The Worker riffles through the pages of his black binder, going through the motions of preparing for his next meeting. After a moment, bored, he claps the binder shut. No need to bother with this sort of thing anymore. Success like his has its rewards. He stands quietly in the center of his immense office—his sanctuary—each detail of which he has personally chosen. Bright and … Continue reading Walls by Caroline Tilley
Something is rotten in the state of Britain. Well, many things actually. But the thing that’s taken center stage of late is the ongoing arrests of hundreds of people—mostly over sixty—for their support of the recently proscribed organization known as Palestine Action, founded in the apocalyptic year of 2020. Then again, every year since has felt pretty apocalyptic, with ‘25 being no exception. This year, … Continue reading Sally Rooney, Palestine Action and What Writers Are Supposed to Do (Particularly the Errant Few Rich Ones)
Politically timely novels in the twenty-first century are largely accidental. The novel business is slow, while the news cycle runs faster and faster. Despite our much-vaunted technical progress, the lag time between signing a book contract and the book’s actual release is longer than it was a generation ago, and compared to previous generations, the pace is glacial. (For instance, despite wartime paper-rationing, George Orwell’s … Continue reading Curtis Smith’s Deaf Heaven Explores the Hunger for a Moral Compass in an Immoral Society by Charles Holdefer
Perhaps, like the March Hare (a.k.a. Haigha) of Lewis Carroll’s beloved Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, we should all be wearing straw on our heads these days. For, during the Victorian times when these stories were originally published (1865 and 1871, respectively), this was a primary way of portraying a character’s madness. And, in case you hadn’t noticed lately, “We’re all mad … Continue reading How the March Hare and the White Rabbit Are Framed Differently Based on Perceptions of “Being Busy”
His daughter, Penny, perches on the piano stool, delivering an exegesis on being dissociative as the father sits calmly on the cat-clawed leather chair, gob-smacked. Fortunately, this ramble only comes occasionally, but when she starts, he sinks into the worn black leather until he is one with the fabric. Penny has been erratic since the summer before college. This included arguments that ended with the … Continue reading A Morning by Mike Lee
“We’ll fall into a chaos.” Renee’s tone is mundane, like ordering breakfast at a diner. I should not have gotten drunk with her, knowing the psychotropic medications she is prescribed and how ineffective they become under the influence, and how fucking crazy she gets. Yet she was buying, and I am cheap. The fields of regret expanded as the effects of the scotches I drank … Continue reading Theater by Mike Lee
In the following interview, The Opiate’s Anton Bonnici (AB) poses a few questions to Genna Rivieccio (GR) about her latest book (a.k.a. massive tome), Diary of an Anonymous Midtown Office Worker in the 2010s. The context of the book is presented as a diary that’s been found many years in the future by a team of archaeologists who no longer have any idea what this … Continue reading Anonymous Office Workers of the World Unite!: An Interview
Perhaps, whether he was aware of it or not, somewhere in the back of George Orwell’s mind, he was definitely borrowing from J. Fred Coots (try not to make the automatic leap to “cooter” with a last name like that) and Haven Gillespie’s lyrics for “Santa Claus Is Comin’ to Town” (or, depending on your level of properness, “…Coming to Town”) when he created the … Continue reading “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” As Inspiration for Big Brother
At the beginning of Only Murders in the Building’s fifth episode in season four, “Adaptation,” Marshall P. Pope (Jin Ha), the screenwriter tasked with adapting the OMITB podcast, declares of Being A Writer, “It starts with the look. A look that says: I’m smart, confident, worldly. Important, but not self-important.” (Riffing on the adage, “Dress for the job you want,” which means most bona fide … Continue reading The Enduring Cliché That One Must “Look” Like A Writer In Order to Really “Be” One
Out of all her works, it is in The Talented Mr. Ripley that Patricia Highsmith makes it glaringly apparent that, to her, the most liberating thing of all is to be a man. For it means the ability to muck about as one pleases. And not as a housewife, which was the only way a woman could loll around back in the day…even though enforced … Continue reading Patricia Highsmith and the Romance of Being A Man/Man of Leisure in The Talented Mr. Ripley
