“Horror House”

The Latest at NEW POP LIT

Two young hipsters, Darla and Simon—one of them an artist—decide to open their own haunted house. Complications ensue.

New pop fiction from a mysterious character known as “Ghost Writer.” (Who is the Ghost Writer?)

http://newpoplit.com/portfolio/horror-house/

Enter our haunted literary house for fun and thrills!

Author Outreach

One of our tasks at NEW POP LIT is to reach out to writers on all ends of the literary spectrum.

Toward that end, we found an author, Chris Cander, somewhere in the middle of ongoing debates. She's been published by a legitimate press, but has also published a book DIY.

Her style of writing is also somewhere in the middle-- in the gap between "pop" and "literary"-- which is where NEW POP LIT seeks to operate.

Read our interview with Chris Cander here:

http://newpoplit.com/portfolio/interview-with-chris-cander/

Stay tuned for more exciting happenings!

(Tomorrow morning we have scheduled a scary? pop Halloween story! www.newpoplit.com)

Publishing and Cronyism

It’s a subject I’ve covered often over the years. I’m at it again, at NEW POP LIT. Why? The problem never ends.

http://newpoplit.com/opinion/tao-lin-and-american-cronyism/

What’s the solution?

To move the center of U.S. Publishing out of New York.

Strange Encounters Dept.

Both are now the subject of literary scandals. But the objective reader asks: Have Ed Champion and Tao Lin encountered each other in the past?

They have, at least online. Here’s an example from 2007:

http://www.edrants.com/mcsweeneys-sells-its-lifetime-subscribers-the-brooklyn-bridge/

Both take opposing sides on the question, of all things, of Dave Eggers. I enter the picture as well, toward the end of the discussion. Makes interesting reading in hindsight.

Ed Champion and Tao Lin: Double Standard?

I’m not a fan of either individual. Their styles of attack are different. Ed Champion goes after you with a mallet, Tao Lin, a stiletto. One is crude, the other subtle.

Still, the question has to be asked: Why are many literary insiders defending Tao Lin and not Ed Champion?

Is it because several publishing concerns have invested heavily in Tao Lin? I speak of Random House, Melville House, and the lit journal n+1. They’ll likely try to salvage the guy, if possible.


It’s curious that women writers, such as Sheila Heti, or Champion’s antagonist Emily Gould, are defending Tao Lin on twitter. Regarding Ed Champion, there’s been widespread agreement that he should be blackballed. Yet Ed Champion, to my knowledge, didn’t physically assault anybody. By all accounts, he had a good relationship with his girlfriend Sarah Weinman. He did write an insulting and crude review, and threatened a woman writer via twitter—threatened her not physically, but that he would publish nude photos of her. Bad enough—but Tao Lin and his fellow “Alt Lit” writer Stephen Tully Dierkes are accused of something more.

Champion has been tagged with the label of ambition—but who’s been more ambitious than Tao Lin?

Tao was one of the cool kids. Ed clearly was not. In the final analysis, do charm and glamour win out?

I have no answers regarding the two of them—am trying to figure out the mind of the established literary world, which still carries clout. I’ll say this: the problem may be that literary culture is centered in a single town. Which creates a hive mindset; in which nonconforming individuals are continually ostracized, and the everpresent thought is: Who’s In and Who’s Out?

(Read more about his issue at http://newpoplitinteractive.wordpress.com/)

NEW POP LIT is the better alternative.

Ten Unanswered Questions

Here are ten questions regarding writer Tao Lin and the so-called Alt Lit movement. Can you answer them?

http://newpoplitinteractive.wordpress.com/2014/10/05/ten-unanswered-questions-about-tao-lin/

p.s. Watch for the new News Page at NEW POP LIT. Coming soon. www.newpoplit.com

Bankrupt Literary Philosophy

THE IDEAS UNDERPINNING THE ALT LIT MOVEMENT

OR, THE DEATH OF POSTMODERNISM?

Here’s a slightly edited transcript of a discussion I engaged in on a HTML Giant post from July 5, 2011. The post was “POP: A Polemic on a Contemporary Language-Based ‘Objectivity.’ “ It was written by postmodern writer Mike Kitchell:

http://htmlgiant.com/word-spaces/pop-a-polemic-on-a-contemporary-language-based-objectivity/

Kitchell’s essay generated 233 comments. Mine came toward the end of them. I went on there originally because I didn’t think Alt Lit had much to do with “pop” writing. It wasn’t populist, wasn’t readable, wasn’t fun. As you’ll see if you read this excerpt from the discussion, we went on to other matters—including the philosophical ideas bolstering Tao Lin and the other members of the short-lived(?) Alt Lit phenomenon.

