The Scofield
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THE SCO FIELD O MAX FRISCH IDENTITY ISSUE 1.4 SPRING 2016 THE SCOFIELD IAN FRANCIS THE SCO FIELD 1.4 “So it is not because I feel a duty to teach or convert the public that I publish my things but because, if one is to recognize one’s own identity, one needs imaginary readers.” MAX FRISCH, MONTAUK Interview Disaster “Here Frisch for the first time elaborated on one of his dominant themes, by some critics the central theme of his oeuvre: the search for identity as the questioning of the existence of a self-contained character or personality, its dependence on the reciprocity of interpersonal image-making, and the impossibility of escaping from the roles we assign to each other.” GERHARD F. PROBST, INTRODUCTION TO PERSPECTIVES ON MAX FRISCH “I know my literary trademark is the problem of identity, MAX FRISCH IDENTITY even though I do not identify with this trademark myself. But both my trademark and I are fine with this.” MAX FRISCH IN AN INTERVIEW WITH DIETER E. ZIMMER FROM DIE ZEIT ISSUE 1.4 SPRING 2016 PAGE 2 THE SCOFIELD TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS Scofield Thayer 2 Markers of Silence and Contemplation: A 28 Sculpture by Gaston Lachaise Conversation in Three Parts with Tony Perez, Jakob Vala, and Jonathan Dee Interview Disaster 2 Interview by Conor Higgins Painting by Ian Francis And Dreaming 32 Table of Contents 3 Painting by Jennifer Packer “That Brought Him to That Creaking Room 33 Always a Question 8 Was Age”: Max Frisch’s Man in the Holocene Letter from the Editor by Tyler Malone Essay by Sven Birkerts Who Is That? 12 Ghost Chamber with the Tall Door (New 39 Photograph by Rudolf Eickemeyer, Jr. Version) Painting by Paul Klee Max Frisch Selected Bibliography 13 List of Works by Max Frisch Nihilistic Password Security Questions 40 Humor by Soheil Rezayazdi Max Frisch 1981 New York #17 13 Photograph by Sigrid Estrada I’m Nobody! Who Are You? 40 Poetry by Emily Dickinson Max Frisch Ports of Entry 14 Recommended Reading by Various Authors The Prism at Rock Bottom 41 Essay by Tennessee Jones A Selection from Montauk 19 Fiction Excerpt by Max Frisch Ain’t I 49 Painting by Jennifer Packer DMAX FRISCH IDENTITY Montauk Cover 27 Cover Design by Jakob Vala Here’s the Truth 50 Fiction by V. V. Ganeshananthan ISSUE 1.4 SPRING 2016 PAGE 3 THE SCOFIELD TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS The Fundamentalist Reader: On Plotless 51 A Selection from Quiet Creature on the Corner 84 Novels and the Meaning of Life Fiction Excerpt by João Gilberto Noll Essay by Scott Cheshire Seven Lives of Bluebeard 88 I Know My Soul 58 Essay by Stephen Sparks Poetry by Claude McKay Testimonial (Supported in Belief / 94 Two Young Men 58 Verified in Fact) Daguerreotype by Unknown Fiction by Jeffery Renard Allen Some Remarks on Stiller 59 Selections from “Song of Myself” 95 Essay by Mark Jay Mirsky Poetry by Walt Whitman Two People Feed a Lion 65 Alternative Montauk Cover #1 98 Painting by Ian Francis Cover Design by Jakob Vala A Selection from Abahn Sabana David 65 The Frisch Questionnaire 99 Fiction Excerpt by Marguerite Duras Responses by Idra Novey The Frisch Questionnaire 75 A Selection from “Advice from a Caterpillar” 101 Responses by Mark de Silva from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland Fiction Excerpt by Lewis Carroll Self Portrait, Yawning 78 Painting by Joseph Ducreux Blood on the Wall 104 Aphorisms by Yahia Lababidi Left Behind: A. Igoni Barrett’s Blackass 79 Anthropoid Man 107 Review by Jonathan Russell Clark MAX FRISCH IDENTITY Aphorisms by Róbert Gál Three Poems 83 Poetry by Juan Gelman ISSUE 1.4 SPRING 2016 PAGE 4 THE SCOFIELD TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS You Lose Your Virginity, But You Acquire 108 Max Frisch 1981 New York #1 139 Your Identity: A Conversation with Photograph by Sigrid Estrada Volker Schlöndorff Interview by Mary Duffy The Heart Is the Record 140 Essay by D. Foy Quicksand: A Conversation Regarding the 114 Max Frisch & Identity Issue Max Frisch 1981 New York #11 152 Commentary and Collage by Mira Jacob & Kaitlyn Photograph by Sigrid Estrada Greenidge Paging Dr. Freud: Prince Cracked Something 153 Drinking Alone by Moonlight 119 Open in Me Poetry by Li Po Essay by Tyler Malone A Selection from Albina and the Dog-Men 120 Inclined Autonomy 156 Fiction Excerpt by Alejandro Jodorowsky Painting by Jennifer Packer A House Escapes Into the Sky, But Loses Its Form 123 Great Thinkers on Identity 157 Painting by Ian Francis Quotations from Various Authors The Frisch Questionnaire 124 The Nose 159 Responses by Jason Porter Fiction by Nikolai Gogol A Holocene Diary (15 Sketches) 128 Strange Garden 173 Commentary by Zachary Hatfield Painting by Paul Klee Max Frisch 1981 New York #10 134 Frischesque 174 Photograph by Sigrid Estrada Recommended Reading by Various Authors We All Frontin’: Identity & Internalized Racism 135 MAX FRISCH IDENTITY Essay by Edyson Julio Max Frisch & Alice Carey #1 176 Photograph by Sigrid Estrada Selections from Drafts for a Third Sketchbook 138 Sketchbook Excerpt by Max Frisch ISSUE 1.4 SPRING 2016 PAGE 5 THE SCOFIELD TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS A Month of Max Frisch: Notes from a 177 The Soul Shedding Itself: Antoine Volodine’s 198 Reader’s Diary Bardo or Not Bardo Commentary by Anthony Brown Review by Alex McElroy A Likeness 180 William 200 Essay by A. M. Davenport Painting by Jennifer Packer Is It Because I’m Black? 