Inspired by some divine foresight, I showed an hour early to the Believer Night-Time Event at the New School's Tishmann auditorium. The crowd showed up not long after. I doubt everyone got in, but while they waited, the throng pulsed, disbanded, and reformed, over and over, for an uncomfortable forty-five minutes. Confusion reigned over the hip, hip, hip scene as a troop of pale, nervous people with special red passes hanging about their necks wrangled the line. Eventually, after much agitation and doubt, we were allowed into the auditorium.
John Hodgman provided the opening remarks and established himself as the event's happy jester. His presence was a welcome sign of relief when things (presentations, panels) lost their pace. He led the audience in a recitation of the "Six Oaths of the Virtuous Child." From the banal to the bizarre, the oaths ranged from "I shall not waste the day" to "In my sleep, I shall smile with my sharpened teeth." It was an auspicious start.
Ben Marcus introduced Matthew Ritchie who then reinforced the pretensions of some, muddled the preconceptions of others, and left me wondering whether his entire presentation wasn't some sort of schtick. He rehearsed a layered exercise in post-modern thought, which was definitely interesting, but I strained to keep up with the many turns in logic. Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Einstein, Hitler, Dali, Pollock, Beckett, Smithson, Warhol, Ginsberg and their ideas were discusssed in passing, and all as a premise to discuss the influence of Ejlert Lovborg on the plays of Henrick Ibsen. Yeesh! Just as Ritchie was beginning the second part of his presentation, Hodgman cut him short with the proverbial hook. "What was that guy talking about?" Hodgman joked.
And so we laughed. The panel was next. Dubravka Ugresic, Etgar Keret, Rodrigo Fresan, Yiyun Li, and Helen Oyeyemi were prompted by the moderator, Samantha Hunt, on the topic of "The Secret Life of Secrets," which touched on politics, childhood, and identity. Hunt was the most loving, nurturing, nodding moderator one could imagine. She sounded exactly like Molly Shannon from the SNL skit, "The Delicious Dish." I don't want to talk about the panel anymore. Rushdie was next.
He read an excerpt from his last novel, "Shamilar the Clown." Now I'm not an authority on Rushdie's work by any means. I haven't read a word. But I sensed a certain complacency in the prose he read, like he knew it was good. Maybe it was, but it fell flat on my ears. There were a few moments when you could tell he was expecting to hear laughter, yet heard nothing. He smiled often, read quickly, and left without leaving much of an impression.
Donald Trump, projected on the overhead, then explicated the truths contained in Citizen Kane. It was funny, and Trump knows more than he lets on. Hodgman reappeared to conclude the evening and that was it. A panel celebrating the 50th anniversary of "Howl" was next, but I had had enough sitting and listening, so I left.
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