***********************

(Me)

When I read all this term-paper intellectualizing about something-- pop-- which isn't intellectual but instead pure and emotional and instinctive, I'm reminded of a scene in the classic Elvis movie "Jailhouse Rock."

Elvis Presley of course was one of the early embodiments of American pop culture. His movies became a pop genre unto themselves.

In the flick Elvis (previously seen smashing a guitar) is dragged to a party by his manager. Elvis gets into a discussion with a stuffy prof who, upon hearing he's a musician, proceeds with a long-winded pseudo-intellectual analysis of contemporary jazz. Elvis stares at her for a moment then drawls, "Lady, I don't know what the hell you're talking about."

This was in the early days of rock n' roll which, like the punk version twenty years after, was a rejection of artistic pretentiousness. (See 70's Pink Floyd.) It embraced instead the natural and the organic.

Tao Lin is a pure hustler, and in that sense he's akin to the Colonel Parkers of early rock. But there's nothing remotely punk or genuine about him, absolutely nothing counter to the status quo. I know this well, as I remember his attacks on what was a rebellious, DIY, punk-style lit group from last decade, the Underground Literary Alliance.

Does anyone here know-- or care-- what real pop writing looks like?

(Broah CCro)

Your anecdote about Elvis exposes that, yes, you don't know what anyone is talking about. "Pop which isn't intellectual" only notes the origination and/or intentionality of that which is created. As to its interpretation (which, regardless of my disagreements with Kitchell, we are in agreement), hermeneutic work involves a dialectic with both the text and the reader that is less narrowly defined than assuming the authorial intent to be supreme.

You hate monger academia and theory ("term-paper intellectuallizing" and "are supposed to know because our professors have told us") and yet later consider Tao's relation to late 19th and 20th century Continental philosophy. And while contradicting yourself, you assume a causal relation between postmodernism and "the most inhuman crimes and wars in all of human history." Furthermore, you attack Kitchell's reference to Robbe-Grillet on the grounds of it not being related to American identity/works. So by being hypocritical, rantish, anti-intellectualizing, and tangential, you've fully embodied the Glenn Beck of the literati. Keep up the Ayn Rand references on your blog and maybe some tea baggers will buy your pop.

(Me)

Say what?

Lady, I don't know what you're talking about.

Criticizing the academy isn't "hate monger"ing it.
I'm anti-intellectualizing, sure. But I'm for sense and intelligence. As I've pointed out, the standards of the academy of late have embraced nonsense and anti-intelligence.

It's a documented fact that many of the creators of postmodernism were either card-carrying Nazis (Heiddegger) or collaborationists (Paul DeMan). It's also impossible to read Nietzsche without seeing some stark parallels to "Triumph of the Will" and such. I assume nothing about postmodernism. The links are there in black and white.

I was using the example to analyze the thinking of Tao Lin, whose own words speak
for themselves. I wasn't discussing there the idea of pop per se. I know that Tao isn't beyond appropriating any idea, without crediting the source, if it serves his own end.

I can't comment on Glenn Beck, as I've never watched his television show. From what I've heard about him, he's yet one more con artist himself. I guess he makes an easy label for you to use. Is that all you can come up with? Go to it.

Re Ayn Rand. She espoused a philosophy of selfishness. The lone artist etc. I understand the appeal, though I strongly disagree with much of it. My entire history speaks against her mindset. The ULA espoused a cooperative mode of operating.

What I won't do, however, is compromise my integrity to the extent of insisting she wasn't a significant American novelist. For me, truth is the highest value.

The difference between Ayn Rand and today's nonsensical postmodernists is that she was living, more or less, in the real world. She knew that you have to know up from down in order to build a house. In Tao Lin's philosophy, in his own words, one can't know anything. He's got the egoistic will part of Ayn Rand down pat but has thrown out the reality ("A is A") part.

(Broah CCro)

You repeatedly are vague about the term postmodernism in your posts. You misrepresent the history of the term and its philosophical ties by relating its creation to Heidegger (one "d") and DeMan. Whereas you could point to Heidegger's later works in relation to destruktion as having ties with what many of the French writers would later popularize, it is inaccurate to call him a "creator." Also, Paul DeMan is a stretch as his works are overwhelmed by the popularity of Derrida (who aligns the two references and seems to be one of the main figureheads you won't note). However, mentioning Derrida who wrote several texts on the Jewish plight (and who is much more appropriately noted as one of the "creators" of postmodernism) would not allow you to make your skewed point as to the evils of the movement. Furthermore, Heidegger's biography notes that as he was writing for the Nazi party, he quickly conceded his role when he began to realize their unethical intentions were in stark contrast to his philosophy of "Being-alongside-others with care." If truth is the highest value, I suggest you read more.

