Hi folks,
Today, I
was honored by being interviewed by the person I feel is the single best
interviewer on the planet these days, Richard Godwin, for his classy interview
site, “Quick Fire at the Slaughterhouse.” It’s my second time I experienced a
Godwin interview, the first at his “Chin Wag at the Slaughterhouse.” Simply
put, there is no one better these days at conducting interviews, and yes, I’m
aware of the Paris Review interviews. Compared to Godwin, those are closer to
being quizzed by a People Magazine reporter…
Godwin
first included a review of my novel, THE RAPIST, by Vicki Gundrum. Here is
Vicki’s review, to be followed by the Quick Fire interview:
Vicki's Review of The Rapist
The
Rapist
By
Les Edgerton
New
Pulp Press, March 2013
ISBN:
970-0-9855786-2-6
Reviewed
by Vicki Lambros
Gundrum
Les
Edgerton’s The Rapist lures through prurient interest of a heinous crime
and the promise to
peek
into the mind of the rapist. It begins as smut, some pages feel dirty. The
rapist, Truman
Ferris
Pinter, is unrepentant, even spiteful and arrogant toward those who would judge
him. He is a condemned man, sits in a cell awaiting execution. He recalls his
crime and his hates, even an
infant
hate. Complexity and contradiction nudge their way in. Edgerton tracks Truman’s
thoughts
and dreams, which are unusual and particular—in this way creating an uncanny
realism
of
an individual mind. The book evokes consideration of art and life. It does not
debate right and
wrong
but aims higher, toward the possibility of salvation.
The
rape lands Truman in the cell. The plot ends and the real story begins: the
ruminations of the
rapist
and perhaps all the guilty soon to die who contemplate death. The book exists
outside of
time—in
the manner of a classic—no contemporary references plus Biblical-level
language. For
example,
here is the opening, a thought monologue by the rapist:
Let
me tell you who occupies this prison cell. Perfidious, his name is Perfidity.
His name is: Liar,
Blasphemer,
Defiler of Truth, Black-Tongued. He lies down with all members of the
congregation
equally, tells them each in turn they are his beloved, while he is already
attending
to
the next assignation, in his relentless rendezvous with the consumption of
souls.
In
the cell Truman dreams and he begins to fly, adventures that relieve him of
prison time and
place
him in the condensed world of thought and visitations to his childhood when he
could truly hover above the ground, until the age of eleven. He suddenly lost
the power because he learned to fear, he had become an adult. The power to fly “insists
on suspension of all fears and laying yourself open to the actions of others.
Pure trust and guilelessness must be achieved….I suspect that is what Christ is
mystically saying when he tells the Pharisee he must become as a ‘little child’
again.”
Truman
also tells of his childhood power to leave his body and float above it, a power
also lost at
age
eleven: “Unlike Christ at the same age, I felt no call to proselytize, my main
activity at this
period
becoming an intense desire to satisfy my carnal nature. I self-abused my flesh,
incessantly.”
Truman
practices flight in his cell and plans an escape. During practice he meets with
his father
and
mother, and then he’s in a dream that seems real and people run for their
lives. He also
debates
a man in a robe on a mountaintop about religion, heaven, hell, humanity, love.
Partway
through
their talk the old man loses his smile, saying “Could it be that God has been
misinterpreted
by man?”
One
of the most virtuosic performances in the novel is the well-read and articulate
Truman’s runthrough of religion, philosophy, psychology; God, Freud, Kant,
Jung, Skinner, Einstein; John
Milton,
John Donne; prisons, the veracity of his own murder charge, and his existential
challenge
to
the warden: “You are looking out of hell, not into it when your eyes lock with
mine.”
Edgerton,
via Truman, proposes an original view of life and souls that reads like a
metaphor of
string
theory—but which was written before publication of the string theorists
(revealed to me in
correspondence
with the author, 2014).
And
in writing this theory of life—and Truman’s flirtations with destinations of
hell, nothing,
strange
loops, or heaven—Edgerton seems to have written like his life depended on it.
