The Weaver Reads reviewed K-Punk by Mark Fisher
Goodreads Review of k-punk: The Collected and Unpublished Writings of Mark Fisher
4 stars
This book took me the better part of three months to complete, as I'd get lost in some of the chapters, which--given that they're largely blog posts--are of inconsistent quality. The best chapters, in my view, are those on politics and "reflections." This brings me to my next point, part of the weakness of the book is the way that it's organized. Having it broken down into "literature," "film and television," "music," "politics," "reflections," and so on works well if you're to use this book as a reference. But, if you use it as I did--to get a sample of Fisher's thought--between 2003 and 2016, the organizational structure is rough. It would have been much better-off if organized chronologically. If it had been, we'd see Fisher's post-CCRU blitzing style give way to more expository and reflective writing. We see this somewhat within each section, but each complete section means we …
This book took me the better part of three months to complete, as I'd get lost in some of the chapters, which--given that they're largely blog posts--are of inconsistent quality. The best chapters, in my view, are those on politics and "reflections." This brings me to my next point, part of the weakness of the book is the way that it's organized. Having it broken down into "literature," "film and television," "music," "politics," "reflections," and so on works well if you're to use this book as a reference. But, if you use it as I did--to get a sample of Fisher's thought--between 2003 and 2016, the organizational structure is rough. It would have been much better-off if organized chronologically. If it had been, we'd see Fisher's post-CCRU blitzing style give way to more expository and reflective writing. We see this somewhat within each section, but each complete section means we have to start over again. We'd also see how events--both in his life and in the world around him--shaped his thought to a much larger extent.
Fisher's most prominent writing, outside of "politics," was in music, and it looms large over the collection. Unfortunately, this is my least favorite of his writing. It's good, of course, but I totally lack his reference points.
The conclusion of the book, the introduction to his book Acid Communism is a fascinating piece, and it is a total shame that this remained a draft, and the rest of the book was never written. It's a reclamation of counter-culture for its post-capitalist potentials. There's so much good stuff here that I just want to read more.
In Fisher's body of work, the odd one out is definitely The Weird and the Eerie. It harkens back to his earlier interests in the Gothic, while being distinct enough from Hauntology. I hoped we would find more on the Weird and Eerie here, but no luck.
Anyways, it's well-worth the read, but better in small chunks.
