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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

20 Comments

  1. Froborr
    May 2, 2016 @ 6:49 pm

    How did I not see the pun on his name coming?

    Reply

    • The Oncoming Hurricane
      May 3, 2016 @ 9:47 am

      I’ve read it twice, and missed it. Can you point it out for us mortals?

      Reply

      • Elizabeth Sandifer
        May 3, 2016 @ 9:47 am

        Don’t worry, I wrote it and I think I missed it.

        Reply

        • The Oncoming Hurricane
          May 3, 2016 @ 11:00 am

          Huh. I did wonder if it wasn’t this bit ‘seeing his name in big, gold letters; a steak, cooked medium’, with the pun being rump. But that was tenuous.

          Reply

        • Froborr
          May 3, 2016 @ 12:40 pm

          Wait, you’re NOT mapping this onto the major arcana, aka trumps?

          Reply

          • Elizabeth Sandifer
            May 3, 2016 @ 6:51 pm

            No, though I do have plans to do that joke at one point within it.

  2. Jacqueline Basco
    May 2, 2016 @ 6:50 pm

    I think I’ve said this before on Phil’s tumblog but I’ll say it again because it’s rather telling: Trump grew up in Jamaica Estates, a gated community in Queens. Which is obviously it’s fitting in that Trump is the product of a white enclave created to attract white bourgeois who felt skeeved by the prospect of living in a two-mile radius of any black people; but funnier yet is that Jamaica Estates is named after the company that built the town. Which means that Trump’s obsession with plastering his name all over the Tristate Area is just him following in the footsteps of the Jamaica Estates Corporation.

    Reply

  3. Eve Schmitt
    May 2, 2016 @ 8:03 pm

    In the context of the Republican Primary, the man has been a Jester: blatantly defying the social structure of the court and making his social superiors look like fools. The Jester, in western storytelling, has become an archetypal figure of chaos. Trump played that role in the debates — constantly getting laughs from the crowd by interrupting his opponents and making them look like fools, skipping debates he didn’t like, insulting the moderator. He did everything Wrong, and the audience loved it, because American audiences love a trickster figure who wanders into a stodgy, regimented place and messes everything up.

    Reply

  4. Matt
    May 3, 2016 @ 12:04 am

    Eve – I think you’re being a bit too kind to him and his audiences. Jesters are low status characters with some self-awareness. Trump is resolutely high-status (as much as some of the Republican elite loathe him, they have pandered to him in the past and will pander to him again if he wins the nomination). And he has demonstrated little self-awareness.

    His audiences certainly feel alienated from the Republican elite but they are also want people to blame for their current state. And Trump hands out that blame in spades (China, Mexicans, Muslims, liberals). He spends as much time punching down as he does punching up. In fact, he doesn’t really care who he punches, provided the crowd roars their approval when he does so.

    Reply

  5. Matt
    May 3, 2016 @ 12:15 am

    The commentary on Citizen Kane is interesting because Trump is primarily an actor. He performs being a businessman on The Apprentice. One quote that sticks in my mind is from this 1997 profile: ‘A securities analyst who has studied Trump’s peregrinations for many years believes, “Deep down, he wants to be Madonna.”’
    http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1997/05/19/trump-solo

    Which is emblematic of Manhattan over the last 40 years. Various inhabitants have said to me that Manhattan is now Disneyland for rich people. It’s not really a city any more, it’s a stage on which the superwealthy perform their roles (with Broadway as a play within a play*). And The Donald performs his.

    *Some mix of Hamlet and Noises Off depending on your tastes.

    Reply

    • Yossarianduck
      May 3, 2016 @ 1:20 am

      I feel like Spiderman: Turn off The Dark would also be appropriate.

      Reply

      • Jacqueline Basco
        May 3, 2016 @ 4:08 am

        Spider-Trump: Turns Off the Black People

        Reply

    • Jane
      May 5, 2016 @ 5:53 pm

      They should rename the island Schenectady.

      Reply

  6. Matt
    May 3, 2016 @ 2:17 am

    Fair call…

    Reply

  7. wanderingarmageddonpeddler
    May 6, 2016 @ 3:23 am

    I really did enjoy this exerpt. I would say, though, that your explanation of the relationship between the psychogeography of New York City was a lot clearer in the tumblr post you made on the subject. Like, if I hadn’t read that particular tumblr post, I doubt I’d’ve understood quite what you’re getting at here. Which is a shame, as it’s an insight that I’ve found really useful, and it’d be a tragedy if people who aren’t your tumblr followers were less likely to get what you’re talking about here.

    Reply

    • Elizabeth Sandifer
      May 6, 2016 @ 4:43 am

      The reason for that is that I’m expecting the next few theses to flesh it out in more solid and evidence-based detail, thankfully.

      Reply

  8. Craken
    May 29, 2016 @ 1:57 am

    I should have thought an “anarchist” would find the advent of the Trump quite appealing, at least compared to the Hillary, that Brezhnevite bureaucratic drone. But, of course, the author wishes to be that thoroughly incoherent thing, a Left Anarchist. So, I guess that explains it…

    Reply

    • Elizabeth Sandifer
      May 29, 2016 @ 2:39 am

      You appear to be conflating “anarchist” with “accelerationist.”

      Reply

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