An irregular hodgepodge of links beyond the library curated together from @OmniumGatherum at Hrmtc I∴O∴ and more … Omnium Gatherum for August 24, 2022.

Here’s a selection of notable things I’ve recently found that you may also be interested in checking out:

• “The Hidden Truths of Lou Reed’s Musical Poetry“—”Lou Reed: Caught Between the Twisted Stars continues at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts (40 Lincoln Center Plaza, Upper West Side, Manhattan) through March 4, 2023. The exhibition was curated by Don Fleming and Jason Stern.”
• The Infected Museum. Viktor Wynd at The National Maritime Museum Cornwall. Tuesday September 20th 6 – 8pm at The Last Tuesday Society, 11 Mare Street, E84RP—”For The Launch of The Infected Museum – Viktor Wynd at The National Maritime Museum Cornwall & Devils’ Botany Absinthe Regalis. Tuesday September 20th 6 – 8pm.” Also The Infected Museum: Viktor Wynd at The National Maritime Museum, Cornwall (Signed Copy)—”Fully illustrated hardback catalogue to the exhibition Viktor Wynd’s UnNatural History Museum within The National Maritime Museum, Cornwall running until December 2022″
• Tweet—”Rachel Pollack, renowned tarot master/comic writer/first UK trans activist of the 1970s, is in the ICU right now. Praying she makes it through.”
• “Aleister Crowley was even more beastly than we’d imagined. His magick and grandiose, self-awarded titles were a lot of nonsense, but his sexual adventures had a very dark side, Phil Baker reveals.” About The City of the Beast: The London of Aleister Crowley by Phil Baker.
• “Darya Dugina: Daughter of Putin ally killed in Moscow blast. The daughter of a close ally of Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has been killed in a suspected car bombing.”—”It is thought her father, the Russian philosopher Alexander Dugin, who is known as “Putin’s brain”, may have been the intended target of the attack.” For those following along, this the the Rasputin-like figure that’s co-opted the chaostar and has a crypto-esoteric philosophy of fascism and hate. As one primer, see, from 2016: “Dugin’s Occult Fascism and the Hijacking of Left Anti-Imperialism and Muslim Anti-Salafism.” From the OP: “While Alexander Dugin is not a state official himself, he is nevertheless a symbolic figure in Russian politics. His anti-Western, ultranationalist philosophy has become the dominant political ideology in Russia and has helped shape President Putin’s expansionist foreign policy, most prominently on Ukraine.” “Incidents like this will make officials in Moscow nervous, especially in the aftermath of a series of explosions and attacks in occupied Crimea and in Russian regions near the border with Ukraine. Kremlin propaganda consistently stresses how Vladimir Putin has brought security and stability in Russia following the turbulent 1990s, when car bombs and assassinations were commonplace. This car bomb in the Russian capital undermines that narrative. Despite not holding an official position in government, Alexander Dugin is believed to be a close ally of the Russian president and has even been branded ‘Putin’s Rasputin’.” Also “Who Really Detonated the Car Bomb That Killed Darya Dugina, Putin’s Brain’s Child? Misinformation campaigns are underway to claim and deny responsibility for the deadly car bomb that killed Darya Dugina instead of her father.”
• “The Gospel According to Dungeons & Dragons. The fantasy role-playing game’s theological dimensions can be spiritually formative.”—”As a pastor-theologian, I have thought a great deal about this game. It’s not the theology inside the fantasy worlds that interests me. Rather, I find the practice of playing D&D—and its theological and ethical dimensions—far more interesting. I’ve concluded that not only is D&D not demonic, but it is also potentially formative for good in many ways.” “Most Christians can appreciate the fantasy aspect of D&D. They know of C. S. Lewis, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Madeleine L’Engle, and they understand that fantasy literature can be a unique vehicle for wonder, virtue, and faith. Fantasy is inherently eschatological because it assumes from the start that the world as it currently exists is not necessarily the world as it must be. It allows us to explore ultimate questions about what is good, true, and beautiful through an alternate reality.”
