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The Sex Magicians Chapter Seven "Time: is it real or illusory?" p. 56-63
Now we're starting to cook. The novel has begun its crescendo in full with the Mama Vibe being firmly manifested by Miss Welch and much of our company assembled at Sput's party. And by the end of the chapter Buffy Sainte-Marie's "God Is Alive, Magic Is Afoot," a recurring leitmotif in the latter half of The Sex Magicians, has put in its first appearance.
I took three things from this chapter when I first read it in 2012 or thereabouts online: using "Turkish tobacco" as a euphemism for cannabis, a fondness for "God Is Alive, Magic Is Afoot," and occasionally ending sentences with "...and all that shit." I'm pretty sure I've sounded as crude to people as Stella does to Dr. Prong, because there's a snowball's chance anyone ever knew the source of that charming phrase. Yet, in my opinion, it is both a concise and comprehensive way to end a statement. Really, I find Stella "Only" to be one of the best characters in the novella- her charming lexicon and shrewdness endears her to the reader. (And it now occurs to me I also took the habit of Stella's to occasionally perform pranayama while smoking, which does seem to increase the pleasure of Turkish tobacco.) All of this is to say: there's a lot to take from this chapter.
I believe that the Buffy Sainte-Marie appearance is one of the few times that Wilson, aside from a handful of references to The Beatles and MC5 in Illuminatus!, mentions a contemporaneous musician. I'm sure some of my erudite readers could correct this impression and I'm curious if it bears out. I could simply be missing some other references as Wilson certainly does spend much more time discussing and referencing classical music in his work. As someone whose musical tastes are rooted in the Sixties and Seventies, preferrably in the realm of psychedelia, I always appreciate when Wilson does mention something that's more up my alley. (I will also note that most of what I know about classical music is derived from Wilson.)
In light of recent events, I think there's something to consider in Sput's spun-out speech about freedom and the Pussycat empire. Sput is echoing Hugh Hefner's real-life libertarian bent while he speaks about increasing the total freedom in the world and getting rich along the way. When do the concepts of freedom and wealth start to contradict each other? Is it when wealth is steadily siphoned to a very small percentage of people while the masses struggle? Is it predicated on how you make money? There have been a handful of exposes of Playboy and Hef over the years since Gloria Steinem became a Playboy bunny to see what it was like- does a commitment to freedom seem more hollow when it is based on (at least some) exploitation? I'm afraid we're finding out that the world is far too interconnected for Sput's brand of philosophy to be taken to its extreme, and we just might continue to find that out until certain parties are persuaded to pay attention. Perhaps.
Also speaking of expenses, how good of a deal does fifty bucks for an ounce of premium sound nowadays? That's inflation for you.
So we end with another one of Sput's perfect orgasm-exclamations as he ejaculates into the mouth of Stella/Mary Poppins and Dr. Prong slipping from reality into fantasy. We're in for more smut and our meeting with the titular sex magicians as well as a great payoff to Markoff Chaney's cameo in this chapter.
On p.57 we get more of Dr. Prong’s sexist views in his complimentary way of thinking about Stella: “with her mouth shut and those young words not coming out of her, she was indeed a beautiful creature.” Man, this Prong is such a dork, and all that shit.
ReplyDeleteP.59 sees the mention of some Andy Warhol art: “one hundred Campbell Soup cans.”
I see those S&C capital letters again, and reality is about to seriously bend for most people present at this party, especially for those not used to get out of their usual reality-tunnel, such as Prong.
Although that’s probably just me, I cannot not think that “hookah” looks and sounds a lot like pookah.
Surely using one to consume “Turkish tobacco” helps manifest the other.
We witness Sput “making an Arabic gesture from an old Ronald Coleman movie.” (p.60)
I admit I was not familiar with Coleman, a Golden Age Hollywood actor. After a bit of research, I suspect that RAW might have been thinking here of the 1944 William Dieterle film Kismet, also featuring Marlene Dietrich.
https://letterboxd.com/film/kismet/
On p.61: “I am dying, Egypt, dying”, says Sput.
I looked it up, it’s from Shakespeare’s Anthony and Cleopatra. The full quote has Mark Anthony going like this:
“I am dying, Egypt, dying; only
I here importune death awhile, until
Of many thousand kisses the poor last
I lay up thy lips.”
I find it interesting that the word following the bit said by Sput is “only”, like Stella.
