09/20/08
Text: Donari Braxton
The shrewd-in-crowd stipulation of "experimental lit" has an isolating effect. (In other news: Yes, there is such thing as ‘experimental lit’). And "experimental fiction"—an inevitable Generic in a 21st century lit world which lives, breathes and shits labeling genres—does little better. Culturally-speaking, the keyword simply suggests fiction "that’s out there," though semantically it really just means: "not what you’d expect from fiction." In other words, experimental really just boils down to a taxonomic of predictability—this is how one transforms creativity into commercialism’s foil. But if experimental is nothing but a stand-in for expect-the-unexpected, then where, really, does this leave us? Well, yes, it leaves us appropriately wondering then just what the hell the opposite of "experimental" literature is, if not expect-the-totally-obvious.
Latest release that might well provoke new label-tantrums from a literary machine on scholastic autopilot? Ximena, author Hillary Raphael’s newest novel (officially out in October, though already available online). The book narrates an improbably beautiful librarian’s struggle to harmonize with a world in which cyberspace is synonymous with extortion, death always questionable, and sex an exchange of mutual foibles. This is the author’s haplessly fetishistic construct of the digital world, delivered on with the motley poetics that define all Raphael’s work to date: An acute understanding of more "technical" literary topoi, and the wherewithal to outmaneuver them by somewhat fatalistically remaining, if you permit, one step ahead of the climactic. But let’s be clear: that literary creativity presently presupposes "capricious out-there-ness" is at least good for one thing: Raphael’s novels and those of envelope-pushers under the same stamp—HP Tinker’s brilliantly progressive fiction comes to mind, likewise authors Andrew Gallix and Tony O’Neill—exist on their own accord, de-contextualized. And if you’re able to nix "experimental lit’s" elitist subterfuge and instead embrace the tabula-rasa, you’ll see they read like any other, er, "non-experimental" book. With pleasure. To prove it, I recently spoke with Ms. Raphael on the subject of her trials on ink and paper, and quite pleasantly, discovered one could gain insight into the author’s work without the abuse of esoterics or hip "postmodern irony." (I promise). Read on.
Ximena's described as your "latest dispatch from the darkest corners of capitalism." In the spirit of things, can we assume the book is then in any way a direct "continuation" of your previous two novels?
All of my work is an attempt (perhaps futile or misguided, but hey) to reconcile the utter spiritual oblivion that is consumer culture with the very real ecstasy of being alive today. In I Love Lord Buddha, this conundrum is dealt with through excess; in Backpacker, through escapism; now Ximena explores a modestly private lifestyle...
And do you feel your characters deliver on this reconciliation?
In my world, death is beautiful and, like all beautiful states, temporary. My characters are fortunate when they fall into that void where all consumption is suspended. For an eternal instant, there's no banality, no boredom, no shopping. Then they'll be reborn, and have to do it all again. Remember, though, that the good part comes again, too: bodies, pleasures, fleeting happinesses.
How about the idea of hedonism pure—highly peppered in throughout your work. How does that figure into the consumption junction for you?
Hedonism is the reward for being human. That's tied in with the good part of incarnation. Yeah, sure, it's hard, horrible even, to possess sophisticated consciousness in the late capitalist culture-- one has to navigate so many symbols and abstractions at every second. One is divorced from reality and wedded to delusion by force. Yet this enslavement comes with a set of privileges. One such privilege is the conscious pursuit of pleasure; the more enslaved to consumerism one is, the more delicately specialized are the pleasures. That's how dominatrices, submistresses, Japanophiles, art collectors, and Buddhist monks always find themselves in my stories.
And sexuality? Also seemingly at the mainstay; does it embody that same reality-versus-delusion duality to you? Or does it play more of mediating role?
Sex is the most human of our preoccupations. Unlike money (that other universal hot-button), it isn't inherently useless. It doesn't require context to acquire value. It feels good and it replicates our genes—double success. This irresistible goodness, combined with cultural hypocrisies governing sexual conduct, make for narrative kindling. Sexual choice [can be] a path to the heart of a fictional character. Who is this character? Well, let's fuck her and find out.
Can you talk a little about your efforts to stimulate reader-writer interactivity, particularly through the Internet?
Yeah, I have asked my readers (with varying degrees of success) to contribute to the narrative process online, either by uploading a backpacker sex story to tokyomonamour.com, or purchasing a pair of used panties (worn by a fictional character) on neogeisha.org. I do this because I hate being the only author of a book. It can feel lonely and masturbatory. It's better when the story evolves post-publication.
Have to ask: Who exactly do you think are these lionhearts buying fictionally used panties? How do you imagine a die-hard Hillary Raphael loyalist?
My top loyalists are writers themselves, so I get mail from them. They're uniformly cool, but wildly disparate types…
And as for the future? What's next for Hillary Raphael?
I've been entertaining the idea of doing a new translation of Sei Shonagon's Pillow Book, but it isn't clear that I have the wherewithal to complete such a mammoth task. It may be easier to just re-write it from scratch. We'll see…
