sotos

[simulacrum]

Gates of Janus gave me the impression that Brady was trying to fabricate for himself an all-powerful persona; an ubermensch, a cold-hearted killer without empathy or weakness, a daunting intellectual, a visionary, a man who sees the killer as a paragon of virtues man is too scared to see in the killer. His piece on Carl Panzram seems like the chapter he most tossed off to. He wishes so bad that he were Carl Panzram, and there's a slight hint of a sense of inferiority from Brady. He wishes he were as powerful and nearly unstoppable as he and not a man who exercised his IRON WILL and practiced his Nietzschean will to power on small children.

Sotos' piece should have been a foreword. He means to warn us that Brady's text may be outright lies or at least exaggerations; manipulations as would not be unlike a psychopath. Sotos reduces The Gates of Janus to child pornography. Nothing greater nor lesser.

You may as well read it for yourself. Brady writes not one word on crime or psychopathy as regards him and his crimes. His writings on the superiority of the killer, though, are so obviously written as to fashion a castle of grand illusion for him to possess the throne of. Brady drones on about his own superiority under the guise of examining the virtues of other killers. He lives in this otherness and uses it to define himself.

[cr]

Sorry, not really fits to topic, but maybe to the last few posts... Has anyone read "Face to face with evil - Conversations with Ian Brady" by Dr. Chris Cowley and is it any good or worth reading?

[HongKongGoolagong]

Sorry, not really fits to topic, but maybe to the last few posts... Has anyone read "Face to face with evil - Conversations with Ian Brady" by Dr. Chris Cowley and is it any good or worth reading?

No, it's very poor exploitative garbage with hardly any scraps worth picking it up for - Carol Ann Lee is the definitive writer on the case and the only two books of the fourteen or so which I have on the Moors murders which I would recommend without reservation are her titles.

What would be the most practical purchase next?

What would be the book you can actually find easily might be a better question. As you already know the books do interlink and the seeds of the  empathetic, broadly humanist and self-consciously intellectual later stuff can be seen in the most obnoxious and vile early material, and counter-intuitively vice versa somehow. Tick and Selfish, Little are important as bridge texts I'd say.

[F_c_O]

did anyone here have predicate as pdf? I think its time to ask here as my search queries to google has prolly caused enough alarms at nsa and local police deparment by this point.

[F_c_O]

it was just a joke but yeah, i couldnt find the pdf so it would be appreciated, heh

[F_c_O]

Understandable but on other hand, I simply can't afford to buy limited book for 90 euros at the moment and certainly believe that I am capable of enjoying the writing for what it is. There are always risks of having your work used against you, especially dealing with this kind of subject of matter in this way and in my opinion, one has to simply accept it. I don't also believe that any kind of financial argument can be made either, as when the material is out-of-print and only traded in second-hand, the artist  himself won't benefit from the sales at all.

[F_c_O]

Sir, I literally just posted a link where you can still buy the book for its original retail price rather than an inflated cost. And he can send it to Europe etc. He's really good to deal with. Surely you're asking for more trouble if you're writing in a public forum that you're after a scanned and illegally copied pdf, rather than buying a book from a private individual?

As I said, I cannot afford at the moment. And I do wonder, what kind of trouble I might get into? I am not first one on this forum, nor even in this thread, to ask things for download and none have been hassled for it before. Honestly, yes, I would prefer to buy it and have hard copy to read but alas, none can do at the moment. In any case, this seems to have brought way more trouble than intended.

[simulacrum]

Sir, I literally just posted a link where you can still buy the book for its original retail price rather than an inflated cost. And he can send it to Europe etc. He's really good to deal with. Surely you're asking for more trouble if you're writing in a public forum that you're after a scanned and illegally copied pdf, rather than buying a book from a private individual?

That post is from 2011, dawg.

[HongKongGoolagong]

Settle down, ladies.

I think I've mentioned before that Predicate is an uncharacteristic post-2000 throwback in tone to his nihilistic and cruel much earlier work - coming out with this at about the same time as the very humane Comfort & Critique may have been a deliberate tactic. The writing on the Christiane F movie in there stands out in my memory.

[HongKongGoolagong]

I know the blog you're talking about - it's a strange sort of unfunny satirical thing taking the piss out of countercultural writers etc that hardly anyone has heard of, with a particular focus on Headpress magazine - someone with too much time on their hands, I don't really get it - the books mentioned do not exist. Pseudonymous former Creation Books writer 'Simon Whitechapel' (whose real identity came as a shocker to me) is the obvious candidate.

[cantle]

I know the blog you're talking about - it's a strange sort of unfunny satirical thing taking the piss out of countercultural writers etc that hardly anyone has heard of, with a particular focus on Headpress magazine - someone with too much time on their hands, I don't really get it - the books mentioned do not exist. Pseudonymous former Creation Books writer 'Simon Whitechapel' (whose real identity came as a shocker to me) is the obvious candidate.

Go on then: who is he?

[boorman]

I know the blog you're talking about - it's a strange sort of unfunny satirical thing taking the piss out of countercultural writers etc that hardly anyone has heard of, with a particular focus on Headpress magazine - someone with too much time on their hands, I don't really get it - the books mentioned do not exist. Pseudonymous former Creation Books writer 'Simon Whitechapel' (whose real identity came as a shocker to me) is the obvious candidate.

Yes, who is it??

[simulacrum]

Sir, I literally just posted a link where you can still buy the book for its original retail price rather than an inflated cost. And he can send it to Europe etc. He's really good to deal with. Surely you're asking for more trouble if you're writing in a public forum that you're after a scanned and illegally copied pdf, rather than buying a book from a private individual?

That post is from 2011, dawg.

I ordered a copy directly from him last October for vomitgore, "dawg"... by all means, feel free to buy it from elsewhere for an extortionate cost if you don't believe me. Or, you know, you can just email danger@komabookstore.com and find out yourself?

I'm very tempted to order the remaining copies from him and sell them at the high going value just to spite inconsiderate people like you.

Lol. Chill, brah.

[simulacrum]

Please don't do that, haha, I'm planning on ordering. Off-topic, but I'm glad I'm not the only one tired of ubiquitous use of words like dawg, bro, man, dude, and the like to address people. Might as well get patronizing and call people chief, skipper, boss, or mack daddy.

Lighten up, cuz.

[HongKongGoolagong]

Bait is exhausting and very depressing material. As it's aimed at a wider audience than his own books, Sotos writes it in the more accessible style seen in the Gillis book, aside from a few parts where furious moral outrage and self-disgust at his own parasitic role lead to verbal contortions and curses.

There is a history of the background behind the book's emergence in which Brady's problems with the original Sotos afterword are given in full and the hitherto undisclosed involvement of a mysterious female record label owner is explained....hmm. There is a perhaps over-long section dealing with the 2013 tribunal in which the double-bind of Brady's current situation is delineated. There is a desire to trust and empathise with Ann West above all against Brady, and it ends with her words. There is criticism of Cowley and admiration for Lee. Brady is addressed directly throughout and if it's aimed at one Constant Reader, it's him.

There is a line in there mentioning 'Christian burial' which Sotos can barely bring himself to utter and prepares the reader for carefully: it's a heartstopping moment of terrible insight and an illustration of the places Brady's mind and stunted existentialism cannot reach.

Go on then: who is he?

Yes, who is it??

Put that up for a few hours before deciding that the guy does not need further publicity and encouragement.