Even if your argument was valid (both in the sense that these two could even be considered in the top ten main fore thinkers of postmodernism and that their Nazi ties were so tightly knit), it still assumes that the work is less valuable as its originators have unethical ties. This is your greatest fallacy aside from your ignorance of these topics as you assume that a work is less worth consideration if its ideological system has unethical practices.

Your traditionalist ties to the superiority of the Enlightenment and supposedly greater American writers misinform your views on what postmodernism means/can refer to. You want to discredit this supposed academy (which you still haven't defined) for its over-intellectualizing yet are unable to draw a distinction as to where your own ignorance should end and education should begin. Please articulate just how knowledgeable us as readers should be before we begin to stare to closely into Nietzsche's darkness.

(Me)

Here's a definition of sorts about what is and always was a jumble of ideas, from historian Eric Hobsbawm from his book The Age of Extremes:

"All 'postmodernisms' had in common an essential scepticism about the existence of an objective reality, and/or the possibility of arriving at an agreed understanding of it by rational means. All tended to a radical relativism. All, therefore, challenged the essence of a world that rested on the opposite assumptions, namely the world transformed by science and the technology based upon it, and the ideology of progress which reflected it."

Both Kitchell in his original post, and Tao Lin in the quotes I posted of his, dismiss or even mock the notion of objectivity. In this sense, they're postmodernists in the broad sense that Hobsbawm uses the word.

To further push Hobsbawm's point: It's one thing to dismiss objective reality in parlor-game philosophizing ("hermeneutics") akin to debating the number of angels that can fit on the head of a pin. I kind of doubt that you or Kitchell or Tao dismiss objectivity when out in the real world. I'm fairly certain you don't often cross against a red ("red") light into the middle of traffic, into what may-or-may-not be real automobiles. You don't walk UP the stairs when you wish to go DOWN to the street, or put your shoes on your head instead of your feet. Why, then, do you dismiss objectivity when it comes to literature and writing?

As for the supposed superiority of the Enlightenment, Hobsbawm's massive work allows me to attempt to further connect the dots about a few of the other things I said, which I admit may seem like a stretch.

In a long section about the past century's endless nihilistic wars, Hobsbawm stresses that the Allies, both the Anglo-American liberal democracies on one hand, and the Soviets on the other, were united by what he calls "the shared values and aspirations of the Enlightenment." Both so-different parties saw themselves as products of the Age of Reason, heirs to that legacy. They united against a society which plunged itself into pure madness, whose leaders embraced UNreason and scorned the Enlightenment in favor of notions of blood, irrationality, and will; ideas which can be found in Nietzsche again and again. Even the uber-Conservative himself, Winston Churchill, was alarmed enough by what he expressly viewed as a unique threat-- a retreat from the values of civilization into barbarism.

How does this apply to literature?

For most of the history of American literature there was a similar consensus between Left and Right about what literature was, what made literature great, the "great American novel" and so forth. And so we see that two great American novels, The Octopus by Norris and Atlas Shrugged by Rand, share aesthetic assumptions and values while coming from opposite ends of the political spectrum. Neither author believes that the writer can know nothing about this world. Instead they seek to express very large themes embracing all of America, using interwoven narrative threads that lay themselves out like a chess game on a chess board, exemplars of intelligence.

You throw this away for-- what? The mentality of a housecat?

As I've said, it leads not only to jargon-filled writing, it's an artistic dead end.
*****************
On one point Tao Lin is right-- that's in seeing "pop" as an aesthetic path, a way to revive the literary art. But to take that path writers will need to knock hermeneutic nonsense out of their heads, to be able to speak, as writers once spoke, with clarity, intelligence, and sense.

(deadgod)

Hermeneutics is not an 'anti-objectivity', but rather, takes seriously subjectivity and intersubjectivity as modes of or paths to - or constitutive of - "truth".

Gadamer takes up the philosophical conversation of Aristotle, Hegel, and the rest of the tradition of philosophical investigation that's before him, and does so with a seriousness not a bit less humane - and readable - for its intellectual strength and meticulous scholarship.

