06 May 2015

On the name ‘Tertius Radnitsky’ & other problems

This entry constitutes Day 2 of my Facebook hogwash roundup. Basically I wrote a bunch of comments over there, and now I’m copying them here for safekeeping; because, if I leave them on The Facebook, they’ll breed worms and stink like the food that our LORD feeds his people (Exodus 16:20).

Obligatory image

Above is a detail that I took from a furniture ad. It is a room shown sideways. Before I turned the picture on its side, it was not art; but, once I rotated it, it became art. How do we know whether or not an artwork is art? Like so: If the Pope waves his wand over the item and shouts a price higher than $6,000 U.S. dollars, the item is art.

On the name ‘Tertius Radnitsky’

I’m fascinated by the movements of Surrealism and Dada, and I was pleased when I first learned that Man Ray, who was associated with those groups, was born with the name Emmanuel Radnitzky: he died in November of 1976, and then I was born a few months later—in March of ’77—with the name Bryan Ray; so I decided to steal his surname because he stole mine.

The name Tertius came from the biblical book of Romans (16:22). I’ve always had a love/hate relationship with the Apostle Paul; and this fellow Tertius actually wrote the Apostle’s epistles: Paul himself just paced back & forth in the room, dictating angrily (and probably spitting while he talked, because he’s exactly like me).

Therefore, by calling myself Tertius Radnitsky, I was trying to siphon the powers of Surrealism, Dada, and all of the Almighty LORD’s false lying prophets (1st Kings 22:23). But now that I’m finally done with all of my literary pranks, I chose to accept the name that my parents gave me, because it has two Ys in it, which will look nice on neon signs when I become a burlesque dancer.

On comedy

Some folks think that comedy cannot exist because our world is made of pure sorrow. But the real reason comedy cannot exist is that, like God, our world is always laughing; so, anything comedic is rendered invisible against this identically colored backdrop. A thing can only enter existence by setting itself off with shades of tragedy.

On the total page number of A Book about What

My boss, who is gravely superstitious about numbers, once awoke in the middle of the night because his alarm clock fell off a high shelf and landed on his head. The time that was showing on my boss’s alarm clock, at that moment, was 4:44 a.m. – so he’s always been terrified of that number. This is why I honed my book until it contained exactly 444 pages, every single one of which is weird.

On preoccupation

There is no need to apologize for being preoccupied: everyone is preoccupied nowadays, because we’re living through an epoch of radical upheaval (lightning-speed technology, etc.) – I’m just glad that we all remain in touch.

On blogging

I knew, from the very start, when I began to post on a regular old boring blog format, that it was an outdated practice; but this type of thing attracts me: I like to contribute to strange, silent places when nobody is looking – it makes me feel devious, yet without hurting anyone – that’s my penchant. I’m happy that you checked out anything that I wrote here or anywhere. Really, to earn someone’s interest in this online realm is like trying to gain attention by reciting poetry in a noisy shopping mall. But I try to find something to love about it.

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