"THE UNCLEANED KETTLE".

It seems that, contrary to prevalent beliefs and fervent declarations, both critics and readers are fond of literary labels as a specific kind of currency; among its numerous functions a label allows us to perceive certain processes occurring within literature as a comfortable series of books to be read. I think that, paradoxically, it is more natural to label those artistic phenomena that achieve a substantial intensity, integrity and scale than to pretend that they are merely a whim or hoax aimed at guaranteeing recognition and sales of a handful of novels by a group of authors.

This said, I identify New Weird as a literary strategy, a way of thinking about writing and understanding imaginative fiction, and, above all, a way of practicing it, which has turned out to be innovative not at the level of narrative technique there is not so much textual experimentation in it but rather at the level of setting and characters. Constructing baroquely lush cityscapes and eclectic, astounding locations, filling them up with multicultural and multiethnic societies of humans, monsters, and all kinds of their hybrid forms, creating complex characters and subjecting them to the dilemmas of the world they live in these are all characteristics of the New Weird practice. Not only did New Weird books transgress the generic limitations of science fiction, fantasy and horror, but, more significantly, emphasized the ongoing departure from the abused and exhausted Tolkienian heroic fantasy mode. What is more, its unprecedentedly dynamic and alchemically brave genre amalgamation resulted in literary synergies of high originality and attractiveness such as those in the books by China Mieville, Steph Swainston, Jeff VanderMeer, or Jeffrey Ford. The need to come up with vibrant, memorable venues as well as original characters and creatures became New Weird's most noticeable attribute.

At the level of subject-matter it rejected many jaded fantasy tropes, including the clash of good and evil, and chose the exploration of such problems as otherness, alienation, and even from both in its physiological and existential dimension. I would like to quote at this point a short passage from William Gibson's Idoru: Idoru: Lo told me a story once, about a job he'd had. He worked for a soup vendor in Hong Kong, a wagon on the sidewalk. He said the wagon had been in business for over fifty years, and their secret was that they'd never cleaned the kettle. In fact, they'd never stopped cooking the soup. It was the same seafood soup they'd been selling for fifty years, but it was never the same, because they added fresh ingredients every day, depending on what was available.

Even though Gibson's kettle can be perceived as a witty metaphor of literature in general, I believe that it is particularly relevant to New Weird, which was, or perhaps so still is, this "uncleaned kettle" of imaginative fiction; the writing whose freshness was to a large extent the result of unrestrained stirring in the kettle as well as joyous and vigorous putting into it any ingredients that were at hand. I am convinced therefore that it is this particular artistic strategy that is fundamental to New Weird.

However, I don't think that it still exists as a coherent literary movement aimed at provoking readers or attacking stale traditions, although I am convinced that some specific traits of New Weird will reverberate in works of both new and established writers. I actually count on New Weird as a source of inspiration and a strong influence for those who take up writing imaginative fiction. I also believe that the genre-mixing strategy the methodical stirring in the uncleaned kettle of fantastic fiction, putting more and more fresh ingredients and spices into the brew exemplified by the New Weird will become a significant approach for future writers. Moreover, the necessity for writers to constantly widen their scope, employ vivid imagery, architectural lavishness, and physiological weirdness are as vital in creating imaginative fiction as narrative skills. Historically speaking, the New Wave revolution opened science fiction to mainstream writing with its variety of narrative techniques and literary traditions, the cyberpunk movement explored all kinds of technological concerns within neon-lit, infinite cityscapes, whereas, in my view, New Weird rediscovered fantastic fiction as an alchemical playground as well as re-established the necessity for a writer to concoct new, surprising formulae of imagined cities or empires and their inhabitants.

When viewed from the perspective of the category's distinctive features, I believe that at least two novels in Polish can be referred to and analyzed as New Weird since they have many similarities to the works of China Mieville, Jeff VanderMeer or Jeffrey Ford. These are Inne piesni (Other Songs, Inne piesni (Other Songs, 2003) by Jacek Dukaj and 2003) by Jacek Dukaj and Miasta pod Skalq (Cities Under the Rock, Miasta pod Skalq (Cities Under the Rock, 2005) by Marek S. Huberath. Both of them are highly impressive achievements of Polish fantastic fiction, brilliantly conceived and masterly executed, both are set in artistically vivid, highly original, and absorbingly unique worlds of their own. 2005) by Marek S. Huberath. Both of them are highly impressive achievements of Polish fantastic fiction, brilliantly conceived and masterly executed, both are set in artistically vivid, highly original, and absorbingly unique worlds of their own.

