Quentin S. Crisp

[qcrisp]

I don't know if anyone is planning to be at the Zócalo Book Fair in Mexico City this month, but if so, I'll be there for a few days from about the 8th or 9th. There's a book launch there for an anthology called Sombra del árbol de la noche, which I'm in, so I shall certainly be at that launch, among other places. So please come and say hello, if you're not feeling socially phobic.

[Justin Isis]

Ramonoski could probably make this right?

[ramonoski]

Might have, but being slightly disconnected I didn't find out it happened until I saw some photos from the Chomu Press facebook feed. Made me want to kick myself. So, next time? Funnily enough, just earlier I was telling a friend my life motto could be "another day, maybe."

Anyway, I really looked up this thread to say that, in my usually late fashion, I've finally been making my way through All God's Angels Beware! and Defeated Dogs, both of which were brought to me from Canada by a relative studying there. It's taking time because life events (and, I must admit, other books) keep getting in the way. But so far both volumes have been brilliant, in different ways. "Ynys-y-Plag" is one of the best stories I've read in quite some time. And I really liked "The Gay Wolf", namely that introspective interlude it breaks into and which I found highly relatable. I think I'd be a perfect Mesmer Tower tenant.

Interesting that those stories very much represent the two aspects (not that your work can be reduced only to these two) that make me appreciate your work, Quentin. From the first, your skills for description and mood-building; often I complain that writers tend to "describe too much" when they don't have much to say, but in your work it, well, it doesn't feel natural but rather is the work, as the commonplace expression goes "painting images" inside the reader's head; or evoking rather than painting (I think that what's evoked can be more powerful than what is described). And the other aspect is that introspective element, those texts that read like personal confession rather than storytelling—though they're both. This is perhaps because I can relate to the feelings of sadness and alienation expressed therein. To me those passages are the "this is exactly how I feel but didn't know how to put it into words" sort, which can be quite rare. That they happen often in your fiction is a bittersweet treat.

Still many stories to go. Anyone finds themselves reading this, I really can't recommend Quentin's books enough.

[Nemonymous]

I have started my review of ERITH here:
https://dflewisreviews.wordpress.com...ths-and-erith/

[Robin Davies]

I've just finished (and enjoyed) reading Erith, which prompted me to explore the area a bit on Google maps. The map in the book is presumably quite old because it doesn't quite match the current one. This reminded me a bit of Iain Sinclair's Dark Lanthorns which describes his psychogeographic excursions following the directions in an old, waterlogged, annotated A-Z of London:

Dark Lanthorns: David Rodinskys A-Z Walked Over by Iain Sinclair: Amazon.co.uk: Iain Sinclair, Rachel Lichtenstein, etc.: 9781870507943: Books

 

Dark Lanthorns: David Rodinskys A-Z Walked Over by Iain Sinclair: Amazon.co.uk: Iain Sinclair, Rachel Lichtenstein, etc.: 9781870507943: Books

Like Des, I identified with the bit about floaters because my eyes unleashed fresh shoals of them earlier this year. As recommended I got my eyes checked out and there is no serious damage but they are horribly distracting. And I too feel a bit nervous when I accidentally catch a glimpse of that grainy red laser light in supermarket checkouts - but they must be safe... mustn't they???

[Tom A.]

I am very curious about Erith, since I have been enjoying QSC's work and literary progression since his very first collection. Unfortunately it is even by small press standards a luxury edition - I hope a paperback or ebook will eventually see the day.
Meanwhile I have Blue on Blue incoming - curious about it !
Edit: scrolling up I now see that that I was unaware of The Boy who played with Shadows. Another QSC title to check if it is eventually e-ified.

[gveranon]

I just read Blue on Blue and Erith. Both could be called metaphysical fantasies, and both are uniquely Q. S. Crispian (no one else could have written them), but otherwise they are strikingly dissimilar. At the risk of being glib and reductive, I'll claim that Blue on Blue is Platonist in its metaphysics (although more in love with instantiation than with universality, the latter serving to add glamor, dimension, meaning, and mystery to the former, and the latter also being both creative and snowily dispersive), while Erith explores the borderland between an Anglo-Saxon paganism and a violently ambivalent, variously hopeful, doomy, and defiantly heretical almost-Christianity, in sometimes dreary and sometimes alluring settings of suburban London. Another dissimilarity: Blue on Blue is a very finished literary artifact (those who think Gene Wolfe is the finest prose stylist and most meticulous fabricator in contemporary fantasy should read this book), while Erith is looser and more tentative, though perhaps also more experimental and profound. Erith reminded me at times of the anti-novelistic investigations of Michel Butor (e.g., Passing Time). Both books contain words that were previously unknown to me; I wish I had made a list, which would have been evocative in itself. Also, Blue on Blue contains a lengthy passage late in the book that is so audacious (yet so brilliant, paragraph by paragraph, and perfect for the book) that I felt like laughing out loud. I did not see that coming. I don't want to say anything further, except that this multi-page passage surpasses Updike (another stylist) on one of Updike's favorite subjects.

[Nemonymous]

Having reviewed ERITH, I am now reviewing BLUE ON BLUE:
Blue on Blue Quentin S. Crisp | THE DREAMCATCHER REAL-TIME REVIEWS

[Sand]

Erith is a compelling study of inner and outer geography. The description of the drab and semi-derelict Thames-side town is precisely observed, unerringly finding the things that represent larger truths about the place. But it is not simply a slice of urban noir: the author finds mystery, even the mystical, in the unlikeliest scenes: a tree at the end of a subway ramp, a hidden and closed church, the sweep of a staircase in a forlorn civic building.

Alongside these outer landscapes, however, he also conveys an inner terrain of mood and emotion with unflinching integrity. In unpromising circumstances, there are passages of dejection and bewilderment, the more telling because they are told with quiet objectivity. But the book also records moments which, as he says, if not exactly of epiphany or revelation, still seem to offer some form of assuaging.

The way in which the book balances these two elements is subtle and unforced. The writing is so good that even the bus and train timetables are made to seem significant, their uncertainty charged with meaning.

I'm not sure if comparisons help for a writer so individual, but certainly the psychogeography of Iain Sinclair and the attention to the unregarded of Robert Walser might hint at the qualities in the book.

[Nemonymous]

Just reviewed THE DARK DAO by Quentin S. Crisp:
The Gift of the kosmos Cometh! | DREAMCATCHER slow-motion reviews of hyper-imaginative fiction