Anyone interested in a presentation of actual relations between hermeneutical perspectives and postmodern ones would be well-advised to read the Gadamer/Derrida book and see first-hand a vivid example of the contrasts between these diverse philosophical approaches.

(Broah CCro) (to me)

Your understanding of postmodernism follows from, by your own post, a secondary source. The only philosopher you've noted to have actually read is Neitzsche which you erroneously assume is a postmodernist (which even considering someone a proto-postmodernism seems fallible if they were before the linguistic turn). Any comments regarding actually discussing postmodernism and its relation to hermeneutics (a field of study) is deemed as parlor tricks. How an entire field of study with numerous, divergent opinions can be a parlor trick or nonsense is anybody's guess. Please inform yourself of the topics you want to rave about.

(Me)

But Heidegger makes little sense even to philosophy professors! There's strong debate taking place about Heidegger within the academy about what he was talking about, and how much he was or wasn't a Nazi. The prof at
www.n4bz.org/gsr10/gsr1004.htm
for instance argues that Heidegger was a Nazi through and through.
Nearly all sources present Martin Heidegger as the father of postmodernism.
These same sources give Nietzsche as a major influence on Heidegger's ideas, if not the chief influence.
Eric Hobsbawm, from whom I took my definition, is a writer of rare clarity and intelligence. NO ONE has written with more thoroughness about Twentieth Century thought than he has, as you'd understand if you read his Age of Extremes.
The world and what we make of the world is a reflection of our thought.
Clarity of writing is a reflection of clarity of thought. It's that very clarity which is missing from too many writers now-- and it was certainly missing from the work of Martin Heidegger, likely the past century's #1 intellectual con-artist. He even conned his way out of any punishment after the end of the Second World War. The guy could rationalize anything. He was the ultimate bullshit artist-- puts others of the breed like Robbe-Grillet and Tao Lin to shame.

(Me)

p.s. Broah's post shows the way he's bought the Right/Left binary way of thought which the mass media-- and the educational system-- pushes everyone toward.
Things are a little more complicated.
For instance, in the Cold War context of the time, Robbe-Grillet's ideas were reactionary. They were anti-populist and anti-activist. They were a retreat from involvement in the world. In this sense they were in line with the attitude espoused by William Styron in the Paris Review when he came out against "axe-grinders." In 1950's Europe the Paris Review and Encounter magazine, both backed by CIA  money, were promoting a nonpopulist style of literature as an alternative to what might be called anything smacking of social realism or socially active literature. The same battle was happening within American literature, of course.
This isn't to say Robbe-Grillet was on the "Right." But-- our artistic work is the product of our thought, the foundation of the underlying belief system. The progress of a culture and its art can be tied to the underlying belief system. Is it an accident that the Enlightenment created the greatest works of art and architecture the world has ever seen?
ideas matter.
Many of the ideas being pushed today, in places like the academy, are an intellectual and artistic dead end. You limit yourselves as writers if you fail to recognize this.

*********************
Convoluted thought is everywhere, but there are points about this thread, this discussion, to be made.
A couple are about M. Kitchell himself.
Beneath the self-referential nature of his post, ("I suppose," "I feel like," "What I'd like to," "I am invested," "I almost feel like," et.al.) is the underlying mindset. Kitchell and Tao Lin have superficial disagreements but are in fact ideological soulmates.
The incoherence of Kitchell's post is a reflection of the incoherence of his thought. It's not his fault. His situation is likely shared by most of the readers of this blog.
Everything is conditional. Kitchell can't say anything for sure. Anything he says comes with provisos. Sure, he "disagrees" with "Tao" about "language," but what's "language," something having to do with "words," whatever "words" are. "Tao" is pushing "objectivity," but as we all know or rather are supposed to know our professors have told us there is no "objectivity," and can be none. Or rather, there "is" "no" "objectivity," we can't really know or ultimately say anything, can we? "Know," "say," etc.
Why does Kitchell reference Robbe-Grillet? Why would any American writer reference Robbe-Grillet? R-G and his feckless ideas have nothing to do with the history of American letters, the American character, or the American voice. With the path writers like Kitchell are on or should be on. Robbe-Grillet is taught in the university because his ideas are quirky, and so absurd that for bored profs they're interesting. Kitchell, like so many eager students, has swallowed him whole.
What can we say about Robbe-Grillet?
Yes, I know we can't really say-- or know-- anything about anything, but if hypothetically we lived in an alternate universe where not everything was relative and conditional, where people had sense, then what would we say about a writer like Robbe-Grillet?
(We should put "writer" in quotes in this instance, because scarcely being a "writer" is the R-G appeal, at least for the easily gulled.)
We would say that Robbe-Grillet was a bigger con artist than Tao Lin. Could we say, he was a quack? ("Quack.")
What was Robbe-Grillet peddling? Do you know?
He was selling the ideology of stupidity.
Can anyone dispute this?
Robbe-Grillet wished the writer to empty the mind and so regress himself as a writer as to become the equivalent of a house cat. Like an observant house cat, to merely notice and record, with no thought or judgment brought into the equation.
The great historical analysis, assessment of human society, and theological musings of a Tolstoy-- or even a Frank Norris-- aren't allowed in. That, truly, for Robbe-Grillet, is ("is") another literary universe.
A universe where literature is relevant and important.