The
book’s
conclusion is a seeker’s twist that might not have been found but was.
It
is a slim book—a novella (142 pages)—with a tightly woven narrative that
springboards from
the
guise of pulp fiction to its destination as guidebook for lost souls. There
would never be a
love
child between Albert Camus and Harold Pinter (the original Pinter—the
playwright famous
for
his comedies of menace) but such an invention comes to mind for the book is one
of a kind.
The
book satisfies the entreaty “Make It New” made famous by Ezra Pound.
The
Rapist is
difficult only if you are troubled by the grisly beginning or don’t want your
head in
the
game of thinking. The author will not strand you as a guide.
How
else to persuade you all to read it? If some nerd creates metrics for measuring
the amount of
book
per page—lyrical communication of ideas, inspiration, insight, brain tickling,
suspense in
the
service of story—this book would win. (Not that I’d want a nerd to do this. The
best books,
like
this one, are mysterious.) Can today’s publishing world of unjuried plenty
spawn a classic?
The Rapist is a work of
genius. It is a classic work that should be read for generations.
Thank you
so much, Vicki! And, here’s my interview with Richard:
Quick Fire At The Slaughterhouse: Interview With Les
Edgerton
Les Edgerton is a highly versatile
author who moves between genres. While known for his gritty and real crime
writing, he often challenges contemporary prejudice in his novels. His novels The
Bitch and The Rapist are two great examples of this. Les met me at
The Slaughterhouse where we talked about fiction and ideology.
Tell us about the progress The
Rapist is making.
If by progress, you mean sales, it’s
holding its own, Richard. Which means—as it does to most writers—not nearly
enough!
What has been extremely gratifying
to me are the reviews it’s been garnering from the people I respect the
most—fellow writers. Their response has been absolutely wonderful and I’m
basking in it. These are the smartest people in the world about literature and
almost universally The Rapist has received raves.
However, it isn’t in bookstores and
that’s not the fault of my publisher. It’s the fault of the system. My agent is
working very hard to correct that. He’s actively seeking a legacy publisher for
it and has the blessing of my publisher at New Pulp Press—Jon Bassoff—in this
quest. As much as indie publishers have done for writers—and it’s an awful
lot—they’re still hamstrung at gaining mass distribution and getting actual
books into bookstores. Hopefully, that will change at some point, but currently
not much headway is taking place. Also, getting a book distributed by Ingram’s
and/or Baker & Taylor, is the only avenue to getting reviews done by
well-respected reviewers, such as the NY Times, LA Times, Washington
Post, et al. And it’s only by getting those kinds of publications to
provide reviews or coverage that filmmakers ever find out about the book.
And—face it—that’s the Holy Grail of most of us as writers. Indie books, by and
large, aren’t even open to most industry awards, although this seems to be
changing a bit. (Not enough, nor fast enough…) To see our books make bona fide
bestseller’s lists (not those sub-sub-sub-sub-set of some obscure Amazon
rankings) and to get noticed by Hollywood is what will transform the indie side
of publishing and so far, mass distribution is the missing (and crucial)
element.
So, in answer to your question, it’s
making good progress in sales and exposure within the limitations of the indie
publishing universe, but not the kind of progress other books make which are
put out by legacy publishers. If an indie can somehow figure out how to get
their books in the Ingram pipeline and therefore on the shelves of B&N,
that’s a publisher who’s going to rise up and become a major player in literature.
My fervent hope is that publishers
such as NPP, Down&Out Books, Blasted Heath and those kinds of magnificent
publishers can someday figure out a way to get major distributors and chain
bookstores on board. Look at the lists of just these three (and at least a
dozen more) and Random House doesn’t even come close to the overall literary
quality of the books these folks are putting out. But, if they’re not seen, it
doesn’t matter. And that’s the shame of today’s publishing. They’re restricted
to the Intergnat. Not enough, alas.
