Dear Siddiq
What “sparked this off” was that you appear to have wasted my time and energies for two years tweaking what turn out to be your love letters… A real WTF moment.
– Michael Cope, private correspondence
This was the beginning of the end of a chain of correspondence between my former literature master and I, which marked the formal conclusion of my apprenticeship to him. I had given notice that the roles and rewards reserved for cultural specialists in this society held no attractions for me whatsoever, and consequently I had no intention of playing the game.
My declaration was a cause of irritation. Considering that he was “working on developing an ironic perspective on it”, I followed his lead (my respect for my sensei in no way diminished) and decided to christen one of the games I invented to play (i.e. this journal)
with his derogatory nickname. Like niggas & queers did to the words they were branded with, I will swallow the nasty and spit out the tasty – with relish. Like the rest of humanity, I will leave my past behind cheerfully. Although I can no longer consider myself a poet, I still find many aspects in the millennia-old tradition of poetry which can be usefully turned to my advantage. Hopefully, the reader will not find the following pages completely devoid of their own particular poetry.
What follows is one of the results of my lifelong struggle to grapple with the miserable, genocidal boredom on which this world has been built – in order to transform it into its opposite. I share this struggle with generations of revelers-in-arms around the world. One of the comrades with whom I gambol shoulder to shoulder, by the name of Charlie Marx, once called our collective project a form of “practical, human sensuous activity”. This journal is a small contribution towards that project.
Traditionally, love is symbolized by an abstract figure of a cartoon heart which bears little relation to reality. In contrast, the "X-ray" of a real human heart – rendered as an industrially-produced work of pop-art – on the "cover" is meant to embody my intent.
Based on a clear-sighted picture of actual material existence – one which carefully & skillfully penetrates the deliberately deceptive “organization of appearances” – the aim is to inject shots of literary adrenalin into the flailing heart of our failing world. Only you, dear reader, by your actions and the collective interactions of everyone (whose "multiplicity of solitudes" constitutes the social basis of our melancholy existence) will be able to determine the outcome of my efforts.
For those who may feel curious as to biographical details, there is little of importance to say. Who is this guy? Well, the vitals: Siddiq Kiaam Kabir Khan lives in Cape Town, South Africa, where he was born at 8pm during a shrill April evening in the year 1990. A product of his times, his time's been spent within the murderously narrow range of passions, adventures, threats & opportunities presented to him by his society, of whom he is an irreconcilable enemy. His action is both result and (all too partial) negation of this thoroughly dissatisfying situation.
S.K.K. Khan
Editor-in-chief
Love Letters Journal
January 2012
P.S.
Encouragement for simple gestures of refusal arrive from the most unexpected quarters. The journalist Eric Miller has just contacted me, requesting that I remove a photograph he took of an apartheid-era police raid on the Congress of South African Trade Unions (which had not yet taken on the openly reactionary role it plays today). This pathetic episode provides ample confirmation, if any more were needed, of the obscene bankruptcy of "the roles and rewards of cultural specialists" which I have been led to reject
unconditionally.
The correspondence is copied below on the principle: "to make shame more shameful still by making it public". Even the most casual reader of thisblog would have realised that my actions, most especially those made public, are all aimed against the existence of private property. Unsurprisingly this professional didn't even bother to check who he was trying to mess with. One more example of the ignorance those in power expect to get away with -- hence the term "dom-pass" which blacks gave to the papers they were forced to carry by the SA state. David Graeber's text "Beyond Power/Knowledge" has a few interesting points to make about all that - although the dictates of the academy in which it was produced blunt their impact somewhat.
The correspondence is copied below on the principle: "to make shame more shameful still by making it public". Even the most casual reader of thisblog would have realised that my actions, most especially those made public, are all aimed against the existence of private property. Unsurprisingly this professional didn't even bother to check who he was trying to mess with. One more example of the ignorance those in power expect to get away with -- hence the term "dom-pass" which blacks gave to the papers they were forced to carry by the SA state. David Graeber's text "Beyond Power/Knowledge" has a few interesting points to make about all that - although the dictates of the academy in which it was produced blunt their impact somewhat.
*
Eric Miller to Siddiq Khan
19 June 2013
Hi Siddiq
You've used a photograph of mine (Cosatu House Siege), without my permission, on http://lovelettersjournal.blogspot.com
Please remove it.
Thanks
You've used a photograph of mine (Cosatu House Siege), without my permission, on http://lovelettersjournal.blogspot.com
Please remove it.
Thanks
*
Siddiq Khan to Eric Miller
21 June 2013
Eric
Did you get permission from the people being suppressed by the state to turn their oppression into fodder for your career?
Do not expect either obedience or sympathy from me in your desire to turn repression into profit and prestige.
Even bourgeois law does not exhibit such a degree of venality.
My use of that image is not for profit and for public interest.
This constitutes "fair use" as far as I am concerned.
If you disagree that is your own problem.
I have no money to buy the "rights".
Even if I did I would not.
Sincerely
*