• “Digital Deconversion. Leaving a religious separatist group—online.”—”Deconversion, rather than one great untangling, might be better thought of as a continuing project.”
• Thread—”Controversial Much? Reformation satirist Ulrich von Hutten raised eyebrows and started a smear campaign against a duke who killed a relative of his in 1515. Censored annotations and bloody handcoloring fill the book.. 1/?” About Gnostic Saint Ulrich von Hutten.
• Thread—”A ? on John Donne, the Tower of Babel and the Scientific Revolution. In ‘The Second Anniversary’, Donne wrote: ‘They who did labour Babel’s tower to ‘erect Might have considered, that for that effect, All this whole solid Earth could not allow Nor furnish forth materials enow'”
• “A Touch of Magic“—”These are images by Cig Harvey, a British-born photographer who now lives on Maine’s Midcoast – a rural location which, she notes, has made her ‘alert to the magic of the mundane.’ Harvey’s work is defined by an acute awareness of nature and the passing of time.”
• The Art of Fosco Culto—”Fosco Culto became known for her paintings reflecting a continued commitment to the Path and a lasting alliance with the nocturnal and chthonic forces of night-wandering & sabbatic Sorcery.” “Her creations manifests as much the numen of the Obscure Feminine as the theological figures of the Adversary. She captures in them the demonic features of the spectral horde of hecatean ghosts, the alluring gazes of siren-like nymphs, the fiery blaze and ophidian majesty of the Watchers, Grigori and Fallen Ones, to transmit the gift of forbidden knowledge to mankind.” “Her work certainly brings to mind Rudolf Otto’s ‘Mysterium Tremendum et Fascinans’ evoking the ‘Sublime Sombre’ of the Romantics and the visionary experiences felt by the artist, witch, or magician in a deep symbiosis with the grandeur of the Night.” “By incarnating and reifying her visions through a vital communion with the Netherworld, Fosco Culto invites the viewer to cross the threshold, to the spirits world, keeping at gaze the haunted and vivid presence of their denizens, like whisperings, gathered for the first time in a very special limited edition.” “The paintings are accompanied by a detailed biography of the author and an in-depth commentary by Per Faxneld, Ph.D. and Associate Professor in History of Religions and author of ‘Satanic Feminism Lucifer as the Liberator of Woman in Nineteenth-Century Culture’, who contextualizes them throughout the history of Art and the Magical Revival of Western esotericism.”
• “A Must-Buy For Any Howard Fan: Robert E. Howard Changed My Life edited by Jason M. Waltz.” About Robert E. Howard Changed My Life ed Jason M Waltz.
• “Review: A hilarious, righteous transgender remix of ‘The Odyssey’ blows up the literary canon.” About Didn’t Nobody Give a Shit What Happened to Carlotta by James Hannaham.
• “A Brief Political—and Personal—History of Gay Bathhouses. Rasheed Newson on Sexually Accommodating Spaces as Community Hubs, and the Moral Panics That Destroyed Them.” About My Government Means to Kill Me by Rasheed Newson.
• “The ovarian “biological clock” and other reproductive health metaphors that have led science astray. And why even the phrase “reproductive health” might be kind of misleading.” About Vagina Obscura: An Anatomical Voyage by Rachel Gross.
• “If Humans Went Extinct, Would a Similar Species Evolve? It’s comforting to believe that another advanced civilization would develop if humanity met its end. Not so fast.” Adapted from What We Owe the Future by William MacAskill. I mean, the way things are going, it’d be good to plan for the inevitable future … can we get Sleestak? And pylons with lighted consoles? See also “Who needs religion when you’ve got these clowns promoting bad ideas?“—”MacAskill has been the recipient of a totally uncritical review of his latest book in the Guardian. He’s a philosopher, but you’ll be relieved to know he has come up with a way to end the pandemic.” “If you aren’t convinced yet that longtermism/effective altruism isn’t a poisoned chalice of horrific consequences, look who else likes this idea.” Also, the uncritical review mentioned at Pharyngula: “William MacAskill: ‘There are 80 trillion people yet to come. They need us to start protecting them’. The moral philosopher gives most of his earnings to charity, says we need more not less economic growth to tackle global heating, and in a striking new book argues that it’s our duty to ensure the wellbeing of our distant descendants.”
