Breslau 1937

 

 

"Wroclaw not Breslau" doesn't have quite the same ring as "Istanbul not Constantinople."

Shade of Branches

 

 

 

 

 

This picture depicts solid, sturdy people who looked as if they could stand up to troubles and challenges. 

And the Hippos were boiled in their Tanks

 

 

 

Months and years after I first gained awareness of William S. Burroughs' (http://realitystudio.org/ -- thanks to Ray of Rigadoon23 for making me aware of this website) and Jack Kerouac's (http://www.dharmabeat.com/kerouac.html) early collaborative novel, And the Hippos were boiled in their Tanks, I finally rolled over my eyes it.
I also am working over Junkie, or the edited version of it, re-reading this one.   Guys, couldn't you have tried a little harder with the Hippos cover?  Based on the covers of the two above, which book would you be drawn to?

And the Hippos were boiled in their Tanks reeled me in with its great frame of Kerouac's and Burroughs' fictionalized self-portraits, Mike Ryko and Will Dennison.  Any novel with the title, And the Hippos were boiled in their Tanks, and which uses the same phrase in its text, is already commendable.  (James Grauerholz's sterling afterword explores the possible sources of the Hippos title, along with discussing the Carr/Kammerer case which inspired the central events of the novel.) Rimbaud and "Phillip Tourian's" New Vision pepper the novel's trajectory to its ambiguous climax.  Some pages I lost track of which author wrote which chapter, a sign that Gysin's third mind here germinated.  Burroughs' writing, while not fully confident and crystallized, has a characteristically darkly dry and funny quality.  "Monday morning I got a letter from a detective agency to report to work.  I'd applied for the job about a month ago and almost forgotten about it.  Evidently they hadn't checked on my fingerprints and the fake references I'd given them."  Kerouac's melancholy descriptions of New York and picaresque accounts of merchant marine matters hold great appeal as well.  World War II, always over the horizon, influences the work in a lunar, tidal fashion.

Reading Junkie again, I was startled by its magnificence -- one great observation and character description following another.

Lisbon

 

 

 

Someone sent me this card from Lisbon in 2004.  It takes some work to be that tired.

Oddities V (ca. 1983) back cover

 

 

 

 

 

Cosmic planaria god art by Roman Scott.

Oddities V (ca. 1983), Inside Back Cover

 

 

 

Drawing by Jonathan Falk

Oddities V (ca. 1983) page 8

 

 

 

 

"Hypostasis" by Steve Sneyd.  "Art World Oddities" by John Engebretson.

Oddities 5 (ca. 1983) page 7

 

 

 

Background by Roman, poem about the soul-lacking social Darwinist by Steve Sneyd:  http://steve-sneyd.com/.  The "ransom note"-style poem and the unsigned "tarantula love" poem are mysterious -- I don't recall who created them, if I ever knew.

Oddities (ca. 1983) page 6

 

 

 

Drawings/ Collages by Paul S. Colvin, Jonathan Falk, and Marc Myers

 

Oddities V (ca. 1983) page 5

 

 

 

Poetry/ collage by Roman Scott

Oddities V (ca. 1983) page 4

 

 

 

Poetry by Bruce Boston.  More info about Bruce Boston:  http://bruceboston.com/