''Dead Doll Humility' was written by Kathy Acker in response to the demand made by author Harold Robbins that she publically apologize for plagiarizing his work in one of her novels. As reasons for her refusal to apologize Acker listed the fact that she did not feel any guilt, there was already a large body of criticism on her work and others who used plagiarism as a method, other writers were flattered by her pirating of their work, and that such appropriation is central to her political project. Acker argued, “if the writer or critic (deconstructionist) didn’t work with the actual language of these texts, the writer or critic wouldn’t be able to uncover the political and social realities involved.”
At issue is a scene from one of Robbin’s books in which a rich white woman walks into a disco, picks up a black boy, and has sex with him. ... Acker’s appropriation of Robbins’ work is threatening because its defiance of property law is accompanied by a defiance of the laws of propriety. Although “Dead Doll Humility” is itself a brilliant mash-up of artistic techniques, which include the construction of various dolls by an artist named CAPITOL, autobiographical elements, a quote from a Rilke letter to Cezanne, and conversations with her publishers, agent, and solicitor, the heart of the matter is crystallized in the following statement: “Deconstruction demands not so much plagiarism as breaking into the copyright law.”' -- Paige Sweet, Dark Matter
Trailer: 'Who's Afraid of Kathy Acker?' (6:25)
Dead Doll Humility
IN ANY SOCIETY BASED ON CLASS, HUMILIATION IS A POLITICAL REALITY. HUMILIATION IS ONE METHOD BY WHICH POLITICAL POWER IS TRANSFORMED INTO SOCIAL OR PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS. THE PERSONAL INTERIORIZATION OF THE PRACTICE OF HUMILIATION IS CALLED _HUMILITY_.
CAPITOL IS AN ARTIST WHO MAKES DOLLS. MAKES, DAMAGES, TRANSFORMS, SMASHES. ONE OF HER DOLLS IS A WRITER DOLL. THE WRITER DOLL ISN'T VERY LARGE AND IS ALL HAIR, HORSE MANE HAIR, RAT FUR, DIRTY HUMAN HAIR, PUSSY.
----ONE NIGHT CAPITOL GAVE THE FOLLOWING SCENARIO TO HER WRITER DOLL:
As a child in sixth grade in a North American school, won first prize in a poetry contest.
----In late teens and early twenties, entered New York City poetry world. Prominent Black Mountain poets, mainly male, taught or attempted to teach her that a writer becomes a writer when and only when he finds his own voice.
CAPITOL DIDN'T MAKE ANY AVANT-GARDE POET DOLLS.
----Since wanted to be a writer, tried hard to find her own voice. Couldn't. But still loved to write. Loved to play with language. Language was material like clay or paint. Loved to play with verbal material, build up slums and mansions, demolish banks and half-rotten buildings, even buildings which she herself had constructed, into never-before-seen, even unseeable jewels.
----To her, every word wasn't only material in itself, but also sent out like beacons, other words. _Blue_ sent out _heaven_ and _The Virgin_. Material is rich. I didn't create language, writer thought. Later she would think about ownership and copyright. I'm constantly being given language. Since this language-world is rich and always changing, flowing, when I write, I enter a world which has complex relations and is, perhaps, illimitable. This world both represents and is human history, public memories and private memories turned public, the records and actualizations of human intentions. This world is more than life and death, for here life and death conjoin. I can't make language, but in this world, I can play and be played.
----So where is 'my voice'?
----Wanted to be a writer.
----Since couldn't find 'her voice', decided she'd first have to learn what a Black Mountain poet meant by 'his voice'. What did he do when he wrote?
----A writer who had found his own voice presented a viewpoint. Created meaning. The writer took a certain amount of language, verbal material, forced that language to stop radiating in multiple, even unnumerable directions, to radiate in only one direction so there could be his meaning.
----The writer's voice wasn't exactly this meaning. The writer's voice was a process, how he had forced the language to obey him, his will. The writer's voice is the voice of the writer-as-God.
----Writer thought, Don't want to be God; have never wanted to be God. All these male poets want to be the top poet, as if, since they can't be a dictator in the political realm, can be dictator of this world.
