Nina Power

The future turned out to be…well what exactly? Having imagined everything from off-world mining to governments run by horses, it turns out that we’d rather spend our time watching ourselves. If the twentieth century space race strove to understand outer space, today’s ambitions are rather more inner-directed. The quest for individuality has descended into the desire to be the same; mimesis and representation have collapsed into the NPC (non-player character), a meme so threatening that, in 2018, major platforms banned anyone pretending to be one; we are happy, though, to have AI mash up our entire visual history. The machine can pretend to be us, but we are not allowed to pretend to be it. Who, or what, exactly, can we say is running things? Returning to the cliché, that dead phrase or reused character-type that we are supposed to avoid in the name of the new, helps us here, because we are a long way beyond wanting novelty.

Continue reading “From Cliché to the World”

[This is a longer version of a piece that was published in The Critic as “In a World Without God, What Does Suicide Mean?”]

[All photographs mine]

Nina Power & Pierre d’Alancaisez

If life becomes unliveable, who would you turn to? A friend? A doctor? A priest?

Today we no longer imagine ourselves God’s creation, with all the concomitant demands to look after ourselves that might entail. On the contrary, we belong only to ourselves, and can dispense with ourselves as we see fit. No more bonds, duties, or higher values. No more worrying about eternal damnation, but no reason to be grateful for the gift of life either: when pain outweighs pleasure, why not simply disappear?

We live in the era, not only of the fully administered life, as Max Horkheimer put it, but of the total bureaucratising of death. In this vision of the world, suicide becomes simply one more thing to check off the list.

In his 1974 critique of modern medicine Medical Nemesis, Ivan Illich declares that “In every society the dominant image of death determines the prevalent concept of health.” What today does death resemble? A lonely pill.

Continue reading “Piece on Suicide”

A Greek goat, Summer 2023: there are, apparently, more than a hundred references in the Bible to goats, mostly positive…

I really should update this site more often…

In any case, here are some forthcoming events.

I’m co-organising two evening talks on the planets at the excellent British Interplanetary Society.

There’s one on November 9th, on Mars, Jupiter & Saturn: tickets available here. Speakers: Noah Kumin (Mars Review of Books), Jacob Phillips (author of Obedience is Freedom) and me (on Saturn).

Another on December 7th, on Uranus, Neptune & Pluto: tickets available here. Speakers TBA!

I’m teaching a course on EVIL in January at the Mary Ward Centre. Every Friday afternoon, IN PERSON, in Stratford for 12 weeks (Jan 12th March 22nd). Sign up here. Philosophical, theological, psychological and literary conceptions of evil (and critiques of the concepts) will all be covered. Thinkers covered include Arendt, Augustine, Bataille, Kant, Leibniz, Midgley, Nietzsche, Plantinga, Plotinus, de Sade.

I have a Substack here, which largely contains poetry.

My main occupation these days is Senior Editor with the excellent Compact Magazine. Please do subscribe!

I am available to write essays on a whole variety of topics, and for one-on-one tutoring (Philosophy, theory, crits).

I’ll be teaching an in-person course at Mary Ward Centre (42 Queen Square) on Friday afternoons 1-3pm from Jan 20th – March 31st 2023. The details and sign-up can be found here.

Along with Lev Parker (Morbid Books), I’ll be co-running a writing workshop in Norway between May 22nd – 29th. Information here. There are eight places.

The Betty Fjord University is an intellectual summer camp, reading group and writing retreat.

Based at the Betty Fjord Clinic, a residential studio and sauna in the Randsfjord Valley an hour from Oslo, the BFU welcomes friends old and new for a week of creative experimentation, relaxation and socialising. 

Video

A variety of new things: a discussion with the very interesting Alex Kaschuta entitled ‘Men & Women at the End of History’.

A discussion with the lovely Deacon Jon for the Gnostic Wisdom Network entitled ‘Pagan Love, Nature, & Authentic Life in the Black Iron Prison’.

A discussion with Lev Parker, Editor of Morbid Books, for Safety Propaganda.

And before all of those, a discussion in Ljubljana with Mladen Dolar and Gregor Moder entitled ‘Mark Fisher and Our Contemporary Moment: Is There Still No Alternative?’

Continue reading “new year, new work, new teaching”

[This piece accompanies an earlier text, ‘The Politics of Care: Rethinking Collective Being in the Wake of COVID-19’. Both texts were written for my friends at the Workers’ University/Front Slobode in Tuzla, Bosnia, funded by the Rosa Luxemburg Society]

All photographs are mine, taken during the last 18 months

Continue reading “Life and Humanity in Covid Times with Reference to Ivan Illich and Giorgio Agamben”

Some recent audio/visual output…and future plans.

A talk a gave for the Royal Musical Association’s Music & Philosophy Working Group entitled Music as Philosophy can be seen here

A podcast I did for Contain on the work of angelicism01 with Buum, Janie, Paul (from bible), Pool Boy, Eris Fendo is here (it’s one of the most sublime and humbling things I’ve ever been part of). Relatedly, I got a call from Wet Brain…

The Illich course is in full swing. Recent videos I did with Justin Murphy include an interview with L M Sacasas of The Frailest Thing which can be seen here

We also spoke with the great David Cayley, the video of which can be seen here

I’m continuing to teach a course on The Philosophy of Angels at MSCP, which is wonderful (I highly recommend their courses which are both incredible and affordable).

You can still get hold of limited editions of my paean to unrequited love, Platforms here and there’s even now a t-shirt too!

My book with Penguin, What Do Men Want? is out in February (and there should be an audiobook read by me too).

I’m doing a weekly podcast with Helen Rollins and Benjamin Studebaker called The Lack which you can subscribe to here – this is a highly enjoyable exercise where we look at a film, text, poem etc. and analyse it from our relative perspectives – psychoanalytic, philosophical, political. There’s also a ‘B’ side for patrons where we get…even freer.

I continue to write for The Telegraph (paywall) and I have a Substack for prose/poems here.

In January I’ll be teaching two courses, one on The Philosophy of Beauty for Mary Ward Centre (you can sign up here, no qualifications needed). The second is on Simone Weil’s The Need for Roots for the GCAS Philosophy Certificate programme (information here).

If anyone would like to hire me for tutorials/to write a poem etc./teach please email ninapower[at]gmail[dot]com

With pagan love, Nina

One on Angels and one on Ivan Illich. Q & A for the latter taking place 4pm UK time Thursday 5th August (register here).

Please contact me if you are interested in private tuition/supervision, or if you would like to commission me to write/speak.

I’m teaching an 8-week course on the work of Ivan Illich, covering all of his major works on tools, schools, medicine, gender, literacy and other important topics. You can find out about the course here.

I did a video with Justin Murphy, convenor of the course here.