• “Many Ways to Be: Elvia Wilk Interviewed by C. Francis Fisher. An essay collection that encourages us to see our humanness as an element of the natural world.”—”What I’m interested in is the negation or annihilation of the individual self not an act of destruction, but a deeply political claim to a different form of life.” About Death by Landscape by Elvia Wilk.
• “How the right is winning the hashtag wars — and how progressives can fight back. Scholar Francesca Bolla Tripodi on how the right weaponizes social media, and “hashtag resistance” isn’t working.” About The Propagandists’ Playbook: How Conservative Elites Manipulate Search and Threaten Democracy by Francesca Bolla Tripodi.
• “How an Unlucky Texas Fisherman Stumbled Upon an Environmental Catastrophe. Kirk Wallace Johnson on the Dark Side of America’s Gulf Coast.” Excerpt from The Fishermen and the Dragon: Fear, Greed, and a Fight for Justice on the Gulf Coast by Kirk Wallace Johnson. Also “When Vietnamese Fishermen Went to War With the Klan in Texas. When Vietnamese immigrants who had resettled on the Texas Gulf Coast got a toehold in the local fishing industry, white fishermen were spoiling for a fight.”
• The Last Revolutionaries: The Conspiracy Trial of Gracchus Babeuf and the Equals by Laura Mason—”The story of a poor man and radical activist who fought to revive the French Revolution, and whose failure heralded the republic’s defeat.” “Although the French Revolution is celebrated as a founding moment of modern representative government, this book reminds us that the experiment failed in just ten years. Mason explains how an elected government’s assault on popular democracy and social justice destroyed the republic, and why that matters now.”
• Kiki’s Delivery Service by Eiko Kadono, trans Emily Balistrieri—”Nostalgic fans of the Hiyao Miyazaki film and newcomers alike–soar into the modern classic about a young witch and her clever cat that started it all!” This was a recent daily deal in the Amazon ebook shop, so I’m thinking about it again. It’s a delightful little story, and it is still a mind-boggling crime against humanity that the other books in the series have not been translated to English yet. Just sayin’.
• “Jared Kushner’s ‘Breaking History’ Is a Soulless and Very Selective Memoir. In this lengthy book, Kushner recounts the time he spent in the White House during his father-in-law’s term.” Being human is hard when you aren’t one. Also “Here are the meanest lines from the Times review of Jared Kushner’s book.” Also tweet—”We made some new covers for Jared Kushner’s book and put them in Barnes and Noble.”
• “The Filter. What is life like for content moderators?” About We Had to Remove This Post by Hanna Bervoets, trans Emma Rault.
• Mad Studies, Kulturarv & Konst – En Antologi eds Engström & Punzi—”Den här boken presenterar “Mad Studies” och kritiska kulturarvsstudier. Dessa två discipliner är lite bråkiga. De ifrågasätter etablerad kunskap om både psykiskt lidande och kulturarv. Gräsrotsperspektiv och kreativa uttryck är viktiga; dels för att förstå psykiskt lidande och galenskap bortom diagnoser och medicinska perspektiv och dels för att lyfta det kulturarv som tillhör människor som ansetts galna. Välkommen till en värld av “Mad Heritage” och kreativa uttryck, skapad av “patienter”, forskare, kliniskt verksamma, konstnärer och museipersonal som ger sina perspektiv på psykiskt lidande, galenskap och kulturarv.” (Mad Studies, Cultural Heritage & Art – An Anthology eds Annica Engström & Elisabeth Punzi. This book presents Mad Studies and critical heritage studies. These two disciplines are a bit rowdy. They question established knowledge about both mental suffering and cultural heritage. Grassroots perspective and creative expression are important; partly to understand mental suffering and madness beyond diagnoses and medical perspectives and partly to lift the cultural heritage of people considered mad. Welcome to a world of “Mad Heritage” and creative expression, created by “patients”, researchers, clinicians, artists and museum staff who provide their perspectives on mental suffering, madness and cultural heritage.)
