Sundry Notes, February
My birthday, What Happened to Repeater, Alley Valkyrie(!), a new podcast(!), and more
Friday’s my birthday.
I’ll be 48, which is honestly kind of cool. Sure, I guess that’s a bit “old” relative to, say, 47 or 27, but I’m quite happy with how I’ve turned out so far.
The other day at the gym, I was talking with a guy who’d just had his lifelong dream and plan for his future utterly crushed. He’d not been at the gym for a while, and when he’d finally come back and I told him I’d noticed his absence, he’d explained it all.
Kind of a sad story, really, and I felt for the guy. And then I smiled and asked him his age, and then smiled even more.
Talking with a guy 25 years younger than me about how lost he felt and how he had no idea what he’d do next couldn’t help bring a bit of kind laughter. I mean, I remember exactly what that felt like, and all the times after that over the ensuing two and a half decades — times when I was absolutely certain my life was over because of some failure or misfortune.
You get crushed, and then you pick yourself up and then get crushed again in a different way, over and over and over — and it’s really fucking wonderful.
I like — no, I love — all my failures and misfortunes, all the calamities and catastrophes and especially all those moments where there was “obviously” no hope possible. And I especially love that I’m about to be 48, and I’m in the best shape I’ve ever been in, and I’m finally doing exactly what I want to do with my life. And, especially, I love how strong my triceps and quadriceps and all the other muscles of my body that push you up from the ground — rather than pull you up from it — have become.
You just get up.
And then you get up again.
And then, eventually, the ground doesn’t feel like such a bad place to be, but rather just a very pleasant and familiar place to rest for a bit after you get knocked down.
47 was really damn cool. True to that dream I had early this year, it’s now my favorite year and my new favorite me. I imagine 48’s gonna be even better.
Speaking of my birthday, you can still order any of my print titles at Sul Books for 20% off. Use code RHYD25 for that.
What Happened to Repeater?
And also speaking of my birthday, on Friday I’ll be publishing an essay that will be a bit of my birthday present to myself. Already written and ready to go, it’s an essay about what the hell happened to Repeater Books and finally divulging the strange story of why Here Be Monsters will be getting a re-release later this year.
An excerpt from Friday’s essay:
This is absolutely worth highlighting. A publisher — even a non-profit or a workers’ collective — needs to promote and sell the books it publishes, otherwise it will lose money and eventually shut down. And, as Daniel Tutt mentions, Repeater accrued losses of around £200,000 annually under Tariq Goddard’s management.
Now, I’m of course not privy to the inner financial workings of Repeater, but it should be obvious that Tariq Goddard was — at best — a poor manager of the Repeater imprint. If you don’t promote and sell books, you’ll lose money. Other authors told me of public events where no books for sale were provided for attendees, and also multiple incidents of publicity opportunities not being followed up on. But worse still was the censorious atmosphere Goddard seemed to encourage, hiring out Repeater’s social media promotion to a small clique of narcissists who then used those platforms for promotion of their personal brands while refusing to promote Repeater books from authors they saw as rivals to those brands.
And if you’d like to get an early jump on the story, go read fellow Repeater author Daniel Tutt’s recently published essay tangential to this essay:
Repeater Books has recently suspended commissions as it assess the future viability of the imprint. According to my conversation with the current owner of the press, Repeater has accrued losses of approximately £200,000 annually in recent years. While Repeater Books will likely and hopefully survive this financial crisis, behind the scenes of the press there have been reports of highly censorial practices, certain authors—whom I will not name—have reported experiences of blatant sabotage of their book after it was published, refusal to promote their work and refusal by the press to connect them to reviewers at other presses.
Yes, you already know one of those “certain authors” he mentions, and he — I — will tell you that story on Friday.
ALLEY VALKYRIE IS ON SUBSTACK!!!
Sorry for the ALL CAPS, but they’re deserved here. My long-time friend and oft co-conspirator
has finally started writing on Substack.And also, she’s got the cutest damn Substack banner there ever was:
In her first essay, she discusses something that really honestly is super ridiculous of people: the outrage about Trump changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico.
Trump's pissing contest regarding the body of water once known as the Cathayan Sea or the Gulf of Yucatán is many things: immature, insulting, hubristic, obnoxious, but also quite historically fitting. And arguably more than anything else it's just embarrassing. But embarrassed as a default state is something that we're going to have to get used to, and fast. But with respect, for those of you still unironically going on about it after three weeks, it's also evident that it's fulfilling its intended role as a distraction meant to drain you.
So really, fuck it. It's just a map, and maps have been geopolitically contentious for as long as they've existed. Don't like it? Draw a new one. Or use an old one, old maps are awesome.…And remember that your outrage is a powerful weapon, but one that will turn against you if you let it run wild. Pick your battles wisely, my friends. And personally, I recommend against this one.
Alley’s mind is a relentless wonder, and especially her extensive knowledge of land, land relations, and its history and politics. Her course offered through Sul Books, Land: Loss & Reconnection, is an utter delight for this, and really more than you’d ever learn in a university course (and without having to wake up early…).
“The Ryan and Rhyd Phenomenal Ficus Show?”
The response to the video
and I did, “Trump and the Monstrous,” has been so overwhelmingly positive that we’re gonna make it a regular podcast!Thing is, we don’t have a good name for it, and “The Ryan and Rhyd Phenomenal Ficus Show” just isn’t going to cut it. So we decided that we’d like you all to help us name it.
Leave a comment here with what you think we should name it, and if we pick that name, we’ll each kick you either a full year paid subscription, a full year extension on a current subscription, or a one year gift subscription to the person of your choosing.
Books I’ve Been Working On
Because so much of my time is now devoted to publishing work, I hope you don’t mind if I now also include a section in each monthly Sundry Notes to talk about some of the books we’re releasing.
We’ve already published one poetry collection this year, my friend Hunter Bloodmoon’s An Autopsy, and a second one is about to release from poet Philip Kane: The Decipherment of Nature. And soon, we’ll release the first fiction book since I took over publishing responsibilities for Sphinx. That’s The Going Down, by Duncan Barford:
The Going Down is a really great novella, telling the story of two friends who each undergo an underworld journey after doing a haphazard ritual to say goodbye to a house they shared. What’s particularly good about the book is that Duncan describes magic exactly the way I experience it, a rarity in any kind of magical fiction. Especially, his descriptions of encountering land spirits and the kinds of internal processing one must go through to sort the imagination from the imaginal are as accurate as you’ll ever see. That book’s already open for pre-order now.
Meantime, I just finished the first round of edits on a collection of short stories from writer and psycholanyst Thomas Ogden due for release in September of this year, and am now editing another poetry collection from Rune Kjaer Rasmussen and an artful retelling of the Gilgamesh epic from the point of Enkidu. We also just commissioned three more manuscripts, including a Jungian reading of The Avengers and another book from popular anarchist writer Christopher Scott Thompson called Anti-Militarists at War.
And yes, we’re absolutely accepting submissions.
That’s all for this one. If you’ve got an idea for a title for the new podcast, do please remember to leave a comment with it!
Much love,
—Rhyd
I enjoyed the podcast a lot. I suppose it matters what it's going to focus on, but anyway, I humbly submit "There Be Monsters", which is not just a reference to the first podcast. I really mean it as a nod to the empty spaces in old maps, which dealt with the end of known land by drawing in serpents and whatnot. Of course there were monsters, there always are. They just shapeshift in response to exploration.
Losing £200k a year? What kind of gravy train are these people on. Total grift.