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| Michelle Olley (from the Cosmic Trigger play website) |
Holding the slim volume in your hands, you're surprised by how flimsy it seems to be, its papery viscosity. Curling covers and splayed pages like some sort of Gutenbergian seaweed, there's something in the tactile sensation of this reprint that reminds the reader that it is insubstantial. This slick-covered and salacious slender novella could have easily not been written or worked into publication. It could easily have been made real, in a small, behind-the-counter manner of real-ness, and still been easily, confidently forgotten. What you're holding in your hand(s) is, at the very least, an improbability.
Michelle Olley, being characteristically classy, opens her essay with some Sun Ra lyrics. I've seen a lot of people online and in the fleshier immediacy who have cast long shadows in the light of Crowley's new Aeon's light hail Sun Ra as a musician-cum-magician (or is it contrariwise?) who tuned into the 93 Current.
I've only read Michelle's intro and talked to her for about an hour, but I feel confident in calling her "characteristically classy." Olley's credentials take up nearly a page and her information and experience-laden Introduction to The Sex Magicians is full of the easily-given and hard-won wisdom of anecdote and reflection. Dinners with Bob Guccione and ruminations on the merits of looking backwards and inflicting modern values are deftly handled as our author-at-hand performs an extremely important task:
Michelle Olley contextualizes and absolves The Sex Magicians. Olley is in a unique position of being a pioneer in sexual expression and one who has come out on top of the game. As far as I know, Olley hasn't declared any extraordinarily ugly sentiments about any groups, peccadillos or ways of being. Instead, she applies her myriad and extraordinary experiences to a multi-fold (multi-folderol?) interpretation, framed in empathy and understanding. Having Olley as our barker and initial interloper with the raw material of Wilson's first published novel is a very good thing, and very apropos, for our clarity-by-convolution century.
When I read her introduction for the first time, while I was drafting my afterword time and again, I mostly felt a massive rush of relief. I had tried to make an unobstrusive apologia for the novel while still trying to dive into the "real" magic of the book and I wasn't hitting my stride. My unvarnished enthusiasm for the book and my dubious demographic made me a poor choice to explain anything. I was moved to splutter, condemn, excuse and shrug. Michelle made everything crystal clear with an authority I could only ape at. Thank Horus for her work.
In our conversation on the Hilaritas Press Podcast, Michelle endeared herself to me, even more, after unknowingly swatting away my sweaty-palmed concerns over speaking on a topic I am wholly unqualified to write about, by professing her intuitive understanding that Wilson was a force of good. Whatever outdated prose and off-the-mark suppositions Wilson makes in his texts, he is always working for the betterment of existence. He's still working on it. Michelle also does a great job in the podcast and her introduction by drawing the listener/reader's eye to Lost Girls, a corollary text to the one you hold in your hand that delineates the boundary between reality and porn and the health of the intertwining ecosystems.
As such, I welcome you to Wilson's first novel and a few months of serious smut. Let's feel those vibes.
Love is the law, love under will.
I enjoyed Michelle Olley's piece (an interview with her about the "Golden Age of Porn" in Britain would be interesting!). I want to focus on this bit:
ReplyDelete"There is a long and honorable tradition of authors writing writing erotic work to support their more ambitious literary efforts; William Burroughs and Anais Nin are traditionally cited here."
Other writers who have written erotica apparently would include Harlan Ellison, Lawrence Block and Anne Rice.
There is also apparently a literary hybrid form of works that are meant as a form of fiction but which also have an overtly erotic element. Perhaps "Fifty Shades of Gray" would be such a book (I haven't read it). Maybe also the Alan Moore work Michelle mentions, "Lost Girls"? I would also cite "Swing Set" by Janice Weber, a writer I really like. "The Sex Magicians" is conversely perhaps a form of pornography that smuggles in overtly literary elements.