----Want to play. Be left alone to play. Want to be a sailor who journeys at every edge and even into the unknown. See strange sights, see. If I can't keep on seeing wonders, I'm in prison. Claustrophobia's sister to my worst nightmare: lobotomy, the total loss of perceptual power, of seeing new. If had to force language to be uni-directional, I'd be helping my own prison to be constructed.
----There are enough prisons outside, outside language.
----Decided, no. Decided that to find her own voice would be negotiating against her joy. That's what the culture seemed to be trying to tell her to do.
----Wanted only to write. Was writing. Would keep on writing without finding 'her own voice'. To hell with the Black Mountain poets even though they had taught her a lot.
----Decided that since what she wanted to do was just to write, not to find her own voice, could and would write by using anyone's voice, anyone's text, whatever materials she wanted to use.
----Had a dream while waking that was running with animals. Wild horses, leopards, red fox, kangaroos, mountain lions, wild dogs. Running over rolling hills. Was able to keep up with the animals and they accepted her.
----Wildness was writing and writing was wildness.
----Decision not to find this own voice but to use and be other, multiple, even innumerable, voices led to two other decisions.
----There were two kinds of writing in her culture: good literature and schlock. Novels which won literary prizes were good literature; science fiction and horror novels, pornography were schlock. Good literature concerned important issues, had a high moral content, and, most important, was written according to well-established rules of taste, elegance, and conservatism.
----Schlock's content was sex horror violence and other aspects of human existence abhorrent to all but the lowest of the low, the socially and morally unacceptable. This trash was made as quickly as possible, either with no regard for the regulations of politeness or else with regard to the crudest, most vulgar techniques possible. Well-educated, intelligent, and concerned people read good literature. Perhaps because the masses were gaining political therefore economic and social control, not only of literary production, good literature was read by an elite diminishing in size and cultural strength.
----Decided to use or to write both good literature and schlock. To mix them up in terms of content and formally, offended everyone.
----Writing in which all kinds of writing mingled seemed, not immoral, but amoral, even to the masses. Played in every playground she found; no one can do that in a class or hierarchichal society.
----(In literature classes in university, had learned that anyone can say or write anything about anything if he or she does so cleverly enough. That cleverness, one of the formal rules of good literature, can be a method of social and political manipulation. Decided to use language stupidly.) In order to use and be other voices as stupidly as possible, decided to copy down simply other texts.
----Copy them down while, maybe, mashing them up because wasn't going to stop playing in any playground. Because loved wildness.
----Having fun with texts is having fun with everything and everyone. Since didn't have one point of view or centralized perspective, was free to find out how texts she used and was worked. In their contexts which were (parts of) culture.
----Liked best of all mushing up texts.
----Began constructing her first story by placing mashed-up texts by and about Henry Kissinger next to 'True Romance' texts. What was the true romance of America? Changed these 'True Romance' texts only by heightening the sexual crudity of their style. Into this mush, placed four pages out of Harold Robbins', one of her heroes', newest hottest bestsellers. Had first made Jacqueline Onassis the star of Robbins' text.
----Twenty years later, a feminist publishing house republished the last third of the novel in which this mash occurred.
CAPITOL MADE A FEMINIST PUBLISHER DOLL EVEN THOUGH, BECAUSE SHE WASN'T STUPID, SHE KNEW THAT THE FEMINIST PUBLISHING HOUSE WAS ACTUALLY A LOT OF DOLLS. THE FEMINIST PUBLISHER DOLL WAS A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN IN A ST. LAURENT DRESS. CAPITOL, PERHAPS OUT OF PERVERSITY, REFRAINED FROM USING HER USUAL CHEWED UP CHEWING GUM, HALF-DRIED FLECKS OF NAIL POLISH, AND BITS OF HER OWN BODY THAT HAD SOMEHOW FALLEN AWAY.
(cont.)