However, one has to remember that what happened as a major literary movement in Britain and in the United States was merely a marginal phenomenon in Poland, or perhaps even something that merely coincided with what was happening in the West. I do not suppose that either Dukaj or Huberath attempted to follow anyone's footsteps, even though their novels operate within the same aesthetics and employ very similar artistic strategies to those of acclaimed New Weird authors.

I wish we were able to develop stronger and faster reactions to new literary trends as well as particular works of fiction, but, unfortunately, Poland, at many levels, is a slow-changing country, whose literary market is really peculiar and, to a large extent, conservative, and where readership is alarmingly slight compared, for instance, to that of our neighbor, the Czech Republic a country with the population nearly four times smaller than Poland's. By many it is still viewed as an inexplicable phenomenon that throughout the 1990s the bestsell-ing authors in Poland were William Wharton (the author of Birdy, Birdy, who at a certain point began to write exclusively for the Polish market) and Jonathan Carroll, while a huge number of both contemporary classics and the most interesting new books were not translated and published (China Mieville's novels have been gradually gaining recognition who at a certain point began to write exclusively for the Polish market) and Jonathan Carroll, while a huge number of both contemporary classics and the most interesting new books were not translated and published (China Mieville's novels have been gradually gaining recognition Iron Council Iron Council has not been published yet while those of Jeffrey Ford or Jeff VanderMeer still wait for publication). has not been published yet while those of Jeffrey Ford or Jeff VanderMeer still wait for publication).

In spite of this, there is a group of writers who, in their short stories and novels, have begun to approach creating fictional, fantastic worlds and characters in a similar way to that of New Weird authors. I think that it is very promising, and that we are on the verge of a revolution in imaginative fiction which, hopefully, will bring more novels as original and important as those of Dukaj and Huberath.

LABORATORY.

Festival Lives

THE NEW WEIRD ROUND ROBIN.

PAUL DI FILIPPO, CAT RAMBO, SARAH MONETTE, DANIEL ABRAHAM, FELIX GILMAN, HAL DUNCAN, CONRAD WILLIAMS.

WE COMMISIONED this piece as a kind of laboratory experiment. Given a brief of coming up with a "New Weird" story, how would some of our finest fantasists generally not identified as "New Weird" interpret that brief? In a sense, we wanted them to show us their take on the term in fictional form. The result was never intended to be a complete story, although it definitely has closure. Di Filippo came up with the milieu and provided avenues for inspiration with his opening, after which each writer was asked to write about a particular element from Di Filippo's opening. The further brief was to advance the plot while also expanding on Di Filippo's milieu. (A conclusion created specifically for the internet by Di Filippo can be found on the Tachyon website at www.tachyonpublications.com on the page devoted to this anthology.) on the page devoted to this anthology.) THE EDITORS

VIEW 1.

Death in a Dirty Dhoti PAUL DI FILIPPO PAUL DI FILIPPO

THE TERRORIST got off the train amidst hundreds of other noisy pilgrims, all debarking into the cavernous, cast-iron columned interior of the Battidarmala station on Khunds Road.

The perfect cover, thought the killer, not for the first time, and as if to reassure himself. thought the killer, not for the first time, and as if to reassure himself. Masquerading as a mindless worshipper ofChuzdt, during the locust god's own annual Festival. Millions of pilgrims flooding Masquerading as a mindless worshipper ofChuzdt, during the locust god's own annual Festival. Millions of pilgrims flooding into immense Riarnanth. The city authorities abandoning all checks of papers. Vast crowds interposed between me and any pursuit. Mindless religious fervor obscuring proper civic vigilance.

How simple it was going to be, to make the ruling Sengpa sept pay dearly for their cruel treatment of the Dardarbji.

