You're listening to the reversing climate change
podcasts by the team at Nori. The carbon removal Marketplace.
This is a show about the innovators and entrepreneurs
developing solutions to climate change.
Hello and welcome to the reversing climate change
podcast. I'm Ross Kenyon, I'm a
co-founder of nori which is a carbon removal Marketplace in
Seattle. Today, I have with me Daniel
becquer longtime friend and collaborator of mine from my
more Writing days, he's a novelist.
He's written books, like Abraham Lionel Lancet in the right Vibe.
You also do a lot of literature education on YouTube.
Tick-Tock Instagram, you can find on YouTube.
Off-the-wall novels in Tick-Tock and Instagram as Daniel backer
author. Hey, Daniel.
Actually I don't, Daniel did, I don't ever ever, they have ever
called you Daniel my entire life.
Hi, Danny. Hi, I transitioned to Daniel and
then back to Danny. So either, I what happened is I
was like to maybe too boyish and you want to go pro or So that
was on my mind but I had a boss named Danny and he made it
perfectly clear that he was the Danny and the room and so I went
by Daniel and my parents had kind of called me Daniel to
growing up so it wasn't completely absurd.
But then realizing that was the reason I started going by Daniel
I was like oh that is actually pretty silly.
I'm just going to be Danny now. So you have a bossy like
reassigned your name. Actually, he served as the
inspiration for the character Damien in my novel and I know he
will never listen to Ooh, this podcast episode.
So I feel comfortable saying that.
Wow, Damien also just has such context to it as well as a name.
I just assumed someone named. That is bad from the start.
Should I even think that? I mean there's the satanic thing
going on from set. The Almond is that right?
Who's the guy wrote Steppenwolf? Yes, Herman has.
Yeah. It's like there's a there's a
Damien I guess his father Damian who worked in Hawaii with
Leprosy, he was good. Something that's a pretty noble
thing that counteracts The satanic implications.
I think there's a you associate with Satanism has a weird
opening to the show 100%. I'm glad we go right into it
though. We wasted.
No time. Yeah, my priorities.
What's the point of this show Danny?
And I have been talking about how to do this for a long time.
We're both passionate about literature, I've learned a lot
from Danny. His novels are super fun and
play with ideas and really interesting ways.
Of course, we would be friends. And as much as I like more High
literary fiction and your someone, I associate very
strongly with sort of contemporary fiction, especially
like the postmodern fiction of the second half of the 20th
century. I also like genre fiction bad
books, bad books, where there are innumerable sequels, books
that are meant to titillate. You might know Jean Reflection
from things like detective, stories are quite popular for
this, where there's a whole industry around writing zombie
books, and zombie books were there, you know, 10, 15 20,
books in a row somewhere. Last apocalyptic fiction prepper
fiction which are like plays into fantasies about the end of
the world. Whether there's gonna be an
electromagnetic pulse that disrupts all electrical motors
and what that looks like obviously erotica is super
popular and super prolific, and I imagine quite profitable as
well, Danny missed opportunity there unless I have a pen name.
I don't know about romance mystery.
These are like quite Tropi genres, and the way that I want
to frame this show, is that there's a lot of sci-fi that is
high literary fiction. I think things like the parable
of the talents, parable of the sower Kim Stanley, Robinson's
Ministry for the future. Perhaps the most like high
literary version here, choose the road by Cormac McCarthy.
Some Cormac McCarthy is so impenetrably.
Difficult to read us often closer to something like
Melville. I'm like, okay, I need to
modernist close reading techniques to just make it
through this at all. I'm still not getting all the
meeting and all the illusion that is happening here.
So I try to talk about how long do I need to?
Wait for there to be climate fiction.
That is genre. In bad in serialized in such a
way. And is that how, you know that
climate change is saying that people actually care about?
Well I think that if you're realizing that there's a dearth
of that sort of thing in the marketplace than the name on
that novel would probably be Ross Canyon.
So there's an opportunity here, there's a vacuum that you could
definitely fill. I think a big issue with a lot
of serious literature is that they shook so many conventions
of what makes a story work that I find myself sometimes reading
more difficult books and being like, why is this 700 pages and
not to because when you have a plot, Not.
I think it creates a metric and plots aren't for everybody.
You don't have to like a plot but there's something nice about
a plot that you're like, oh, okay, it feels done now or it
feels like at the middle part or the beginning.
Like the I think the conventions are very useful and so I think
that's something that kind of Drew me to postmodern fiction,
is that they're very intentionally in dialogue with
more traditional narratives. And so even if they're trying to
subvert it, you often do get some sort of an appeal to a
traditional plot even if they are trying to twist it into a
pretzel. As they're going.
So that has been pretty much the thing that's got me interested
in it. Because as literary is the
stuff, is I like to read. I like something that does
entertain me, you know, I like to indulge in the Big Ideas and
important things about being humid, but part of that is
entertainment, and have only Park, even if some important
people think that were like finished with the idea of a
story as something that's meaningful to humans.
So I don't know if that answers your question, but I think
you're blind some listeners Minds right now that the idea of
play Lot might be old hat at this point, but I think in some
ways I think act structure is programmed into our brains for
what to expect in a story. To get the fuel fully paid off
invalidated for investing the time in it.
And I mean, I know you're big Thomas pynchon fan and you have
you read the crying of lot 49 ahead of this time before that,
I'd only ever seen inherent Vice, which cracked me up to.