(lagsolo)

tao lin may in fact be a hustler yes but then again so was allen ginsberg / will the world ever be rid of hustlers? i doubt it

poor elvis & all the movies they made him do

i will take a look at yr blog

(Me)

Now for some further comments on Tao Lin himself. Such comments are for you unfamiliar, uncomfortable to read. Just remember that many people in this society-- possibly even yourself-- are Eloi to whom strong opinion, disagreement, and emotion are new experiences.
A revealing discussion about Tao Lin is the infamous one he had several years ago with Whitney Pastorek. It's still to be found at Tao's "hehehehehehehehe" blog, which might be better named "mememememememememe."
Tao describes how he uses "concrete language," "without emotion." Very Robbe-Grillet-like. He means, without opinion, judgement, humanity.
Here are some interesting quotes from Tao:

************************************

(The quotes are the same given yesterday on this blog’s previous post.)

Quotes from Tao Lin

AS the writer Tao Lin is the latest lit-world darling to self-destruct, I thought I’d post a few quotes of his, for perspective:

"--sometimes my goal is to gain as much power in the lit world as possible, sometimes my goal is to focus on real human beings that i can touch in reality as much as possible, sometimes my goal is to try to be as truthful as possible in the world, sometimes my goal is to try to reduce pain and suffering as much as possible in the world, sometimes my goal is to be as selfish as possible and get as much pleasure as possible for myself, sometimes my goal is to try to not care about identity and to destroy my own, etc., about a thousand more goals and all these goals have probably occurred before within the same hour, if even just 'entertained' for a millisecond—"

This is an expression of the intellectually and morally bankrupt postmodernist philosophy which underpins Tao Lin and his work. As is this:

"I live in the universe
therefore I have no answers, I have no rules, and I don't know anything."
"It should be obvious to everyone that no one knows what to do, no one is right, nothing is right or wrong . . . it is impossible for me to know any of these things. . . ."

I gave these quotes and their source in a discussion I engaged in about Tao Lin and his philosophy in 2011, in the comments section of HTML Giant, of all places—the spawning ground of “Alt Lit” and its nonsensical ideas. HTML Giant says it’s shutting down in a few weeks, incidentally. I suppose rocked by too many scandals. I’ll be posting more of that discussion here in coming days, because it’s, er, enlightening.

The Biggest Dinosaur

INDEPENDENT EBOOK AUTHORS are having a field day laughing at this New York Times article, “Literary Lions Unite,” by David Streitfeld:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/29/business/literary-lions-unite-in-protest-over-amazons-e-book-tactics.html?_r=0

Death throes of the literary establishment?

Ebookers call it “The Land that Time Forgot,” and refer to the authors mentioned as dinosaurs.

If so, literary agent Andrew Wylie, checking in from Paris, of all places, is the biggest dinosaur of them all. He’s obviously making an extremely good living, being—what? A literary artist? No. Andrew Wylie is a middleman, nothing more, feeding off the current inefficient and top-heavy publishing system; taking a very generous slice of the profits.

Expect more about this issue at NEW POP LIT (www.newpoplit.com) either at the Opinion page, or an upcoming NPL News page.

More Mantel

HILARY MANTEL’S MUCH HYPED TALE

Predictable voices of offense and protest, as if on cue (the publicists scripted this very well) have been raised about Hilary Mantel’s story, “The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher.” See my review of the story:

http://kingwenclas.blogspot.com/2014/09/dueling-assassins.html

as well as this in-depth NEW POP LIT examination of the controversy:

http://newpoplitinteractive.wordpress.com/2014/09/21/the-hilary-mantel-fiasco/

The question arises: Are Mantel’s critics practicing censorship? Is this a free speech issue?

