of transgressive fiction.
Using Bahktin's hallmarks of the carnivalesque as guideposts on this tour, the first, “familiar and free interaction between people where barriers are broken,” is the crux of Don Logan’s “Isaac and Me,” where the worlds of a homeless man and a mysterious “kid” collide then separate leaving one of them indelibly marked by betrayal. CT Marie's “Sugarbaby” is a train wreck that begins on a subway and ends in an unexpected place (for this reader anyway). In both of these stories, the urban setting heightens the “random” precision of chance encounters, Hitchcockian intersections where fate lurks behind the scenes, then steps out and knees you in the groin when you least expect it.
The next hallmark is “eccentric behavior,” where society’s norms are broken and/or blithely ignored without consequences. Simon Broder's“Dollhouse" flows in this vein, exposing the lie that grown-ups are wiser than kids, featuring an immature narrator with a most distinctive voice. Another example of eccentric behavior stretched to extremes is Emily Woe's “The Secret Smile,” where the narrator's utter blindness to the consequences of his own actions is nothing short of remarkable.
The hallmark of “carnivalistic” mesalliances” where those normally separated unite, is personified in Paige Johnson's “The Blue Hour.” Set in a strip club where lines are both crossed and laid out on a table, the roles of performer and spectator are blurred as forbidden familiarity portends a special kind of friendship, doom, or both. Another case of forbidden familiarity is examined in G.C. McKay ‘s “Je Ne Sais Quoi,” in a father's tortured observations of his daughter's odd behavior.
The final hallmark of the carnivalesque world view, “profanation,” is on full-frontal display with “The Fire Inside,” by Sebastian Vice, where anarchic take-down of all that is “holy” debases and grinds guardians of corrupt power into the ground. Profanation of the human body, specifically the female body, occurs in Amanda Cecelia Lang's “Daisy in the Dirt,” its dark magical realism sparkling with a crystal-clear awareness gained in the presence of death.
The book’s cover art features a woman removing a mask, an appropriate image to represent this volume. Perhaps I have a particular affinity for the notion of the carnivalesque and what it represents, having lived in New Orleans for nearly twenty years. There, Carnival season is a time when normal rules don’t apply: everyday routes are altered, appetites indulged, and appearances don’t represent reality. Bourbon Street swells into a bacchanalian mass of humanity in all its wonder and debauchery. The success of each Mardi Gras is measured by the amount of trash collected on Ash Wednesday, but for weeks and even months afterward, one finds glitter in the gutters, and beads hanging from the trees. Such is the effect of feasting on the stories herein and coming to the last page: the show is over, parade passed, but the details linger and haunt.
Each of the twenty stories in this anthology makes its unique contribution to the transgressive gestalt of In Filth It Shall Be Found. I look forward to seeing more from all these writers in the future, and more anthologies from Outcast Press.
Laissez le bon temps rouler!