Writing Sedition

Writing Sedition (January 2009)
2803 words

ERNST: …I’m beginning to lose faith in my ability to make decisions….. I feel like a programmed robot.
DR. PANG [spitting out his nicotine gum]: How long have you been feeling this way?
ERNST: I don’t know. I just think lately I haven’t had any control.…
ERNST: I feel like I haven’t been involved…you know… like I’ve been missing everything that’s supposed to happen.
DR. PANG: Maybe it’s the pot.
ERNST: No, I feel like the pot helped me wake up to the realities of my life…to my …[laughs]..utter mediocrity.
ERNST [with his eyes closed]: When I was younger, people said I had potential…. Nobody says that anymore.
DR. PANG [rubs his temples]: So you’re worried about how people perceive you?
ERNST: Its not about that.
DR. PANG: What is it about?
ERNST: Sadness…
DR. PANG: Depression?
ERNST: No…..despair. There isn’t much to feel good about.
DR. PANG: Really….
ERNST: The sadness feels true…
DR. PANG [pauses to light a cigarette]: what if it wasn’t, would you still want it?
ERNST: I don’t know…. Maybe
***
The local Australians proudly covered the child blessed with two heads, and (necessarily therefore), the burden of two consciences. Miraculously, the Scientists had been able to socialize each head independently of the other. They obtained the finest sound isolating material, constructed a wall from it, and every few months, they expanded the central cavity, a hole through the middle, to match the size of the growing boy’s head. After he had put one of his heads (always the same head) in through the hole, the remaining space around his neck was vacuum sealed for the duration of his lessons. In this uncomfortable manner, the child was given the benefit of simultaneous Absurdist and Atavist upbringings.

Eventually, the child with two heads came to be seen as a symbol of unity within the political establishment. He was sought after at political meetings where both Absurdists and Atavists sought to label themselves “centrists”, making sure he was situated behind them as they made their speeches, so the cameras would capture them with him. The two-headed boy was the sole novelty the town possessed and the source of all of its visitors. The hitherto non-existent tourist industry flourished despite the fact that Sedition was a barren wasteland that had historically never attracted visitors. This too was significant. Historians concur that perhaps the Seditioners should never have drawn attention to themselves.

When making appearances in public, each of the two-headed boy’s heads wore a scarf that was the appropriate party color: either pink or magenta. The heads smiled and grimaced when appropriate and often appeared to be animatedly debating each other.
At 27, he was appointed mayor of Sedition. He was groomed for this role for many years and won a landslide victory over his rival Mr. Whitehead IV, the teetering veteran of Onewaydamage Subconflict XVIII.

HELEN: Did you write this?
[ERNST nods.]
HELEN: Does it have a happy ending?
ERNST: Its not finished yet.
HELEN: Are you high?
ERNST [smiles]: A little, maybe. Its hard to tell these days.
HELEN: And what does that mean?
ERNST: Yes…
ERNST: I’m lonely here. The weed helps.
HELEN: We didn’t have to move.
***

The World was a small place. There were too many people and far too little space. This problem was particularly severe in Sedition. The residents of the town lived in cell apartments in high rise shantytowns. Many never saw the daylight. Particularly incongruous then, was the coexistence of the Hopes, a small tribe of idealists who kept their population small and their existence an open secret. They had adopted the seemingly unworkable principles of a defactobenigndictatorship, with each leader nominating his successor. Surprisingly, they flourished within their reservations where they were free to do as they pleased. They worked fiercely all day, gathering and planting their crops, tending to their livestock, and celebrated by moonlight with fireside orgies. Their existence was not without controversy since the surrounding townsfolk were bitterly envious of the lavish spaces this small group occupied. It was the two
headed mayor’s responsibility to ensure the peaceful coexistence of the Hopes with the rest of the inhabitants.

But the local populace was particularly afraid of offending the Hopes since the traditional texts wrote, in great detail, of their underground arsenal of chemical and biological weapons. The source of these weapons is disputed but legend has it that they were procured from Naziland after their defeat in Internecine Conflict II during the course of which Charlie Chaplin terrorized the industrialized world.

Many years before the advent of the two headed mayor and the Hopes, the town was a corrupt pit. The green collar workers were paid little and lived in abject poverty. They complained bitterly about the lack of social welfare programs. But they didn’t pay their taxes so it didn’t matter. They hadn’t paid them since the Atavist government squandered the taxpayers’ money and implemented so called “five-year-plans” that demanded the continued bondage of the greens’ children.

Then, the People had sought to unseat the cruel mayor Sir. Whitehead II, but had been suppressed by the might of the military they had helped construct. Still, they refused to pay their taxes and that was sufficient to eventually throw the government into unrest. It was into this atmosphere of unruly chaos that Ivan laid foot.
In his former career as a clown, he had been unusually bitter, and had taunted children to tears, while reportedly laughing horrifically in their faces as he did so. For his transgressions against future generations, he had been banished from the neighboring pirate town of Key West by the usually amiable mayor, Mr. Wysee.

