WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.419 Welcome to the Deep Dive. Our mission, as always, 00:00:02.620 --> 00:00:04.440 is to take a whole stack of compelling sources, 00:00:04.799 --> 00:00:06.820 really cut through the noise, and just leave 00:00:06.820 --> 00:00:09.199 you with the essential knowledge. And today, 00:00:09.500 --> 00:00:12.460 well, we're immersing ourselves in a career that 00:00:12.460 --> 00:00:16.300 somehow manages to connect some really, really 00:00:16.300 --> 00:00:20.059 different extremes of 20th century culture. It's 00:00:20.059 --> 00:00:22.039 quite a journey. It really is. If you have any 00:00:22.039 --> 00:00:24.809 interest at all in, like, the definitive story 00:00:24.809 --> 00:00:27.309 of the New York punk scene. Yeah. You know, that 00:00:27.309 --> 00:00:29.350 raw, visceral time with the Velvet Underground, 00:00:29.710 --> 00:00:32.149 Iggy Pop, the Ramones. Then you definitely know 00:00:32.149 --> 00:00:34.229 the book Please Kill Me. And our subject today 00:00:34.229 --> 00:00:36.399 is Gillian McCain. The co -author who really 00:00:36.399 --> 00:00:39.079 helped shape that incredible oral history. Exactly. 00:00:39.079 --> 00:00:41.000 But here's what makes this deep dive, I think, 00:00:41.020 --> 00:00:43.880 so fascinating. It's the sheer, maybe unexpected 00:00:43.880 --> 00:00:47.280 range of her work. Our sources show this major 00:00:47.280 --> 00:00:50.320 figure in punk history. Right, a towering figure. 00:00:50.340 --> 00:00:53.159 Who is also simultaneously a Canadian academic, 00:00:53.320 --> 00:00:56.240 a really sophisticated prose poet, very much 00:00:56.240 --> 00:00:58.560 plugged into the New York school literary theory. 00:00:58.780 --> 00:01:00.859 Yeah, on top of that. And yeah, also a dedicated, 00:01:01.039 --> 00:01:03.939 rigorous curator of forgotten photographs, you 00:01:03.939 --> 00:01:06.040 know, with the art world. calls found art. It's 00:01:06.040 --> 00:01:08.459 quite the spectrum, isn't it? From the noise 00:01:08.459 --> 00:01:10.939 of the mosh pit, you could say, straight to the 00:01:10.939 --> 00:01:14.680 quiet focus of the archive. Yeah, that's a great 00:01:14.680 --> 00:01:16.519 way to put it. And what's really fascinating 00:01:16.519 --> 00:01:18.299 here, and this is what we're going to track throughout 00:01:18.299 --> 00:01:22.959 her career, is this single core idea. Synthesis. 00:01:23.040 --> 00:01:25.079 It seems to run through everything. Synthesis? 00:01:25.239 --> 00:01:28.400 How so? Well, think about it. Whether she's pulling 00:01:28.400 --> 00:01:32.019 together hundreds of, you know, often conflicting 00:01:32.019 --> 00:01:35.420 interviews for a history book. or isolating just 00:01:35.420 --> 00:01:38.200 a few stray lines for a poem. Or even saving 00:01:38.200 --> 00:01:40.719 an old snapshot from a flea market. Exactly. 00:01:40.819 --> 00:01:43.840 She's always giving weight, giving value to these 00:01:43.840 --> 00:01:46.459 discarded fragments, things others might overlook. 