From Magic and Myth-Work to Care and Repair

The practices of magic and contemporary myth-making in relation to landscape, performance, and writing. From Magic and Myth-Work to Care and Repair is a two-part book bringing together fourteen essays broadly concerned with the “fiction of the self” and with practices and explorations beyond that fiction. Each part of the book approaches this theme from a different angle. The first part, entitled “On Magic and Myth-Work,” deals with practices of transformation and with contemporary myth-making in relation to landscape, performance, and writing. The second part, “On Care and Repair,” gathers together essays that are more personal, but that also look to various technologies (or devices) of self-care alongside ideas of collaboration and the collective. Crucial throughout this exploration are questions of agency and self-narration, but also how these connect to larger issues around historical trauma, neoliberalism, and ecological crisis. The essays reference many other texts and fellow travellers, and also draw on the author's own experiences (and teaching) within various art and theory worlds, as well as with performance, magical practices, gaming, and Buddhism.

Simon O'Sullivan is Professor of Art Theory and Practice at Goldsmiths, University of London. His other most recent books are On Theory-Fiction and Other Genres (2024); The Ancient Device (2024); and (with David Burrows) Fictioning: The Myth-Functions of Contemporary Art and Philosophy (2019). He is also part of the collaborative "performance fiction" Plastique Fantastique (see www.plastiquefantastique.org).