• “Oozing Class. The leaky fictions of Wolfgang Hilbig.”—”Of all the many literary images for Germany’s long, difficult process of coming to terms with its past … here is none quite so unforgettable as one that comes late on in Wolfgang Hilbig’s The Interim.” About The Interim by Wolfgang Hilbig, translated by Isabel Fargo Cole.
• “Joan Didion and Eve Babitz Shared an Unlikely, Uneasy Friendship—One That Shaped Their Worlds and Work Forever. In a trove of never-published archival material, their fraught relationship comes to electrifying life.”
• Tomorrow’s Forgotten Relics EP by Tomorrows Forgotten Relics, pre-order, due September 2022. Music from James Curcio & al.
• “‘Stealing from others:’ The continuing plagiarism of Pagan books.”
• “From Book Stacks to Psychosis and Food Stamps, Librarians Confront a New Workplace“—”Libraries have long been one of society’s great equalizers, offering knowledge to anyone who craves it. As public buildings, often with long hours, they also have become orderly havens for people with nowhere else to go. In recent years, amid unrelenting demand for safety-net services, libraries have been asked by community leaders to formalize that role”
• “A history of the blurb, every author’s best friend.”
• “‘Lord of the Rings,’ ‘The Hobbit’ Film, Merchandise, Theme Park and Gaming Rights Sold to Video Games Company Embracer“—”The rights include movies, books, theatrical productions, video games, theme parks and merchandise.” Also “The Lord of the Rings, Hobbit, and Tolkien IP to Be Acquired by Embracer Group“—”In a sudden late-night bombshell, it was announced that Embracer Group has entered an agreement to acquire the IPs for The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.” “Embracer Group has entered an agreement to acquire The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit from The Saul Zaentz Company, the rights holders for the franchise since 1976.”
• “Keller school officials order 41 books — including the Bible and an Anne Frank adaptation — off of library shelves. A new policy scraps community recommendations from last fall that some books that had been questioned should remain on shelves.”—”Attached to the email was a list of 41 book titles to be removed, including all versions of the Bible and ‘Gender Queer: A Memoir’” by Maia Kobabe, which depicts Kobabe’s journey of gender identity and sexual orientation.”
• “Beyond the Anthropocentric: When Plants Become Literary Characters. Coco Picard Recommends Elif Shafak, Sheila Heti, and More.”—”At a time when other life forms are rapidly disappearing as a result of climate change and capitalist extraction, we must stretch our imagination beyond anthropocentric narratives, in an attempt to find new polyvocal paradigms for sustainable coexistence.” “The following reading list includes novels in which plants transcend metaphorical use, becoming active characters, conditions, or modes of nonlinguistic communication. Plants in these books connect language with the earth, posing spiritual and existential questions about sisterhood, legacy, diasporic traditions, time, grief, and exile.”
• “The PRH Trial Has Revealed a Barely Hidden Scorn for Independent Publishers. Margot Atwell of Feminist Press on the Importance of Indies.”—”Over the past two weeks, writers and publishing professionals have been riveted by coverage of the trial in which the U.S. Department of Justice is attempting to block Penguin Random House’s purchase of Big Five rival Simon & Schuster.” “As a member of the independent book publishing community, I’ve been by turns frustrated and astounded by much of what the Big Five CEOs and other witnesses have said on the stand”
• “Handwritten diaries may feel old fashioned, but they offer insights that digital diaries just can’t match“—”Every original mark in a diary reflects an impulse of the moment.” Also this one goes out to all the magical journalists.
