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Hello all!
Welcome to April and Autumn in Canberra. As I write this I’m finally starting to feel a chill in the air. I’m sitting in my house with a jumper on, blowing warm air onto my fingers every now and then to keep them going while I type. I can feel Winter coming!
And what better time to write than in the cold months of Winter? There is nothing nicer than being inside with a hot cup of tea, listening to the wind howl outside, and writing something.
On that note, here is some updates on where things are at for me.
Forgiveness — Second Draft Finished!
As of a couple of weeks ago I have officially finished the second draft of my novel! 🙂
This second draft was a massive rewrite. The redraft included significantly changing big chunks of the structure, adding in many more chapters (and deleting some others) and completely changing the point of view of the book (from 3rd to 1st). No wonder it took me almost a year to get done!
But the work has been worth it. I am really happy with this draft and am feeling confident that I have a strong book down on paper.
However, I’m not quite done yet. With the second draft finished I am now going through the book on paper and doing one final copy edit. This is because I often find that I pick up more things when reading a book on paper than on the screen. I am already about half way through this process but will probably take another month or so to get it done and to get the changes up onto the computer.
Labor or Green: How to elect a progressive Government
I am really excited to announce that I will have an essay in the upcoming book How to Vote Progressive in Australia: Labor or Green?
With a federal election just around the corner this book brings together a collection of writers and politicians to make the case of how we can elect a progressive Government in Australia. My essay however takes a different approach. I argue that under our current system progressive governance is actually impossible — whether office is held by Labor or the Greens. It is up to progressives therefore to rethink how we engage in the state, working to challenge its power rather than trying to gain access to it.
I’m really excited to be writing alongside some great writers and can’t wait until this book comes out. You can get your copy of it here.
Sexy Capitalism — New Reading and New Ideas
While I have been finalising the second draft of Forgiveness I have also been doing some more reading for Sexy Capitalism, coming up with some new ideas to fill the book. In particular I have recently read The Origins of Capitalism by Ellen Meiksins Wood and PostCapitalism by Paul Mason. I’ve started (and will continue) this reading as I’ve become aware of my need to understand more the ebbs and flows of capitalist economics to understand how sex fits within this.
There are two thoughts I want to quickly tease out.
First it The Origins of Capitalism Ellen Meiksins Wood talks about the myth of capitalist origins. She argues that we have developed a myth which sees the development of capitalism as part of a ‘natural order’. Our desire for capitalism has always been there, it is just that we’ve only been able to fully explore this in the past few centuries. Capitalism is therefore a natural state of being.
Meiskins Wood challenges this throughout her book, and effectively so. But for me it made me think about the myths of sexual and familial life. While there are myths of the origins of capitalism there are also myths of why we live in monogamous nuclear families — myths that tell us this is part of the natural order. I am now starting to see these two myths as being more clearly linked. They are both stories we tell ourselves about the nature of our system, excuses we give to ensure its survival. These stories are important as they shape how we deal with capitalism and sex.
Second, in PostCapitalism Paul Mason discusses what he describes as the 50 year cycles of capitalism. These are cycles based on long booms, followed by an inevitable crash, followed by economic struggle, which ultimately results in new innovation to creates another long boom. These cycles are not new and have been discussed by Marxists in particular in the past.
What is interesting for me is that I am now seeing links between these cycles and cycles of sexual politics. For example the two major economic crashes of the 20th Century (the 1920s and 1970s) both coincided with major upheavals in sexual politics, in particular big sexual revolutions. Both times these were followed by a ‘calming down’, largely coinciding with the following boom periods (i.e. the 50s/60s and the 90s). Do our sexual politics therefore correlate with these cycles? This is a new idea and one I have to explore more, but one that I think has real potential.
Articles and podcasts
Not too many new articles in the past month (I’ve been busy) but here is a selection of what I’ve been writing/podcasting:
- SBS Sexuality: Telstra and the harsh lesson of seeking moral support from corporate giants
- Blog Post: The Tragedy of the Commons and the Family.
- Blog Post: Compulsory Heterosexuality and the Lesbian Experience
- Podcast: Queers Episode 5: Made Straight
- Podcast: Queers Episode 6: The Self-Help Guide to Queerness
- Podcast: Queers Episode 7: Burned by Business
That’s it from me this month! Hope you are all enjoying your Autumn and will be in touch soon.
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