I thought I'd movie was brilliantly funny because I
started watching it. I was like, what do people to
this movie's complicated? I don't get it.
Sort of a straightforward detective story.
He's going, he's following leads then like 40 minutes into it.
I was like, oh my God. What is even is there a plot I
remember? Did you ever read the
illuminatus books? The Robert Anton Wilson series
earlier but I have not Thomas pynchon is like the same.
I feel like and also I think they're both l.a. people I think
dish or at least their stuff is often in LA.
But in The Illuminati's books it's like all conspiracies are
simultaneously true. Even contradictory ones so
you'll have things we like I thought this wasn't all of these
things coexist at the same time and it's not really about the
plot. It's almost just about being in
that place in the hilarity of story and do stories matter.
I don't think I'm smart enough to understand what is trying to
be said by that pyncheons like this too, right?
What do you need to say this? So I think the criticism of a
lot of this experimental stuff is true in a lot of cases, is
that it can be just navel-gazing it can just be an author trying
to show off, how experimental and stranger they can be, but I
think, The standouts of postmodern fiction and
experimental fiction. Do a great job of subverting
stories and ideas in a way that feels very meaningful to
people's lives. And so for example like I'm
rereading V by Thomas pynchon right now and one of the main
themes in it is that myths are the things that guide people's
decision making especially people in power is that they
will commonly evoke a myth in order to justify certain
actions. Certain atrocities And
specifically, like a tenant of fascism is evoking a Mythic
past, so that's like pretty important putting that in there.
But then this kind of goes without saying, but these are
myths, these are not true, they're not historical
documents. There are stories that people
often tell the unreliable narrator is a popular thing in
many different literary forms. But especially in postmodern
fiction when they're trying to engage history and storytelling
and myths. They blur all of those things
together. So that they're saying that.
Like when we talk about the past we're telling us Story and we're
telling a myth but it's more complicated than just that
because they're also saying that this is what makes us human.
And so one of the main themes of V is that myths are made up and
they justify atrocities, but to get rid of them makes us as
inanimate as the material objects in the room around you.
And so his thesis at the end of this is kind of like keep cool
but care that you on some sense, sort of have to detach yourself
from the historical train tracks that you're on because they are
fraudulent. But at the same time you do need
some utilitarian myths, just to have a soul and to have emotions
and have a relationships with other people which people have
any association with post-modernism at this point.
Depending on your political background.
You might have set associated with criticism from people like
Jordan Peterson who are saying saying post-modernism is just
about the death of Truth and that there's there's sort of at
least two a cultural dead end of nihilism and despair and what
you've just said Struck me, as none of those things.
Where do you think that gets twisted along the way?
Or I mean, yeah, we can start there.
I think truth be told the criticisms that people like
Jordan Pederson have I think are valid ish, but I don't think he
gives a very charitable interpretation of it, because
post-modernism is a lot of different things and not a lot
of post modern. Thinkers necessarily agree with
each other on everything. And so it's almost like when you
hear someone criticize something without demonstrating their
familiarity with It you're kind of like a you may be right?
But like that's actually hours to criticize because it's
important to us, but I mean, post-modernism can refer to an
Era to a sensibility to anesthetic, sort of the cop-out
that I give myself sometimes is that I really try to ground the
conversation in art because I noticed that when people are not
familiar with post-modernism, the first thing they try to do
is turn it on itself is that they're already going meta
before they've even kind of mastered the fundamentals, which
is just a method of Questioning its questioning, some
fundamental assumptions asking the question.
What about the way we're asking? The question is determining the
sort of answers that are coming up, you know?
And I think maybe the super charitable interpretation of
post-modernism is that it's not supposed to be a comprehensive
worldview. It's a tool in your toolbox.
So and like a classic example is like what about the way that we
divide men and women influences the answers that we come to when
we ask questions about what is a man What is a woman and it
doesn't necessarily come up with conclusions, but it's just
asking you to say, hey, let's, let's take a look at our
categories for a second. What about the way that we've
created these categories, might influence the conclusions that
we reach interesting and if you take for granted the stuff you
said about myth as pretty core to post-modernism, you might say
the idea of what makes a man, what makes a woman or myths that
different cultures have stories that they tell ourselves that
these are not just inherently fixed immutable.
Characteristics. In fact, there's a lot of
culture that's tied up in here. And that how we engage with
those myths changes, the answers that we might receive from them.
Exactly. Yeah.
So I think following that thread like one of the classic ones is
that men are traditionally associated with dominance.
And women are traditionally associated with submission and
so they're basically just asking like, how do we drag that into
conversations, where it doesn't belong.
And so, like I get people's frustration with it because if
you are Are used to just kind of tracking a traditional logical
thread and you hear that like oh Derrida said logic is not
necessarily always great. Like I get why Jordan Peterson
freaks out about that because he's built his life and career
on this notion of objectivity which I'm you know highly
critical of on my Tick Tock in particular because I think often
people will use the word objective just as a rhetorical
strategy and even though I think we can come to some objective
observations about World. I like to use the word objective
ish is that at the end of the day, were always going to be
observing the world through the holes and our face and
experiencing things in a mitigated way.