The first time we saw Sput coming (also from oral sex), he was fantasizing about the Attorney General (“you foe of the First Amendment”). Now he’s on about Mary Poppins (“you bloody English snob”).
Perhaps unsurprisingly, someone who already has everything, can bed anyone, and considers himself to be above the law (“[they] will never get past the voice print on the door”) finds the need to diminish and subjugate others further more in order for him to get off sexually.
Apuleius, this might connect to what you were saying, with RAW already hinting in the early 70s that this type of people simply never have enough, and that there might be a psychological reason for that. Maybe something to do with a lack of confidence, impotence, and misdirected anger. Sput might indeed be openly honest when he admits “I am uneasy and suffering from existential angst”.
Like Stella, I enjoy combining cannabis and pranayama. In fact, breathing exercises seem to me to make sense (or give results) mostly when I am stoned. It only takes 5 to 10 minutes of rhythmic breathing or alternate nostrils (without even doing breath retention) to end up bombed out of my skull.
Although I suspect that this might not be the case if I would not be going through the hard grind of sober and lengthier daily practices, or if I wasn’t already used to consume “Turkish tobacco”.
I’d be curious to see what other people around here have to say about this particular combination.
I have heard that ‘cannabis breathwork’ is now a thing in some circles.
Far fucking out.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnJYgBYAtuI
Interesting post. I wonder if Rawillumination.net will have a Schroedinger's Cat study group. If so, we will encounter a lot of this material again.
ReplyDeleteI like how RAW tricks the reader into thinking Stella's last name is Only by capitalizing "only" when Dill introduces her to Prong. I chuckled when it fooled me as well. First he has "Stella Only" then a bit later "Only Stella" leading me to add O + S = 130. The sentence after "Only Stella" is "No last name" (p. 57 last sentence). N + l + n (initials of "No last name") also adds up to 130. The gematria of 130 relates to sex magick, to comments I wrote last week pertaining to the concept of the Hanged Man and the N.O.X. formula. I'll let people figure it out for themselves by looking up 130 in "Sepher Sephiroth." If folks don't own a copy of 777 which has "Sepher Sephiroth" they can see it here:
ReplyDeletehttps://hermetic.com/crowley/libers/lib500
RAW also qabalistically connects Stella with Tarantella implying either some kind of shared identity, or indicating they might hook up at some point. P. 57 has "Miss Only" for Stella; M = O = 110. P. 58 has Stella "hugging Tarantella affectionately." P. 60 has two relevant sentences, the first: "And Miss Tarantella Serpentine"; A + M + T + S also = 110. By gematria 110 = "Resemblance, likeness" it also = " to embrace" as they recently did. The second sentence immediately following: "And you know Stella"; A + y + k + S = 91. 91 = "Amen" as in "not men". This also connects with 130, and the Hanged Man thing. My time is limited to comment further, but there's much more. I feel I'm merely scratching the surface. For instance, more gets communicated re sex magick by researching 91 further. RAW appears a cabalistic genius.
Sput's computerized door entrance system seems a prototype for the use of AI. Pretty prescient considering he wrote this in the 1970s.
Pranayama and Turkish tobacco seems a good combination. When I saw David Bowie on his Sirius Moonlight tour in the 1980s I arrived at the outdoor concert 3 hours early so I could see it up close. It was festival seating. I was by myself initially and did 2.5 hours of pranayama before taking one toke of strong wacky tobaccy. The strong psychedelic experience I had contributed to this being one of the best concerts I've ever seen. Peter Gabriel and The Tubes were the warm-ups. Gabriel was so incredible we didn't think Bowie and his band could top it, but they certainly did. I'll comment more later – I have something relevant to say about the hookah.
By the way, the name 'Ronald Coleman' should actually be spelled Colman. I replicated the mistake in my comment.
ReplyDeleteAbout the combination of pranayama and cannabis, I forgot to precise that, for me, not only does it give better results, but I also find it easier to do physically. I can fall into a rhythmic pattern that does not feel forced. It all feels much more natural than when practicing sober.
To comment further on Stan Sputnick: for all his seemingly liberated sex habits, and based upon what I wrote earlier, I would say that, in his own way, his sex life appears just as unsatisfying and charged with negative emotions than that of Prong or Joe Smith. Quantity does not equal quality.