----
*
p.s. Hey. So, I'm going to move really swiftly today, for which I apologize. Got to bed late due to a post-Brest stint party and woke up late for the same reason, and my train back to Paris is closer than I had originally planned. I'll be more attentive and lackadaisical again starting tomorrow. ** Bollo, Hey, Jonathan. Your analysis of the pic of Peter and Stephen was almost eerily on the money, ha ha. No picking up of music this past week or so, I don't think. Peter gave me some Mego stuff, but I haven't tried it out yet. Demon Channel, cool. I'll spin it when I get home. Nice channel in general too. Oh, did you see the dates, etc. for the Dublin 'Jerk' shows are set now? In the blog's news column thingy. ** Empty Frame, I've been to Rhodes. I think I liked it there. Gracias a lot for the me/reading querying in Berlin. Yeah, give R-G another shot. It might not be your thing, but he's worth two tries. Never met Goytisolo. I almost did once for some Serpents Tail group reading event, but I think he canceled out or something. Enjoy Rhodes, and I'll try to enjoy my train. ** Bernard Welt, It's pretty PS122 unfriendly, yeah. Some NYC festival is tentatively interested in bring it over depending on how it goes in Avignon, I think. ** David, Exactly about the pleasures of 'TI'. Well put. For me, FF got better as they went along, so I'd just go for the most recent FF album maybe. ** David Ehrenstein, Thanks, David. Oh, I think I did hear about the LA Weekly ownership thing now that you mention it. Call me justifiably naive due to expatriat status, but I'm not so sure the Republicans are on the rise that the US media seems stuck on promoting. Oh, he made 'Tropical Malady'. Yeah, I've been really wanting to see that for ages. Could I now possibly like Tilda any more? No. ** Oscar B, See you in a mere if long several hours maybe. Looks like I might be in Paris until about June 22nd, so maybe we can sort our show date out fairly easily. ** Mark Q, Hey, welcome, greets, thank you, and more. Sucks I'm in such a rush on the day you arrive. I did get to pop over and look at your blog for a second. Really like that text/poem near the top with the repeating line. Really good. I'll explore further once I'm sitting in my proper place again. Everyone, Mark Q joined the fray here yesterday, and his blog and the writing, posts, and sensibility there look very intriguing. Please go check it out, if you will, both to welcome him and get to know his writing, etc. for own benefit. Talk to you better next time. ** Bill, Hey. That Steim place seems really cool. Margret, one of the performers in 'TIHYWD', lives in Amsterdam, and I asked her about it, and she was all 'one of the best, most vital things going on in the city'. I know exactly where it's situated. Nice locale. Enjoy the things there, and I hope hear more about it. ** Alan, When you write for Artforum, especially when you're a monthly exhibition reviewer like I was at that stage, everyone's into meeting you for 'it can't hurt' reasons if nothing else. So, I got lucky. ** Sypha, The owl in the photo ended up freaking out, got fired, was replaced by a little white owl for a while, but now I think we're either going back to the freaked out one or one that looks exactly like it but less on edge. ** Paul Curran, Thanks, Paul. Bret and Brest, interesting, yeah, I hadn't noticed that. Hm. Glad you've got the writing time going on. I'm looking forward to finding some again. ** Joseph, Me showing up with malt liquor and trailing a dance party. That's me all over. You're psychic, man. ** Chris Goode, Hey, Chris! How's the QUN experience going? You might be in Bergen? I probably won't. Yeah, I hope this piece of ours works as well as it's supposed to. I'm still not sure. I'll be all over your lecture post-train trip. Everyone, here or rather over here is a lecture by the great god of the theater arts Chris Goode on the future of performance that you can read or listen to as you prefer, and, you know, you owe it to yourself. I'm going to dwell on your dream and its meanings both posited by others and yet to be to coagulated by me all day. Love to you, big guy. ** Changeling, Hey. A further discussion would be great. A phoner or something maybe, or a chat, although I kind of hate chatting. Or if you ever go camping in Paris. Let's sort something out. The fog we're using is particularly good for daily life 'cos it's water based not smoke. No smell at all, and it dies in this really beautiful ghostly way. I think I'd heard that about ducks. Swans too, maybe? Excellent day to you. ** The Man Who Couldn't Blog, I did really like Ross' interview. He got Ariel's particular intelligence out in the open in a way I haven't seen elsewhere. I want to read more