As a leader, however, Ivan was unparalleled. In subsequent years, he would lament the irreplaceable “years of service” he had lost while “pursuing the lucre of the stage”. Unlike the Key Westerners, the Seditioners loved him. He was a star from the moment he stepped up to a megaphone and inquired “Hello, is this working?” The women swooned and the men were overcome by an as yet “difficult-to-categorize” admiration. Shy and retiring in private, Ivan was everyone’s idea of the perfect man.

Till date, scholars argue that his sex-appeal had as much to do with his ultimate ascendancy, as his keenly analytical mind and ability to debate both sides of every issue, a skill that later came to be known as flip-flopping.

Opponents of this theory point to his continued popularity despite the rapid alienation of lustful female fans after he announced near the end of his inaugural speech that he “had no interest in women” and that “the female body is fundamentally unattractive.”
***

WITHERS [publisher, over the phone]: “Hows it coming?”
ERNST: “Its hard to tell, its just fragments at this point.”
WITHERS: “Well, are they beginning to come together?”
ERNST: “Maybe. I really can’t force them together. It has to happen organically.”
WITHERS: “I see. Well, people are getting annoyed by how long this is taking”
ERNST: “I know.”
WITHERS: “Do you need help?
ERNST: “Hemingway says if you didn’t have an unhappy childhood then you’re fucked. As a writer.”
WITHERS: “Well you’re unhappy as an adult. Does that cut it?”
ERNST: “No…”
***
Cinderella Sighs set the country ablaze for many reasons but especially because it was the work of a man who had been forced to leave Sedition.
In the years that immediately preceded the release of the Record, Ivan ruled with the aid of his Deputy Mayor and rumored bedmate, the bearded giant. Together, they had presided over a violent uprising in which they lost many of the lives they were hoping to save. Nevertheless, the Atavist Whiteheads had been deposed after decades of autocratic rule. The folksinger, however, had been a household name long before the advent of Ivan.
At one stage, he was so popular that the Absurdists began to pressure him to take on a “position of leadership”. In a brief statement to the press, he said cryptically “the cabaret queen is just a man” and left troublesome political considerations behind him forever.

This was when Ivan took the political stage of Sedition by storm, quickly coming to embody the hopes of the Absurdist party. Had he arrived earlier, he may well have been offered the”position of leadership” ahead of the folksinger. Nevertheless, the unfortunate machinations of chronology had caused this to remain a sore spot. Ivan had continued to see the folksinger as an arch-nemesis. After the success of the revolution, the first document he signed as mayor concerned itself with the “necessary and permanent” exile of the folksinger. When asked how he felt about this turn of events, the folksinger replied “Hope is like a shiny black hole. Resurface now…explode.”

The popularity of this new Record was thus particularly vexing to Ivan and his administration. They ordered “perpetual monitoring” of wave stations, gave the local newspapers, the Australians, a list of “subversive material” that was not to be included, and ordered the recommencement of Project Artichoke, a covert operation that had lain dormant since the days of Sir Whitehead I.
They left the venerable Mr. Schrub in charge of this program. He brought with him his poor cretin son, whose greatest aspiration was to one day be normal, like his father.
***

ERNST [Tossing a vinyl aside]: What is this, a sixties revival?
GUPPY [drug dealer/entrepreneur, dressed in sixties attire]: Would it be so bad if it was?
ERNST: I can’t imagine it would have been much fun for me.
GUPPY: You could have had the opportunity to be inspired….
ERNST [smiles]: Or killed.
GUPPY: I thought you liked Dylan.
ERNST: I do. Just his earlier stuff though.
GUPPY: Don’t tell me. You were betrayed when he went electric.
ERNST: Well no. I heard his electric material before the earlier acoustic stuff….obviously I didn’t grow up in the sixties….its not so much the sound of it. [pauses to inhale smoke]… his lyrics became utter nonsense…. like he’d stopped trying.
GUPPY: So you were looking for some sort of message then?
ERNST: Well no, but without one [pauses to exhale smoke]…. he was a shitty guitar player, even worse at the harmonica and a terrible singer. What was left?
GUPPY: What kind of message were you expecting anyway?
ERNST [coughs]: I don’t know. Dylan seemed so…so righteous, then he just self-destructed.
GUPPY [shakes his head]: He embraced his art, man.
ERNST: But it was meaningless, man.
GUPPY [laughing]: Some nihilist you are.
ERNST: Heh, maybe I need the illusion of meaning.
GUPPY [laughs]: you’re an idiot, man.
GUPPY: whenever you’re ready, there’s some Quixotic greens for you to choose from.
ERNST: Quixotic?
GUPPY [lies down on a sofa]: Yeah, we’re hoping the brand will stick. Fucking imitators man.
GUPPY [from the sofa]: That’s my central problem ….I’m not slumming like some of these other motherfuckers. How do you market something that’s forbidden because of puritanical cocksuckers?
ERNST: There’s a rhyme…. This isn’t the depressive kind is it?
GUPPY [smiles]: Fuck, how am I supposed to know? You’re the only one that ever complains.
ERNST: How’s business?
GUPPY : Ah its alright. We’re opening a new call-center soon.
GUPPY: Hopefully, this one’s going to be slightly bigger scale…. we need catchy names for the toll-free number so let me know if you can think of something.
ERNST: that’s exactly what I want to do with my free time.
GUPPY: You’re a writer man. Free time is all you have.
***
The bearded giant was caught cheating by the paparazzi. Plastered all over the Jolly Australian, the Glitzy Australian and in particular the Sleazy Australian, were pictures of him with a nubile young lady called Nyna. Ivan appeared contemplative in public, often talking softly to himself, repeating the aphoristic expression “Don’t show them everything, just the funny bits”. Since this was a Keys expression, nobody had the slightest idea what it meant, but sympathized with him anyway.

