For the last hour of the presentation, the Wu Mings took questions from the audience; and these quickly progressed from queries about how the four members of the Wu Ming group (originally five) wrote collectively, to their thoughts on left-communists such as Jacques Camatte and Amadeo Bordiga. I was impressed with both the depth and breadth of the answers, as well as with how relaxed the Wu Mings were on stage. Although I’ve been in contact with the Wu Mings for about 15 years now, I’d not seen them do a public presentation before, and it was quite a revelation! So if they’re ever somewhere near you – and I understand McKenzie Wark is hosting a Wu Ming event in New York in November – make sure you catch them! There’s no point in me summarising what the Wu Mings said yesterday here, you should check their website, and if possible catch them live!

And while you’re at it don’t forget to check – www.stewarthomesociety.org – you know it makes (no) sense!

The Iroquois way of life was destroyed by the development of capitalism, and this entailed the exploitation of both Africa and the Americas, as well as the European working class. The diseases that accompanied European traders and their goods decimated the indigenous American population and thereby opened the way for their conquest. The Iroquois were caught between a rock and a hard place and mostly chose to ally with ‘perfidious Albion’, rather than the equally barbarous French or – slightly later – the genocidal armies of George Washington. However, for me the real ‘heroes’ of this novel are not the characters who take up the bulk of its pages (some are  actual historical figures), but rather those shadowy proletarian figures who attempt to make an alliance with the Iroquois when some of their leaders visit London.  From page 199 of Marituana:

“For the sake of clarity let us say straightaway that we Mohocks of London – with the exception of him who writes to you – have not a drop of Indian blood in our veins, but we feel similar to you in every way. The so-called honest men, in fact, see us as savages and like to attribute to us the most cruel misdeeds, before remembering us when they need cannon-fodder for their armies… The Mohocks of London, weighted down for centuries by deprivation and abuse, never had the opportunity to establish a pact with a sovereign. But they do have one advantage over their American brothers, which is that they live in the heart of the Empire, a few streets away from the house of His Majesty, and that they can raise a loud voice of their own. Imagine the Indians of the Colonies and those of the Motherland joining forces to form a single great nation….”

This band of rebels are a real prefiguration of the future. They are called ‘Sohocks’ in Marituana but they might as well be referred to as ‘Metropolitan Indians’ – a name attached to those segments of the 1970s  Italian autonomist movement who favoured Indian imagery and names, and who attacked the ongoing commodification of culture by tearing down fences at pop festivals and expropriating luxury goods. Marituana’s Metropolitan Indians rough up the rich and free those who have been imprisoned and abused in the Bedlam ‘lunatic assylum’. A continuation of this short thread will hopefully form the basis of a future Wu Ming novel, since in the one under review we follow the Iroquois leaders back to the Americas, where they meet defeat with dignity.

At the end of the book, a character called Esther (another prefiguration of the autonomists of the 1970s), views the future as a return-at-a-higher-level to earlier modes of human existence: “There is no destruction for those who understand the law of time. She thought of what she had seen in her sixteen years and the world that had collapsed around her. She thought of the life that awaited her and the new world they would build in the Garden in the middle of the Water. The Thousand Islands. Manituana.” This, of course, is the world we must win!

It has been a long time since English language readers had a new Wu Ming book, but when y’all get yo mits on this tome, you’ll see it was well worth the wait! Manituana is a groove sensation!

And while you’re at it don’t forget to check - www.stewarthomesociety.org – you know it makes (no) sense!

“You are not allowed to comment on this entry as it has restricted commenting permissions.”

Yeah, search for shit and you get shit. So I figured I might as well apply my alchemical knowledge to this search and transmute some shit into gold. I went for “empty blog’ and “Stewart Home” and got only one entry, but what an entry! A blog by top American novelist Dennis Cooper from 30 July 2006:

“Joe Mills said… if the competition was a ploy to out The Lurkers – it worked. Lots of new names – unfortunately not much info on their (often empty) blogs… Jeff said. Everyone here should check out lutherblissett.net. Dennis, have you heard of the Luther Blissett project? I think Stewart Home is involved…”

Yep, it looks like it is the all important comments that will pull the traffic onto your blog, coz they just produce such wonderfully post-modern random word combinations.

Moving on I figured I should reverse my search process with a double dose of shit by looking for “empty blogs” and “Kate Muir”.  And it was no surprise to be told: “Your search – ‘empty blogs’ ‘Kate Muir’ – did not match any documents.” Yes, out of nothing comes nothing. And little Katie the Times columnist with an irrational fear of ‘drunk ventriloquists” really ain’t worth nothing at all! But all that has changed thanks to me. From now on when you search for “empty blogs” and “Kate Muir” you can come here… Like that old groover The Almost Fake Heraclitus observed way back when: “it is impossible to step into the same data stream twice…”

And while you’re at it don’t forget to check – http://www.stewarthomesociety.org/ – you know it makes (no) sense!