If I were an indie publisher, I
think I’d be looking to band with other indies and trying to make a case to
Ingram’s and also to the major chains such as B&N to get their books on the
bookshelves and get covered by the major media. As it is, most don’t have the
financial resources to do it alone, but I have to think that if say five of the
best-heeled indies got together and presented a case for Ingram’s and B&N
to take their product and put it on the shelves and store it in the warehouses,
a major breakthrough could be made. What keeps that from happening now is that
no one house has the resources to physically publish enough copies of the books
to make it worthwhile for Ingram’s or B&N to distribute or stock them on
their shelves. I think someday a visionary will come up with a plan to organize
a consortium that would take a book like The Rapist, print 10,000 copies
and then they’d be able to sit at the poker table with Random House and those
folks and get books out to the buying public. That’s the major difference—the
legacy boys have the bucks to print a significant number of books, send them to
Ingram’s and made available quickly to bookstores as needed with the flick of a
computer button. If I was younger I’d try to do just that, but that’s a job
that’s going to require enormous energy to get the right parties together and
talking.
Just think about how much better a
novel such as Neil Smith’s All The Young Warriors, Richard Godwin’s Mr.
Glamour, or my own, The Rapist, would do if it was on the shelves at
B&N? Hell, we might even rival those Fifty Shades of Crap books that
are on those same shelves. So much book-buying is done on impulse when a
customer browsing the shelves happens on a copy of a book, picks it up, thumbs
through a few pages… and then takes it to the sales counter and the person
standing behind them in line spies it, asks about it and then buys his own
copy? Our books don’t have that chance… We can’t even finance our own book
tours since B&N and other chains won’t order our books unless they’re in
the distributor pipeline. I think the key to mass market success lies in the
major distributors.
There are small publishers who’ve
done just this. Algonquin Books, Gray Wolf—there are several. The deal is, they
published enough copies that Ingram’s could financially take a chance on them
as could B&N. Their editorial acumen was good enough that the major
reviewers would also look at their books. I really think if a few of the really
top indie publishers banded together and started out with a few of their best
titles, this strategy could work for them as well.
But, then, maybe I’m just naïve…
wouldn’t be the first time…
How does it compare to The Bitch?
Two entirely different kinds of
books, so probably not fair to compare them. The Bitch is a noirish
thriller, while The Rapist is a more existential, literary novel. For
some reason, I seem to have gotten labeled as a “noir” writer, but in
actuality, I’ve only written a few novels that fall into that category. I’m not
complaining! Just a bit puzzled. I do think what they each have in common is
that both explore and plumb the dark parts of the human psyche.
As far as sales, The Bitch
has a more commercial appeal. Although both titles are examples of how to
irritate the PC folks, The Rapist seems to scare away more potential
buyers because of its title. I kind of figured that would be the case for both,
but my contrarian nature basically said “Fuck it” to both sentiments. If
there’s anything I abhor more than PCism, I haven’t encountered it yet.
Especially when it rears its ignorant head among so-called “intellectuals” and
“academics.” More and more, I find a more anal group doesn’t exist. Freedom of
speech and freedom of thought don’t seem to exist with these folks in any great
degree. I used to teach at various universities and haven’t yet experienced a
more restrictive atmosphere in any other milieu. In fact there’s a decided and
vocal bias against thought that goes against the prevailing political mood and
if you don’t subscribe to the ruling thought if you want to keep a job, you
either learn to simply keep silent or else say fuck it. I took the latter tack
and that’s why I won’t teach in a university these days. They’re very rigid and
very close-minded. And, in my view, very ignorant.
Vicki Lambros Gund, who wrote the
review you have here, presented it to two scholarly review publications and it
was turned down. The reason? The way Vicki presented it to me, they’re run by a
group of “feminists” who rejected it out of hand because of the title and what
they supposed it was about. As you know, it’s not much about rape nor are there
numbers of rape scenes, but simply a look inside a person’s soul who was
accused of rape. One might think that a group of people who are against
something like the heinous crime of rape might want to investigate something
that reveals the inner workings of such a criminal, but like most people who
belong to groups and live their lives by bumper stickers, that would require
the process of intellectual thought and that’s a lot of work, I presume…
Throwing a bumper sticker on their Prius and locking arms and singing Kumbayah
takes a lot less effort…
Am I bitter or pissed? Well… yeah.
