Terror Trickles Down
Raw Dog Screaming Press has released the collection Terror-Dot-Gov, the twelfth book from guerilla writer Harold Jaffe. This book of "docufiction" dissects the War On Terror to pin down not only its causes and effects on America, but its shortcomings and effect on the world at large. While other books of political analysis are dry, Jaffe's unique approach is both infinitely sad and hilarious.
(PRWEB) June 10, 2005 -- Raw Dog Screaming Press is proud to release Harold
Jaffe’s most unflinching book to date, Terror-Dot-Gov, a collection of
docufictions that dissect the nature of terrorism. Set in our own contemporary
mediatized reality, these docufictions blend the facts deftly with fictional
elements to chronicle our times more accurately than nonfiction ever could. This
book is distributed
through Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Bertram’s UK, and
direct from the publisher.
The author will be making several appearances
throughout 2005 in support of this release. Publicity began with a signing at
Aztec Books in San Diego, May 3. Then, on June 7 and 8.
Jaffe
participated in the Revolution and the Avant Garde event at San Diego State
University, where he did a reading followed by a lecture and discussion. More
speaking engagements will follow in the summer.
Jaffe is well known as
one of the most prominent postmodernist authors in North America. Those who
enjoy satire and progressive political literature will be attracted to what
Terror-Dot-Gov offers. This book will be of special interest to fans of Michael
Moore and Al Franken.
In addition to author appearances, Terror-Dot-Gov
will also be promoted through display ads in magazines, banner ads, catalogs,
direct mail, and interviews.
From the Back of the Book
As in Harold
Jaffe’s two previous “docufiction” collections, False Positive and 15 Serial
Killers, the author of Terror- Dot-Gov selects then “treats” his texts such that
the reader is incapable of distinguishing between fact and fiction. That
ambiguity permits Jaffe to cunningly tease out the contradictions and subtexts
of official “news” or “information” and torque it into what it so often is
fundamentally: jingoism, xenophobia and propaganda. Jaffe’s subject in
Terror-Dot-Gov is not the everywhere-represented “illicit” terrorism so much as
“licit,” institutionalized terrorism, and he assaults his subject from multiple
angles: razor-sharp satire, precisely cadenced rhetoric, faux reportage, and
“unsituated” dialogues (Jaffe’s term, referring to his trademark talking heads
with perfect pitch). The result is virtuosic and paradoxical: a prodigious
display of firepower—in the cause of peace.
Critical Acclaim for
Terror-Dot-Gov
“As Terror-Dot-Gov vividly demonstrates: We are spiritually
imperiled by illusions masked as ‘news.’ Omissions, slants, pallid editorials
all testifying to servitude to a slavish, enslaving text. Harold Jaffe knows
this by heart and has it right. He isolates the self-justifying words that
demonize the enemy while cleansing the ongoing crime, the ‘preventive strike.’
He encourages organized terror (our very own) to emerge white as new-fallen
snow. White as leprosy. Everywhere in Terror-Dot- Gov is exemplary skill,
faultless tonality. And courage, don’t forget courage. In order to be healed,
our illness must worsen. Thank you, Harold Jaffe.” —Daniel Berrigan,
SJ
“Kill your TV. Terror-Dot-Gov will give you all the news that’s unfit
to print—reportage gone fictive (or is it vice versa?) Jaffe’s brilliantly
constructed docufictions blast holes through the mediadrome to unmask the
terrifying institutionalized rhetoric that passes itself off as business as
usual.” —Jan Ramjerdi
"Terror-Dot-Gov is a full frontal assault on our
duct-taped minds. High velocity words fired with unerring precision, dancing
feverishly on the page before zapping their target, which is nothing less than
“First World” war-mongering and the terror it invokes to validate itself."
—Faruk Ulay
About the Author
Harold Jaffe is the author of 12 books,
including nine fiction collections and three novels, including 15 Serial
Killers, False Positive, Sex for the Millennium, and Othello Blues. His fiction
has appeared in such journals as Mississippi Review; City Lights Review; Paris
Review; New Directions in Prose and Poetry; Chicago Review; Chelsea; Fiction;
Central Park; Witness; Black Ice; Minnesota Review; Boundary 2; ACM; Black
Warrior Review; Cream City Review; Two Girls’ Review; and New Novel Review. His
stories have been anthologized in Pushcart Prize; Best American Stories; Best of
American Humor; Storming the Reality Studio; American Made; Avant Pop: Fiction
for a Daydreaming Nation; After Yesterday’s Crash: The Avant-Pop Anthology;
Bateria and Am Lit (Germany); Borderlands (Mexico); Praz (Italy); Positive
(Japan); and elsewhere. His novels and stories have been translated into German,
Japanese, Spanish, French, Dutch, Czech, and Serbo-Croatian. Harold Jaffe has
won two NEA grants in fiction, a New York CAPS grant, a California Arts Council
fellowship in fiction, and a San Diego fellowship (COMBO) in fiction. Jaffe
teaches literature at San Diego State University (San Diego, California) and is
editor of Fiction International.
Terror-Dot-Gov by Harold Jaffe
156
pages, trade paperback, $13.95
Release date: June 2005
ISBN:
1-933293-09-8, distributed by Ingram
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Source : http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005/6/prweb249716.htm