"I looked through your magazine and I was repelled by the title, Semiotext(e). It's so dry, you just want to throw it in the trash, which I did. Listen: Hatred of Capitalism would be a much better title. It's stunning. The world is starving for thoughts. If you can think of something, the language will fall into place, but the thought is what's going to do it." —Jack Smith A READER edited by Chris Kraus and Sylvère Lotringer SEMIOTEXT(E) ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The editors would like to thank all the friends who helped us retype portions of this manuscript: Priyanka Basu, Shannon Durbin, Jim Fletcher, Giovanni Intra, D'Arcy Cook Jones, John Kelsey, Hedi El Kholti, Tessa Laird, Joan Laughlin, Allison Madigsohn, Keith Pirlot, Sara Reich, Steve Shimada, Tom Simpson, Mark Stritzel, Joel Tauber, John Tremblay, and Robert Hardwick Weston Additional editing: Mark Von Schlegell Assistant editors: Shannon Durbin and Tessa Laird Designed at The Royal Academy of Nuts + Bolts, D.O.D. www.TheRoyalAcademy.org We gratefully acknowledge financial assistance in the publication of this book from the California Arts Council. This work, published as part of a program of aid for publication, received support from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States. Cover photo by Mark Borthwick Text at top of back cover from Algeria by Kathy Acker HATRED OF CAPITALISM, A READER. Copyright © 2001 Edited by Chris Kraus and Sylvère Lotringer. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. First Semiotext(e) edition published 2001 ISBN 1584350121 Semiotext(e) 2571 W, Street Los Angeles, California 90057 and 501 Philosophy Hall Columbia University New York, NY 10027 distributed by: The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England To the Memory off an Era (1974-2002) Table Of Contents 013 Chris Kraus & Sylvère Lotringer .. Introduction: The History of Semiotext(e) 025 Eileen Myles .. An American Poem TERROR 037 Assata Shakur .. Prisoner in the United States 051 Jean Baudrillard .. Our Theatre of Cruelty 057 Chris Kraus .. Aliens & Anorexia 063 Ulrike Meinhof .. Armed Anti-Imperialist Strugggle PURE WAR 067 Nina Zivancevic .. Pandora's Box 083 Alain Joxe .. The Empire of Disorder 097 Kathy Acker .. Algeria 105 Georges Bataille .. The Culprit 121 Hélène Cixous .. "The Writing, Always the Writing." POLITICS, DOMESTICITY AND FLIGHT 129 Jean Baudrillard .. Why Theory? 133 David Rattray .. The Angel 151 Paul Virilio .. The Last Vehicle 161 John Cage .. For the Birds 173 Sylvère Lotringer .. The Dance of Signs 191 Bob Flanagan .. January 201 Lynne Tillman . Dynasty Reruns 209 Deleuze & Guattari .. May 68 Did Not Take Place GETTING & SPENDING 215 Deleuze & Guattari .. Capitalism: A Very Special Delirium 221 Jane Delynn .. Leash 229 Jean-Frangois Lyotard .. Energumen Capitalism 243 Jack Smith .. Uncle Fishhook and the Sacred Baby Poo Poo of Art ECSTASY 261 Fanny Howe .. In the White Winter Sun 273 Ulrike Meinhof .. Armed Anti-Imperialist Struggle 281 Louis Wolfson .. Full Stop for an Infernal Planet 285 Frédéric Rossif .. The Wild Celebration 283 Guy Hocquenghem .. We All Can't Die in Bed BECOMING 297 Michel Foucault .. Friendship as a Way of Life 303 Michelle Tea .. Goth-N-Roll High School 321 Chris Marker .. Sunless 335 Kate Millett .. Women, Homosexuals and Youth: Latent Sexual Liberation 341 Chris Kraus .. The Exegesis 355 Félix Guattari .. Becoming-Woman LIFE IN THESE UNITED STATES 363 Tisa Bryant .. Home Training to Crash Pad 375 William Burroughs . The Popling 383 Cookie Mueller .. Abduction and Rape - Highway 31, Elkton, Md - 1969 393 Ann Rower .. LSD...Just the High Points 409 David Wojnarowicz .. Death Mask Introduction: The History of Semiotext(e) Chris Kraus and Sylvère Lotringer Introduction: The History of Semiotext(e) Chris Kraus and Sylvère Lotringer Part 1: Sylvère's First Dream (June 12, '01 - Los Angeles California - 7:30 p.m.) Chris Kraus: Could you tell me about the dream you had last night? Sylvère Lotringer: What was the dream? C: The dream about not having sex. Because, you see, I was disappointed... I moved the bed around here in the room so that everything could be different. S: But we were having sex. We were just, we didn't go beyond the crepuscular. C: Crepuscular Dawn. That's the title I thought up for the book you're doing with Paul Virilio. It's very trans... like a tequila sunrise, pineapple juice getting mixed up with grenadine. But