Lee Hunts

It was inevitable that I would write something on the topic of politics and fiction. I hate the way it is talked about, because people are often so shallow in how they approach the topic. We are regularly treated to gems like, "Art shouldn't be political," and equally shiny gems like "All art is political." Invariably, I find the discussions to be particularly annoying and, at the heart of all of them, there is a rather obvious problem. They do not define what it means to be political. How else do you think people could be making such ridiculously contrasting statements? They have different understandings of what it means to be political. In this post, I want to unpack multiple senses of what it means for art to be political, and draw out the implications. What is Politics? I subscribe to a particular form of power politics, so my understanding of politics places power at the center. Politics is the set of activities individuals, groups, and institutions engage ...

I just finished reading House of Leaves, by Zampanò and Johnny Truant. This is a literary horror novel, and a postmodern novel that I bought probably over a decade ago, after watching a video about it. But I was quickly intimidated by it, and it remained on my shelf for that length of time. But finally, finally after deciding to put my foot down this year and read all the heavy books that need to be read, I finished this beast of a book after a month or two of reading. I didn't count the time, but it was a chore and I know that this is a good ballpark estimate. Borrowing the basic concept from a comment by Vince Gilligan, I did not enjoy reading this book, but I enjoy having read it. Let's explore what that means. No Spoilers Summary The inside cover description of the book starts with the following: "Years ago, when House of Leaves was first being passed around, it was nothing more than a badly bundled heap of paper, parts of which would occasionally surface on the Inte...