For a book that might make some throw in the word ‘sexist’, I find it interesting that, so far and in my view, only female characters seem to be enjoying a healthy sex life. I applaud the sex-positive attitude displayed by Josie, Tarantella, Briggitte and Stella.
And I still maintain that, at least up to this point in the book, the only sexist bits from RAW himself were Josie fantasizing about another person’s emotional misery in order to climax, and Briggitte wanting to betray her own sister behind her back. Everything else (that I could catch) tended to be RAW painting a male character with sexist views, which appears vastly different than calling The Sex Magicians outdated in this respect.
Looking forward to read more of your gematria, Oz Fritz.
To expand on the sexual politics at play in this chapter, I find the bit between Sput and Stella worth looking into. We see a rich and powerful man, the host of the party, head of a magazine aimed at a male audience and featuring naked women, giving a half-baked rap about freedom and then publicly asking a woman to give him a blowjob because he wants to “live up to his reputation”. And she complies, ending up with his sperm (no relation to Moby Dick) in her mouth.
ReplyDeleteOn surface level, I can see how some could find this scene in bad taste. Patriarchy using its position of power to subjugate womanhood, and all that shit. Although Sput is technically asking her, not ordering her, he’s still kind of putting her on the line, what with everyone watching. She could still say no, and I doubt that Sput would care much about it. But not only Stella seems to accept more due to a carefree attitude toward casual sex than anything else, we also see her negotiating beforehand. She is in charge of her own sexuality, and even uses it to get her way! Talk about ‘authority and submission’...seems to me that the power mechanisms aren’t quite what they appear to be at first.
Similarly, earlier in the book Tarantella as a sex worker was depicted as entirely in control of herself and of her customer. Some might take offense at a rose-tinted view of prostitution, but I find calling all sex workers victims by default a tad too simplistic as well.
On the other hand, I still have to find in this book a male character that isn’t pathetic in some way. Perhaps Josh Dill, but his characterization seems pretty thin so far.
Every man and every woman is a star, and Stella sure looks stellar to me!
(‘Only’ of course starts with O N ...could Stella be somehow connected to the ‘Starbride’ from the RAW poem that opens Lion of Light? 91 = ‘bride’)
Synchronicity: after dashing off my previous comment I rushed to the gym for my class. "Let's Dance" by Bowie was played there. It has the lyrics: "under the moonlight, the serious moonlight" which became the name of the concert tour I wrote about yesterday. Bowie expressed himself cabalistically at times: "put on your red shoes and dance the blues," for instance, and more explicitly on the song and album Station to Station. During RAW's Crowley 101 class a rumor circulated that Bowie had attended a Wilson talk in the 70s. That seems around the height of both Bowie and RAW's involvement with Magick. To my knowledge, that rumor has never been verified or refuted.
ReplyDeleteI always appreciate all your comments Spookah, but am especially glad you brought up the hookah as it reminded me of a song called "Hooka Tooka." The version I know is by Judy Henske who was part of NY's Greenwich Village folk scene in the 60's and a contemporary of Buffy St. Marie. Hooka, in the song, sounds exactly like hookah and is slang for a hooker, a prostitute. Henske gives a comedic account of the song's history at the beginning of the video clip:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROb9CAdu4eg
Apparently it comes from Chicago's red light district and was sung by children to warn the girls that cops were around. Chicago, of course, is where RAW lived and where this story takes place. The first verse of the song goes: "Hooka tooka my soda cracker, well, does your mama chaw tobacca? If your mama chaws tobacca, then hooka tooka my soda cracker." The "s" and "c" of soda cracker play into this communication. Henske is a friend of E.J. Gold's, he originally played the song for me. Gold and RAW were pals.
If Tarantella only used her first name like Stella, then Stella + Tarantella has the same initials as Tarantella with her last name, Serpentine. S + T = 69, a number which can indicate reversal of identity, among other things. Tarantella is a hooka. The conflation of Stella with Tarantella suggests that when Stella gives Sput a public blow job then hooka tooka his soda cracker. The egotistical reasons for Sput wanting a blow job to make himself feel better, his feeling that nothing can change ("People are hopeless") and his ultimate identification as an "American" indicate the exact opposite of sex magick. This gets reinforced by Prong's line that immediately follows: "I have fallen out of reality into fantasy." Then we hear Buffy St. Marie singing "God is alive, magic is afoot" which seems the exact opposite of what's just occurred (69), or in other words, the possibility of real sex magick. Buffy - to do something in the buff is an expression for doing it in the nude. St. = Saint = holy ("God is alive"); Marie = Mary, mother of God in some cultures. Sput fantasizing about Mary Poppins also seems the exact opposite of what's happening magically (69), i.e. "Mary Poppins" also indicates an aim of real sex magick – Mary, as already mentioned; pop appears to occur when the alchemical heat has been applied long enough to a Soup Can or a Soda Cracker. That seems analogous to cooking popcorn. One of Gold's primary exercises is called The Popcorn Exercise.
