THE NIGHTMARE NETWORK - Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

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Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Very interesting, Speaking Mute, especially the part about Kantianism anent Schopenhauer and Ligotti. You might be right about CATHR needing some sort of Anti-Realist metaphysics/epistemology.

I didn't watch True Detective because I don't have HBO, but from comments in this thread and the YouTube clip posted by Malone, it seems that Dr. Locrian and Druidic are right that Pizzolatto was deliberately using Ligotti's "packaging." Rust Cohle's remarks are unmistakably Ligottian in style. Concerning Ligotti's packaging of Schopenhauer and Zapffe, I'm reminded of an anecdote from one of Asimov's volumes of autobiography. One day while Asimov was still employed as a biochemistry professor, he was working in his office on a pop science book with reference materials spread out around him. One of his colleagues walked in, looked over his shoulder and said, "But you're just copying this!" Asimov pushed the typewriter toward him and said "Care to continue?"

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Quote:

Originally Posted by Murony_Pyre (Post 100204)

Great post and I don't wish to knitpick but the fascinating thread you are referring to was brought to us by the great "Malone" and not someone with almost my screen name. :o

Well, quite a gaffe. My apologies to you and Malone. I corrected the original for anyone scrolling through later on...

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Speaking Mute, I appreciate your thought provoking response, and I apologize for my confrontational tone yesterday.

I do think that claiming that Ligotti's prose (specifically, lifted by Pizzolatto) is simply a regurgitation of Schopenhauer's philosophy is reductive. Ligotti's ideas are informed by dozens of writers and thinkers and are really critical (and personal) responses more than anything. At any rate, as Druidic suggested, Ligotti's prose is highly distinctive and original in its style as well as its content.

Take this snippet from CATHR:

Quote:

"We know that nature has veered into the supernatural by fabricating a creature that cannot and should not exist by natural law, and yet does." CATHR, p. 107

I challenge anyone--respectfully so--to point out a similar quote like that by any other writer.

There's a reason Pizzolatto copped to his Ligotti "influence" instead of merely stating that he was influenced by the same folks that Ligotti discussed at length in CATHR. The evidence that he paraphrased whole passages and in some cases lifted Ligotti's prose whole cloth is overwhelming.

Again, thanks for the enlightening and intriguing discussion, everyone.

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr. Locrian (Post 100213)

At any rate, as Druidic suggested, Ligotti's prose is highly distinctive and original in its style as well as its content.

I agree with that. As I said in my 2010 CATHR real-time review, I found the whole book 'beautifully true' or words to that effect; in fact it diminished my own pessimism at reading such a great book. I am not qualified to comment on its status as an original work of philosophy but, as I also said in my review, I did miss in the book an index and a formal bibliography.

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr. Locrian (Post 100213)

I do think that claiming that Ligotti's prose (specifically, lifted by Pizzolatto) is simply a regurgitation of Schopenhauer's philosophy is reductive. Ligotti's ideas are informed by dozens of writers and thinkers and are really critical (and personal) responses more than anything.

Dr. Locrian, I'm not arguing the other "side" of this because I agree with what you said here, and that was the point of my including the anecdote about Asimov in a previous post.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr. Locrian (Post 100213)

Take this snippet from CATHR:

Quote:

"We know that nature has veered into the supernatural by fabricating a creature that cannot and should not exist by natural law, and yet does." CATHR, p. 107

I challenge anyone--respectfully so--to point out a similar quote like that by any other writer.

The closest thing I'm aware of is the opening of Zapffe's The Last Messiah. No need for me to quote snippets; just follow the link and look at the first few paragraphs in sections I and II. There are striking similarities, although obviously, comparing passages, this is not a matter of plagiarism. And there is no subterfuge on Ligotti's part: He makes it clear in the first few pages of CATHR that he is presenting and working with some of Zapffe's ideas, even quoting passages of Zapffe alongside his own somewhat Zapffian epigrams. (By the way, I don't find that particular quote on p. 107 of CATHR.)

Edit: Aargh. Looks like I'll have to quote snippets after all. Linking to the Zapffe essay gets a "subscribers only" message. I can go directly to it from Google, and I'm not a subscriber to Philosophy Now. Hold on -- I'll get some snippets.

Okay, here are some snippets from sections I and II of The Last Messiah, as translated by Gisle R. Tangenes and first published in 1933:

Quote:

One night in long bygone times, man awoke and saw himself.