00:01:46.939 --> 00:01:49.219 So our mission today is really to explore how 00:01:49.219 --> 00:01:52.700 she became this, well, architect of counterculture 00:01:52.700 --> 00:01:55.120 history. And how that unique way of seeing things 00:01:55.120 --> 00:01:58.340 led her to champion this vernacular overlooked 00:01:58.340 --> 00:02:00.659 art. Right. And the benefit for you listening 00:02:00.659 --> 00:02:02.760 in is you get this. really complete intellectual 00:02:02.760 --> 00:02:05.040 toolkit by the end. Yeah, we're covering a lot 00:02:05.040 --> 00:02:08.199 the foundations of the NYC literary scene, the 00:02:08.199 --> 00:02:12.740 origins of modern oral history as a form. The 00:02:12.740 --> 00:02:15.560 specifics of post -beat experimental poetry, 00:02:15.759 --> 00:02:18.469 which is its own... fascinating world and the 00:02:18.469 --> 00:02:21.349 surprisingly deep world of collecting these forgotten 00:02:21.349 --> 00:02:24.129 images you'll definitely walk away with a richer 00:02:24.129 --> 00:02:26.210 sense of what it means to be an archivist of 00:02:26.210 --> 00:02:29.430 the overlooked i think definitely so let's dive 00:02:29.430 --> 00:02:30.990 in we should probably start with the groundwork 00:02:30.990 --> 00:02:34.750 right her academic and literary foundations because 00:02:34.750 --> 00:02:36.550 there may be more traditional than you'd expect 00:02:36.550 --> 00:02:39.530 given where she ended up absolutely so gillian 00:02:39.530 --> 00:02:42.289 mccain her roots are actually in canada bath 00:02:42.759 --> 00:02:45.400 New Brunswick, specifically, which, you know, 00:02:45.419 --> 00:02:47.439 feels a long way from the Bowery in New York 00:02:47.439 --> 00:02:49.719 City. A very long way. Her initial schooling 00:02:49.719 --> 00:02:52.580 gave her a really solid base. She got a Bachelor 00:02:52.580 --> 00:02:54.639 of Arts in Literature from the University of 00:02:54.639 --> 00:02:57.659 King's College in Halifax, Nova Scotia. And that 00:02:57.659 --> 00:03:01.280 strong base, it seems, quickly propelled her 00:03:01.280 --> 00:03:03.759 south. She made that really key move to New York 00:03:03.759 --> 00:03:06.240 City in 1987. Right. And you have to imagine 00:03:06.240 --> 00:03:09.099 New York at that time. What a magnet it was for 00:03:09.099 --> 00:03:12.680 writers, for artists looking for that. That downtown 00:03:12.680 --> 00:03:16.060 energy? Absolutely. And by 1990, she'd already 00:03:16.060 --> 00:03:18.639 secured a Master of Arts in Literature from NYU. 00:03:19.219 --> 00:03:21.599 So you see this mix, right? Canadian discipline, 00:03:21.740 --> 00:03:24.120 maybe, and then this New York academic rigor. 00:03:24.280 --> 00:03:25.979 That's her starting point, intellectually. But, 00:03:26.039 --> 00:03:27.960 okay, something really important happens right 00:03:27.960 --> 00:03:30.300 in the middle of that MA work. In the summer 00:03:30.300 --> 00:03:33.020 of 88, she attends a study program at the Naropa 00:03:33.020 --> 00:03:36.479 Institute. In Boulder, Colorado. Ah, Naropa. 00:03:36.520 --> 00:03:38.819 Yes. For anyone who doesn't know, Naropa is hugely 00:03:38.819 --> 00:03:42.919 significant in American letters. Founded by Chugam 00:03:42.919 --> 00:03:45.979 Trungpa Rinpoche, a Tibetan Buddhist teacher, 00:03:46.120 --> 00:03:48.860 but also poets Allen Ginsberg and Ann Waldman. 00:03:49.069 --> 00:03:51.409 The beat connection. Exactly. That's famous for 00:03:51.409 --> 00:03:53.710 its association with the beats, with developing 00:03:53.710 --> 00:03:56.689 American avant -garde poetry, often really focused 00:03:56.689 --> 00:03:59.069 on, you know, spontaneous writing, non -traditional 00:03:59.069 --> 00:04:01.229 methods. So this exposure seems critical. It 00:04:01.229 --> 00:04:03.509 shows she's absorbing classical literary theory 00:04:03.509 --> 00:04:05.889 at NYU. But at the same time, she's embracing 00:04:05.889 --> 00:04:09.229 