IF the amount of free speech one has is judged by the size of the microphone, then Hilary Mantel has an enormous amount of free speech, given that her book is published by not one, but two of the largest book conglomerates on the planet. Her “assassination” story was published by two of the most important newspapers on earth. If free speech is judged by with what power a writer is supported, and how widely her words are circulated, then Hilary Mantel has many times the amount of free speech as the average writer. Is it 1,000 times more? 10,000 times? That’s the way the matter should be honestly judged.

After all, both the HarperCollins and MacMillan book empires by nature “censor” writers, every day. Seeing that Hilary Mantel’s provocative story is shallow and not very interesting, in and of itself, one can conclude that the decisions made by the book giants as to which writers are published and promoted are based as much on politics as on quality.

********************

What’s most visible in this affair is the sad state of literature today. This great writer, Hilary Mantel, selected for massive publicity; the acme of the legacy publishing industry; lacks an artistic conscience. Not only is her story a cheap hit piece—metaphorically and in actuality—it makes no effort to examine the causes and effects of violence in society. The meaningful questions which a work of literature would be expected to address are nowhere to be found. Unlike the literary giants of past days, the Dickenses and Dostoevskys, Dumases, Hugos, and Tolstoys, Hilary Mantel lacks a moral voice. In judging the story, aside from all other considerations, that lack is everything.

Dueling Assassins

OR, THE NARCISSISM OF THE ESTABLISHMENT WRITER

The literary establishment in both the United Kingdom (united a while longer) and New York is making noise about a story by one of their “best,” Booker Prize winner Hilary Mantel. The story is “The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher.”

This interested me, because a couple months ago I produced my latest ebook, a short novella titled Assassination of X. Unlike Mantel, I don’t name my victim, a U.S. senator. My story is also written in a completely different style from Mantel’s, who can write only in the standard status quo literary fashion. You can read her tale here:

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/sep/19/hilary-mantel-short-story-assassination-margaret-thatcher

The story is not really about Margaret Thatcher, but Hilary Mantel. Which is why she has to name Thatcher—it’s a way to draw attention to herself and her politically-correct attitude. It’s a species of exhibitionism. “Look at me!” Mantel is demonstrating how much she’s always hated Thatcher—used as a symbol—and so, this demonstrates to the intellectual elite her credentials as one of them. The story is merely the excuse used to make the demonstration. It might as well be a painting; Margaret Thatcher with a sour expression on her face; examples of her social crimes depicted behind her. Waiting assassin off to the side.

The story Mantel tells is ridiculous. It’s a farce. Hilary Mantel doesn’t have a clue how such a crime would be done; or what an actual assassin would be like.

Mantel introduces the story with endless description—paragraphs full of it—as if to ensure that all but the proper “literary” audience will lose interest. This completed, the rest is conversation between a Hilary Mantel stand-in and the assassin. All very British and ludicrous. The assassin, about to commit the crime of the century, has scant focus. It’s all very casual. Make the tea, someone. “I’ll mind the gun.” (Note to Mantel: rifle.)

The narrator—these stories are almost always first person; they can only be so because the solipsistic viewpoint is all—has, like Hilary Mantel, not a clue about the weapon used, preparation needed, and such. The assassin is no professional, nor a credible facsimile of a good amateur. Instead, he’s popped whole out of her imagination, a man of stupidity and carelessness, which allows the narrator to engage with him in what might be the most insipid conversation ever—again, given the gravity of the event.

Hilary Mantel takes a pop premise and turns it into literary idiocy. Into cutesiness. This at a time when real terrorists are loose in the world; actors of serious business. With, instead of British casualness, deadly purpose. Unclownish focus. An actual assassin would dispose of the talkative Hilary Mantel stand-in within five seconds—and save himself from her self-centered conversation and precious arrogance.

The story can’t be taken seriously and isn’t meant to be taken seriously. It has no connection to reality. It serves as a way for Mantel to make a connection to the like-minded. As such, though it’s “well-written” by literary standards, it’s not literature. It asks no questions. It challenges no one to re-examine the world or themself. There are no shadings or depths to the story. It’s affirmation, not art.

Of course, I’m biased. Through a new website, at which I’m co-editor (www.newpoplit.com), I’m promoting a style of writing opposed to that of a Hilary Mantel. It’s a different way of looking at the short story art, and at the world.