I remember Moore, in quite a few interviews when Lost Girls was released as a complete volume, was pretty adamant about not calling it "erotica" and favoring the more blunt appellation of "porn." Likewise, I think that what Wilson has presented us here goes well beyond the limits of erotica. (Moore always maintained that "erotica," like the term "graphic novels," was simply made up by publishers to make the actual content more palatable.)
DeleteFunny anecdote from yesterday: Adie and I were at the library to return some books we had checked out and an older lady was checking out books in front of us. She was talking to the librarian about how much she enjoyed one series of books because there was "no violence, dirty words or sex" in them. Well, one of the books she was checking out was 50 Shades of Gray. The librarian informed her that the book had everything she had said she disliked in it instead of taking the funnier route.
First of all, thank you Apuleius for once again hosting a reading group. Those are always a pleasure, as far as I am concerned.
ReplyDeleteThe very first page of text, “At the orgasm research foundation…”, is that what was on the original back cover? I sure am glad the original cover art got included in this new edition, what a hilarious piece of pulpy sleaze.
On page XII, Michelle lists some old home video formats and writes that they “soon superseded (super seeded) all that.” I am unsure if she is making a sperm joke, or refers to the seed/leech lingo from the world of torrenting, acknowledging the fact that nowadays, porn is easily accessible online. Perhaps both.
She seems to be a great writer, often making puns such as talking of a ‘rabbit hole’ before mentioning Playboy, or saying that the book is ‘careful not to disturb the Matter at Hand’.
The only thing I failed to understand is why she writes of “guilty little turtles, all the way down.” We are the ones feeling guilty, the little turtles are way too busy going extinct due to eating micro plastic.
Like Apuleius, I also find her to be very eloquent in the way she deals with 70s RAW and this particular book as it could be perceived nowadays. We’ve all seen a whole bunch of criticism directed at Bob Wilson, but most of it seems to me to be missing his points entirely. Some examples recently popped up on rawillumination.
But being too male-centric in his writings definitely seems to me a valid criticism, especially around the time The Sex Magicians originally came out. That being said, as Michelle points out, he frequently warned against our own Belief Systems, always tried to update his own models, and kept on saying things like ‘I was such a fool ten years ago, and I suspect that in ten more years I will laugh at the ludicrous things I am thinking these day’.
We often see people saying “we need RAW now more than ever”, or “I wonder what Bob would make of the world these days”. Unfortunately, I have a sad feeling that if he’d be around and outspoken nowadays, he’d be misunderstood and canceled by many.
Here is the Sun Ra song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZavzVON4sVs
Is there a direct connection between Crowley/Thelema and Sun Ra? If not, with all due respect to the Current 93, I think it might be doing Sun Ra disrespect to link them together. For all the parallels that can be made between the two (all the Egyptian stuff, for instance), we should keep in mind that, as the spiritual father of Afrofuturism -and regardless of his claims of being from Saturn- Sun Ra was also definitely saying something about the very earthly Black condition. So it might be problematic to see him as walking in the footsteps of, or coming after, a white man who drew from a largely white magickal tradition. Even if Sun Ra also sometimes drew from some of those same sources.
In any case, Sun Ra is a huge favorite of mine, and I can only recommend delving into his gigantic output.
There is, though, some irony in opening a very sexually charged book with a quote from Sun Ra, as he seemed to be have led a largely celibate life.
I used to think I knew how Wilson would react to these times, nowadays I'm much more ambivalent. But absolutely, yes, the Old Man would have landed in trouble a time or three.
DeleteOne thing I love about Tom, the owner of rawillumination, is his journalistic objectivity in pretty much awll matters. He presents and informs, without bias, and when he injects bias he is very clear and restrained. I don't like a lot of the comments on Tom's blog, but I appreciate his even-handedness. I think I know what you're talking about with the comments, but as much as I hate other people's opinions, I am indebted to Tom's stewardship of the fandom.