• “What Indigenous cultures can tell us about astrophysics. Gomeroi astrophysicist Krystal de Napoli is preserving First Nations knowledges about the environment and universe around us through scientific communication.”
• “Bison herd reestablished by Red Lake Nation has grown to 31“—”Only a couple of hundred years ago, 20 to 30 million Bison lived in vast herds across North America. There is an effort by some Native tribes to reestablish bison herds in Minnesota.”
• “A “cannibal” solar ejection heading straight for Earth could bring northern lights as far south as Illinois and trigger power voltage issues.”
• “Doppelgängers’ genes make them act alike too“—”Could there be someone out there in the world, some unrelated stranger, who not only looks exactly like you but behaves like you too? Might you have a genetic doppelgänger? Scientists have analysed ‘extreme lookalikes’, unrelated people who bear a striking resemblance to one another, and found that they share genetic variants which not only make them look similar but also act in a similar way.”
• “Common Tech Jobs Described as Cabals of Mesoamerican Wizards. AWM #91: I wanted to clarify the tech work landscape for myself and instead I wrote this (??)”—”Some call them mobile engineers, but their true name is a complicated Nahuatl word that translates to “those who have tamed the black smoke mirrors.” They are the ones who have mastered the dark energies at work in the Other World. They are the ones who allow us all to See.” Tweet—”Tech is Magic (a dissection):”
• “Massive Facebook glitch floods users’ feeds with celebrity posts“—”The scale of the glitch is enormous because it’s affecting some of Facebook’s most-followed accounts. They include the pages of Cristiano Ronaldo, which has 152 million followers, Shakira, which has 116 million and Rihanna, which has 101 million.” So … posts on Facebook actually can reach people? You realize this is probably merely a misconfigured “feature”. FWIW all Facebook timelines are truly the darkest timeline.
• “Get A Load Of These Dolts“—”Something incredible happened today in a Hilton Garden Inn in Rochester, New York. A local couple, Nicholas and Mary Nicosia, and their attorney, Corey Hogan, held a nearly hour-long press conference with the goal of convincing the gathered members of the press that the Nicosias did not host a racist party at their home on July 7 of this year. At one point during this press conference, Hogan spoke the following words: “Mary Nicosia has a Twitter account. It’s racist. It’s wrong. It’s vile. Shouldn’t exist.’ We’ll get back to that. First, you are going to need some context for all of this.” See also “Popehat’s Law of Goats.”
• “‘Scary Stuff’: GOP Election Deniers Surge to Victory in 2024 Battlegrounds. ‘This is how our democracy could crumble, quickly and quietly,’ warned one observer.”
• “The Psychiatrist Who Warned Us That Donald Trump Would Unleash Violence Was Absolutely Right. The vindication of Bandy Lee.” Also “U.S. v. Donald Trump: What comes after FBI raid? I know one thing: Be afraid. We are closer than ever to a criminal prosecution of Donald Trump. That will be a massive test for America.” Also “A new holy war rises in America, Israel and Europe — people of faith must stand against it. From Jan. 6 rioters to the West Bank, the poisonous distortion of scripture is fueling conflict. We can stop it.”
• “Trump Tells His Lawyers: Get ‘My’ Top Secret Documents Back. The ex-president is desperate to recover the classified trove taken from Mar-a-Lago — and is pushing his legal team on a long-shot maneuver to return them.” See also non-paywall thread.
• “New Right-Wing Megadonor Barre Seid Has Sparked Huge Controversy Before. A virtually unknown Chicago billionaire gave a conservative nonprofit $1.6 billion pay day. It’s not the first time he’s made waves.”—”The transfer, which took place in 2020 but only just came to light, could be transformative, both because of the amount of money involved and how it may change the way ultra-rich political donors structure their gifts.”