In my own tale I seek to plunge the reader into the reality of a shocking event. The world itself is the focus—and not the vapid spaces of a privileged author’s head. You can read my modernist pop tale via Kindle or Nook Books. Here’s an Amazon link to it:

http://www.amazon.com/Assassination-X-King-Wenclas-ebook/dp/B00KPHLTKI/ref=sr_1_2?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1411143513&sr=1-2&keywords=assassination+of+x

I invite you to read both stories and judge the difference.

Diversity of Ideas

As you may have heard, I’m now Editor-in-Chief at an ambitious project called NEW POP LIT (www.newpoplit.com). The main engine behind the endeavor is a Wisconsin dynamo named Andrea Nolen. We receive ideas and support from a variety of “friends and enemies.” While we’re starting as a web site, our plans go far beyond it.

EDITORIAL POLICY

What’s our editorial policy?

Any project I’m involved in will slant toward the DIY end of the spectrum. HOWEVER, presenting one viewpoint isn’t good enough, if we’re to be all things to all readers and writers. While we aim to be at the forefront of change in the literary world, we also seek to present a diversity of ideas.

Diversity of opinion and ideas, even on questions of art, is seldom seen anywhere today.

Left-wing media present left-wing ideas, while right-wing media present right-wing ideas.

A literary journal like Brooklyn-based n+1 presents their narrow range of ideas, while a similar lit journal like The Believer, albeit in San Francisco, presents a slightly quirkier version of same; no less pretentious, with an equally narrow range.

Sides have been taken on the Amazon-versus-Hachette fight. Establishment writers and editors plead with Jeff Bezos or the universe to stop economic change— “Save us!”—while other writers embrace that change. No middle ground is found between the two camps, but castigations ARE all over the place.

NEW POP LIT stands for a new literary path. We’re asking a smorgasboard of voices to help us determine a “Third Way” between competing sides. For literary art: a hybrid. Compromise. For ideas about process and publishing, we’ll explore all viewpoints.

In coming days we’ll solicit informed opinions on current literary issues. For and against. Status quo or DIY. We welcome input even from those few writers or critics who embrace neutrality.

We hope to regularly report on the literary future. In some small way, we plan to make it.

Better Fiction?

What does better fiction look like?

If NEW POP LIT is to distinguish itself from the literary pack, we'll need to present new fiction as good or better than what anyone else is publishing. Our task is to discover hidden talent-- exciting new writers.

We're doing that! (Just three weeks up and running.) See our latest gem, "The Unshakable Kayfabe of Tommy Rage," by Andrea Gregovich-- an inside look at the small town wrestling scene.

http://newpoplit.com/portfolio/the-unshakable-kayfabe-of-tommy-rage/

A pop topic is combined with the sensitivity of a Mary Gaitskill.

Read it! This is terrific writing.

Third Way Fiction

Catch the New Pop Wave

Shooting the Messenger

AS I’VE LIVED much of my life in Detroit, and had it drummed into my head over and over that change is inevitable, I’m sensitive to economic change elsewhere in the world—particularly the inability to recognize or acknowledge drastic change.

It was with this mindset that I jumped briefly into a discussion at the widely-read literary blog The Millions. The topic of the thread, “Practical Art: On Teaching the Business of Creative Writing,” was the idea of introducing business questions into the structure of creative programs. What I found interesting in the initial post by Nick Ripatrazone, and subsequent comments, is that no one acknowledged the proverbial elephant in the room. (See the post here—you’ll have to scroll down to reach my remarks: http://www.themillions.com/2014/08/practical-art-on-teaching-the-business-of-creative-writing.html)

My comments were aggressive, but not extreme by any means. They were written with clarity and intelligence. What I found interesting in the responses was that no one addressed my point about the uncompetitiveness of the book publishing giants. One respondent finessed the issue, saying it would be a shame if the big publishers went under. Well, maybe, but that’s not the point. The point is that change in the publishing realm IS happening. It does a disservice to students in writing programs not to mention this. Students should be given all the options available to them.

Neither was I advocating excluding the big publishers from the marketplace, or from the world of literary ideas. That’s scarcely an option. I’m sure some of them will survive, in retrenched form. Like most bureaucracies—the Detroit automakers a notable example—they likely won’t change until reality comes crashing down upon them; when they can willfully ignore reality no longer.

Neither would I want to exclude literary writers from literature—though I’d suggest they learn to tweak their writing, to make it more competitive in a changing world. My co-editor at www.newpoplit.com, Andrea Nolen, and myself want to walk a middle path between the two extremes of literary and popular writing. We’ve stated again and again that the short story should be able to be both. (However, to suggest that Nobel Prize-winning short story writer Alice Munro, with her lengthy paragraphs and endless descriptions of trifles, her turtle’s pace, is readable and pop is absurd.) NEW POP LIT is designed to offer an alternative to both camps. I went on The Millions site to get word out to MFA/status quo writers who otherwise wouldn’t consider amending their art, to write what we call The New New.