of Ross' inquisitions. Fourth printing, awesome. I'm heavily in the camp awaiting your next book. Is there one on the way? I think I read there is, but I can't remember in my scurrying state this morning. Thanks a lot, man. ** Wolf, Dude, that was really something right there. It's churning in me. ** Ken Baumann, Hey, Ken! Yeah, I was envying every one in LA for their chance to see that '60' film, not to mention the visitation by the wonderful Mr. Kimball. I'm heavily game for being a piece of whatever plans you guys put in place. Thank you! The weather's almost perfect here too, just a little too warm and summery for my taste. ** Chilly Jay Chill, Hey. Mm, I would say I'm cautiously optimistic. I was feeling pretty good until some curators and people sat in for the last run-through yesterday. Their response was a bit disconcerting, but I need to think more about it and their possible agendas or not and stuff. I'm not wildly confident, yet at least. I liked 'Memphis Underground'. I'll talk more about it when I have more time. I pretty much like everything Stewart does basically. It's not my favorite thing of his, but ... I'd better hold off for now or risk missing my ride. ** Kier, Thanks, pal. I think I like this 'new' tower even more. Everyone, here's a second black tower sculture by Kier. Hit this. Vince's influence was general in way. He's a close friend, and we were hanging out a lot while I was writing 'Period', and I'd guess the body of work he was making at that time was the particular key. 98-99. I'll try to find some images and do a link thing when I get back to Paris, if you're interested. Hope the day was as least messy as possible. Love, love. ** STOPHEREYES, Hey, man. I'm not going to have time to read your piece on Vag's piece this morning, but it's bookmarked for this evening. Everyone, newish d.l. and general wise/talented guy STOPHEREYES had the very good fortune to see the recent NYC performance by the genius who goes by the name Vaginal Davis, and Vag, as we friends of VD call her, had the good fortune of having STOPHEREYES weigh in on her show, and you can see what all that good fortune is about by clicking this. Some festival whose name escapes me at the moment might bring our new piece to NYC, but it's very much in the discussion phase at this point. That's our first, best shot at the moment. ** Trees, Hey, man. Not until 2011, best case scenario. Coffee slinging, not bad. Rich people tend to think non-rich people's tattoos are charming and entertaining, don't they? You and KK, double bill? Yum. Where would this happen? Great to see you, T. ** Misanthrope, I think the closest I'll get to the stage is maybe helping the crew move the dolls and their set on and offstage. It's taking forever right now, and that's about the biggest problem we're still facing. He should have carved that sandal into a shiv and taken a guard hostage and escaped and only then shoved it up his ass. Or that's what I would have done. ** Chris, I wish I could remember the name of NYC theater festival that's very, very tentatively interested in curating the new piece. It's still a long shot, but it's the only offer so far. Don't worry about the gig. You're going to kill it. ** Justin, Hey. So, Slava's your type, and his type is your type. That sounds like it might just work. The only stickler might be that Slava and his type are might be more into sex than emotions. That's about 80% guess and 20% inside scoop. ** Will Decker, Thanks for the kind words, Will. We might get a piece to Chicago at some point, There've been feelers from there. Gio Black Peter is quite a curious character and performer, yes. Punishment gets defiance. D ** Christopher/ Mark, Hi. We'll be indoors at Avignon. With the fog sculpture/installation, we have to. The temperature and atmosphere have to be really controlled. And then there are the live birds onstage, of course. Fujiko Nakaya, the fog artist, who's just amazing and such an incredible person too, just last night told me that she was Merce Cunningham's cook whenever he came to Tokyo. He knew her work and the collabs she did with Trisha Brown, I guess. I told Yury to go check out the CE farm yesterday, and I think he did. I'm sad to have missed that. Oh, great, thank you for the KGB photos! My mailbox has been in neglected mode while I've been here. ** Inthemostpeculiarway, I just remember 'Drag Me to Hell' being on a bunch of top 10 films of the year lists, and that seemed like too much. I'm sorry about the Valentine thing, and I hope asking didn't occasion a lingering sadness. Yeah, I know people like that, I mean like him, or rather I did, I guess. You never know, though. The birds are total Mariah Careys, man. Wtf! Titty Bear, no. I don't think I've