And, at the end, I'm embarassed of drawing the comparison after everything you pointed out about Sun Ra v. Crowley. I'm going to leave what I wrote up as a testament to my ignorance. I really don't know much about Sun Ra, nor have I listened to him and his Arkhestra enough. I'm also going to leave it up so your comment stands in context. I have a very rosy-fingered conception of Crowley and often forget his shadow.
Regarding rawillumination, I was referring to a couple of pieces of opinion about RAW that Tom recently linked to, not something that Tom himself wrote.
Deletehttp://www.rawillumination.net/2024/09/philosopher-michael-huemer-raw-that.html
https://slatestarcodex.com/2013/04/03/against-anton-wilsonism/
The second link was posted on Sept. 21st, and had Oz Fritz reacting to both in the comments.
That being said, reading someone criticising RAW gives me food for thoughts, and I am grateful for that, just like I think Tom Jackson does a fantastic job with his blog. He helps keeping me in a RAWality tunnel, and without his daily posts my inner life would feel poorer.
I was genuinely wondering if Sun Ra had ever mentioned Crowley as an influence, since you yourself seemed to be saying that you'd seen other people link the two of them.
In their own very special ways, both Crowley and Sun Ra indeed seemed like complete aliens, relentlessly working for the spiritual advancement of the human race.
I have often wondered if there ever was a crossover between Sun Ra/Afrofuturism and Tim Leary, seeing how they were all concerned with outer space exploration (although perhaps more metaphorically speaking, in the case of Afrofuturism).
Even though RAW loved jazz music, I do not recall seeing him name-dropping Sun Ra.
And if you'd like to discover more about him, you could do worse that watching this documentary:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2il7XTq8Es
The feature film Space is the Place also seems an easy entry point, being a sort of groovy sci-fi 70s blaxploitation romp.
Yeah, Tom has a true old-fashioned journalistic drive to present all relevant points. I've been frustrated by things I've read on his blog, but he's always pretty nonplussed. In another life, Tom was a scandal-sheet or crimbeat reporter and saw enough shit that nothing surprises him in this life.
DeleteBut criticism is valuable and I appreciate your more nuanced take on the Sun Ra-Crowley connection. I think it might just be that people who find Crowley interesting find Sun Ra interesting. I will certainly check out the documentary. Thank you for the link. And Space is the Place looks like it is worth a watch. Always appreciate your recomendations! (I still listen to Graham Bond often.)
When it comes down to it, I am basically a nerdy librarian type. So if someone can discover something new to them that they like, I feel happy and useful to society.
DeleteMuch less obscure than Graham Bond, legendary Brazilian musician Jorge Ben had one of his best selling albums called The Emeral Tablet, featuring references to alchemy, Nicholas Flamel, Paracelsus, and even had a picture of Hermes Trismegistus on the back cover! Some fantastic studio work throughout, definitely worthy of being called studio alchemy.
May this be of some inspiration to you on your next blog post.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ketCiNMqayk
I love Jorge Ben! We are trapped in an amber of good taste.
DeleteI find the Sun Ra quote an interesting synchronicity, since I have found myself mildly obsessed with Sun Ra in recent years, and I just finished John Szwed's bio of Sun Ra.
ReplyDeleteI too love Tom Jackson's blogs. I find them invaluable, and I like most of the comments there.
What did you think of the John Szwed book, Eric?
DeleteI plan on catching the Arkestra (now without Marshall Allen, who retired this year after his 100th birthday!) very soon for a couple of dates on their current European tour, and decided I will take the book with me to read while I'm traveling.
I enjoyed the book. I did not resonate with all of it, but I feel grateful that he wrote it. At times he seems to wants to see Sun Ra as the forerunner of twenty different movements rather than seeing him working in parallel with other innovators. Of course, I love the AACM, so the little comments implying that Sun Ra began all the innovations of the jazz avant garde rubbed me the wrong way.
ReplyDeleteI did enjoy the Michelle Olley introduction.
ReplyDelete