After the reasonable comments of “Hot Ossuary” came a predictable demi-puppet attack by someone named “Toad.” A classic case of cognitive dissonance. I have no doubt that Toad read my remarks as he described them. It’s a condition of the human animal that when encountering sudden contrary ideas, the average person will at first see only red—the mind distorts the message, reading the words emotionally, instead of seeing what’s actually there. Toad ends up making me look moderate!

I suspect that within five years even Toad, as well as the blog he appears on (and for?) will be open to DIY ebook writing. In the face of reality, all bandwagons and their followers eventually change course.

A Cat and a Ballerina?

That’s the subject of our latest NEW POP LIT “Rate-This-Story!” feature, “Attitude En Pointe” by Christina Murphy.

http://newpoplitinteractive.wordpress.com/

Take a minute to read this short short and vote on it!

Is the Phanatic Leaving Philadelphia?

The notion of the Phillie Phanatic leaving Philadelphia has been the subject of conversation since the spring. See this article:

http://wapc.mlb.com/cutfour/2014/05/28/77028874/phillies-fans-want-to-trade-the-phillie-phanatic-for-mike-trout

The idea interests me, since my new project, NEW POP LIT—which I’m producing with writer/blogger Andrea Nolen as well as the Friends and Enemies of Pop Literature—needs a mascot!

(See our fantastic site: www.newpoplit.com )

If the Phillie Phanatic is truly available, searching for a better deal, we’d like to make him an offer. Maybe some classic Detroit–style Coney Dogs and the opportunity to watch, um, a better baseball team. (And by now he must be tired of cheesesteaks.)

Of course, since the Phanatic is a native of the Galapagos Islands, there’s the question of possible travel restrictions on his visa.

“Rate This Story!”

‘HOW A STORY FAILS” BY LANCE MANION

One of the features of the New Pop Lit website will be “Rate-This-Story” as part of our Interactive page, which is located in a side room of the New Pop Lit “Coffeehouse.” First up is short story writer Lance Manion with his “how a story fails.” What is this guy talking about? Click on the link and see.

http://newpoplitinteractive.wordpress.com/

(Scroll down for more Interactivity.)

Kudos to NPL co-editor Andrea Nolen for the striking look she’s achieved—and mucho thanks to Mr. Manion for courageously contributing his story!

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(This week’s NPL Feature Story coincidentally is also about a writer: “Harry Pinker Does It Again” by Corey Mesler. It’s also something of a short detective story. We are, after all, a pop lit site.)

http://newpoplit.com/portfolio/harry-pinker-does-it-again/

Thanks. Happy reading.

New Pop Lit Is Here!

LAUNCH DAY

www.newpoplit.com

Get the New New hyperreal hyperexciting pop stories art ideas mascots games the new entertaining literary web site. Surf the New Literary Wave.

Has the New Pop Lit era begun?

Terrific Story Writers

IF our task is to discover the best pop short story writers, we've already located two of them: Jessie Lynn McMains and Ian Lahey. Read their work NOW, "Insect Summer" and "Matt Murphy Private Eye" at New Pop Lit:

http://newpoplit.com/featured-stories/

We're finding good writers but we want more of them!

(Take our poll at http://newpoplitinteractive.wordpress.com/2014/08/05/pop-or-literary/)

@NewPopLit

www.newpoplit.com

New Pop Lit Is Coming!

WHAT is that appearing on the horizon, in the distance but moving steadily closer? Is it ISIS? Omar Sharif in “Lawrence of Arabia?” Are they good guys or bad guys? Do they carry destruction or renewal?

It’s NEW POP LIT! Launch date is in four days. Time to get on board as a writer, artist, reader or game participant. (Yes, we will have an interaction section.) What should the New New in literature look like? Will it lean more toward the literary or pop? Can we rescue the short story from its doldrums, and thereby reinvigorate literature as a whole?

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Please answer the current question at our Coffeehouse feature: “Does NEW POP LIT Need a Mascot?” Do we? If so, what should it look like?

Also, please take our poll, “Pop or Literary?” placed directly beneath the mascot post. Both can be accessed here:

http://newpoplitinteractive.wordpress.com/

We have one must as a new literary site: That everyone have fun.