Q: I doubt that many editors and agents are traveling first-class.
Most of them are working stiffs, just like writers.
A: They aspire to leave the working stiff behind in a cloud of dust.
That’s what’s wrong with capitalism. Everybody wants to fuck his buddy to get ahead. At their expense.
Rather than looking out for the next guy. The other working stiff.
They don’t want to make things better for everybody. They think they are going to grab the brass ring by acting selfishly. By putting self-interest ahead of community, the common good.
Capitalism has turned America into a cancer on the face of the earth.
Q: European socialism isn’t any better.
A: Who says so? Donald Trump?
Mitt Romney?
Do you believe they are a disinterested party?
Q: You’re just jealous because they succeeded and you didn’t.
A: I succeeded.
I did it myself and I gave it away.
For 40 years.
Q: And you think Year 41 is going to be the payoff?
A: No.
Doing it was the payoff.
Doing it is the payoff.
I’m doing it.
Q: You’re in a rut.
You’re stuck.
A: That’s what Tracy Emin said about Billy Childish.
Marshall McLuhan said endless mental rutting kept us off balance.
Last year I read biographies of two of my favorite writers, Joseph Heller and Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
I was disappointed by both of them.
They had affairs.
It was part of the advertising culture.
Part of being a celebrity. A movie star.
New York is Hollywood.
Books are television.
The writer is a movie star, or a rock star.
The bookstore in the mall is the Gap and the Internet is the bookstore in the mall.
I’d rather be Nelson Algren.
Q: Jesus, if anyone went Hollywood it was Nelson Algren.
They made a movie of A Walk on the Wild Side and The Man with the Golden Arm.
A: He also wrote Notes from a Sea Diary: Hemingway all the Way and Who Lost an American?
Q: Conversations with Nelson Algren.
A: Every writer should read Conversations with Nelson Algren.
Q: You have a chip on your shoulder.
About being a working stiff.
A: Being a beat poet.
I’m proud of being a beat poet.
I drive an art car.
People give me the black-power salute.
I give them the peace sign.
This is for John Lennon, you fuckers.
Q: That’s what Colin Farrell said in In Bruges.
A: A great movie.
Q: Vietnam-Era Veterans for John Lennon.
A: Tom Waits and Iggy Pop in Coffee and Cigarettes.
Q: Iggy Pop was in Sid and Nancy.
A: They did it their way.
Q: V. Vale uses a picture of Billy Childish and Tracy Emin on the back cover of RESearch Real Conversations 1: Henry Rollins, Jello Biafra, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Billy Childish.
A: Every writer should read RESearch Real Conversations 1.