And so like even though I understand why people think it's
very nihilistic, I don't think they've always actually even
read the thinkers that are associated with these ideas and
so almost talking out of two sides of my mouth, people who
are familiar with post-modernism sometimes get frustrated that it
doesn't have enough conclusive information within it but Again,
that's that's kind of why I like to put it mostly within an
artistic framework because most people don't read fiction and be
like, wait a minute, did this really happen?
Like there's a suspension of disbelief and I think that's
where post-modernism is most interesting, but I find arguing
about post-modernism is a total dead end and trying to make a
postmodern criticism of post-modernism is a total waste
of time, even if it's kind of fun, you know, you don't really
give what is the do this podcast now, man?
Because I got more time to fill. Well, I mean that's the thing.
I guess it's not a waste of time, but I just find that.
Usually again, the criticism that post-modernism undoes
itself is usually made by people like as they're learning about
it is that they're like it questions fundamental
assumptions. But what about the fundamental
assumptions of post-modernism? It's like, well yeah, but one of
their tenants is that they think that discourse is something
where you organize the parameters.
And so like they're organizing the parameters and Just for
utilitarian sake. They're like well, let's like
maybe not undo the discourse before, we know what it is, but
I think there's also a reason that post-modernism as an era is
considered kind of over in a lot of ways and like, meta,
modernism is, I think more in Vogue, in critical circles
because it sort of takes the critical incredulity of
post-modernism. But then is also like, okay, but
like we need a truth. We need objects.
And so like within that realm, there's speculative Some an
object-oriented ontology and they kind of take the Best of
Both Worlds. Is that they're like, we have
objects, both material objects that are like, in the room with
us. But also philosophical objects
of of conception, like within your mind and even though
they're like real ish, there's a part of them that's always a
little bit removed from us so we can't know them completely, but
we can sort of build games with them in a way that works for us.
I'm going to share with you in something that I've used to
Anchor by thinking for a long time.
It was this Insight was one of the main reasons that I figured
out that philosophy, grad school was not the right fit for me and
I've always associated with post-modernism but it sounds
closer to meta. Modernism frankly where I read
Nietzsche's on truth and lies in a non moral sense.
Have you ever read that? Well, I thought I'd love to
hear. It's a classic people.
Consider it. One of the like, like, Proto
taxed of post-modernism, where he talks about how every
category, every concept is a lie.
Everything is truly unique. Yet we are forced by how Verse
and numerous the objects in the world are to make sense of them
by grouping them. And every grouping is inherently
unjust, because everything is truly unique.
Yet, if you fail to group them in any meaningful way, you you
lose your mind because you cannot categorize.
And anyway, it's just undifferentiated mass and you
will drown your mind will drown. And in some ways that has made
like kind of like a more boring King of the Hill, Hank Hill,
kind of figure in my life. As we discussed, I'm kind of
like conventional. Oil in my life, where I used to
be a little bit more radical and interest interesting and taking
The Road Less Traveled. And, in some ways this
postmodern or even met a modern inside has caused me to respect
tradition a little bit more saying.
Okay, this is the product of thousands or hundreds of years
of evolutionary insight for what makes stable-ish light, that is
worth living. I'm more willing to trust a
given postmodern the tendency to philosophize with a hammer to
use another neat trick phrase that post-modernism gets called
actually in. We've made me like more
dispositional. He personally conservative
wanting a more stable, less artsy.
Anything goes kind of life. Is that might of modernism?
That is a fascinating question. The short answer is, I don't
know, but I do know that, you know, critics of post-modernism.
I think sometimes do gain that people, people notice it, like
Jordan Pederson and David Foster Wallace both who criticize
post-modernism, albeit in completely different ways, very
different ways, but yeah. Yeah.
And like, I definitely like David Foster Wallace's criticism
of it more because all of his work is postmodern bike as much
as he was trying to advance it. I think categorically, it's
post-modernism. I Wouldn't Die on that Hill.
I could hear an argument that it was otherwise, but but both
David Foster Wallace and Jordan Pederson during Peterson more.
So get accused of being conservative and of course, the
cop forger and Peterson is no, I'm a classical liberal, it's
just everything I say is conservative, but a little bit
more of a digression that being said, I find that Buddhism and
Text in Buddhist philosophy, tend to access some of what I
consider valuable about post-modernism but in a more
accessible and experiential way. And so sometimes the concept of
Dharma is interpreted as attachment to certain truths.
And so it's not necessarily that we're playing the game of what
is true and what is false but it's like what Notions of
solidity? Are you projecting onto the
narratives that you have and in what ways are you identifying?
With truths instead of just evaluating if they're true or
false. Because one of the biggest
criticisms that I have against like this notion of objectivity
is that it's just a lie, is that people are like I'm being
objective and my emotions and my desires are not influencing the
data that I'm processing. And then again, just should on
Jordan Peterson. One more time, is that like, the
Venom? Which he has begun to kind of an
act to the second part of his career.
I think demonstrates or of an attachment to certain ideas that
he has, then any kind And of, you know, disinterested just
stating the facts. So yeah, all of that is to say
that like I think that you know, people do need stability and
maybe where conservatism goes wrong as saying that everyone
should have the same exact kind of solidity that I have or the
same kind of stability that I have as an individual.
I don't think those are necessarily bad things to want
but when we attach ourselves to those truths and say this as the
Divine truth Or the objective truth.
That's where I'm kind of like this.
Just sounds like we're using our desires and opinions to
rationalize the data that we're processing.
