Dulle Grietby Pieter Bruegel the Elder O sinner! Consider the fearful danger you are in: it is a great furnace of wrath, a wide and bottomless pit, full of the fire of wrath, that you are held over in the hand of that God, whose wrath is provoked and incensed as much against you, as … Continue reading Sinners in the Hands of an Angry Basilisk: Some early thoughts on the Political Theology of AI
Happy Christmas friends and comrades. Taking some inspiration from xenogothic, whose blog and wider intellectual work I’ve deeply admired for years now, I thought it would be interesting to try and wrap up the year and collate all of the writing I’ve managed to publish this year. Much of the year I spent wracked with … Continue reading 2025 Retrospective
After starting last week with the piece on Fulci, I thought I would turn to another film that takes even heavier inspiration from Henry James’s novella, “The Turn of the Screw.” The Innocents, directed by arguably the most literary of British film directors, Jack Clayton, is utterly peerless. It is formally and thematically bold in … Continue reading The Haunted House on Film Part Two
For FRJ. Fredric Jameson is dead and it feels like the world has moved on its axis, a center of gravity has shifted. It is almost impossible to give a full and fair summation of Jameson’s achievements - as an intellectual, writer and philosopher he can only be thought of in plural, as many Jamesons. … Continue reading Thought To The Second Power
I’ve been doing a series of events for A Primer on Utopian Philosophy (available now, order it here etc etc). What has been perhaps somewhat surprising is the extent to which Bloch’s philosophical project seems to resonate with people. In the midst of the bleak nightmare of modernity, Bloch’s unabashed philosophy of hope could easily … Continue reading Blessed Are They That Mourn, For They Shall Be Haunted
The connections and similarities between Bloch and Benjamin are still, I think, under-appreciated -- reflecting the wider lack of interest in Bloch’s work. The two were contemporaries, knew one another and had a deep appreciation for one another’s work and methods. Just on the surface there are some interesting polarities -- Bloch, the exegete; loquacious, … Continue reading Now Time and the Not Yet
From a situation in which nothing is possible, suddenly anything is possible againMark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, Is There No Alternative Today marks the publication of my new book, A Primer on Utopian Philosophy: An Introduction to the Work of Ernst Bloch, out with Zer0 Books. The book -- more of a pamphlet really -- is … Continue reading Feeling Bloched
“Denken heißt überschreiten” -- to think is to transgress,-- Ernst Bloch Prompted by this post about the intersections of Goethe and Marx, I can think of no better thinker than Ernst Bloch who fits the bill. Like many German intellectuals of his day, Bloch was enormously influenced by Goethe, particularly Faust but was also a … Continue reading Provisional & Early Thoughts On Go(e)thic Marxism
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