August was exactly as unpleasant as I expected it to be, but I did get some good thinking done on several angsty questions that have been troubling my

Low-Level Vitalist Memeing

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2021-09-11 19:00:18

August was exactly as unpleasant as I expected it to be, but I did get some good thinking done on several angsty questions that have been troubling my sensitive soul, and filled about half a Moleskine notebook. I awarded myself one gold snowflake for making my break about as productive as is possible in August.

The conceit of this newsletter is that it is a studio for words, so it’s the sort of self-absorbed question I think should be asking here from time to time, but it’s also a question that’s of broader interest. Words are an indicator species for the health of the cultural ecosystem, even for those who harbor thinly veiled contempt for words and those attached to producing and consuming them like they matter.

I came up with an answer that was at least amusing to me, possibly insightful, and perhaps even correct: Low-Level Vitalist Memeing. LLVM for short.

“The war has used up words; they have weakened, they have deteriorated like motor-car tyres; they have like millions of other things, been more overstrained and knocked about and voided of the happy semblance during the last six months than in all the long ages before, and we are now confronted with a depreciation of all our terms, or otherwise speaking, with a loss of expression through increase of limpness, that may well make us wonder what ghosts will be left to walk.”