Hmm. What do you make of the presence
of red herrings and pinch and that almost feel laid to
mislead? Like there will be people named
silly. Think what was the example that
most crack me up? There's a couple, was it a
memory boys? Oh, yeah.
Kevin gets Cohen is like a very, very funny combination.
There's like a bunch of things like that.
We're is it meant Say something, is it?
Because those words are claimed by cultures, right?
They have meanings that precede your reading of the book, and
it's meant to play with that, but I can't tell if it's playing
with it in a meaningful way or if it's just meaningless word
play. And is that is that
post-modernism? See, that's the kind of question
you end up asking and the then you become the guy who says, I
don't like modern art, I find Modern Art to be distasteful,
and that's not really. That fun of a place to be in by
also, don't know what it's doing.
Yeah, that's that's the thing. It for any one of Pensions names
that he uses it, I think is a coin toss that like this one
could mean something. This could just be a silly joke
of his because he is a very Whimsical writer and is
characterized as being very difficult and people don't I
think push through that difficulty to realize how
cartoonish and absurd it is. So yeah I mean for anyone named
it's very difficult to tell but the more I have read pension in
particular but also just other post modern stuff there.
Often is a Thread, that isn't always easily grasped on the
first read through, and that's a huge barrier to entry, I
completely understand. But when I first read this kind
of stuff I would finish these books and just be like, it was
cool. There were memorable moments.
I have no idea what it is, but the more that I have read them
crying of lot 49. For example, I think has a very
clear thesis that doesn't mean that every phenomenon in.
The book is easy to place within that he sits but yeah, on
subsequent readings. I think that there are
definitely An argument that he's trying to make.
But again, that argument is criticizing a traditional way of
constructing truth. And so the yield of this thesis
or the big take away from the book is kind of slippery and not
always easy to pin down, but it's there, you know, your
videos on the book are really good and taught me a lot and
also maybe appreciate the book a lot more because I watched over
me, I enjoy humor. There's plenty in the book to
laugh about your like, this is absurd.
Sir, does even make sense these this world is being constructed
in front of me is just hot nonsense and it has a realistic
comedy to it. As the same thing I mentioned
with inherent Vice to your like, does this mean anything?
Is it signals that noise who even cares?
The ride is fun and the same way to I also with capers are often
like that. Did you watch on?
Sorry? I have so many thoughts racing
through my head. This did you watch the Paramount
Plus show about the making of The Godfather, the offer?
No. My dad was just telling me about
this. I I know that it exists but I
haven't seen it if you like the Golden Age of Hollywood and Bob
Evans and that whole shtick it's good but Bob Evans is trying to
get Chinatown produced near the second half of the show.
And Chinatown I've seen a bunch of times, I have no idea how it
works. I'm like so there you slept with
the twin and then who the money goes to who's getting paid off
here and in the offer they actually don't know what
Chinatown is about, and no one can really explain it and it's
sort of a running gag. These, I picked up on it and
made me feel less dumb for never really understanding Chinatown.
And whenever I read or like brick the Joseph Gordon-Levitt,
the tiger of high school today. I'm like what even Big Lebowski?
I'm like, what he threw out a ringer for a ringer and there's
a tow and like, who got paid? And what woohoo do the Germans
even think they're doing in the thing is none of it matters
because it's all world-building. Just being in this place and
it's like a set of feelings and that's all that I'm left with
which is maybe a superficial read but I had that really
strongly here, teach me more about What is actually happening
in this book and maybe introduce it for people listening.
I mean, yeah. Nora is a perfect Touchstone for
this because it achieves a lot of what postmodern word does,
but obviously in a simpler more straightforward way, but you're
exactly right. Like, if you watch Chinatown or
The Big Lebowski, I think part of the intentional effect of
those movies is to, disorient you.
I've seen The Big Lebowski probably 15 times and I could
not accurately tell you what the problem is.
Thank God, this is such a relief.
Thought this is just me. Everyone else is watching his
loving this movie for decades and did none of them.
Get it either sounds like. Yeah.
I think the Big Lebowski is a perfect Touchstone for it to
because the dude for all of his admirable qualities without
being too, judgmental is dumb. Like he is not a bright guy and
he does not solve the plot like a Sherlock Holmes type who's you
know relying on his just unique sharp intuition.
The Big Lebowski advances, the plot kind of in spite of the
main character. I think that that is, you know,
what's kind of fun about that, but then what is, what's cool is
that, you know, pynchon was a big fan of dime, novels and
genre fiction, and detective, and spy fiction in particular.
And so, I think that's what gives his books.
So much fun at least from my perspective is that they're kind
of like a rump and a play on this traditional genre.
And so, with the crying of lot 49, you have a housewife who is
substituted for the smooth-talking.
Detective, who relies on his into, Tuition and wit.
And I think that at the beginning of the book, there's
like a very clear thesis statement about at a pub Moss,
as a character allows her to access the deeper truths that a
detective would traditionally suss out with a more
conventional way of assessing the truth and that it's the fact
that she's able to empathize with other people and see their
pain. And he beautifully did puts this
into an image with her tears. And that's one of the reasons
it's called The Crying of lot 49 is that she has a lens of tea.
Is that are always filling her eyes that seemingly distort, the
information that's going through them and she relies on this
instead of a logical thread tracking suspects, this that or
the other. And if I remember correctly, the
crying of lot 49 ends on a very ambiguous.