His confidantes told the liberal magazine, the Distracted Australian, that it was particularly shameful to the mayor that his competitor was the aunt of the former Mayor, Sir. Whitehead II, from whom Ivan and the giant had seized control (and who was now sweetly senile). It was, to Ivan, the bitterest and most comprehensive rejection imaginable. Betrayal proved difficult to bear. One night he donned a clown suit he hadn’t touched in years and spent hours practicing kind and gentle expressions in front of his mirror. His memoirs would later reveal that it was a terribly messy affair, since he could hardly stop himself from crying and nonrun makeup had not, as yet, been reinvented.

Shortly thereafter, he left Sedition in the guise of a clown. It was rumored that every child he passed on the way burst into tears. It didn’t matter. None of the adults were able to appreciate the significance of this curious trail of body fluid until it turned, by nightfall, into a river. By means of a hand-scrawled note, Ivan entrusted the town to the bearlike hands o f his successor and “darling friend”, the bearded giant. Honorable to the very end, he had even provided a source of irrigation for the townsfolk. This was no small feat in the barren land of Sedition. In those days, it was rumored that Ivan had superhuman abilities but the Scientists recently quashed these notions, calling them “paranormal nonsense.”

“He was merely a capable man-manager who made good use of his resources” they said.
Whatever the truth about Ivan’s superhuman abilities, he was also touchingly human. Somewhat less charitably, underneath the passage that dealt with the transference of his estate, he had scrawled, in thick bloody letters, “I hate your stupid slut”.

The giant proclaimed at a rushed press conference, “I was tired of living in his closet”.
Asked to comment on her newly acquired celebrity, Nyna replied that she liked cows because they were unthreatening and moved so slowly. They weren’t capable of surprising anyone, and she said she found comfort in that thought. She also said she was terrified of snakes, particularly the talking variety.

This last comment was controversial, since each household in Sedition possessed at least one such pet snake that routinely imitated common greetings or the sound of babies crying. Some owners spent a lot of time grooming and training their talking companions and these snakes were inevitably more intelligent, with expansive vocabularies. Others, however, suffered neglect and could only be heard repeating profanities. Some didn’t talk at all, except when they were completely alone.

When you bought a snake, it was difficult to anticipate whether it was going to be a good investment. Everyone wanted a snake as talented as Gilda, the hermaphrodite cobra who appeared frequently on television. He had, however, bitten and killed five of his keepers thus far.
After the most recent incident, there was talk of defanging Gilda, but the townsfolk had risen in protest. Gilda’s vocal cords would almost certainly have to be sacrificed in the process, and then what good would she be? It was common knowledge that it was better to own an intelligent, unpredictable snake rather than a stupid harmless one. The residents of Sedition did not cling to life. They were bored and merely wished to experience something out of the ordinary.
***

ERNST [talking to a fellow writer]: What is art?
LYA: Expression
ERNST: Well then, what is good art?
LYA: Transcendent expression
ERNST [guffaws]: What does that even mean? What should we be attempting to transcend?
LYA: The mundane, I guess. The ordinary.
ERNST: How is a reader to relate to what isn’t ordinary?
LYA: I always figured if the prose was good enough, there’d be people who want to read it. And it happened…to me, I mean.
ERNST: Do you ever worry about being truthful?
LYA [sipping gin]: Not especially. People are looking for embellishment anyway.
ERNST[laughing]: How much hubris does it take to make a generalization like that?
LYA: [laughs] Whats the alternative? Write about shallow, pithy truths and what..live in poverty and be “highly respected by critics” when you’re dead?
ERNST: So you’re catering to an audience then? If expectations guide your choices, then is it really pure?
ERNST: I mean, its not really unfettered then, is it? Its not really expression if you’re parroting what other people want you to say. And if art is expression….then….
LYA: there are degrees. You don’t get it, do you? Its still expression.
ERNST: It just isn’t voluntary?
LYA: it is if you enjoy it……You know you should have become a reporter.
LYA [mumbles]: Your blinkered vision would be perfectly suited for that sort of thing.
ERNST: That’s unnecessary.
LYA: I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to offend.
ERNST: You did…. It’s ok though.
LYA: Have you started writing again?
ERNST: In fits and starts.