Not because of my little book so much as I am in the general landscape of
literature, especially in the U.S. I’ve found a much more open audience in
Europe. Seems there are still large numbers of people there who actually enjoy seeing
and considering other points of view. Not so much over here… at least among the
ruling class… If you think I’m simply being paranoid, take a look at most of
the major literary awards. Most are given to folks who toe the party line. Kind
of a circle jerk…
Sorry. This is the reason I write. I
hate. A lot. And hard. I especially hate small-minded people who’ve made up
their minds to become part of the herd and have sold their souls for the
congress of other small minds.
It’s why I will always come running
any time you want to do an interview, Richard. You have one of the few
remaining bastions of free thought and free exchange of ideas in literature
that I’m aware of.
While political correctness is
driven by ideology, history evinces evidence of the lack of Art under
dictatorships. Given that, do you think that pc is the enemy of Art?
I think a truer statement has never
been made! The destruction of freedom of speech (which is the direct
manifestation of freedom of thought), is the biggest enemy of art that has ever
existed, and this is exactly what PCism accomplishes—restricting freedom of
speech. What makes it even more insidious is that many who find themselves
reacting to a political correct culture, not only practice it themselves but
exert pressure on others as well. At least in an overtly repressive society
where freedom of expression is regulated by the state, there exists a healthy
underground of dissent. In a society that has largely given itself over to a pc
culture, Pogo’s dictum becomes the pulse of the society—“We have met the enemy
and it is us.”
As it pertains to literature, truth
is central to the quality. There simply isn’t any way to achieve truth when
PCism is introduced into the formula. The basic unit of writing is the word. If
we begin to use words that are in existence solely because they spare someone’s
feelings—real or imagined—we’ve veered from that truth. Instead of the beauty
that truth brings, we’ve created fool’s gold. We’ve seen the result of PCism in
the version of Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. PCism
has reduced one of the great works of literature into a pathetic kind of Hardy
Boys crap.
PCism isn’t something new. It’s just
the newest form of censorship we’ve had to deal with. Like many grandiose
ideas, there is a noble intent at the center of this outlook, but also like
many other popular notions, it has been perverted until it is the antithesis of
what it originated as. Being PC nowadays amounts to out and out censorship in
my opinion. For every writer like Bukowski, William Vollmann, and David Sedaris
who breaks through and becomes a cult hero, there are hundreds of writers who
are being stifled, vilified, and destroyed, simply because they do not preach
the party’s message nor do they conform to the parameters set up by the PC
folks who seem to be in charge. Too often they are stifling themselves by
trying to placate society. What used to be considered simply bad taste nowadays
takes on a more sinister connotation and that is dangerous if we value freedom
of thought and value the time-honored tradition of the debate of ideas which is
the only viable method for advancing knowledge and understanding. And, which
constitutes true art.
Plato himself spoke about political
correctness in The Republic, when he said:“Then the first thing will be
to establish a censorship of the writers of fiction, and let the censors
receive any tale of fiction which is good, and reject the bad; and we will
desire mothers and nurses to tell their children the authorized ones only.” How
about that.
Author Gordon Weaver told me in an
interview years ago that, “If our special interest, as writers and/or editors,
is the precise use of language toward the end of a viable perception of and
effect on reality, we may argue there is some virtue implicit in any
utterance (written or oral) that confronts the consensus of any gathering.” He
gives an example. “There is a cost that will be paid by all concerned if one
tells a Polack joke in the presence of Poles, but I contend the cost is greater
if one stifles or sanitizes the anecdote.” Gordon has something here, I think.