Note you get to, like, the crying of lot 49, but you don't
actually get to see the scene of them at the auction of whatever
lot 49 is supposed to. B, I might, I think it's
ambiguous. Yeah, yeah.
And one of the comments that I make in the video is that her
last character action is that, she has to sit back and await
the crying of lot 49 in her own story.
And I think I could be reading too deep into this, but I think
that this is a comment on her marginalization in a
male-dominated world. And I think that it's kind of a
bittersweet ending is that she gets to be our protagonist and
she gets to in some ways unravel this big conspiracy.
But then at the And in her own story, she kind of has to sit
back and watch the men sell property in front of her and
suss out this inheritance that was really supposed to be for
her and I mean, we can, we can explode this conversation in two
different Notions of the Oedipus Complex in ways, that that's
instantiated and symbols within Society.
But I think that more than anything.
It's it is a play on the detective genre and a critique
of scientific rationalism and traditional ways of constructing
meaning, beautiful thoughts. It's also possible Well that I
mean the Oedipus complex both in pop culture and also in literary
criticism is extremely old now thousands of years old and so
just just naming someone oedipa already, could be a red herring
or like, a misleading thing because there's so much meeting
already tied up in it. That's the most frustrating part
of reading pynchon is that like a special with a short book like
that, you're like, oh, I'm going to Breeze through this in an
afternoon and then like in the first line her name is oedipa
moss. And you're like, okay I gotta
hit Wikipedia for a second. Like I've got a I've got to
unpack this already and like a single paragraph will send you
on a little little journey like that.
I wish there was more play with genre and climate fiction
because today it hasn't been in the same kind of playfulness
that I long to see. Like, for instance, when my SNL
sketches ever. And I've never been able to find
a, because NBC is so stingy about what they allow to be put
onto YouTube. But there's a Kelsey Grammer
sketch when he was hosting and he was a detective and is one of
those like you knock on the door and everything they say, is some
sort of metaphor of it. The only metaphorical illusion
that he has is Burrito related to be.
Like she was, she walked into my office, like, a warm Burrito on
a cold Chicago night and it's like, Everything like every
single thing that he has his burrito related.
I won't get is one of the sketches that barely made the
show. You could tell it was like the
last 10 minutes and Lorne, Michaels is like, whatever the
burritos that just fine. I guess, I wish there were
climate books that approach this level of mainstream
acceptability because people read a lot of this stuff too.
I've even seen the effects on loneliness of people re watching
sitcoms. There's something inherently
comforting about re-watching, the office for the big The end
of time. And there's also a literary
version of this to with genres. Like one of my friends older
sisters, I sear on Goodreads sometimes and I'll seems like
she reads like 500 Mysteries a year.
I can't keep up with how many mystery novels this woman reads.
How much deletion can one person stand in a lifetime?
I'm not sure she might be over her allotment but there is
something that's having like the tropes that are regular rise
that you were just re-experiencing.
That is like really It Feels Like Home in a way and I write
fiction does not feel like that so we've invited.
David Foster Wallace has been reference.
I've been reading Infinite Jest for like six months at this
point and psyching myself up to read it.
I have a good time every time except for thoughts of all the
terrible stuff. He did to Mary car, you put that
aside and try to appreciate this Landmark novel its work.
It's not really like a fun in the same way that I want to
experience the familiarity of literary conventions, that make
me feel at home. I'm being challenged, I being
toyed Yes, and being subverted. I want to be subverted in my
free time. There's a line, I think on Parks
and Rec where one of the characters is like Sorry,
Charlie Kaufman people have work in the morning, I butchered the
quote, but it's something like that.
That like, yeah, I think it can be exhausting a lot of the,
hyper experimentation and whatnot.
But I think for climate fiction is that maybe it could seem like
it's making light of a pretty serious issue that we haven't
had closure on yet. And so like, I can kind of see
that there might be some Resistance to maybe parroting or
satirizing, the genre. But at the same time I would
love to see that especially someone who's like not as
familiar with climate fiction. Like the postmodern climate
novel, I think is is a super interesting notion and on that
note to I know that like William volman I think has written a lot
of nonfiction on climate and then also a lot of postmodern
fiction. So maybe if there's somebody to
do it it would probably be him. You got red at least be real 15
in or Roz with Z's. Yeah, I think I've read at least
one of his maybe to even. Yeah, wouldn't be something
that's nearly so highbrow or if it would be postmodern, it would
be. So, in a way that would be
playing with convention so that there's like there's an
awareness that they're playing with an established genre and
they're poking fun of it. While also affirming it
something that's meant a modern is what I'm trying to say.
I'm talking about genre fiction. Some of these books are like if
you take apocalypse fiction, these are guilty.
Usher's of mine, some of which are terrible.
Truly, some of them have politics that will make you want
to barf and you'll have to rage quit but some of them are often
quite good but they're often pretty Tropi like you know, you
know, broadly. What kind of character you're
going to get. In fact, most of these
apocalyptic books. Get just just tell me like when
you imagine who's the protagonist and apocalyptic
fiction series. Who is this person?
I guess kind of like a rugged. I'm picturing a lot of torn.
Link. Is that right?
Like kind of maybe a rugged person who has, like visible
scars, maybe like a sling of bullets across their chest
pretty close. Yeah.
