The Knye is ended

Scott Bradfield (The Fanzine) and David L. Ulin (L.A. Times) remember Disch.

Bradfield:

But I suspect that most of the people who truly loved Tom and understood him best never actually met him. They only needed to read him—and so experience that dependable repeatable sudden thrill of pleasure we all felt when opening up each new story, or essay, or poem by Tom in all his guises: Thomas M. Disch, Tom Disch, and even the ornate, publicity-shy Victorianish lady-novelist, Cassandra Knye.

UPDATE: HSKS member James Sallis on Disch, in The Boston Globe:

Making their way to the inmost chambers of caves, bypassing other interiors that seem to us just as suitable, our ancestors covered walls with their paintings. We've little idea what purposes (social? religious?) the chambers served, all those detailed renderings, those grand animals. But there in privacy a few invented, for us all, the entire vocabulary of our arts: image, narrative, celebration, form. They speak to us still: We were here. This is what we saw. This is how we experienced our world.

Bruce Conner, RIP

Linksmeister General Thomas sends us two short films—Bruce Conner's Devo video (for "Mongoloid")—



—and Roger Beebe's recent BC tribute, featuring Toni Basil (as she appeared in Breakaway).

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More Dischiana:

The NYT obit, with a wide range of quotes (Norman Rush, Dana Gioia...): "He wrote a series of poems on grammar, for which he was a stickler, including one on auxiliary verbs."

Other Ed's appreciation on the New York site: "[Philip K.] Dick suggested [to the F.B.I.] that [Disch's novel Camp Concentration] contained coded information 'to be read by the right people here and there.' "

William Gibson: "On Wings Of Song, as I've said elsewhere, and more than once, is one of the great neglected masterpieces of late 20th-century science fiction."

I always liked this Disch blurb of the work of Harry Mathews (anyone know the original source?): "I cannot express the extent of my admiration for Harry Mathews, which is well-nigh evangelical. There are now, here and there, other zephyrs blowing—John Barth, Susan Sontag, Donald Barthelme, Thomas Pynchon—but none so strong as this, none that bear so clearly and deliciously the tang of spring."

And more links here.

Thomas M. Disch, RIP

Sad news: Thomas M. Disch has died, an apparent suicide.

More here and here.

In Berkeley on my tour a few weeks ago, I picked up an old paperback—


Update: Other Ed interviewed him recently.
UPDATE (7/7): Poetry's Don Share provides information about Disch's contributions to the magazine, and links to some poems.