‘there’s a red house over yonder’ (grita liberdade)

‘well then, tell it to us, we will not repeat it...’ - the young couple out walking, a seaside tragedy, balzac.

so to celebrate the birthday of balzac (yesterday) horsemouth read a number of his short stories that he doesn’t think he’s read before; the atheist’s mass, the conscript, the elixir of life, the red house, and a seaside tragedy. he also read the wikipedia article on him (so all that type founding stuff in lost illusions was from bitter personal experience).

he also glanced at the introduction to l’illustre gaudissart that he has - but this is in french so horsemouth struggles to make sense of it (and yet it seems very foucault to him - un certain ordre de choses);

‘le commis-voyageur, personnage inconnu dans l'antiquité, n'est-il pas une des plus curieuses figures créées par les mœurs de l'époque actuelle? n'est-il pas destiné, dans un certain ordre de choses, à marquer la grande transition qui, pour les observateurs, soude le temps des exploitations matérielles au temps des exploitations intellectuelles...’

there’s more, it’s another huge machine (it’s one of those great coffee-fueled balzacian set-up rants). all of it in one huge paragraph ending - ‘écoutez le discours d'un des grands dignitaires de l'industrie parisienne au profit desquels trottent, frappent et fonctionnent ces intelligents pistons de la machine à vapeur nommé Spéculation...’ 

of course horsemouth can read it in translation online.

in red house (written in paris may 1832) a criminal is discovered at the bourgeois dinner table, what of it? - say the young man’s advisors, lawyers and aristocrats together - all property is theft if you look back into it far enough.

ben has been contemplating the current situation based on a comment in frederic jameson’s hyperspace essay (lrb, 2015). horsemouth did little with this essay but note that he had read it and rehearse some of the arguments until he was satisfied he had understood them.

now horsemouth (as you will have noticed if you have been reading these) sometimes tries to make sense of the current moment. broadly he sees it as an intensification of the logic of brexit, the replacement of a globalised neo-liberal order with a nationalised neo-liberal order. horsemouth doesn’t think this will get anybody anywhere worth going (except for the ruling class who will continue to rule) but it is in line with what the 52% who voted for brexit wanted.

otherwise the crisis merely accelerates what was happening previously - the movement of everything online into total surveillance. the replacement of the local and the lived with a boutique facsimile.


horsemouth has added a cape verdean revolutionary anthem to his current african music selection. in vanda’s room an old man now living in portugal listens to it over and over - soon they will clear the slums and move him to a new apartment block. the song is just the lost dreams of youth.