The terrorist had been traveling for six wearisome days, his train stopping for new passengers, it seemed, at every other collection of four hovels or more, across three thousand miles of heterogeneous terrain: from Dardarbji itself, the small northern mountain-nestled city named for its majority sept, down alpine slopes studded with summer flowers, over trestles threading the foothill swamps of Swatay, across the endless village-dotted plains of Neethune, detouring most circumspectly around the jungles of Kubota, hugging the shore of the Verminous Sea for the last hundred miles, train tracks slicing through acres and acres of squalid slums, until finally, blessed and wicked Riarnanth rose up against a backdrop of towering cliffs, occupying the long, long, miles-wide strip of land between the Dallut Escarpment and the pleasant jade waters of Bangma Bay.

At random intervals along the curving cliffs, the terrorist noted as his chuffing train made its slow, populace-clogged way to the station, dozens of sizable waterfalls plunged over, their atomized mists casting perpetual rainbows. Captured at the bottom in big marble-ledged artificial ponds surrounded by tiled plazas, the resulting rivers rushed to the bay through an assortment of canals: the Meritful, the Easeful, the Tranquil, the Imponderable, the Torpid and others, trafficked by boats and bathers alike.

At last, inside the Battidarmala terminal, the tedious first stage of the terrorist's journey had come to an end.

And excruciatingly tedious it had been. Most of the trip had been spent standing, packed pelvis-to-buttock with seething humanity. Sleep was accomplished in shifts in special windowless cars, segregated by sex and outfitted with hard coffin-like niches from floor to roof, amidst suffocating odors of flatulence and sweat. Meals were catch-as-catch-can, based on whatever prepared foodstuffs vendors were selling as they raced alongside the slowing train. Voiding of bowels and bladders occurred in public while hanging from a kind of bosun's-chair lofted outward from the train, while the train was still in motion. (Fatalities were common.) Facilities for ablutions were non-existent.

Yet his voyage could not have been otherwise. The group of radicals subsidizing his journey to Riarnanth could have easily afforded him private transport, for the terrorists counted among their number many of the most prominent citizens of Dardarbji. But the terrorist's camouflage relied on merging with the masses.

So now, as the terrorist paused a moment beneath the vivid aestival sunlight pouring down through the terminal's glass roof, he relished a moment of stoppage, of assessment of his condition in a small bubble of privacy.

His dhoti, crisp and white at the outset in Dardarbji, was grimed and splattered, and the strap of one sandal had broken when someone trod on his heel as he sought to advance. That sandal flopped loosely with every step, constant impediment. His single-knotted fabric bindle crossed an otherwise bare mahogany chest and back tacky with a crust composed of road grit and sweat, as if he were a breaded lamb chop. His hair was snarled, his teeth and tongue furred, and his nails caulked. He knew he was not thinking as clearly as he needed to, thanks to the general sleeplessness of the past week. He was hungry and irritable and lonely, for this was the farthest he had ever traveled from Dardarbji in his young life. The weight of his mission camped heavily on his shoulders.

And these pilgrims! How their devotions sickened him!

Passing by, two of them now grinned in an overflow of fellow-feeling and made Chuzdt's sign toward the terrorist: both arms bent at the elbow and held vertically close to the torso, with forward- and downward-pointing hands drooping as if their wrists were broken.

The locust's stance.

Worship of earthy Chuzdt was widespread across all districts of the multifarious nation, but not among the pure Dardarbji, who instead paid tribute to lordly and regal Jaggenuth.

But now of course the terrorist was forced by expediency to smile back and imitate the shibboleth until the pilgrims passed.

Best to get out of this hot, enclosed, pilgrim-filled space, he thought. he thought.

Although the streets of Riarnanth would be nearly as hot, nearly as tight, and certainly as thronged with pilgrims. But an odd breeze, a chance open vista, and a smattering of non-pious citizens would be a relief.

The terrorist passed the train's massive engine where it rested its nose against a padded wooden bumper. Workers were shoveling bio-mass into its maw and bleeding off wastes through unclamped nipples. The ketonic odor assailed the terrorist's nostrils, and he hurried toward the exit.

He had an address: Number 50 Djudrum Lane, in the Tsongtrik ban-lieue. There he would receive his next instructions. (The exact nature of his righteous assault on the city remained unknown to him, a precaution against unlikely capture and interrogation.) But surely he could delay the rendezvous with his co-conspirators long enough to visit a public bath, a rice- or noodle- or samosa-shop, and a cobbler. Perhaps he would even grab a night's doss without company or obligations, just to rest up for his arduous and dangerous assignment, whatever it might be.

