Azmud

Drifting in & out of sense as in an interrupted dream, Azmud is a novel contribution to literary art as political allegory. In each of its five sections - "expired generations" - it attempts to retell the tale of the human psyche, the damage it has undergone under capitalism, in the form of a wandering work tribe searching for value in the spectacular flow of mass communication, on behalf of various severe 'generals' who demand a quota of abstract accumulation. But each of Azmud's industrial adventures in turn become allegories for the act of the text's own creation. But what happens in Azmud? Under orders, a human herd wanders thru the dense miasma of mass communication, hunting for precious ox-ore to stash in their air-ark or fuel their ancient steam engine. A vagrant crew invades the broken dreams of a drowsy industrial tycoon, stealing baskets full of his precious sleep. A homeless hoard combs thru post-industrial litter, searching for burnable rubble. A fake engineer captures a team of lost work-horses & four mammoth protozoans to help boost the energy yield of his toxic currents. A cargo ship collects a crew of stranded industrial outcasts with their precious ark full of ore & its tyrannical captain subjects them to relentless injections & many unwanted adventures.