Weaver also told me that academicians are perhaps the newest bullies on the
censorship block and perhaps the most dangerous of all. He stated that, “There
is a greater danger, it seems to me, when the censors come from the ranks of
the presumably ‘enlightened’. It is not surprising that a number of college and
university communities nurture factions who wish to control free speech; it is
unsettling when more sophisticated citizens (faculty) add their clout to
movements desiring to police our utterance in the interests of what minority or
another deems politically incorrect.”
Simply as it pertains to literature
itself, PCism influences every aspect of writing and publishing.
If PCism wasn’t such an insidious
threat to free speech, most of it would be laughable. Just this week, reports
have surfaced that the word “illegal” as applied to illegal aliens shouldn’t be
used in government reports. That’s just plain moronic. A person who comes across
our border who isn’t a citizen and doesn’t have permission from the government
to enter has just broken a law. Therefore, he or she is only one thing.
Illegal. And, not an illegal “immigrant.” They’re not immigrating—they’re
entering the country illegally. They’re an illegal alien. Nothing but. The sad
thing is that there are people who will accept this kind of language seriously.
They don’t want to hurt the feelings of people who’ve broken the law? Okay…
We’ve got government agencies
targeting individuals and groups for their thoughts and speech. The IRS is
currently under Congressional investigation for just that. This is something
every single American should be incensed at but are they? Nope. As long as they
continue to get their “free” crap from the government, they’re happy. (Reality
alert: It ain’t “free.” It’s paid for with our taxes and our freedoms.)
Benjamin Franklin famously wrote that “whoever would overthrow the liberty of a
nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech.” These words remain true
today. What’s truly scary is that the mainstream press is fully complicit in
preventing free speech.
What scares me the most is that
universities should be the bastion of free thought but the state of the matter
is that free debate of ideas is rapidly disappearing from the college campus.
As more and more writers come out of university settings and are being
influenced by teachers with a decided political bent, the writing they produce
becomes more and more insipid. These same writers take over the litmags and
editor positions at publishing houses and impose their political beliefs on
those who submit, publishing only those that can pass the PC test in the
content of their creative material. As Kurt Vonnegut said, “Literature should
not disappear up its own asshole, so to speak.” Well, it’s in great danger of
doing just that. It’s about halfway up the anus.
Alisa Smith, co-editor of The
Marlet, the student newspaper at the University of Victoria in British
Columbia, says, “Universities are trying to shut down thought, rather
than newspapers. All the articles that you see are about how PC’s have sort of
gotten a grip on society and how people can’t say what they want anymore. I
guess it’s like a left-wing phenomenon.”
Virtually every publisher in the
country, from the smallest litmag to the largest publishing conglomerate, is
terrified of antagonizing any reader whatsoever, unless the person offended is
not part of a highly-organized, highly-vocal political group. It seems
everybody in America has now organized, has a group with a slogan, a
newsletter, a home page on the Internet, and a secret handshake. The battle is
being waged over who gets ultimate control of the presses. And it doesn’t
matter who wins. We all lose. What we lose is freedom of expression. And once
that happens, we are done as a free society. I go to Gordon Weaver once again,
who said it as best as it can be said. “Censorship from without is bad for the
language, bad for those who speak or write it; self-imposed censorship, whatever
the motive is worse. If you won’t say what you think, you run the risk of
losing the powers of both speech and thought. I suspect we’ll be safe just as
long as we refuse to accept censorship for anyone.”
I’d like to leave you with one of my
favorite quotes. In the preface to the infamous Story of O, Jean Paulhan
wrote, “Dangerous books are those that restore us to our natural state of
danger.”
Yes, they do.
What else is on the cards for you
this year?
Several things. The launching of my
latest novel, a black comedy crime caper titled THE GENUINE, IMITATION, PLASTIC
KIDNAPPING from Down & Out Books in October. This one was a
true labor of love. It began life as a short story in The South Carolina
Review, then expanded into a novel as well as a screenplay. The screenplay
is still being shopped and placed as a finalist in both the Writer’s Guild and
Best of Austin screenplay competitions. I liked the characters so much I’m
writing a sequel and I’ve never done that. In fact, I see several sequels in
the future provided I live long enough to write them.