Thoughts of a woman hired to share his pallet briefly flashed across his imagination, but he sternly put them down. Duty brooked no carnal pleasures.

The exit to the terminal was festooned with long garlands of garish flowers, both real and paper. A banner in the harsh Sengpa script, which all the children of Dardarbji had been forced to learn for the past hundred years, welcomed the "brides and grooms of Chuzdt."

Outside fresh breezes from Bangma Bay to the east enlivened the terrorist's sensibilities somewhat, although odors from street mire, cooking foods, beasts of burden, perfumes, pets, industrial processes and the bodies of approximately a thousand active citizens crammed into the proximate square block defeated nature soundly.

In Dardarbji's steep and solemn pristine streets it was not thus.

Tentatively the terrorist joined the flow of humanity. He was uncertain of the actual path to Number 50 Djudrum Lane in the Tsongtrik banlieue. But he assumed he would soon discover a public information cubicle where he could ask for directions.

He noted from an official enameled sign affixed to the wall of a building that he had left behind Khunds Road and now traversed Jonkul Avenue.

A block ahead, a knot of people surrounded a small raised stage, atop which a troupe of actors cavorted. Not quite approving but nonetheless intrigued, the terrorist stopped to watch.

The leader of the troupe sported a fierce mustache that trailed below his chin. Acerbic and wry, he seemed to include his listeners in on some droll secret. While beautiful women in pastel silks danced behind him and clowns juggled antique scimitars, he pitched to the crowd.

"Come see Hrangit's Accomplished Thespians and Mountebanks this evening, as we enliven your dull existences with a drama of deep tragedy and heroism. 'The Inundation of Riarnanth!' That most ancient legend of the destruction of your very own beautiful city, when the puissant sea turned traitor and smashed down upon the metropolis! Enacted before your unbelieving eyes with miraculous effects! Only those who could climb the Dallut cliffs like monkeys or swim in Bangma Bay like fish survived that day."

On cue a small monkey appeared from nowhere and clambered up the pants of the pitchman to perch atop his head. A clown attempted to help dislodge the beast by whacking it with a bladder shaped like a puffer fish. The crowd roared.

When at last the boisterous citizenry quieted down, the pitchman concluded: "I, Hrangit, guarantee your satisfaction!"

The terrorist found himself smiling and feeling beneficent. Mention of the destruction of Riarnanth constituted a good omen. He felt grateful to the troupe. If their gods favored them, Hrangit and Company would move safely on to another city before a more modern disaster befell Riarnanth.

Jonkul intersected with a broader boulevard denominated Poonma Way. The terrorist arbitrarily turned right, still seeking a public information cubicle of the kind he was familiar with from home.

A corps of musicians, all male youths in gold-braided uniforms, meandered down the street, barely avoiding collisions with vehicles such as a big dray full of pumpkins, while celebrating Chuzdt's temporary reign with sarod, flute, violin and tablas. People threw coins at them for luck and out of appreciation. The bandleader, a wiry old man whose instrument was the vina carried more for show than for use hurriedly gathered the coins. "Chuzdt thanks you, and Doumani and his Golden Songboys do likewise!"

Growing thirsty, the terrorist stopped for a cool yogurt drink from a sidewalk cart surrounded by a scrim of water from its onboard melting ice blocks. As he was finishing it, a beggar approached. Dressed in tatters, his bare feet horned and cracked, his big frame warped, the man displayed various sores and scars.

"An oobol or two, good sir, to feed poor Goza! In Chuzdt's name!"

The beggar's lack of propriety, disgusting condition, and evident disfavor in the eyes of Jaggenuth repelled the visitor from Dardarbji. His clean city would never countenance the presence of such.

"Get away! I have no oobols to spare for you! Hire yourself out as guide to the fiery cracks of Mount Meru, for all I care!"

The beggar named Goza cringed obsequiously. "Blessings from Chuzdt be yours in any case, good sir!"

Gratefully leaving the beggar behind, the terrorist continued his search for a booth where he could get the directions he needed. Could it be that Riarnanth did not possess this public amenity?