• “I’m a Local News Reporter. To Save Local News, We Must Publicly Fund It.“—”Local news infrastructure is collapsing. As I’ve seen firsthand as a local reporter, the only interventions are coming from wealthy investors, who are often angling to gin up positive coverage for themselves. To change that, we need publicly funded local news.”
• “Trader Joe’s Workers Decided To Unionize. The Company Abruptly Closed Their Store.. Workers say they were just days from going public with their union campaign when the company shuttered the Union Square wine shop.”
• “Apple is allegedly threatening to fire an employee over a viral TikTok video. The tech giant’s social media policy isn’t built for TikTok.”
• Watch “The Truman Show Tried To Warn You“—”This video explores the message of The Truman Show on modernity and post modernism through Truman’s struggle in the film called The Truman Show. Truman (Jim Carrey) is a regular working who slowly wakes up to the realisation that he’s living a lie leading his breakdown in The Truman Show.”
• “HBO Max to Remove 36 Titles, Including 20 Originals, From Streaming“—”It is currently unclear whether they will be made available on DVD or rental services, or if their removal will result in them becoming completely inaccessible.” “titles to be taken off … Aquaman: King of Atlantis … Infinity Train … Summer Camp Island” That’s the opposite of a good thing. They’re doing the opposite thing. Also “Why Is HBO Max Erasing the Best Queer Teen Series From Existence? “Generation,” “Infinity Train,” and “The Not-Too-Late Show With Elmo” are among the HBO Max-exclusive series that are about to vanish from the platform. It’s a mess.” As an aside, tweet—”With Streaming Services cruelly dropping beloved series & Disney’s love of locking things “in the vault,” feels like not a bad time to remind y’all about the Gravity Falls box set. Commentary on every episode- and guaranteed to survive Streamageddon!” About Gravity Falls: The Complete Series or direct. Also “HBO Max is removing 36 titles and creators are not happy.” Also thread—”We worked for 5 years to make 100 episodes of animation. We worked late into the night, we let ourselves go, we were a family of hard working artists who wanted to make something beautiful, and HBO MAX just pulled them all like we were nothing. Animation is not nothing!” “and we worked through the pandemic to make 20 linear episodes that are our most beautiful work yet. I cannot wait for you to see them. YOU WILL SEE THEM! I will not rest!” Tweet—”HBO Max is removing a bunch of Sesame Street content from their service? You know what that means!” Tweet—”HBO Max just logged onto my laptop and deleted the first draft of my pilot.” Thread—”It’s gone. They’re all gone.” “Like, yeah. I can go on a pirate streaming web site to watch episodes, but my kids can’t. I made this for them.”
• “Batman Robert Pattinson Rumored ‘Phased Out’ Of DC Films. Rumors continue to fly and this time they surround the fate of the Matt Reeves Batman universe.” Also “Warner Bros. Discovery’s Batgirl Cancellation Raises Antitrust Concerns, Warns Law Professor. A law professor at USC warns that the vast power now wielded by the recently merged Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. may breach antitrust laws.” Also “Leslie Grace Offered To Return As Batgirl But Declined“—”In fact, it seems that Leslie Grace’s refusal to return to the role of Barbara Gordon was pretty emphatic and the actress is extremely angry at Warner Bros. Discovery, pretty understandably.” Also “Warner Bros. Discovery’s ’10 Year Plan’ Could Ruin DC. Here’s why Warner Bros. Discovery investing in a huge plan for its DC films is likely to be a misstep for the studio.”
• “CNN Staff Fears Right-Wing Billionaire Will Turn It Into a Dumpster Fire. In this week’s edition of Confider, we look at how CNN’s shock firing of Brian Stelter has stoked internal fears centered around one libertarian billionaire board member.” “CNN insiders tell Confider that staffers cannot shake the feeling the shocking move was made to appease John Malone, a right-leaning billionaire, close friend of the Murdoch family, and key Warner Bros. Discovery board member who has made it well-known that he would like CNN to be more ‘centrist’—whatever that means.” Connection to the tone and theme of the Warner Bros debacle … they’re swinging the whole boat to the right.