ever even heard of that before. I'll google it. Titty Bear Day, here we come? Another sweet, complicated, emotionally rich Bendy report, thank you. Yikes about the jailbird boyfriend thing. Heck, again, you never know, right? But ... yeah, hm. Okay, I'd better jump into my brief day report. Rehearsed and rehearsed and rehearsed from morning until 5 pm when we had a last run-through. A handful of curators and visitors showed up to watch. I thought the first two-thirds of the piece looked really good, really close to being finished, and Gisele did too. The last third is still a big mess, and that's what we'll be concentrating on in the last Brest stint in June. Then we all carred out to the ruined chateau for a big dinner and party thing. It's so pretty out there. Wish my camera battery hadn't died. So, that was nice and a little drunken except that pretty much the first that happened was one of the curators from, I think, Austria, cornered me and, not knowing I wrote the texts and performed the Jonathan Schatz texts, started into me about how the piece has great potential except for the texts, which she thought were completely wrong and should be either removed or completely rewritten. She said they were too emotional and confusing and badly written, and that the piece needs to be more abstract and blahblah and that nobody's going to care how the characters feel or that they're confused, and that the texts ruin the piece. I told her, uh, I wrote them, and that just made her get more negative about them. I argued with her, and I think she had some weird agenda about what theater should be, but it really threw me. Gisele is talking to her today, and I hope that doesn't change things. Anyway, I felt weird about that the rest of the night, but I had fun anyway, I guess. Came back to the hotel, slept. I'd better stop because I'm running out of time, but give me your Tuesday report in full blush please. ** Magick Mike, Hey, Mike! Awesome if you can get to France for, well, the obvious reasons as well as possibly getting to meet up. 'TIHYWD' is playing in Paris in April, if that helps. Fantastic news about the press! Wow, great! I can't look at it right now 'cos I'm really running late, but I'll check out the site tonight. Everyone, please pay close attention to these words from the great Magick Mike: 'I started a "small press," SOLAR LUXURIANCE. I'm pretty excited about the design, it's one of those weird things that I imagined in my head and then figured out how to actually accomplish. hopefully it will grow and deliver a lot of great shit, i want to 'publish' zines, artists books, sound art, music, chapbooks, and anything else i can figure out how to publish i guess.' Mike's incredible. Definitely use that link and have a look. Mm, on your question, that sounds vaguely familiar. Let me think about it on my leisurely train ride, and I'll try to come up with the artist's name. Oh, wait, I think Kiuer might have gotten it. Bruno Pelassy, yeah. Thanks, Mike! ** I have to start really, really rushing now 'cos my train is leaving really soon, I'm sorry.** JW Veldhoen, Hey. Another fine day you had there. Gotta fly by. Sorry, man. ** Waiting for John, Hey! Okay, really quick: worming is an extreme master & slave, SM practice where the slave has all of his limbs amputated to make him utterly helpless and disempowered for his master. Glad you asked, ha ha? Lovely to see you, sir. ** 皮皮 , No time for you today. ** Steven Trull, Thank you. ** Math, Thanks, Math. ** Memoirs of a Heroinhead, Hi, Shane! I ... think we'll get to Lyon. All of our pieces except for 'Jerk' -- which the venues in Lyon thought too offensive to book, weirdly; Lyon was the only city to refuse 'Jerk' due its being too shocking -- have played there, always at Subsistances. So, I think so. I hope so. Sorry to have to speed along. I'll give you your due next time. Take care, man. ** Little foal, Hey! You've been missed, man. But time away is totally okay, of course. Whatever you want or need. Your comment was beautiful, and I'm going to read it properly when I get back to Paris 'cos I'm borderline late for my train right now. Lyn Hejinian's 'My Life' is a fave of mine, cool. All right, talk to you tomorrow, I hope. ** Slatted Light, Hey, David! Damn, I really can't say much right now. I misjudged my tempo on this p.s. badly. I'll talk to you about what you said first thing tomorrow, okay? Thanks for your patience, my pal. ** Blendin, Hi, Brendan. Gotta wave at you and run today, sorry. Much love. ** Really have to split this very second. I think the Kathy Acker piece today is really interesting for all kinds of reaons, but see what you think. See you from Paris tomorrow.
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