In Dardarbji there was hardly a block that did not boast the little stupa-shielded hollow statue whereby one communicated questions and payment through capsules dropped down a demon's mouth and thence through a pneumatic system to a central library, and received speedy answers back out the demon's nether parts! (Information as such was not a particularly revered commodity in Jaggenuth's eyes, spiritual fervor being favored.) But Dardarbji was a civilized, advanced place, and these people were all obviously uncultured heathens.

The terrorist came abreast of a large humming factory of pleasant aspect, set behind an iron fence: an immaculate, sprawling, sand-colored building of some three stories, its open windows affording fine ventilation to its workers, the whole complex, including a plashing fountain, shaded by tall pipal trees.

After a second, the terrorist recognized the sound of scores of sewing machines, powered no doubt by a stomach in the basement. His trained eye soon discovered the fart-pipe venting that stomach's exhaust, as well as a chute for biomass deliveries. It was well to pay attention to the details of the enemy's infrastructure.

A plaque on the factory read: VALVAY'S GARIAL HIDES VALVAY'S GARIAL HIDES FINEST QUALITY FINEST QUALITY12000 POONMA WAY In one window on an upper floor, just a few yards from the street, a self-important-looking man could be seen sitting at a desk, shuffling papers and string-bound folders. A beautiful woman entered the office and addressed the man, and he replied. But their words were lost amidst the factory hum.

Possibly, thought the terrorist, that man was the proud owner Valvay himself, one of the class of commercial exploiters who had so oppressed Dardarbji. What would it be like, to command flocks of people including such a splendid woman?

As the terrorist passed the building, a piercing whistle blew. Workers, mostly other young women, began to pour out the doors. End of shift already! The afternoon was well advanced. The terrorist could feel his hours of hypothetical leisure slipping away. He determined to forget about seeking directions to his rendezvous until tomorrow, and concentrate on finding lodgings, a bath and food.

But now a few hundred yards further on, Poonma Way was all industry, with no signs of what he needed. Reluctant to backtrack he was constitutionally averse to ever overturning his own decisions or retreating, a trait which had worked in his favor during the tough competition to carry out this mission the terrorist instead looked for a cross-street that would bring him to livelier commercial precincts.

Ahead, a dim alley loomed between big windowless warehouses. The terrorist hesitated at its mouth. Light and almost abstract colorful motion at its distant far end betokened another avenue. No other obvious route toward what he sought offered itself.

He ventured down the dimly lit narrow passage.

A heap of noisome rubbish halfway down the alley urged the terrorist over toward the far wall.

As he sought to navigate past the midden, three four-legged shadows arose from the pile.

The terrorist's heart skipped But they were just dogs middling yellow-furred mutts. Wild dogs, yes, but surely no real threat And then he saw the salps.

Clinging to the fur of each dog at the base of its upper neck was a gelatinous translucent blob, inside of which an embryonic entity could be vaguely seen. The terrorist had been warned in his briefings of such amphibian threats, to be encountered in some of the city's canals less well tended by cleaning squads.

Its nervous system intertwined with that of the dogs, the parasitic salps were the true predators, sentient and merciless.

The lead dog growled puppet words: "Man, lie down and feed us."

"No!"

The terrorist lashed out with an expert kick, but the salp-driven dogs were even wilier than their feral natures normally allowed. They ringed him just out of reach, then began to close in.

The terrorist leaped high over one dog, landed, stumbled, and felt teeth graze his calf. Then he was up and running, back the way he had come.

He almost made it to the alley mouth. But then his broken sandal sent him sprawling.

The dogs were on him, snarling, slavering. He writhed, sought to protect his neck, stomach, groin all at once "Make him quiet!" one dog ordered.

Another dog gripped a blunt heavy stick in its mouth. The mutt swung, and the stick connected with the terrorist's head.

Hrangit climbed down off the portable stage as the crowd dispersed. "Break this down," he ordered. "We have to be set up in Sringla's Yards by eight tonight!"

His troupe swung into efficient action as he watched with approval, stroking his mustache. All was going well in this early period of their long engagement during the Festival of Chuzdt. Riarnanth was always a rewarding venue.

So why then did he feel so uneasy, as if some vague doom loomed just around the corner? He had been happy and cheerful until a few moments ago. Some indefinable aura from the most recent crowd, a malign presence?