187 Episodic Blips, Incomplete Things: A 201 Poetry by Joseph S. Cotter, Jr. Conversation with Simon Critchley Interview by Tyler Malone We Were All Lesbians Once 188 Fiction by Alison B. Hart Astrological Fantasy Portrait 209 Painting by Paul Klee Ragged Voices: Reading and Writing 193 Through the Nightmare of Self “Who Can I Be Now?”: The David Bowie 210 Essay by Dustin Illingworth Identity Mixtape Tracklist & Liner Notes by Tyler Malone Reflective Encounter 194 Painting by Ian Francis Self Portrait (with Cows) 216 Drawing by Jean-Jacques de Boissieu Two Poems 195 Poetry by Phillip B. Williams To Begin Again: A Conversation with Max Frisch 217 Interview by Dieter E. Zimmer Against Aboutness: The Corpse that Almost 196 Got Away This Unwelcome Conversation: A Dialogue in 222 Essay by Olaf Berwald Story Form on Max Frisch’s Homo Faber & Volker Schlöndorff’s Voyager MAX FRISCH IDENTITY Alternative Montauk Cover #2 197 Dialogue by Will Chancellor & Kevin Jaszek Cover Design by Jakob Vala The Frisch Questionnaire 228 Responses by Sarah Gerard ISSUE 1.4 SPRING 2016 PAGE 6 THE SCOFIELD TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS Nocturne 229 Alternative Montauk Cover #3 246 Poetry by Ruben Dario Cover Design by Jakob Vala A Selection from “Self-Made Men” 230 On Our Nightstand 247 Essay Excerpt by Frederick Douglass Recommended Reading by Various Authors Journey 231 One Who Understands 249 Painting by Ian Francis Painting by Paul Klee A Selection from “Of Identity and Diversity” 232 The Long, Easy Afternoon 250 from An Essay Concerning Human Understanding Cocktail Recipe & Photograph by Joe Salvatore Philosophy Excerpt by John Locke Yellowed Archives 251 A Selection from “Denoting” from The 233 Comic by Dustin Illingworth Principles of Mathematics Philosophy Excerpt by Bertrand Russell Panel of Dead Authors 252 Comic by Charlie Meyard Two Poems 234 A Selection from a Letter to Georgiana Keats, 253 Poetry by Jared Chipkin February 14th – May 4th, 1819 A Report for an Academy 235 Epistolary Excerpt by John Keats Fiction by Franz Kafka A Selection from the Procunier v. Martinez 255 A Full-Circle Moment: A Conversation with 241 Concurrence Tanwi Nandini Islam By Justice Thurgood Marshall Interview by Mira Jacob A Selection from Hamlet 255 Petrified Archway 244 Drama Excerpt by William Shakespeare MAX FRISCH IDENTITY Painting by Ian Francis Masthead & Dramatis Personae 256 A Selection from The Tempest 245 Portraits by Chris Ames Drama Excerpt by William Shakespeare ISSUE 1.4 SPRING 2016 PAGE 7 THE SCOFIELD TYLER MALONE TYLER MALONE Cheshire, one of our managing editors, wrote an essay for Electric Literature in August of 2014 (republished in these pages), which focused on plotless novels and featured some Always a Question extensive praise for one particular plotless novel that had been out of print for years: Montauk by Max Frisch. When Philosopher Simon Critchley, who I interviewed for this Electric issue, wrote the following statement in two of his books, Tony Perez of Tin House read Cheshire’s piece in On Humour and ABC of Impossibility: “Does not our Literature, he set out to acquire the rights to republish identity precisely consist in a lack of self-identity, in the the novel (a complicated process, as you’ll see when you fact that identity is always a question for us—a quest, dive into the issue and read his conversation with Conor indeed—that we might vigorously pursue, but it is not Higgins). At the same time that Perez was trying to something I actually possess?” hammer out a rights agreement for Tin House to republish There is some sort of irony in the fact that this Montauk, we were creating the first issue of The Scofield, so exact statement appears twice in Critchley’s oeurve and, it made sense that when Tin House finally did republish therefore, has some identity with itself, resonating from Montauk, we would release an issue focused on its author. one text to the other, an echo. For our purposes, though, The author of Montauk, Max Frisch, is better known the more compelling thing to notice about Critchley’s as the author of the novels I’m Not Stiller and Homo Faber statement on identity is that it is not actually a statement and of the plays Firebugs and Andorra.