I would say they're always like, like, recently former Special
Forces or something like that. So they have the best like,
absolutely super powers relative to the like set of skills.
Yeah, yeah, I can ask, ya, sneak around in the forest, no one
would see me kind of deal slit a man's throat.
Yeah. There's like always there's just
a lot of stuff like that as pretty goofy.
So you know what you're getting but current climate fiction
hasn't had that as far as I know if you're listening still at
this point and you like literature, is there something
out there that is about regular people trying to survive in a
climate change world. That is not, I don't know the
mystery for the future. It's a really interesting book
on this but is also not heavily serialized.
The kind of books that people consume one after the other
page, Turner kind of deal. That's, that's what I'm Can for
as I'm always looking for something less serious.
Unless our see that what you describe as for upsetting?
Yeah, I mean I would assume it's a newer genre to write.
So I think there's definitely still time and if it hasn't been
clear, I'm obviously pressuring you to fill this void by writing
this. This book that you would like to
see in the world, I'm too goofy. I would write the version that
was like too self-aware. Like one of the scripts we were
working on back in the day as like, The most like
intentionally fourth wall breaking just like satire of
rom-coms and, and you're like that or maybe you told me about
it. Iíve read.
One of your scripts that I feel like felt very aware.
Yeah. And like, there's pluses to that
to us kind of a commentary on how, like, at this point in
Humanities life, everything is a reference to something else in
there. Isn't a whole lot of unmediated
experience, like everything has a link to some book.
The movie or TV show that you can reference your life is just
if you read old books in the pre-modern or even just early
modern era, there's not a lot of like, oh, have you read this
book? Have you seen the latest season
of Six Feet Under? You know, like there's like not
a lot but I feel like maybe read a book about contemporary
humans. It's like it's like 90% of what
we even talked about. Yeah, it's complicated.
I think that's one of the issues for fiction writers today and
there's a lot of discourse about this on the internet of like Are
you being unrealistic for not including social media in your
fiction or acting if you do? Because I don't do it not as
like a rule but like I can't see myself writing down the word
Tick-Tock in a story that I write and pulling it off in any
kind of way that I would want to read a story like that.
And so I do have to kind of contrived these stories to be
like a little bit less realistic than they are because like I
just don't want to read a book about somebody on their phone.
I'm sure someone's done a good job at that.
I've seen it if they've gotten better up, the trying it and
visual media recently where to like pop up on the screen, the
sound will in this like little bubble.
It's even that though. It seems smarmy.
They're like oh look at us like truly.
It is the modern era, you know, like I don't know, maybe that's
just me. But like maybe the first time I
saw it cause I know what house of cards they would do that a
lot. Or they're like, really the
first time that it was like, really big.
Yeah. I think you're right.
Yeah, that's the first time I remember seeing it anyway, and
like, I remember, A kind of being like cool but also kind of
like no. Thank you at the same time it
definitely felt novel. Yeah I like the old-school way
of watching like Tony Soprano. Have to drive to a payphone.
Found a deal. Yes.
But why do I think that though? Because my life is not like
that, is it just because I've been trained through the way
that we experience media that real real stuff happens on Via
voce. Like, we're like, what why do I
think that? Why can't real life happen?
Digital age. I think this might be connecting
us counter to what we were talking earlier.
Just about like the kind of loss of utility of stories is that,
you know, I think this is kind of a cliche criticism now, but
with how much technology and social media we have were not as
active. And the traditional idea of
like, you know, the hero's journey, you go on.
You have to fight the monster not just to kill the monster but
to kind of learn something about yourself and and to uncover some
sort of truth that's like in the bun.
That you bring back to the community and I think in a very
real way, the bun is just a few keystrokes away like any any
question that you might have and then to like I think there's
just like a growing distaste for that entire process of like,
having to go on a journey to find something out.
I think even Beyond just, like laziness.
I think that we've sort of like, criticized, that cycle to death
more than anything. The problems that plague us
people consider very Eric even hard, right?
Winger Source ideating like citing major institutions to be
the source of their problems. They obviously have a totally
different angle than the more left perspective, but I think
that there is this sense that we, like, we already figured it
out. It's just a matter of these
problems being too big for us to surmount.
I'm kind of kind of spitballing to.
That's what comes to my mind. You think we no longer as a
civilization or culture believe that individual progress is
Meaningful That's your taste, I think so.
You know and like it's something I struggle with for myself and
just in conversations with different friends is that it
seems like the more aware you are of the problems that plague
Society. The less confident you are.
That anything can be done about them.
And so maybe this relates to the climate fiction thing too, is
that and you obviously know much more about this than I, but
like, I think a lot of people are super depressed about it.
There's climate anxiety. It's, I think maybe a little
harder to tease out a light-hearted narrative when
they're like, oh, You were ruining the world and the people
responsible are in control of these enormous Industries, or
maybe it's not even the people responsible, it's the industries
themselves. It's a runaway machine, that was
started by people, that are long dead.
And so my gut tells me, I don't want that to be the end of the
conversation, but I think that does explain a lot of the
paralysis and like, unwillingness for people to
engage in individual Pursuits. Well, there's a big story that
happened a couple of years ago, and I can't speak.
With certainty on exactly how it played out.
But the idea that the carbon footprint was a corporate
invention to take scrutiny off of Corporations, and to get
people to think about their own liability, climate wise and to
have them stop, criticizing oil and gas.