I think the dream was about being middle aged. S: Let me describe my dream. I never dream, but for the last two nights I remember my dreams. In both dreams, there is a communal situation -a big room like a loft or an office, with people coming and going. Nothing is private. And in the first dream I was trying to make out with someone. I just remember the white sheets pushed aside, the mattress on the floor. People were passing and I was kind of annoyed but somehow having sex didn't seem so important. Like in Kafka, The Country Doctor, I was looking between people passing by. The bodies themselves were not so important. And then last night, I was in another of these huge halls, but I was lying on my back with my sex erect - C: You mean, your penis? S: Awgggh, I hate the word "penis." As soon as you become physiological, it's not much fun. C: Sylvère, that's all the fun. S: I mean, I was like the Egyptian Needle. C: You mean, you had a great big hard on. S: Yeah. And you were hovering above me like the sky.. .And, how can you penetrate the sky? C: That is a beautiful dream. S: So then, it's not just you and me, it was people moving around doing their things and I was just trying to do mine and it didn't matter if it went anywhere or not. It was a feeling of energy and presence and there was a point. You don't always have to try to make a point - C: So that is the history of Semiotext(e). S: Exactly. The Red Army Fraction wanted to make a point, and it was taken away from them. You can only take a disparate action... Disparate Action/Desperate Action... wasn't that the title of your first play? C: Yeah - that was how I met you. Of the ten famous people I invited, you were the only one who came. S: What was it about? C: It was about coming to the East Village from Wellington, New Zealand and realizing there wasn't such a thing as politics any more. In New Zealand I was a teenage Maoist, working for trade unions... there was a working class culture that was different from consumer culture, what you'd call "popular" in France... so we had that in common, even though we were different generations. I was wondering how to make sense, or maintain a sense of politics, in a situation that was inherently chaotic and apolitical. Regretting history. Of course that hardly is a topic anymore. But it was one of Semiotext(e)'s big topics. That's why I thought it was destiny that I should meet you. S: I was never a Maoist. I only realized later on that in France I had been a Stalinist. C: Yeah, well. How do you talk about the past without it seeming like an epitaph? S: Hence my hatred of the penis. Hatred of capitalism. C: Yeah, but I love dick, ya know? (laughs) What did you think, looking through the book today? S: I felt that all of it was theory, even when theory wasn't there. It was so strong. Reading Assata's interview, Prisoner in the United States, made me think that while we're supposed to live such a privileged life in our glamorous vacuum it relies on the fact that 1.3 people in this country have just been put away. And that millions of people all over the world and in America are paying for this technological paradise. It's very upsetting. But the feeling I had was also strength - being connected to something very important, that hasn't disappeared. When I started Semiotext(e) in 1974 we were in the last gasp of Marxism, and I knew the terrorists were right, but I could not condone their actions. That is still the way I feel right now. What happened is that we forgot that capitalism even exists. It has become invisible because there's nothing else to see. When I told Baudrillard about this book, he said the title sounded too old-fashioned. C: He didn't get the joke. S: But capitalism hasn't disappeared. I was trying to disappear for years by doing interviews, but capitalism hasn't disappeared. Its repercussions are even more momentous than before, but no one can seem to grasp them. (The phone rings. It's Mark Von Schlegell, who has edited sections of this book.) C: Mark, what do you think about the book? M: I think it's fine. I enjoyed the parts I read. I totally liked it. C: Yeah, but do you think it's historical or speculative? M. Probably a bit of both. I think it's hysterical. What do you want it to be? C: I want it to be beautiful. (Mark hangs up.) Sylvère, should we move on to another topic? I wanted to say something about this direct, immediate tone of voice we publish in Native Agents.