I have a small Notepad
document on my computer with ideas for blog posts, and I look at the
short list of about four or five topics. “Hm, that one needs more
research.” “No, that one's out of date.” “I need to watch
those films again.” “...”
I realise that nothing
has caught my interest lately that feels worth blogging about. I
close the document and start looking for something else to do.
It's two days later,
and it's three in the morning. I should be in bed, which is obviously
why I'm on the internet. Half-asleep, I absent-mindedly go to
StumbleUpon, looking for something to entertain me. After about five
stumbles, I see this:
dear
tao
today i read a book called NATURAL SCIENCE.
it
had a picture of two ants standing very close together.
above
the picture it said ‘worker ants communicate by rubbing their
antennae.’
i
wanted to communicate with you by rubbing our heads together but you
weren't here so i rubbed my head against the wall instead and the
wall said ‘i'm sad.’
my
eyes made 3 tears and i pet the wall until we both fell asleep.
ellen
Apparently, it's page
13 of a novel called Hikikomori.
I go back to page 1 and read until I finish the book.
The
short letters between the two hikikomori (recluses), Tao and Ellen, documenting
trips to the convenience store at 3am, meals of fermented soy beans
and sleeping for twenty-four hours straight leave a lasting emotional
impact. Their conversations are tragicomic, sometimes surreal, but
while they are at times bizarre and funny, at others they are
painfully sad. Most of the time, they are both simultaneously.
Afterwards,
I have to Google the writers, Tao Lin and Ellen Kennedy (who have the
same names as the characters), and what I discover is just as
intriguing as the book itself. As well as having had three novels,
two poetry collections and a short story collection published in the
last five years (not to mention a number of online publications), Tao
Lin is also the founder of a small press called Muumuu House.
What
is unorthodox about Muumuu House is that they publish content from
writers' Twitter feeds and Gmail chats on their website alongside
poetry, short stories and other content. In addition, their website's 'About' page
reads:
Muumuu
House does not accept submissions for acceptance/rejection. All work
published on the site was first read on people's blogs or in emails
or on Twitter or other websites for purposes of personal enjoyment or
simply as work being shared among friends or strangers. Those
interested in Muumuu House are encouraged to communicate with people
involved with Muumuu House (commenting on blogs or messaging people
or being involved in some other manner) for purposes of friendship or
relieving boredom or having fun. Muumuu House strives to avoid
engaging in business-like relationships.
I
realise that the community of writers I've discovered is something as
rare and valuable as the literature I've just read. Lin, Kennedy, the writers published by Muumuu House and
the other writers on Bear Parade, where I found
Hikikomori, seem to
care a great deal about content and expression, while ignoring convention.
Noah
Cicero, one of the authors featured on Bear Parade, shares some interesting thoughts on his blog about the nature and state of literature:
People
who have gotten published at Bear Parade know that literature is
dead, it has gone the way of painting, poetry, jazz, sculpture, and
heavy metal, it is dead. But like learning that there no god, a new
freedom arises, knowing that the audience will never be that big
again, gives a new view on the literature, I'm not sure if Bear
Parade has a correct or incorrect view, but it is a new view, of fun
mixed with existential hell.
I'll
leave you with a link to Hikikomori,
and urge you to take a look. Meanwhile, I'm going to order a copy of
Kennedy's poetry collection and read some of Lin's other work.
Later~
