By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=29768619

In September of this year we’ll recognize 35 years since poet Richard Brautigan shot himself in the head, committing suicide at the age of 49 in 1984. I was thinking about Brautigan today because a link to the excellent Adam Curtis documentary All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace popped up on my Twitter feed. The BBC documentary series outlines the spread of Ayn Rand’s Objectivist philosophies into America’s Silicon Valley, and it examines the cybernetic utopia promised by the virtue of selfishness at the speed of integrated circuits. The series takes its name from one of my favorite Brautigan poems…

All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace

I like to think (and
the sooner the better!)
of a cybernetic meadow
where mammals and computers
live together in mutually
programming harmony
like pure water
touching clear sky.

I like to think
(right now, please!)
of a cybernetic forest
filled with pines and electronics
where deer stroll peacefully
past computers
as if they were flowers
with spinning blossoms.

I like to think
(it has to be!)
of a cybernetic ecology
where we are free of our labors
and joined back to nature,
returned to our mammal
brothers and sisters,
and all watched over
by machines of loving grace.

Watch Part 1 of the series on Vimeo but first check out this great interview with Curtis talking about his unique style of storytelling…

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Peepeth

This week we remember Richard Brautigan’s birthday on January 30. Brautigan would’ve been 81 this year. Celebrate this hippie happening with this 1970 release, Listening to Richard Brautigan…

This early-’70s cult classic doesn’t just feature hippie/beatnik writer Richard Brautigan reading from his novels “Trout Fishing in America,” “A Confederate General from Big Sur” and “In Watermelon Sugar,” as well as his short story collection “A Revenge of the Lawn” and various poems; it also has such tracks as “Here Are Some More Sounds of My Life,” which features the sounds of the author brushing his teeth, taking off his clothes and shaving. In other words, you really are “listening to Richard Brautigan,” and if those mundane sounds don’t pique your interest, then there are the disarming, poetic moments, like when you hear phones ringing while Brautigan explains why he won’t answer the phone, or when he shares the actual sound of the stream he wrote about in “Trout Fishing in America.” Special guests include Michael McClure, Imogen Cunningham and Bruce Conner, but for 52 minutes this is pretty much pure Brautigan, as whimsical and searching as ever.

Stay Awake!

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