Papa
I’ve read The Sun Also Rises three times. Incredible book. Incredible author.
Hemingway’s prose is direct—sometimes so direct that it’s easy to get confused during dialog. Attributions aren’t always attached and the story moves so quickly that it is, at once, easy to understand the direction of the story and hard to understand the immediate page. I found myself having to re-read portions to make sure I fully grasped who was doing what to whom.
Despite the pace of the book, its time capsule describes a culture where lives were lived much more slowly. Full afternoons were spent in Parisian cafes, followed by dinners and drinking that went long into the night. Social privilege. Obvious and suspended.
Following my first reading, when I was seventeen years old, I wanted nothing more than to live the life of the Lost Generation. Fish in Basque country. Walk drunkenly through Montmatre. Run with the bulls during the festival of San Fermin.
Never in a millions years would I have compared myself to Hemingway or his characters. It wasn’t until later in life that I would think I could go toe-to-toe, in a boxing ring, while still holding the core belief that I could never compete with his literary brilliance.
Perhaps the million years are over. We live in a time where the bullets shot from the rifles of troll snipers offer more brand equity than any threat from the blood drawn.
I can beat Hemingway, as a boxer, fisherman and writer. Boom. Bring the pain.
Banksy
An anonymous legend. Believed to be male. Perhaps the greatest street artist of our generation, his work shows up in public places only after he has blended back into the darkness from which he spontaneously emerged. Romance bleeds from his persona. Freedom. Paradox. Social consciousness. Brashness.
Stepping away from the visceral, I’ve often wondered how Banksy supports his art. Does he trade equities? Is he a drug dealer? A trust fund? The answer, in many cases, would qualify him to occupy a place in Hemingway’s novel. Social privilege.
Obvious and suspended, no?
Hektad
A prolific Bronx-born street artist, he is almost as anonymous as Banksy. His identity shielded by the spray mask he wears to protect him from paint mist, he is not afraid to be found and interviewed. Banksy is a shadow. Hektad casts a shadow.
The image associated with this essay was photographed in NYC’s Chelsea gallery district several years ago. At the time, I had no awareness of Hektad’s brand. By directly comparing himself to Banksy, Hektad climbed the Empire State Building and started swatting biplanes.
Hektad, as far as I can tell, works for a living. Props.
DeSoi
I am the anonymous guy who wrestled a bull to the ground in the infamous video from the festival of San Fermin in Pamplona in 2002.
Bulls, biplanes—whatever. I write for a living.
—