BOOK LAUNCH: The 2020s: An Age of Conversation
Is this the stuff dreams are made of? 2015. Jose Castiella.
Today is a proud day for Mercurius, for it is the day we launch our first printed version of the magazine. And wow, what a journey it has been! From an experimental collaboration among artistically inclined friends and acquaintances under lockdown to a journal with a fully fledged aesthetic and distinctive voice, the word “evolution” is perhaps the best word to describe the sequence of transformations that have culminated with here….
You can purchase the printed version of the journal, which compiles the best “printable” work published on the site between May 2020 and May 2021, on Amazon via these links:
Sneak Preview of Mercurius’s first printed edition of the magazine!
The price, £20.00, may seem steep, but this is only because the journal is printed on the highest quality paper and contains many colour images. Our aim was to create an object of beauty that can sit on your shelf for years to come and still feel fresh and vital.
All profits from the book (we make £4.55 per book) will go to paying the running costs of the journal. This well help keep Mercurius ad-free and sustainable going forward! A portion of these profits will also go towards a tree planting charity to make sure the paper used for the production of the book goes back to the trees.
Thank you so much to our readers, contributors and editors for making this dream happen.
Please find below the editor’s letter that introduces the book.
Peace,
Thomas Helm
The 2020s: An Age of Conversation
There are those who compare the post-2008 crisis-ridden landscape to the “Age of Anxiety” of the 1930s, as eloquently summarised by W.H. Auden in his 1944 classic poem. However, perhaps an “Age of Conversation” is more appropriate for our current epoch, for there is a big difference between the 1930s and the 2020s. While the 1930s offered two major alternatives to liberal capitalism: fascism and communism (and in certain cases anarchism), our age has been noticeably short of alternative –isms ever since the Berlin Wall came down and Fukuyama triumphantly declared the End of History. Many of the intellectuals and artists of the 1930s were communists or at least fervent leftists who believed in the overthrow of capitalism; names such as George Orwell, Andre Breton, as well as Auden himself come to mind; a few were open fascists (Céline, Salvador Dali, Ezra Pound) and others tried to steer clear of politics. However, the artists and intellectuals of today may identify themselves as “postfeminist” or “Marxist” but they tend to lack the same connection to a radical, joined-up on-the-ground movement. This is because such a movement does not exist. And so, in the absence of an alternative -ism, combined with a clear vision of the failings of the predominant neoliberalism, the emphasis on conversation feels appropriate: questions need to be asked, radical viewpoints raised, healthy, constructive debate initiated.
Only by thinking outside the box may we find ways of reconciling democracy with housing, environmental, social, technology and economic justice and create a civilizational model that exists in harmony with both the human and non-human denizens of earth. There are glimmers of hope, such as the Green New Deal, and the minimum 15% corporation tax recently agreed upon by the G7. There are also valuable demonstrations of energy, as popular protest movements such as Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter have brought important issues under the public spotlight. However, there is just no joined-up, holistic, cohesive alternative at which we can point and say that’s where humanity needs to be in the next 100 years. In this age of fragmentation and hyper-specialisation, I would argue the “age of conversation” requires an inter-disciplinary approach, not just in the arts, but in all areas, as thinkers of diverse fields and backgrounds come together to draft a blueprint for an ideal future world. Mercurius´s next big venture, Future(s) Worlds, will attempt to do just this, or at least experiment with an alternative organisational model that may facilitate the emergence of an alternative –ism from the bottom up.
Where do the arts fit into this picture? You may well ask. An age of crises marks a shift in consciousness, and the arts, which channel the collective unconscious, as well as the personal, evolves to reflect this shift. What was acceptable before may suddenly look tired in the new paradigm. For example, in a time of environmental collapse, defined by the sixth mass extinction phase, placing the subjective “I” at the centre of the universe – as though the “I” were an enduring font of universal wisdom – may no longer feel endearing. The sagacious “I” has not managed to halt capitalist humanity´s gross abuse of nature. Moreover, there is a semantic problem here, especially in the context of consumer capitalism, where the “I”-centred consciousness has been trained to associate the maximum of gratifications with the highest of virtues. Some Mercurius contributors are at the forefront of this more critical and experimental way of thinking. There are artists and thinkers such as SJ Fowler, who deliberately introduces error into his work to question the received wisdom that poetic language is a tool for progress; and Paul Hawkins, editor of the future-facing Hesterglock Press, who has been quietly hammering away at the mainstream approach to literature for many years. Both share the same appreciation of “failure” as an authentic means to represent the current state of civilization.
This doesn´t mean the avant-garde should seek to impose new rigid aesthetic lines to substitute the old rigid lines. It only means having a wider conversation in which we don´t blindly accept the practices of the past can be beneficial when combined with other practices, the same way a blast of oxygen is useful for a fire. As Hawkins himself says in the essay in this volume, radical experimentation is not even the “main” way he uses to express himself. Conversation gracefully allows contradiction else the speakers risk sounding priggish or standoffish.
The word Mercurius comes from an alchemical concept found in the writings of Carl Jung meaning “world-creating spirit”. It recalls the element of mercury, which flows to fit diverse shapes and is capable of accommodating diversity and paradox. Mercurius is both male and female, day and night, the beginning and the end of the alchemist´s quest. It is perhaps the quintessence of conversation. Wildly diverse perspectives can generate the best debates, or as the Tibetan Buddhists would say, wisdom and conflict are in constant dialogue. There is room for both the old and new, the traditional and the avant-garde. Perhaps there is no rule as to where the deity of transformation and vitality may reside. While some artists venerate articulate in-articulations, exquisite lyric poetry that evokes the state of the world or perhaps just a state of the soul is still to be admired, hence the inclusion of long-term favourites, such as Marie Howe and Rafael Cadenas, whose forms are more traditional but whose eloquence is piercing and relevant.
What is beautiful is the act of conversation. Mercurius, as a world-creating spirit, and a vessel of transformation, is a place where experiments can happen, where the sparks of inspiration we have today are inseparable from the futures we usher forth tomorrow, both on the generational and the personal level. As editor, I have read every single piece of work the magazine has ever published. The process has been transformative. The Thomas Helm of June 2021 is not the same Thomas Helm of June 2020. Each of the fascinating voices contained within this volume connect in some way with the generational conversation – whether at the artistic or political level or both. May you also find listening to them as potently transformative.