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June 07, 2007
Weather Report
by Marc Estrin
The Charlotte Observer offers up a reflection on the plight of right-wing publishers at the recent Book Expo America. Lost, it thinks, they are, jetsam floating among the "dependably Democratic publishing crowd", their offerings "unsure who to attack, and who to defend." Right wing publishers, claims the headline, are "worried about the future."
They needn't worry too much. Though the Republican presidential candidates come off as a collection of long-fanged clowns, talking tough, demanding the blood of various enemies even as they decry their president, the larger right-wing project seems sturdily intact, protected by right stalwarts, and a not-so-secret service of Democrats with identical agendas — US world domination via military and economic force, American national/corporate interest über alles. All the Democratic front-runners want to substantially RAISE the military budget over that requested by Bush, and increase enrollment in the military. I wonder what for.
But yes, on the surface, the Republican and conservative agendas (not always identical) seem in disarray as US body counts go up, and GOP corruption outpaces its Democratic competition.
However, these are merely ripples on a deep, seasonal sea, seasonal in the Spenglerian, Viconian sense, belonging, all of them, to our long autumn of cultural decline. If the liberal face of publishing seems smilier than the conservative one, they both are washed from the same rusting pipe, fed from the same American cloaca of mal-information, mal-education, and stultification of thought and action. Quite the environment in which to publish demanding, high-quality literature.
There are quixotic crusaders, of course, pushing not only against the tide, but against the ocean itself. My own publisher, Unbridled Books, is one of them, puffing its cheeks, trying to blow the season back from fall to summer. But it's easy to get discouraged and out of breath when the CO2 content is so high and the O2 content so low.
My forthcoming novel, The Lamentations of Julius Marantz, is a satire on the fraudulent uses of religion in our contemporary political culture, and a comparison of such manipulation with more authentic spiritual search. It will be read by few, and will comfort even fewer. Yet Unbridled has chosen to publish it. It will sell a few thousand copies, while Left Behind has sold ten million, and left its beastly mark on the politics of the middle east.
Such is the ocean at this season of the cultural year. The ripples come and go, and may conjure interesting forms at book fairs, political conventions or G8 Conferences. But contrary to what The Charlotte Observer may observe, we are all worried about the future, left and right, here and everywhere, flora and fauna and stone.
Marc Estrin is the author of Insect Dreams: The Half Life of Gregor Samsa, The Education of Arnold Hitler, Golem Song, and the forthcoming novel, The Lamentations of Julius Marantz.
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