Reykjavík Grapevine - 13.07.2007, Blaðsíða 4

06_REYKJAVÍK_GRAPEVINE_ISSUE 10_007_OPINION
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We maintain: Originality is the refusal to bor-
row anything you can remember as stolen.
No being is more pitiable than the arrogant
writer who claims ‘he only creates for him-
self’ while lacking the necessary means which
should enable him to spot the narcissism en-
capsulated in this very remark. As if all writers
are not mongers who pimp their own perspec-
tive. What is the value of a perspective which
no one perceives, a fire that does not burn, or
a prostitute abstaining from sexual relations?
As if you could write in a void, pulling yourself
up by your own bootstraps. Does anyone truly
believe that Münchhausen escaped the deadly
depths of the swamp by pulling himself out
by his hair?
In an attempt to engage your interest…
We have a few mates who we quite like to get
pissed with, but ultimately some disappoint.
They profess to write ‘for themselves’ but
eventually you get into dreary discussions about
the very basics and feel like giving them an
evil dressing down or chuck Fight Club quotes
at them: ‘You are not special!’, ‘You are not
a unique snow flake!’. None of us are; your
attraction to originality comes from people
reading your work and pointing out other
people who have had similar sentiments and
abstractions – as if this somehow is an insult
to your work and points scored; these people
are idiots for god’s sake, reactive shitwits!
You suddenly realise that these mates of
yours have the kind of faces you just want to
punch and that time is running out to get one
in: Smartness is just a petty form of power;
presence has so much more force than clever
arguments; character is the source of belief.
It did not spring from nothing that the Greek
mythology made the goddess of wisdom burst
from her father’s forehead dressed in divine
armour: One will always have to fight for one’s
‘truth.’
Writing is only about one’s ego and arro-
gance… Arrogance, arrogance, arrogance!
First comes the suspicion, then psychosis, then
understanding and finally that epitome of
sanity: arrogance! Love struck with the ob-
vious: I never forget to shit. It slowly dawns
on you: If you want to be a writer you have
to stick to your own. Give us an ‘and’ over a
‘but’ anytime of the day, though of course you
can never exclude yourself from the game of
exclusion. Why do we worship such automated
parsimony? Efficiently retrieved answers that
beg no questions? Occam’s razor as deadly as
its sharpness is sharp, the lack of plurality that
is its edge – that bleatingly whispered echo:
one...
Wondering about fictional ethics – what
fictions should we allow people to entertain,
and which should we censor? We can’t stand
people ‘correcting’ other people’s dreams.
There is a distasteful bitterness in the senti-
ment; how, and more to the point, why, do
people take pleasure in others’ misfortune.
We are glad that we suffer, it allows us to be
more human, which is to say, more sympa-
thetic. And what gives us the right to present
further fictions as the ‘truth’? Wittgenstein
put it elegantly and with characteristic brevity
when he cited “I must not cut off the branch
on which I am sitting”. Indeed. Perhaps we
should build a swing.
Here is a productive operative that could
possibly be of use for our aforementioned
mates: Instead of engaging in dull, dull argu-
ments, try to keep your will to publish the texts
alive by peppering them with wit and a sullen,
dejected and wounded but eloquently sarcastic
tone – a tone meant for ‘others’. Convergent
Evolution, though instead of involving genetics
you could cross breed fictions, explore meta-
phors, analogies, syntactic metonymic semantic
disparities that give birth to moments, raping
and pillaging language to conquer grammar in
all its static glory while paving the way to a new
and dynamic Rome. Have no mercy. Tear it
down brothers. Tear it down! Beyond left and
right, beyond up and down... Beyond beyond
to beyond itself. “Oh the wonders never cease
when you have eyes for this marvel!”
Arrogance, arrogance, arrogance! Sorry
about our arrogance. Not that you’d be bothe-
red anyway. Columns – probably due to most of
them being invented in business environments
where social niceties are as disgustingly ubi-
quitous as the average office slaves’ stupidity
– seem to demand such pleasantries, so we
feel compelled to say something of the sort.
So apologies for the apology.
Kind regards,
“Two men so miserable that they have
lost their faith and have nothing left but the
cross”.
On Arrogant Writers
(us included)
Text by Magnús Björn Ólafsson and Jamie Burton
Writing is only about one’s ego and arrogance…
Arrogance, arrogance, arrogance! First comes the
suspicion, then psychosis, then understanding and
finally that epitome of sanity: arrogance!
