[Erik Davis' Figments] "Shadow Dancing"

[anna balint]

Hi folks

I have a new piece, "Shadow Dancing," in my friend Marcus Boon's 
marvelous webzine, Hungry Ghost: http://www.hungryghost.net. It's 
about the spooky side of the current administration's drive toward 
international violence and domestic repression. There are other nifty 
articles about "Magical Politics" up by Boon, Michael Taussig, Peter 
Lamborn Wilson, and others.

[Some of you may be saying to yourselves: why am I geeting emails 
from this fellow? If you are not interested in this or occasional 
Figments emails in the future, please let me know.]

erik davis



fresh food for hungry ghosts
http://www.hungryghost.net

magical politics

erik davis, "shadow dancing"
michael taussig, "the horror, the horror"
ngawang lhamo, "whirling through crisis"
"the hundred thousand dick cheney jokes of sparrow and lawrence fishberg"
peter lamborn wilson, "psychic nomadism"
marcus boon, "dark angels"
sparrow, "two ways of ancient chinese thought in america 2003"
and more

quotes:
erik davis, "shadow dancing"
"Today the fear of possibility has become an instrument of statecraft, now
pervasive in the domestic sphere. However likely or not the possibilities
are, this instrument does not target reason; it targets the imagination. The
pre-emptive logic that has come to dominate the Bush administration's bid
for global dominance is a logic of imaginal fear. This is what I mean by
magic: the strong rhetorical manipulation of the imagination and the
direction and quality of the energy, such as fear or desire, that infuses
the psyche."

michael taussig, "the horror, the horror"
"Yes! This is Kurtz speaking. You do remember me, I'm sure. It's been a long
time since Marlow killed me off in the heart of darkness as he sat there on
the other side of the world-the good side, of course--nice and comfy in his
sailing boat by the marshes on the Thames ... Now a new empire is girding
its loins to deal with savage customs and here I am once again goggle-eyed
like a skull's empty eyes spellbound by the depth of depravity-my depravity
based on their depravity only worse because while theirs is natural mine is
unnatural. This is what is so curious, how I yearn to destroy them by
imitating them, or rather what I see as them, while all the time I condemn
them. How does the enemy become a mirror like that, making you and he
identical while you twist this way and that in the darkness, tap-tapping
your way?"