No New Republic of Letters

Dear Readers,

Ever since I set up this site in 2005, I have been adamant that it is no blog, but an archive, and that I am no blogger, but an essayist, critic, commentator, &c. It can't be a blog, I've explained, because I only make available here writing that originates elsewhere. It is thus, I've insisted, an electronic archive. A compendium. A resource even.

My insistence has come to naught. Friends and strangers alike continue to proclaim: "Great blog!" "Justin here's a blogger." "Keep posting your blogs. Their [sic] so funny."

Fine, I now wish to tell them. Have it your way. This is a blog, and I am a blogger. I am not a venerated member of some imagined Republic of Letters, but only another private in that vast army of men who believe, against all evidence, that they've something important to tell the world, donning the uniform of undies, stubble, and an oversized coffee mug, insignificantly tapping out my billionth part of this great, meaningless epic.

In view of my slow and painful acceptance of reality, I have been forced to adapt myself to the rules of the game by opening up my 'posts' to subliterate and incoherent comments from anonymous aggressors, who will swiftly blight my lovingly crafted pages with scattershot ejaculations about chemtrails, Kurt Vonnegut's wisdom, things that make them 'lol', and things that remind them of Hitler.

I hope, however, that from among the simple life forms known to inhabit the comments zone of the blogosphere, that stinking swamp of tired commonplaces, evanescent unfit memes, and adolescent texting argot, a few might be discovered with backbones and brains, ready to enrich this, um, blog, with sequences of letters composed into words that in turn make up sentences reflective of some degree of mental complexity. We'll see. 

In keeping with my newly acknowledged calling, I will also be providing exclusive content on this blog, not reposted from elsewhere, at least once a week. I envision a series of vignettes somewhat modelled after Paul Harvey's "The Rest of the Story," had Paul Harvey been a blogger, and had he been interested in early modern Wunderkammer, Chukchi oral epics, or the history of trepanning. Please do check back in soon for more.

--Justin Smith

Comments

[Vadim]

Fuck you! lol.

[Brad]

u r a fag!

[Andrew]

HI!

Love your writing but this site sucks in Opera. Can you give bigger clues for identifying which of your essays are parodic - I don't have enough knowledge of philosophy to tell when you are spinning a yarn. I'd hate to laugh at some arcane drollery and then find out that you were perfectly serious.

[Matt]

How long until you regret this decision Justin? Is four comments enough?

[helen]

Of course you are a critic, essayist, commentator, no-blogger, and whatever you want to name your elitist self, Mr. Justin! Fuck you, EHSmith!!
Hah! Better late than never!

[helen]

Fuck you, Justin Erik Halldór Smith!!!

[nancy boyd]

These comments reveal the awesome power of the Internet.