#leavingtheatochastation

[houseofthought]

#saluarchive 2012 development work for Leaving the Atocha Station by Ben Lerner published by Granta Books in the U.K. & @coffeehousepress in the US. We appropriated #thegardenofearthlydelights and laboriously ran it through altered perception. #benlerner #leavingtheatochastation #art #classicart #adobe #process #hieronymusbosch #reality #futureart #digitalartist #glitch #trip #tripart #tripping #photoshop

[scootwashere-blog]

On the highway to Toledo we passed several tour buses full of what looked like Americans, digital cameras already in hand, and as we drew past them I expressed infinite disdain, which I could do easily with my eyebrows, for every tourist whose gaze I met. My look accused them of supporting the war, of treating people and the relations between people like things, of being the lemmings of a murderous and spectacular empire, accused them as if I were a writer in flight from a repressive regime, rather than one of its most fraudulent grantees. Indeed, whenever I encountered an American I showered him or her with silent contempt, and not just the loud, interchangeable frat boys calling each other by their last names, calling each other fags, and the peroxided, inevitably miniskirted sorority girls spending their junior year abroad, dividing their time between internet cafés and discotecas, complaining about the food or water pressure in the households of their host families, having chosen Spain over Mexico, where Cyrus was, because it was safer, cleaner, whiter, if farther from their parents’ gated communities. I had contempt not just for the middle-aged with their fanny packs and fishing hats and whining kids, or the barbate backpackers who acted as though failing to shower were falling off the grid; rather, I reserved my most intense antipathy for those Americans who attempted to blend in, who made Spanish friends and eschewed the company of their countrymen, who refused to speak English and who, when they spoke Spanish, exaggerated the peninsular lisp. At first I was unaware of the presence in Madrid of these subtler, quieter Americans, but as I became one, I began to perceive their numbers; I would be congratulating myself on lunching with Isabel at a tourist-free restaurant, congratulating myself on making contact with authentic Spain, which I only defined negatively as an American-free space, when I would catch the eyes of a man or woman at another table, early twenties to early thirties, surrounded by Spaniards, reticent compared to the rest of the company, smoking a little sullenly, and I knew, we would both know immediately, that we were of a piece. I came to understand that if you looked around carefully as you walked through the supposedly least touristy barrios, you could identify young Americans whose lives were structured by attempting to appear otherwise, probably living on savings or giving private English lessons to rich kids, temporary expatriates sporting haircuts and clothing that, in hard-to-specify ways, seemed native to Madrid, in part because they were imperfect or belated versions ofAmerican styles. Each member of this shadowy network resented the others, who were irritating reminders that nothing was more American, whatever that means, than fleeing the American, whatever that is, and that their soft version of self-imposed exile was just another of late empire’s packaged tours. Lerner, Ben (2011-08-23). Leaving the Atocha Station (Kindle Locations 574-576). Coffee House Press. -THAT MOMENT WHERE SOMEONE HAS ALREADY SAID ALL OF THE THINGS YOU COULD EVER MEAN TO SAY ABOUT SOMETHING, AND YOU REALIZE YOU MIGHT AS WELL GO HOME NOW.

[lannancenter-blog]

Ben Lerner reading coming up on Tuesday, February 26, 2013.

Seminar at 5:30 PM in Lannan Center (New North 408)

Reading at 8:00 PM in Copley Formal Lounge

[houseofthought]

From work in progress on #cover of #leavingtheatochastation by Ben Lerner. An #erudite & #hilarious read

[houseofthought]

Just Finishing the #paperback #cover of #leavingtheatochastation by Ben Lerner. A #smart & #hilarious read