And I'm pretty sure that has been pretty well validated this
point, but I can't say with certainty that it is.
And so it could be the case. That maybe we do believe that
actually what you do, as an individual doesn't really
matter. Like, sure you can sort your
recycling Better. You can fly last but like if the
Earth is going to collapse, anyways, like why even bother?
I think you're right. I don't know that we could say
it's a fully explanatory solution that you're posing but
it's in the cultural mix for sure.
Yeah. Well what it makes me think of
two and I've made a lot of tick-tocks about this is that I
think people have a tendency to jump to the most massive scope
in any conversation and so like, I like to Make talks about the
importance of community that just like, as an individual,
it's important to find a community that you love and that
loves you super hard. Might take your whole life, but
that's like a worthy Pursuit and people immediately will say,
well, and I mean until capitalism's over, it's not
really possible. It's like, well, you're not
wrong, like capitalism does make it very difficult to form
communities and especially like, if you're fighting for your
life, paying rent, and buying food, but at the same time, I
noticed that we take Small individual problem, and
immediately blow it up to the most massive way to think about
it. Is that the only way to approach
this conversation is on a massive scale with huge
statistics and analyzing major institutions.
And this makes sense because you want to be accurate, but I
characterize this in line of Lancet in the right Vibe.
My second novel as like, taking a bird's-eye view of everything
that people think what truth is is to sort of like, remove the
individual. And only look at everything and
a huge. Text and there are different
applications of this that it's like oh if you're an artist, you
explain that story to yourself in terms of Fame that if you
even say, you don't want to be famous and almost sounds like
you're creating a self-defense story or not.
So, you're, you know, defending yourself by not actually going
for it. And just saying, I don't
actually want that where it's like, you can vary validly not
want to be famous and still enjoy your artistic career and I
just think there's countless examples of it is that people
scope is often too big and then they justify doing.
I think because like oh the only way to do something is to do it
at scale which is funny because you can't ever achieve scale.
If you don't start with what's right in front of you and the
funniest part of this critique is that it almost sounds like
Jordan Peterson saying you have to clean your room.
First before you both are called, try to change society.
So like I want to I want to call that out that as that's not what
I'm saying, but I think people go to big picture too soon.
It's not literature inherently personalizing.
You have to write about characters that people care
enough to stick with for several hours.
Hours and this is small. Literature is almost inherently
small and stories that don't do this.
I often associate with things like science fiction, which they
often come from a place where they have a theme or World.
They want to create an Explorer would if we all lived on Mars.
And and it was an anarchist Mars, by the way, rather than
rather than someone coming out at the other, the other end of
the telescope and saying, like, oh, I have an idea for a
character. It's like, it's like a mixture
of some of my, the traits of my Ensign like what they would do.
Under these circumstances, I have such a strong vision of who
this person is and what it's like for them to be in the
world. Those are two entirely different
ways of being an author and are probably several more.
Additionally, but do you agree that literature just has a
personal touch right at its best, it should come from a
place of character? I think so.
Yeah. I you could probably show me an
example of something that doesn't do that.
And it's very funny of books that are like, exploring worlds
to. It doesn't always, but the
literature that I like love the most.
It's because it comes from a place of character.
I think the first book that I had this with was Anna,
Karenina, I told you about, where's Leo III?
Like, I feel so much so strongly towards Anna, and count vronsky
and then Karen into all these people.
My God, I feel like, I'm all of these people simultaneously and
that to me was a Sublime achievement that has been very
rarely matched. Yeah.
Seth, Rogen of all people has an interesting Insight on this, is
that like amateur writers will often make a blank main
character because they want everyone to relate to it.
And so, Name it like John every man and the funny thing is that
like I mean obviously you know, unless you're a very talented
writer, it's probably not going to be very good, but he said
that one of the things that he discovered was the more
particular you make the character, the more Universal.
It feels because need to have an individual in order to like
project yourself onto or two like evoke those Universal
qualities. And so sometimes like as a
writer, you're almost doing the audience's work for them, by
trying to make it super. Universal.
When really your job should be, to make it particular, choose
your world, choose your details. Don't make it so abstract.
And then the reader will bring that to the table, they will see
themselves and they will see the whole universe within those
particular. He's that you chose so insofar
as we're trying to figure out how to write climate.
Genre fiction, low fiction here. Did you ever play that game this
war of mine? No, never heard of it actually.
I don't know to what degree you're a gamer but it's really
amazing storytelling. It's based on this.
Siege of Sarajevo and you're not, it's the only war game I've
ever played where you weren't actually a soldier trying to
kill as many people. It's just surviving like
Scavenging, resources. Trying not to get hit by a
sniper. Like if someone there are cases
where to put you into scenarios, where you can try to save
someone, who's about to be abused by a paramilitary
soldier. It can go badly, you can end up
harmed or killed and then what happens with people who live in
your house now that you didn't come home that night from
Scavenging and like their emotional lives.
That understand. How do you do that?
It's really, really successfully.
Beautiful storytelling. That's something.
There's nothing else quite like that.
I feel like, if you were going to write genre fiction of
climate and you would presuppose that, the world is going through
hard times, you would want to write it in such a way as that
it doesn't have to be nearly so dramatic because not all things
related to climate change, severity will be nearly.
So extreme the some, in some cases truly will, but that's the
kind of humanizing that I think tells a good climate story.
