I suppose I know K.D. Langston as well as anyone. In our numerous metal halide-lit discussions at the dumpster behind Krispy Kreme, I think I have learned enough to at least presen...ver másI suppose I know K.D. Langston as well as anyone. In our numerous metal halide-lit discussions at the dumpster behind Krispy Kreme, I think I have learned enough to at least present a brief profile of this author.
K.D. Langston is a pseudonym, although not at all a clever one. Through this device, he hopes to maintain some separation between his various works, whether fiction, non-fiction, or simply sub-standard.
With extensive training in a number of social sciences, including multiple unnecessary graduate degrees, Langston has tried to explore the interactions between groups of people who live in starkly different ways. The political science fiction focus in several of his works derives from his close study of tribal, family-based societies as they interacted with larger, more complex groups of people, usually nation states whose organization was based on contract or coercion. I cannot say whether his use of scholarly knowledge in his fiction is a continued embrace of academia, a repudiation or even indictment of it, or maybe just a stain among many on a borrowed soul, overdue, by the way.
Nonetheless, having spent years writing material that few in academia ever read, Langston decided to branch out into the fictional realm where he assumed he might expand the audience who could ignore his ideas. So far this supposition has been proved accurate. In most ways, however, the author remains a mystery, even to me.
I have attempted to discern Langston's origins, difficult through accent analysis and the author's questionable grasp of English, even less from appearance. Early in our relationship, I had been convinced of a foreign birth, although I never asked to see a birth certificate, after all, why bother? But now I'm sure Langston was born to a southern American family like myself. Take that for whatever meaning it might have. I'm sure everyone will have a different set of misconceptions about the south with which to pass judgment on his character.
I would have to guess at K.D. Langston's personal situation: an age near my own, that is in the middle of middle age, in middling health, of a muddled albeit vaguely European-American ethnicity, and of lower middle class origins. I should add that I was confused initially, as with many aspects of his life, since what I can see and hear of Langston leaves the impression of someone much older. After further thought, my conclusion was understandable given the author's primary diet, admitted distractability, and self-professed nano-phobia (particularly for gases dissolved in brown solutions, artificial, short-lived subatomic particles, and seed ticks).
I hope to have a website operating soon. Whether I will use social media on Langston's behalf is another matter. The author refuses to have any connection to such means of communication, in large part, as best as I can gather, because of a fear of some sort of corrupting effect it might have. Also, he refuses to use most newly invented verbs, especially those made from recently coined nouns. He will likely continue resisting until FDA approves the use of these words as actions, or when emailing, tweeting, texting, facebooking and such become obsolete.
For those hopeful that he may succumb to social media, he has described to me a sort of protective device that might be employed, but, unfortunately, I have yet been able to collect enough scrap tin to fashion the described headgear. No, aluminum will not suffice. And even with the approved accoutrements, Langston might still resist social media (but might give me leave to do so). Meanwhile he will continue writing.
Ultimately, he hopes to assemble a vast collection of fiction and non-fiction, most dealing with arrangements of humans, hypothetical or real, interacting under different assumptions about how societies should be organized and what values they should possess. Some of these might involve true science fiction as well while others might incorporate elements of counter-fantasy or para-fantasy, both he sees as a possibility when tribal people seek support from their animistic religions when faced with well-armed foreigners amazed with their own prowess.
Langston envisions a transformation of many of these works into movies for the Disney Deranged Channel, Lifetime single-episode miniseries, or aerial, mimed circus performances, all with the possibility of further extending his audience and the potential for people to ignore his work.ver menos