Iain Sinclair visits Gary Snyder

[Tom Beshear]

I highly recommend Sinclair's new book "Ghost Milk: Calling Time on the 
Grand Project." It came out in the UK last year and is about to be published 
in the states. It's his jeremiad against "grand projects" like the 2012 
London Olympics. It's a terrific, sustained piece of prose -- Pynchon gets a 
mention or two along the way (the V image recurs), along with DeLillo and 
Sebold, though J.G. Ballard is the main touchstone here.

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "rich" <richard.romeo at gmail.com>
To: <pynchon-l at waste.org>
Sent: Friday, June 01, 2012 12:28 PM
Subject: Iain Sinclair visits Gary Snyder


Sinclair loves ghosts. lots of 'em here in that Califor-ni-ay

'The poets who survived from the San Francisco renaissance of the late
1950s and early 1960s branded themselves, or were branded, becoming
identified with various philosophies or styles. Voluntary simplicity
was never an easy pitch. ‘There are books about that,’ Snyder said,
‘but many people looking for the simple life didn’t do it well. They
came out of the bourgeois background. They didn’t have the cultural
context with which to do it. But there are places that are flourishing
still. Like Southern Oregon. And parts of Northern California. Or
south of Eureka on the river basin. Not everybody knows about them.’

full text available here:

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v34/n10/iain-sinclair/the-man-in-the-clearing