ISSUE 6 | JUL 2011
MAKING AN EXIT
Michael Kinnucan
Self-Destruction as Spiritual Practice
what a history of ethics must seek out - her corpse; fingers, feet, elbows and eyelashes were shipped - « or by heavy rain, when the Lord waters » - antinomies of the Counter-Reformation - despite the nothingness of the world
Eliza Rose
The Empty Stadium
a critical game of ping-pong - Muskeljudentum - the Ostjude - Zishe Bartbeit, the « Strongest Man in the World » - a new species for a new territory - a devastating suicide letter - en masse eurythmics - « imagine a door, a good old door » - « six million Jews found alive in Argentina » - the paralysis of pity - a skyline of empty sports stadiums
Allison Howe
Leaving in Style
why doesn’t she leave as a chicken - disheveled or drunk versions of the attendees ducking into cars and going home - showing off that torn dress - John Wilkes Booth - « you’ll pay for the lack of Cool Ranch Doritos! » - his general incompetence and lack of participation no longer matter - run, run as fast as you can
Eric Noah Feldman
No Second Chance at a Last Impression
a morbid little man - the wittiest corpse within earshot - the prepubescent sons and daughters of Abraham would run screaming for cover - « I've had 18 straight whiskies… I think that's the record » - another hundred years to workshop my ultimate quip
Austin Gross
Open Ends
the sign-character of waving - that exceptional recipient, puzzled or cautious, pointing to herself, mouthing, « Me? » - the famous cat who looked at the moon - another line in a thousand-page register - « And we will keep doing it. Back and forth. With the same poop. Forever. » - how can a thread of bubbles be cut? - vampire boyfriend watches like it’s porn
David Richter
Exiting Somewhere: Sofia Coppola and the Excess of Bourgeois Asceticism
It is the stillness that the rich attempt to escape - metabolism - Nietzschean master morality—when attempted - neurotic anxieties and violent outbursts - a gap that takes the outward appearance of waste - « deep » Oedipal dramas - upper-class Bartlebies - bourgeois ascetic values - the ascesis of celebrity