July 2019 Open Post

   July 24, 2019
   John Michael Greer
   486 Comments

   This week's Ecosophian  offering is the monthly (well, more  or less!) open
   post to field questions and encourage  discussion among my readers. All the
   standard rules  apply -  no profanity,  no sales  pitches, no  trolling, no
   rudeness, no long  screeds proclaiming the infallible truth of  fill in the
   blank - but since there's no topic, nothing is off topic.

   For those who  are interested in my paral-Lovecraftian  fantasies, I'm also
   pleased to announce that The Shoggoth  Concerto is now available for sale -
   you can  get print or e-book  copies here. I  realized, in the course  of a
   discussion  online a  little  while  back, that  The  Shoggoth Concerto  is
   basically  the  anti-Fountainhead.  Those  of  my  readers  who've  slogged
   their  way through  the least  turgid of  Ayn Rand's  novels know  that The
   Fountainhead runs on  the well-worn conflict between  the individual genius
   who wants to do  something new and shocking, on the one  hand, and the dead
   weight of popular taste and tradition on the other. What do you do, though,
   when doing something new and shocking  has become the new conformity that's
   imposed  on  every rising  talent,  and  your  inspiration comes  not  from
   whatever conventially new  and shocking idea all your  classmates are doing
   by rote,  but from the traditional  forms of Baroque music?  That's Brecken
   Kendall's dilemma  in The  Shoggoth Concerto. Of  course Howard  Roark also
   didn't have to deal with shoggoths...

   With that said, have at it!