Sheepdog Brain (ft. Dean Kissick)

Surely one of our most Knausgaardian episodes yet - we spent four
hours last Sunday afternoon - a rainy, unseasonably cold day in
the mid-Atlantic - chatting with brilliant art critic and
prolific croissant eater Dean Kissick. Manhattan traffic hummed
outside of Dean's window, we took a yogurt break followed by a
coffee break, there was a brief drama involving an overheated
MacBook computer, and we of course witnessed Dean don and doff
his Argyle sweater no less than three times (although we did not
catch a glimpse of his supposed abs). This was the last episode
recorded before we became boldface names in Vanity Fair so
treasure it - we fully plan to go whole-hog on vacuous literary
world prestige mongering in coming episodes!


TECHNICAL NOTE: You will notice a whirring sound around one hour
ten but it gets fixed after a few minutes (Dean cools off his
computer) so if you're one of those audio freaks who always
complains about sound quality just push through, or
alternatively, get a life


cheat sheet:


0:00 - A namecheck of the Dominique Ansel bakery (sponsor of the
pod) somehow leads into a discussion of LinkedIn stalking and how
LinkedIn is in fact the most Knausgaardian of the social
networks.


19:15 - Dean, a hardcore strugglehead, recounts his initiation
into the word of Knausgaard and explains how the books changed
his life. We try to figure out what Knausgaard means by "form"
(all literature "must submit to form"? but why does MS not seem
to submit to anything) and meanwhile uncover a barnyard motif in
this passage involving sheep, sheepdogs, ducks and more. Also:
some inside baseball on the secret affinity between alt-lit and
raw milk.


1:09:00 - We begin talking about what is probably the most
important idea in the My Struggle series (or at least the first
two books), a concept Knausgaard most often refers to as
"longing" but is often associated or synonymous with
"inexhaustibility," "boundlessness," "the unmentionable." What is
the Longing? What does it have to do with death, with art, with
basement jackoff parlors (of the sort so vividly detailed in this
passage)?


1:24:00 - Touching off from Knausgaard's famous passage about the
Constable sketch of the clouds, Dean brilliantly articulates
Knausgaard's particular taste in art and explains why he thinks
Knausgaard is one of the best art critics today. What does
Knausgaard have that art criticism in general has lost? And what
does his predilection for "naive" objective realist landscapes
have to do with his own writing project?


2:06:00 - Dean takes us through what we believe to be the
culmination of the passage, Knausgaard's meditation on discovery
and exploration. The whole world has been "experienced" through
representations, making it seem smaller, and thus enclosed,
unenchanted, incestuous. How has the endless flood of images
stunted art and literature? Is there anything left outside of the
algorithm? Dean has some optimistic answers!


2:25:00 - We plan our upcoming live struggle session in Koreatown
and Dean gives a glowing review of our upcoming t-shirts


Thank you for listening!! As always you can reach out to us (but
please be more deferential now that we're Vanity Fair stars) at
teixeira.lauren@gmail.com or deohringer@gmail.com.  We love
hearing from listeners!


OUTRO - BINGO DOG SONG BY FLICKBOX NURSERY RHYMES