• “The ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ Reboot Gets Staked“—”Into every generation a Slayer is born … except this one, apparently. 20th Century Studios has pulled the plug … Gail Berman confirmed that the series was ‘on pause’ … ‘industry speak for purgatory, make of that what you will.'” I feel like this cancellation was probably for the best, tbh.
• “Jack Quaid formed a ‘Spoimler’ bromance with Ethan Peck on Star Trek crossover event. The actor tees up the upcoming Lower Decks crossover episode in Strange New Worlds season 2.” Spock and Boimler sitting in a tree … slash fictioning.
• “Pressure, Crunch, Blacklist Fears: The MCU’s Visual Effects Artists Speak Out. A flood of MCU projects has stretched beleaguered visual effects artists to the breaking point.” Feige got The Inhumans’d. Also, shitty work conditions for people not getting residuals are snafu.
• Watch “Anne Rice’s Interview With The Vampire | Quiet Dark | AMC“—”A modern, unforgettable retelling of Anne Rice’s best-selling novel, Interview With The Vampire. Starring Jacob Anderson (Game of Thrones), Sam Reid (The Newsreader), Bailey Bass (Avatar: The Way of the Water) and Eric Bogosian (Succession). Premieres October 2nd on AMC and AMC+.” Also, tangentially “THE INVITATION – Official Trailer (HD)“—”You’re invited to a nightmare generations in the making. Save the date for #InvitationMovie exclusively in movie theaters August 26.” Also, still tangentially “Innistrad: Crimson Vow Official Cinematic Trailer – Magic: The Gathering“—”Eternal night falls over Innistrad, and Olivia Voldaren prepares to marry and claim ultimate power over the vampire elite” Huh. Themes.
• Watch “giving snakes there legs back.“—”god made a misnake.” Ugh, not now cyborg snakes!
• “Finally, a game that will just let me be a creepy witch in the woods. Become Baba Jaga’s apprentice in a giant chicken-legged cabin in upcoming Reka.”
• Watch “God’s Creatures | Official Trailer HD | A24“—”From filmmakers Saela Davis & Anna Rose Holmer and starring Emily Watson, Paul Mescal, and Aisling Franciosi. GOD’S CREATURES – September 30.”
• Watch “LIVING | Teaser Trailer (2022)“—”LIVING is the story of an ordinary man, reduced by years of oppressive office routine to a shadow existence, who at the eleventh hour makes a supreme effort to turn his dull life into something wonderful.”
• Watch “GUILLERMO DEL TORO’S PINOCCHIO | Official Teaser Trailer | Netflix“—”Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Guillermo del Toro reinvents the classic tale of the wooden marionette who is magically brought to life in order to mend the heart of a grieving woodcarver named Geppetto. This whimsical, stop-motion film directed by Guillermo del Toro and Mark Gustafson follows the mischievous and disobedient adventures of Pinocchio in his pursuit of a place in the world.”
• Watch “Jamie Bower – I Am [Official Music Video]“—Official music video for Jamie Bower – I Am—”I’m the devotion to the preacher. I’m the priest you want I’m on the front side of the fire side in the moonlit dark. I’m an angel I’m patron of the crash of sword. I’m an omen I’m a showman I’m the holy lord. I’m a vulture I’m an eagle I’m the crow you seek. I’m the morning I’m a groaning underneath your feet. I’m for the witches covered in stitches holy matricide. I’m an angel I’m the devil and I’m coming inside.”