It’s the story of Pete Halliday, a
degenerate gambler who was busted out of baseball for… gambling. It picks up
ten years later in New Orleans where Pete retired to after hanging up his glove
and who has a smarmy sidekick named Tommy LeClerc, a part-Indian, full idiot,
who keeps inveigling him into hair-brained schemes. Both are heavily into debt
to the Italian Mafia to the point of the duo getting rendered room temperature,
and Tommy comes up with the bright idea of kidnapping the head of the Cajun
Mafia (there are a lot of Mafias in the Big Sleazy), but with a twist. Instead
of doing the old-fashioned and boring method of kidnapping, our two heroes plan
to amputate Charles Deneuve’s hand and hold that unit for ransom. General
mayhem ensues, including a scene where Pete’s new girlfriend, full-time
waitress and part-time hooker, Cat, helps him escape the Italian Mafia’s
enforcer, Sam “The Bam” Capelleti who just entered the black bar they’re in, by
pretending to have Tourettes and screaming racial epithets for a diversion so
he can slip out the back door while they’re cutting her throat. Or so Pete
assumes, but it turns out Cat is slicker than he thought.
Tommy’s initial scheme is to kidnap
the manager of a Kenner supermarket and gain cash by holding the guy’s wife
hostage while he retrieves the money from the store safe. But… there’s even a
prior to this one as they decide they can’t go into this guy’s neighborhood
unless they’re dressed in suits, which neither own. To finance their wardrobe,
Tommy lays out a plan where they’ll rob tourists on a streetcar, which goes
south when they discover the passengers are better armed than they are and they
escape in a hail of bullets. They get a loan and buy the suits and show up at
the supermarket guy’s house, only to find out there’s no great love lost
between the manager and his bride, and that, too, goes quickly south. It
becomes quickly evident why the Indians lost the war… (This is not a PC Indian,
btw—Tommy doesn’t believe in any frickin’ Great Spirits and he’s a polluter par
excellence…)
Lots of twists and chases through
the French Quarters, the Jazz Fest, and other environs and in the end, Pete and
Tommy get the loot and then Tommy double-crosses Pete. Deneuve’s hand is
returned to its owner, but alas, finds it can’t be reattached as his meathook
has suffered severe freezer burn from when the pair hid it in Tommy’s
girlfriend Wanda’s freezer under the veal cutlets and didn’t realize one needs
to burp a Baggie before freezing.
In the end, Pete gets revenge on
Tommy in a particularly ingenious way and he and Cat escape to hide out in the
open in Lost Wages by getting plastic surgery to make them look like famous
lookalikes, which Vegas is chockfull of. Only problem is, just before their
operations by a reputable plastic surgery, Cat spies an ad by a surgeon who
offers a cut-rate on such procedures by not having all the frills such as a
high-priced office space (he works out of his split-level), nor other
unnecessary items such as a licensed nurse, high-priced anesthetics, etc., and
they end up looking like celebrities, albeit not the ones they envisioned.
Instead of Elvis, Pete ends up looking like Liberace with yellower teeth and
Cat? Well, Cat goes around these days not as the Cher she asked for, but more
along the lines of Bette Midler with black hair and a Jimmy Durante shnozz.
She’s not a happy camper…
This was just a pure-d fun novel to write.
Other things on my plate include an
appearance at the Fayetteville, NC public library and then a trip to
Bouchercon, both in November.
Richard, I just want to thank you
for another great interview! No one out there asks the level of questions that
you do. None of those: Where do you get your ideas? What time of day do you
write? Twitter of FB? kinds of boring-ass snooze alert questions. It’s such
a pleasure and rare treat to be asked intelligent questions! Thank you.
Thank you Les for a perceptive and
informative interview.
Thank you,
Richard. Hope y’all enjoyed our chat!
Blue
skies,
Les
Get a copy of The Rapist
in Kindle and paperback format at Amazon US and UK
Les’ books pages on Amazon US and UK
Hope y'all enjoyed these!
Blue skies,
Les
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