Fucked Up in 20 Different Ways (w/ Jack Skelley)

System of Systems

Jack Skelley is a writer and a poet that has been publishing books since the 1980s. His career began in the early '80s in LA when he worked at the Venice-based literary and arts center Beyond Baroque. Beyond Baroque was put on the map by Dennis Cooper who created a scene around it that included late poet and performance artist Bob Flanagan, the late conceptual artist Mike Kelley, the hilarious late poet Ed Smith, Guggenheim Fellowship winning poet Amy Gerstler, painter and novelist Benjamin Weissman, and Jack himself.
The crux of this conversation revolves around the publication of Jack's new book, The Complete Fear of Kathy Acker, which was released by Semiotext(e)in May. Jack started writing the book in the 1980s, and as such follows a protaganist named Jack as he traverses the Los Angeles art world of the eighties that Jack himself was indeed a part of. The figure of the late writer Kathy Acker who provides the book's namesake only actually appears briefly in the novel but her method of postmodern literary collage is assumed as a means for Jack to deconstruct the signifiers of the Los Angeles dream factory and the formation of mass culture as the protagonist flits from book readings to punk rock shows to art openings to misbegotten sexcapades. It's a weird and thrilling novel.
Jack and Adam here discuss this new book, Los Angeles, Kathy Acker, locating an avant-gardist sentiment in pop culture, the problematization of male heterosexual desire in literature, fictionalizing historical figures, Mike Kelley, SST records, punk rock, and much more.
SOUNDTRACK
Black Flag "White Minority" Blasphemy "Ritual" Mike Kelley, Violent Onsen Geisha, and Paul McCarthy "Upstairs" Eddie Crisis Group "Killer" Lawndale "March of the Melted Army Men"
LINKS
Jack at Twitter: @JackSkelley
Jack at Instagram: @HelterSkelley
Purchase the Complete Fear of Kathy Acker
Jack interviewed by Hobart Pulp