• Watch “Wednesday Addams | Official Teaser | Netflix“—”Watch the official teaser for WEDNESDAY, an upcoming Netflix series from the imagination of Tim Burton. WEDNESDAY — starring Jenna Ortega in the title role, alongside Catherine Zeta-Jones, Luis Guzman, Gwendoline Christie, Christina Ricci and more — is a sleuthing, supernaturally infused mystery charting Wednesday Addams’ years as a student at Nevermore Academy. Snap snap.”
• Watch “Little Demon Official Trailer | Aubrey Plaza, Lucy DeVito, Danny DeVito | FX“—”From the co-creator of Rick and Morty comes the new animated comedy, FX’s Little Demon. Watch the OFFICIAL TRAILER featuring Aubrey Plaza, Lucy DeVito, and Danny DeVito, coming to FXX August 25. Stream on Hulu.”
• “Body found sitting in a chair in Sierra home for years“—”Officials believe that a body found inside a home in a small town in the Sierra Nevada foothills has been there for years before it was discovered.” Was it me?
• “Pedro I: Emperor’s embalmed heart on plane to Brazil. The embalmed heart of Brazil’s first emperor, Dom Pedro I, has arrived in the capital Brasilia to mark 200 years of independence from Portugal.” I mean … “I Carry Your Heart – Michael Hedges“.
• “David Tennant and James McAvoy join bonus episode of The Sandman. The episode is split into two parts – both based on popular instalments of Neil Gaiman’s original comic book series.” David and Georgia Tennent! James McAvoy and Sandra Oh and Neil Gaiman! And so many more! Not the least of whom is Derek Jacobi! Watch “The Sandman | Two-Part Bonus Episode | Now Streaming | Netflix“—”From the mind of Neil Gaiman, a two-part bonus episode of THE SANDMAN, featuring the stories “A Dream of a Thousand Cats” and “Calliope,” In this two-part story collection, a Siamese cat dreaming of a new world and a writer in desperate need of inspiration cross paths with Morpheus.”
• “The Sandman Stars Grapple With the Endless’ Sexual Chemistry. The Sandman stars Kirby Howell-Baptiste and Mason Alexander Park discuss the unintentional sexual tension between Dream and Death and Desire.”—”The Sandman stars Kirby Howell-Baptiste and Mason Alexander Park recently grappled with the unintentional sexual chemistry between the Endless siblings in the Netflix series. Howell-Baptiste and Park discussed the not-so-platonic undercurrent in scenes between Tom Sturridge’s Dream and their respective characters, Death and Desire, during a recent Q&A” “Park then chimed in: ‘That’s funny because my partner said the exact same thing about me and Tom… there’s a scene where Tom grabs my hair, and it’s very kinky, and she was literally watching it and was just going ‘Kiss, kiss, kiss!’ right next to me.'” “But the funny thing is that [executive producer] Alan [Heinberg] was telling me stories about how Tom just has sexual chemistry with everyone.”
• “On Circlusion by Bini Adamczak (English translation: Sophie Lewis)“—”I wish to propose to you a new term, one that has been missing for a long time: ‘circlusion,’ or, if you prefer a purer latinate, ‘circumclusion.’ It denotes the antonym of penetration. It refers to the same physical process, but from the opposite perspective. Penetration means pushing something … into something else … Circlusion means pushing something … onto something else” “This word, circlusion, allows us to speak differently about certain forms of sex. We need it because penetration still rules supreme over the heteronormative imaginary and its arbitrary division of bodies into “active” and “passive.” The verb to penetrate evokes a non-reciprocal or at least unequally distributed process. The one who is penetrated is implied to be passive. More than that, being penetrated, like being screwed, is automatically imagined as disempowerment.” “O workers of the anus and the mouth, of the vagina and the hand, I say to you: be aufdringlich!” Don’t tell the poets. Wait. No. Tell them. Tell them!

This post was possible because of support from generous ongoing Patrons. Patrons get access to Omnium Gatherum immediately. On the blog, this will be exclusive to Patrons for one year, after which I’ll make it publicly available to everyone so they can see what they’ve been missing.