Quote:<Such sloppy, emotion-driven hyperbole is precisely what provides fuel for such comments as Whitechapel makes in his apologia.>
i don't see it as sloppy, emotion-driven hyperbole. you're getting a little hyperbolic yourself. like i said, i just find racism sickening. calm down. i love CAS, despite his racism (which i find sickening).
We'll just have to agree to disagree here. I think that it is both sloppy and hyperbolic to label CAS a "sickening racist" on the basis of a handful of private remarks. I'm also not sure that I'm the one who needs calming!
Quote:okay, maybe i exaggerated a little. how about let's use "somewhat nauseating racism" and call it even? i'll even buy you a beer to make it up to you
Fair enough! I would actually have had no quarrel with your comments if you had referred to CAS's
statements as "sickeningly racist" (although, again, I may not have taken matters quite that far). The way your first sentence reads, though, you're calling CAS himself by that epithet; that's where I had difficulty. Anyway, no need to make anything up to me; I'm certainly not offended!
Quote:but when we have that beer, please, don't under any context use the word "apologia."
I can't make any promises. Lol. I speak pretty much the way I write....
Quote:i'm not saying this kid doesn't have the right to express his opinions.
It's interesting that both you and calonlan imply that Whitechapel is a callow youngster. Whatever else he may be, he is not that. I've been occasionally reading, but mostly ignoring, his writings for some time now. Whitechapel has written fiction and critical essays for"transgressive" and "extreme" publications such as the British magazine
Headpress (now defunct, I think? Perhaps not.). Given the interests he has expressed in these and other writings (his surname pseudonym is something of a giveaway), I've always thought of him more as a sort of Oxbridge version of Peter Sotos than as someone who would take a vivid interest in the writings of Clark Ashton Smith. Therefore, his interest in both CAS and this Web site has surprised me, to say the least. (He does seem to avoid this forum, though, I've noticed, unless he posts here under yet another pseudonym, which I rather doubt). I know nothing of his politics, although his dislike for liberalism shines through clearly enough in the article that you mention. Based, however, on other things I know or believe about him and his works--which, I'm sorry to say, I cannot repeat here for fear of libel--I would not necessarily assume that he is sincere or serious in any of his published opinions, and his musings on the subject of CAS are to be taken "with a salutary pinch of saline seasoning", to quote, or at least paraphrase, CAS.
I've nothing to add to your remarks about the poetry, except to say that I agree completely.