He saw that he was naked under cosmos, homeless in his own body. All things dissolved before his testing thought, wonder above wonder, horror above horror unfolded in his mind.

[snip]

Whatever happened? A breach in the very unity of life, a biological paradox, an abomination, an absurdity, an exaggeration of disastrous nature. Life had overshot its target, blowing itself apart. A species had been armed too heavily – by spirit made almighty without, but equally a menace to its own well-being. . . .

Despite his new eyes, man was still rooted in matter, his soul spun into it and subordinated to its blind laws. And yet he could see matter as a stranger, compare himself to all phenomena, see through and locate his vital processes. He comes to nature as an unbidden guest, in vain extending his arms to beg conciliation with his maker: Nature answers no more, it performed a miracle with man, but later did not know him. He has lost his right of residence in the universe, has eaten from the Tree of Knowledge and been expelled from Paradise. . . .

[snip]

So there he stands with his visions, betrayed by the universe, in wonder and fear. . . .

[etc.]

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Quote:

Originally Posted by Speaking Mute (Post 100206)

Pizzolatto's "genius" was and is that he took a philosophical stance that most writer's would have used, if at all, for a particularly disturbing villain and translated it to a protagonist relatively free from moral ambiguity. The simplest way the show would have failed is if Rust turned out to be the killer afterall; and the show would have gotten far less interest if Errol Childress or Reggie LeDoux were the one's paraphrasing Ligotti. What was said was far less striking than who was saying it.

That is very true. Well put.

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Quote:

Originally Posted by gveranon (Post 100215)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr. Locrian (Post 100213)

Dr. Locrian, I'm not arguing the other "side" of this because I agree with what you said here, and that was the point of my including the anecdote about Asimov in a previous post.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr. Locrian (Post 100213)

Take this snippet from CATHR:

Quote:

"We know that nature has veered into the supernatural by fabricating a creature that cannot and should not exist by natural law, and yet does." CATHR, p. 107

I challenge anyone--respectfully so--to point out a similar quote like that by any other writer.

Thanks for the response. No time to go in depth, but I'm working off of a PDF version of the book, so that's why the pagination is off.

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

Quote:

Originally Posted by Speaking Mute (Post 100197)

So, as I said, Ligotti's views are essentially Schopenhauer's. You can't accuse Pizzolatto of stealing ideas from Ligotti when those ideas weren't Ligotti's in the first place.

As I have said before, people on the net have disqualified Cohle's ideas by deeming him mad, mentally ill or simply a nihilist (which "seems to be the word one throws at anyone who is deemed a threat", to badly paraphrase Friedrich Dürrenmatt).

Which leads me to a related question, that maybe has not been addresed here yet: If Cohle had simply read from an edition of or quoted from Schopenhauer approvingly, how would the general public have reacted?

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

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Originally Posted by JBC (Post 100224)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Speaking Mute (Post 100197)

So, as I said, Ligotti's views are essentially Schopenhauer's. You can't accuse Pizzolatto of stealing ideas from Ligotti when those ideas weren't Ligotti's in the first place.

Basically I think the average person/viewer doesn't really care if thoghts/ideas/attitudes that go against what they see as "common sense" can be attributed to some established and famous philosopher. For them it's all strange and sick. Maybe my view is too negative but I remember talking with a friend about gender theory some weeks ago and I was basically taking the piss a bit and while she was in no way a big fan of such theories either, she said to me: "If you worked with the kind of people as I do, you would be glad that people think about things such as gender." ;)

Re: Writer Nic Pizzolatto on Thomas Ligotti and the Weird Secrets of ‘True Detective’

I've just finished watching Episode 4 of TD on the other side of the Atlantic. While I find the series watchable I must admit to not finding it particularly spectacular or wonderful. I find Cohle's pessimistic speeches to be a little too 'staged'. The action chugs along and it's as if the director periodically announces, "We will now halt while Cohle ascends the soapbox to discourse on the futility of life. We shall then resume with the murder plot". I feel it's a good vindication of the old 'show, don't tell' rule in art. Only artists of titanic stature like Tolstoy or Dostoyevsky could get away with the kind of didacticism in TD, and even then there are plenty of clunky scenes in both those writers' work because of the preachy tone. I wouldn't put TD up there with, for example, Twin Peaks.