(cont.) "These days I think a lot about shame, which is an important word or concept for a lot of us. It's something we're on very familiar terms with, mostly on account of having grown up with it. You have these feelings and desires, which are accompanied by shame, because you've been told that to have these feelings and desires is wrong. We're right, you're wrong. Or worse then wrong, you're defective or deficient or immortal. Hence shame."
"Then we get a little older and we realize that the judgment implicit in this shame is what's actually wrong. We're no better or worse than anyone else, and once we reach this conclusion -- or let's hope! -- we have to aggressively 'treat' the shame by actively developing its antidote, which is a sense of pride. We cross the line. We tell ourselves and everyone else that these feelings and desires are part of who we are, we're better like this, I wouldn't want to be any other way, and if you don't like it, you can shut the fuck up. Goodbye shame, hello pride. Let's have a drink!"
"Which can be a good experience -- necessary, transforming even -- and one that I think everyone should go through. And I'm not saying that you have to be gay to do it, but I have a friend that used to say that everyone has to come out about something, which I think is probably true. Or should be. Or it would be true if we want the world to be a better, more compassionate place, which let's be honest isn't always the case."
"Because I don't know about you but I see a lot of people -- politicians, business leaders, professional athletes, asshole novelists, I don't who else -- who just seem way too confident, which makes me think that they're either hiding something or that they've never felt any shame about who they are. They've never understood what it means to be unfairly judged and constrained, to be told that you don't deserve something because of who you are."
"And as a society, we tend to admire these people, we fawn over them and say 'isn't it great that this person exudes so much confidence? They could do anything they want.' Or, well, almost anything. Nobody talks about death, even though no amount of confidence is going to stop that shoe from falling, although I've read plenty of articles about rich people trying through these ridiculous cryogenic technologies or gene manipulation or what have you. It would be embarrassing but these people have so much money that everyone takes them seriously."
"But anyway, shame. What's unfortunate, I think, is that certain groups in our society bear too much of the shame, and we'd be better off it was spread around. Equally. Because if you look at the state of world today, everyone except for the most shameless (laughs) people will admit that we've really fucked things up. Global warming, mass extinction, garbage everywhere, wars and guns and such horrible movies that I can't even. I mean, seriously, take your pick and chances are that we've fucked the shit up."
"Or to put it another way, as a species, I think we're getting an F. Self-grading exam or something, right? (Laughs.) My point is that, if we were all in elementary school, our teacher would stand in the front of the classroom and say 'you know what, humans, you have so much potential but you're blowing it. I can't tell you how disappointed I am. You should really be ashamed ... and you're not getting any more recess until you figure out how to unfuck it up.' "
"So we all need to carry around a little bit of residual shame, just by virtue of being alive at this juncture of civilization. I'm not saying it has to overwhelm us, but it should be a factor in decisions. Some of these decisions might be big. Like no, I'm not going to send ten billion dollars to an offshore banking account because I understand that taxes are necessary to pay for a functional government. And some might be small. Like no, I'm not going to walk through this beautiful public garden in my high heels so that I can get the perfect wedding picture, because I understand that if everyone did what I'm doing, it would destroy the garden. Tragedy of the commons and so forth."
"I understand that society is a lot more complicated than what I'm making it out to be here, but I don't think it weakens my broader point that we all need a little more existential shame, and it should influence the way we interact with each other and the environment."
"Which I also know is easy for me to say because I live in a room with bars. But I remember what I saw, and you know what? I bet if they really are gods -- if they really have lived for thousands of years -- they know what it means to feel some shame, because why else would they be coming back? That's my question, and nobody can answer it."
Pictures taken in Fort Tryon Park (New York City) on June 18, 2016. Text excerpted from The #Gods Project: A Training Manual (Section 2, "Interviews with the Institutionalized.")
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06/23/2016
ORDER HERE
A RADICAL NEW MYTH ABOUT SEX, FAITH, AND THOSE OF US WHO WILL NEVER DIE
A young boy wanders into the woods of Harlem and witnesses the abduction of his sister by a glowing creature. Forty years later, now working as a New York City homicide detective, Gus is assigned to a case in which he unexpectedly succumbs to a vision that Helen is still alive. To find her, he embarks on an uorthodox investigation that leads to an ancient civilization of gods and the people determined to bring them back.
In this colossal new novel from the author of The Metropolis Case, the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice collides with a new religion founded by three corporate office workers, creating something beautiful, illogical, and overwhelming. Part sex manifesto, part religious text, part Manhattan noir—with a dose of deadly serious, internet inspired satire—#gods is a sprawling inquest into the nature of faith and resistance in the modern world. With each turn of the page, #gods will leave you increasingly reborn.
Praise for #gods
“#gods is a mystery, an excavation of myths, an index of modern life, a gay coming-of-age story, an office satire, a lyrical fever dream, a conspiracy. One of the most ambitious novels in recent memory—and a wild, possibly transformative addition to the canon of gay literature—it contains multitudes, and seethes with brilliance.” —Mark Doten, author of The Infernal
“Matthew Gallaway’s #gods is a novel so brilliant, so funny, so full of strange and marvelous things, I couldn’t stop writing OMG WTF I <3 THIS SO MUCH in its margins. It’s rare to find a novel that so dazzlingly reinvigorates age-old meditations on faith and f&!*ing, art and eros. Luminous, enterprising, and sublimely cheeky, #gods tells the story, the myth, the dream of the human soul in all its glorious complexity.” —Suzanne Morrison, author of Yoga Bitch
“Matthew Gallaway’s storytelling manages to be both dreamy and serious; lean and luxurious. His words carry an incantatory power of mythic storytelling where beauty and savagery wrap around each other like bright threads in a gorgeous tapestry.” —Natasha Vargas-Cooper, author of Mad Men Unbuttoned: A Romp Through 1960s America
“If the ancient gods were just like us, only more so, then the same could be said for this strange, wonderful book, in which the mundane sorrows and small triumphs of very ordinary lives glow ever so slightly around the edges, sometimes quite literally. At once an oddly romantic send-up of dead-end office culture and an offbeat supernatural procedural, #gods is terrifically weird, melancholy, sexy, and charming.” —Jacob Bacharach, author of The Bend of the World
'It’s to the credit of Matthew Gallaway’s enchanting, often funny first novel that it doesn’t require a corresponding degree of obsession from readers, but may leave them similarly transported: the book is so well written — there’s hardly a lazy sentence here — and filled with such memorable lead and supporting players that it quickly absorbs you into its worlds.'
-- The New York Times
Music: Death Culture at Sea and Saturnine
Listen or download songs and records from my indie-rock past with Saturnine here and Death Culture at Sea here.
Music Video: Remembrance of Things Past
Watch the rock opera Remembrance of Things Past written and performed by Saturnine and Frances Gibson, starring Bennett Madison and Sheila McClear.
Video: The Chaos Detective
The Chaos Detective is a series about a man searching for 'identity' as he completes assignments from a mysterious organization. Watch the first episode (five parts) on YouTube.