Final Edition

A co-publication of Wallace Shawn Inc. and Seven Stories Press

Final Edition is a one-issue-only political publication written by people who are aesthetes and literary writers and edited by Wallace Shawn, who “seriously believe[s] that part of our national problem is that the people who run the country have a crude and minimal imaginative life and are too little acquainted with the quartets of Beethoven.”

The issue consists of five pieces:

“Before the Election—Fragments from a Diary 2004” by Wallace Shawn
The diarist broods on the analogy between the addiction to pornography and nationalistic obsessions, and he also speculates on the question of whether a collection of people who vote in a kind of sleepwalking ignorance can ever be called a democracy.

“Invitation to a Degraded World” by Jonathan Schell
In this essay, Schell meditates on the comic book/disaster movie view of life, in which bin Laden and George W. Bush are both immersed, and discusses the “standing army” stationed in all of our homes, the media.

“The Webern Variations” by Mark Strand
Mark Strand offers a dark but hauntingly delicious poem on the theme of descent, decline and nothingness.

“Wallace Shawn Interviews Noam Chomsky”
For those with no acquaintance with Chomsky, this could make a wonderful introduction, while offering surprising insights to those who know him well. Chomsky is electric with vitality, wit and rage as he ranges ferociously across the present and ancient worlds, giving his thoughts on the development of the Internet, the 2004 election and the God of the Bible.

“Twilight of the Superheroes” by Deborah Eisenberg
In this brooding, passionate and brilliant short story, Deborah Eisenberg paints a brutally honest portrait of New York City today and of our lives today, wherever we live.

Final Edition comprises all new pieces, never before published in any format.