Re that is not abstract. It's not polar bears, it's not
parts per million but it's about individual lives and
tribulations. I think that's where it would
need to go. I think you're right.
Yeah, well, it's making me reflect on that.
That. It's like it.
Yeah, it is, it is kind of hard to personalize a problem that it
doesn't have a lot of personal experience to it.
It's like, obviously there are different natural disasters that
are being attributed to climate change today.
So there's always that angle. But like I think for your
average Person in the suburbs in the midwest, even if they
believe in climate change. It's not a very in-your-face
problem for them. So like evoking, those
particularities might pose a challenge.
Unless you go straight apocalypse for out that like
we're fast forwarding to collapse knock on wood.
But that's I think how you would maybe create more of a genre
tailless to make it like more of a personal experience for that
protagonist. There's also so there's so much
apocalyptic fiction to it's just I don't see any of it being
climate or a Did I wonder if part of its politics?
Because a lot of the survivalists literature is quite
right wing. I've rented a couple of bikes
started. A couple.
We're all here dog whistles. I'll be like what was that last
thing he said was like I'm pretty sure I know where this is
going. And there's a lot that are just
you could just tell are written by quite lonely men.
Lonely men in bunkers are writing bad, books out there.
I'm unsurprised to learn this now.
Yeah, there's actually like so. Best zombie books are written by
a woman in Oregon that I've read where I felt like they had
actually like really developed characters relative for the
genre and was pretty impressed by, but it was such a, in some
ways, it's such a low bar, you're like, oh, it's not just
like a Gruff, former Special Forces Soldier trying to save,
everybody. Oh, it's someone who actually
has doubts and concerns and fears and mixed emotions about
things. Wow, that's pretty.
T. It's a little bar, isn't it?
Kind of maybe I should write this.
Maybe I could have a people care about climate change.
Would they want to read a series like this?
I don't know. Well yeah, because like a
specially at I'm not as familiar with this style or the genres
much but like from what it sounding like is this a little
bit of like wish-fulfillment on the author's part that people
time. Many of these people will be
disappointed. If an EMP does not destroy all
cars pass 1978 or whatever, that's Vibe that I get and you
know I mean I don't think that's the worst thing in the world.
It kind of makes me think of the onion headline that it's like
man imagines himself to be four times as effective in a fight as
he actually, I'm terrible at remembering funny things.
When I try to reproduce them. The great.
I know the one you're talking about.
Yeah, yeah, but but yeah, I mean that's kind of what it strikes
me as but then I think that that's ripe for parody to my
head immediately goes to like Tropic Thunder that.
Yeah. The like special forces guy but
they're really kind of Cetera is in the performance of the vet
and acting weirder than that, character type of General.
So yeah, I think there's a lot of want to play with there, for
sure. Maybe I should it sounds fun,
although writing, projects are so.
So did we ever watched diversity that like that Hamlet to clip
from when he's trying to write Hamlet to when he was like
crying? Yeah, he's like crying it.
Like the beauty of it and like layer to that movie as you, are
you too? And I love like the cut.
After he's crying and he's looks at his cat.
And goes who the hell do you think you are?
Yeah, he's like walking around with their shirt and like no
underwear on like playing on like a like a handheld keyboard
be like yeah that's writing. I've always felt like on the
brink of Madness writing a large project.
Oh 100%. I think I think that is part of
the fun and I have definitely cried while writing something
before. I'm not saying that it was good
but like yeah I think you do. Kind of have to work yourself up
into different places and and mind that in a lot of ways.
One of the other series I read, I gave up on it, but it was very
much like being a boat bum in South, Florida.
And it was basically like an extended Jimmy Buffett song.
So, if you were a fan of anything, Jimmy Buffett,
absolutely not. You could just exist in that
world where you're like kind of a Smuggler but you're not like
one of the mean like cartels Smugglers, you're like one of
the cool. Like Hawaiian shirt guys, just
trying to make a little like dirt bag, a living.
There's something about it that I was really comforting and also
quite they're gonna be a better word than John.
Ray is just is just rho p and repetitive but good anyways
something I gotta write this now is that where we're headed?
Are we agreed? Yeah, I think so.
I expected on my desk in two weeks get going.
Yeah, good grief. Well I'm actually happy, we Talk
about climate stuff, nearly enough, I think.
And hopefully, you know, how do you intend this?
Post-modernism meta. Modernism, a whole bunch of
weird literary ramblings. I hope you enjoy it.
I think it's safe to say that there's nothing else like this
in the entire climate podcasting space.
So For Better, or For Worse, it now exists.
Well, yeah, I'm glad to be a part of it.
Thanks for calling me up. We I think we planned this
initially maybe two and a half years ago so I'm glad we made
good. I'm glad we made good too.
Well thanks for being on the show.
Hey thanks for listening. Hope you enjoyed this show.
It was a fun one, an oddball one and one that is near and dear to
my heart. If you like what we're doing
here. I don't know if your app has a
rating service on it but many of them do a podcast, does Spotify
give us a great rating and review.
Help us get this out to more people and thanks so much for
listening. Thank you so much for listening.
If you could, please subscribe and give us a great rating and
review on Apple podcast or a rating on.
On Spotify that be much appreciated.
It helps us get our content out to more people.
You can sign up for our newsletter at nor e.com, follow
us on social media and we will catch you next time.