Oz, I will have to slowly chew on your post as if it was mama’s tobacca.
ReplyDeleteA hookah is also likely to bring to mind pictures of the Caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland, a story in which the eponymous character has literally “fallen out of reality into fantasy”. Another Alice, B. Toklas, has strong ties to Turkish tobacco. “Have another toke, Doc.” (p.62)
I really liked the Judy Henske song, thank you for sharing.
You are quoting Bowie writing "put on your red shoes and dance the blues."
I will answer by quoting Prong: “what an amazing shade of blue.”
Prong then says “must be two threads very cleverly woven together.” He is looking at a pillow, but might as well be talking about sex & magick, or ida and pingala, or the DNA spiral. Or God (who had not been seen alive since Nietzsche!) knows what else.
Josh Dill spells it out for us: “I want to sixty-nine”. 69 can also refer to the zodiacal sign of Cancer, connecting to the Chariot in tarot, the Hero starting his Journey proper.
As for the Campbell Soup cans, the reference to Warhol suggests art. The tarot card Art (Temperance) reflects the delicate alchemical operations Oz talks about.
And when it comes to Mary Poppins, not only she’s obviously female, but also a magician. Has anyone here ever read the original book series? Like the Marx brothers, is Mary Poppins secretly a Sufi?
I have and made sure to read it to my daughter when she was young. Mary Poppins takes on the role as an emissary of the imagination and a form of Babalon in Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neil's League. Travers was very influenced by Gurdjieff and A. E.. I highly recommend her book of essays "What the Bee Knows."
DeleteCorn can indeed pop. So can cherries.
ReplyDeleteIn his biography, Gabriel Kennedy recounts how, back in the early sixties, RAW wrote an article called "Hugh Hefner is a virgin".
Good point, Spookah, re Mary Poppins doing magic. You'll also be interested to know that M + P = 120 as does O + N = 120 – On, which you spotted in Miss On-ly who kindles the fire for Sput's fantasy or sex magick operation, depending on how he's using his attention. Mary Poppins as a Sufi would explain a lot.
ReplyDeleteI knew someone literally said 69, thanks for pointing it out. The "Hooka Tooka" song as performed by Miss Henske also has a 69 trajectory in that the second and third verses seem reversed in spirit from the first. It helps to know that green corresponds with Venus. The last verse recalls Crowley, to me.
Yes to 69, Cancer & the Chariot; the hero drives the Chariot. Crowley says the Chariot represents the formula of the New Aeon. It also corresponds with Cheth (Hebrew alphabet) = 8. The same 8 in 68.
S + C = Samekh + Cheth = 68. Samekh corresponds with the Art or Temperance Tarot trump.
Bowie wrote a song about Andy Warhol on his Hunky Dory album. Both Campbell Soup cans and Soda Cracker describe food items. Food seems a significant facet of the 68 complex. Chapter 68 in The Book of Lies has the title "Manna."
I had missed the Shakespeare reference. We have erudite commenters!
ReplyDeleteHere is another reference: The magazine editor "Josh Dill" in this chapter is a reference to "Josh the Dill," which was Robert Shea's Discordian name, according to Adam Gorightly:
http://historiadiscordia.com/the-early-discordians/
I did not know Shea's Discordian name! Good catch.
Delete"Let's Dance" by Bowie makes me think of the song in Phil Dick's "Radio Free Albemuth". Phil Dick became obsessed by the film "The Man Who Fell to Earth" starring Bowie. "VALIS" deals with that period of Phil's life. I haven't seen that film for decades (or read either of those books).
ReplyDeleteAmazingly, I haven't read VALIS but have read The Divine Invasion multiple times. I love both the book and film of The Man Who Fell to Earth.
Delete