#informationism

[billherbert23]

The Gairfish Years (2/3)

This middle stretch saw Richard and I dedicate issues to our doctoral heroes, MacDiarmid (again) and Neil Gunn. Actual design skills (Ben Edgell) were in evidence, and a cohort of Scottish poets of the 90s were represented.

Duende, the Dundee anthology, was produced to pick up on the Octocentenial in 1991, and was an early attempt at what Andy Jackson and I did a little more thoroughly in Whaleback City (2013).

The column Virtual Scotland picked up the polemic from our editorials and remixed it as satire, playing with discourse in a similar way to some of the poetry we published, which we were beginning to term ‘Informationist’.

[billherbert23]

virtual dundee: a flock of sparlings

The recent discovery that the rare fish known as the sparling has again been caught in the waters of the Forth bodes well for the Scottish fishing industry. A distant cousin of the salmon, this little fish has for many years been caught by the tonne in the Tay, where it is considered a great delicacy because of its scent. The sparling is also known as the “cucumber smelt” for the simple reason that it smells strongly of that large oblong fruit. Fishermen in the Carse of Gowrie are able to detect a shoal of sparling from the river bank, simply by dilating an experienced nostril. Dundonians have long had their own piscine version of that English dainty, the cucumber sandwich.

Now geneticists, spurred on by ancient documents in archives in Dundee and Perth, are striving to reintroduce the sparling’s full range of subspecies. A cryptic note in the accounts of a Perth merchant for the year 1538 refers to “thae puir soules wha depend sa on the Orient tae gust thair mowes, given hou hereawa is sic a fouth o spice fish.” A Dundee chronicler in the late 1570s refers to “the sparline, that is baith benigne and breme.” Scientists conjecture that there were once several types of sparling, and are experimenting with two new strains.

The first of these, the garlic smelt, looks like it may prove more popular for its eggs than for its flesh. The unfortunate fish smelt so strongly of garlic that the population of Newburgh were recently advised to stay indoors with windows shut while river police “herded” the guilty shoal downstream. The eggs, however, are odourless and may be eaten like caviar. Their beneficent qualities have already aroused the jealousy of producers of garlic capsules. River police have been alerted that industrial sabotage is possible, and spawning areas are being guarded round the clock.

The chilli smelt has proved slightly less successful as the fish have displayed a marked tendency toward spontaneous combustion. When one sparling explodes this sets off a chain reaction amongst the others. One fisherman, displaying a learned bent, has described the effect as resembling “Greek fire”: “Ye can see the haill shoal burnin awa ablow the waater like a coal fire through a windie.”

Compensation comes for the sparling at least in the form of jet propelled excreta. Marine scientists observing the chilli smelt have established that the small fish can employ the considerable power generated by their unstable constitutions both to thrust themselves through the water at high speeds, and to repel attackers with a focussed squirt of shit. As one young diver put it, “When the lot of them turn their backs on you it’s quite a daunting experience.”

It is hoped to eventually be able to produce varieties of sparling for each of the major spices employed in preparing fish. Those fishing communities which happen to occupy the estuaries of Scotland’s major rivers may be able to look forward to a decidedly less hazardous future. Plans are already afoot to relaunch boats from Broughty Ferry on the Firth of Tay, for the first time since the 1930s. The commercial possibilities seem limitless. The hot-tempered little chilli smelt may yet become Britain’s ultimate fast food.

[billherbert23]

virtual dundee: the losergate

In Virtual Dundee, the Losergate is a street which appears to recede into the tenemented distance, but actually just grows rapidly smaller.

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The Losergate ends in the Fail Port, AKA the McGonagall Arch, where the original Makar of Virtual Dundee would gather to read his poems.

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The actual arch of the Fail Port was so small that you had to crawl through it on hands and knees in order to exit the city.

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The tunnel leading out of the Fail Port was reputedly lined with haddocks' teeth, all facing outward, so that once you'd left, you could never return.

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Immediately next to the Fail Port, however, was an unlocked 'Door for Exiles & General Monk' by which you might gain 24 hour access.