A French poet once wrote “A gray city, sad as
a tombstone with chrysanthemums”. To be
honest, these words might only seem like some
sort of morbid allusion, especially seeing how
nice the weather has been here in Iceland these
past few weeks. Perhaps, perhaps. Or maybe it
has something to do with the fact that I have
been sitting inside sick, fighting windmills with
my Thinkpad and pen as a sword. Or maybe you
just need an acute eye. However, I decided to
quote this line in connection to a conversation
I had the other day. This conversation also got
me thinking about the recent fishing quota
debate, which I am not going to write about,
or am I?
Because almost everybody has an opinion
on something, you bump into stupid opinions
everyday. For example, the Westman Islands’
most famous resident, and their elected repre-
sentative in Alþingi, wrote in Morgunblaðið that
fishermen know the ocean better than ocean
biologists with their fancy smancy PhDs. Slam
dunk there, Air Johnsen. The papyrus frag-
ment “Thought is common to all” has just been
proven wrong. Johnsen is a classical case of a
stupid opinion from an even stupider person.
Yes, I said stupid. Just ask any rational person.
He, like everybody in Iceland, has an opinion on
something, or what some call “this and that”,
which can become quite annoying in the long
run. Sure democracy and freedom of speech
are great, they just seem sometimes to become
eroded when you hear opinions that forego the
process of rational thinking. Although I prefer
that to the other option “In the end we shall
make thought-crime literally impossible, because
there will be no words in which to express it.
Every concept that can ever be needed will be
expressed by exactly one word, with its meaning
rigidly defined and all its subsidiary meanings
rubbed out and forgotten.”
So after this aforementioned conversation
I got to thinking, and this came to mind: “Go
home and write a page tonight. And let that
page come out of you – then, it will be true”.
Yes, the other day I was at the swimming pool
and the conversation led to literature and phi-
losophy. In what seemed a nano second, I was
asked to name a favourite literary quote and
book. How can you utter one verbatim ac-
count, like some floozy posing as the Sibyll,
from countless hours of reading? My learning
was shamed into a condensed form of trivial
small chat. So, here is my opinion. I hate it
when “semi famous” Icelanders are asked about
their favourite movie or what movie they saw
recently. It annoys me for many reasons: few
people second guess a doctor, lawyer or say a
financial broker. But when it comes to literature,
everybody wants to be a tour guide like Virgil
in the murky domains of the humanities.
Although with the onslaught of blogs online,
things have just gotten worse. Now it seems
like almost everybody in Iceland is digitalizing
their sublime thoughts on the online blog of our
famous newspaper, Morgunblaðið. Before you
only had to cringe at the readers’ letters about
the dangers of communism, immigration and
numerous other threats. Now technology has
made it possible in one short click for you to find
right wing theologians, illiterate housewives,
various schmucks, Islam bashers and others at
mbl.is. Everybody there just loves to voice their
opinion. However, in my opinion, not only do
you have to emulate Descartes but you should
always doubt your own opinion like clockwork,
every day if possible. I have an opinion too. But,
I am not going to rationalise it just so I can fit
in with the fringe of the blogging community
on mbl.is: Legalise drugs.
Interestingly enough, there has been a lot of
“talk” (opinions) suggesting there should be a
shopping mall in downtown Reykjavík. During
this weekend I actually did read an opinion in
Fréttablaðið that did make sense regarding
the matter. In the article the author managed
to point out the absurdities of the matter, e.g.
putting a shopping mall downtown or on the
Laugavegur is like putting a shopping mall inside
a shopping mall. She even asks the authors of
the supposed plan whether or not they would
rather see the old distinguished parts of Eu-
ropeans cities, or rather just go to the Mall of
America.
The thing that frightens me the most is the
fact that there are actually plenty of people
here in Iceland who prefer the experience of
shopping indoors to culture. People with more
soft-boiled opinions than sense. If they get to
decide, the city would not only become grey
– it would become a victim of base values. A
city draped in grey, decked out for its burial of
downtown Reykjavík. A fitting end.
Oh yeah, in my opinion the fishing quota
should be reduced to ten tonnes, because that
is my opinion.
My Opinion
Text by Marvin Lee Dupree
Sure democracy and freedom of speech are great, they
just seem sometimes to become eroded when you hear
opinions that forego the process of rational thinking.
Although I prefer that to the other option.
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