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Once you had left Virtual Dundee by the Fail Port, though, even if you immediately re-entered, you were forever an exile and to be shunned.

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The treatment of exiles contrasts with that of Ghost Whales, guiltily ushered in through the magnificent Whale Port in order to be propitiated.

[billherbert23]

An account of the fishing communities of the Ferry

Source for the by-names poem.

[billherbert23]

informationist dundee: broughty ferry by-names

(found poem)

Annie the Tweenie, Bomber, Blackie Knight, Blue Lippy, Carver Robbie, Catty Tam, Chae Bow, Chicky Ning, Coco, the Daddler, Daddy Dorrit, Daft Jeemie, Dottle, the Happer, Jellico, Jergen, Jeemy Peh, Johnny Aye Aye, Kitty Cogie, Lollipop, Nanook, Quack, Parrot Aggie, Penter, Powerful, Prince Chairlie, Tappy, Tipperary, Tripe Jean, Seckle, the Swift, Wullsie, Woot, and Wuckie.

[billherbert23]

artsplaining: nine sentences about informationism

Informationist art is art that tells you stuff you didn’t know you wanted to know in a manner you didn’t think was really art.

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Information about Informationism is inevitably Post-Informationist: the movement was designed to be over as soon as anyone had heard of it. (1)

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Some theorists argue it was over as soon as it was thought of - most Informationists were not informed in time and so were already Post-.

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Actually, this being Scotland in the 1990s, the rule about Informationism being over once it was heard of gave us 25 years of uninterrupted work. (2)

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To this day, the key practitioners of Informationism toil away neither knowing that they are Informationists nor that it is already all over.

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Because anyone who’s heard of Informationism has only heard it’s over, they have not really been informed about Informationism at all.

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Thus, as the Founding Informationists found out from the outset, Informationism both persists and is Post-Informationist at the same time.

(1) Nods, nodes, and noodles of ongoing Informationism in the Post-Informationist era are, properly, not known as Informationist Eccentres.

(2) Informationist books are programmed to shed their skins every seventh year, or to find their way back to their publishing house and spawn, depending on whether they have been read or not.

[billherbert23]

informationist dundee: the little wooden giraffe

At night the little wooden giraffe from the kiddies’ ride ootside the toy shop in Broughty Ferry comes tae life and waanders the streets.

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It bangs on doors wi its wooden heid but dinna let it in: it canna bite ye but will gee ye a guid bludgeonin then mak aff wi yir wallet.

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It’s addicted tae bettin on the camel races and, tho it cannae drink, will soak up turps thru its foot. Then it loups in the river and jist drifts.

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There’s a mannie in Tayport’s got a set o nicht goggles - he’s convinced a sea serpent wi a lang blotchy yellow neck haunts the Tay.

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Ilka nicht he’s oot there inniz dinghy looking for the Monster, but the little wooden giraffe jist drifts wi the tide gazing up at the Mune.

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Sometimes the giraffe waashes up in Tentsmuir: early risers report seeing it gallop owre the roadbridge tae get back doon the Ferry on time.

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Any cheenge left it pits in the slot and waatches the stump o the kiddies’ ride go back and forth till mornin, when it reassumes The Position.

[billherbert23]

informationist scotland: facts about dugongs

A dugong can literally do no wrong.

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Who remembers ‘The Dugong Show’ now, where anyone could do anything on live TV until a dugong came and lay down upon them?

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Due to a difficulty in obtaining dugongs, or getting them to express an opinion about anything, acts on 'The Dugong Show’ went on for hours.

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'The Singalonga Dugong Show’ was always a whiskery, snuffly affair of uncertain time signature, but for some reason children loved it.

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In the 1960s, every municipal paddling pool in Scotland had its own resident dugong who would look after the blue-limbed, splashing children.

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While my mother taught, if Gran was busy cleaning for the local doctor, I would be left instead with 'Aunty Dugong’.

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Many was the long, amniotic afternoon spent floating in the warm shallows while trying to visualise my homework.