this very different, experimental, maybe more 00:04:09.229 --> 00:04:11.870 lived experience kind of poetry at Naropa. It 00:04:11.870 --> 00:04:14.009 really sets the stage, I think, for her whole 00:04:14.009 --> 00:04:17.430 career. Bridging that gap. between maybe the 00:04:17.430 --> 00:04:20.310 highbrow and the lowbrow. She understood structure, 00:04:20.550 --> 00:04:23.850 absolutely, but she also clearly understood the 00:04:23.850 --> 00:04:27.069 power of the unfiltered, immediate voice. And 00:04:27.069 --> 00:04:29.129 that understanding seems to have led her straight 00:04:29.129 --> 00:04:32.069 to, well, what really was the nerve center for 00:04:32.069 --> 00:04:33.910 experimental writing in New York at the time, 00:04:33.910 --> 00:04:36.610 the Poetry Project at St. Mark's Church in the 00:04:36.610 --> 00:04:39.490 Bowery? Right, an amazing institution. located 00:04:39.490 --> 00:04:41.870 inside an active Episcopal church, which is interesting 00:04:41.870 --> 00:04:44.529 in itself. But yeah, it was the absolute nexus 00:04:44.529 --> 00:04:46.750 of the literary underground. And straight after 00:04:46.750 --> 00:04:49.269 graduating, she jumps right in and basically 00:04:49.269 --> 00:04:51.990 starts shaping the conversation there for like 00:04:51.990 --> 00:04:54.310 the next decade. You can see it in the role she 00:04:54.310 --> 00:04:56.430 held. The timeline shows real commitment, not 00:04:56.430 --> 00:04:58.269 just showing up. She was program coordinator 00:04:58.269 --> 00:05:01.290 from 91 to 94. And being program coordinator 00:05:01.290 --> 00:05:03.050 there, I mean, that wasn't just booking readings 00:05:03.050 --> 00:05:07.120 in that downtown scene. That meant managing some 00:05:07.120 --> 00:05:09.680 pretty volatile personalities, probably juggling 00:05:09.680 --> 00:05:12.519 grants, keeping the whole sometimes chaotic thing 00:05:12.519 --> 00:05:14.800 running. Yeah, I can only imagine. And then she 00:05:14.800 --> 00:05:16.740 shifts, becoming editor of the Poetry Project 00:05:16.740 --> 00:05:20.379 newsletter from 94 to 95. See that shift from 00:05:20.379 --> 00:05:23.879 managing people and events to managing and shaping 00:05:23.879 --> 00:05:26.500 the narrative, the actual published record of 00:05:26.500 --> 00:05:28.279 the place. And on top of that, she also edited 00:05:28.279 --> 00:05:30.980 four issues of the literary magazine Milk, which 00:05:30.980 --> 00:05:33.279 was... Pretty influential at the time. So she's 00:05:33.279 --> 00:05:35.620 not just a writer observing. She's mastering 00:05:35.620 --> 00:05:39.079 the craft of literary curation, of editing, right 00:05:39.079 --> 00:05:41.519 there in the thick of it, in real time. If we 00:05:41.519 --> 00:05:43.519 look back at her legacy from that period, though, 00:05:43.620 --> 00:05:45.980 the big one has to be founding the Friday Night 00:05:45.980 --> 00:05:49.540 Series in 1991. Ah, yes, the Friday Night Series. 00:05:49.839 --> 00:05:53.759 What was the specific vibe of that series? Because 00:05:53.759 --> 00:05:55.959 it sounds like it was pretty broad. It was intentionally 00:05:55.959 --> 00:05:59.519 expensive, yeah. Hosted over 400 artists in just 00:05:59.519 --> 00:06:02.180 four years, and it cut across every boundary 00:06:02.180 --> 00:06:04.600 you can think of. Poetry, fiction, nonfiction, 00:06:04.860 --> 00:06:07.360 themed readings, tributes, lectures, performance 00:06:07.360 --> 00:06:11.259 art, even music. 400 artists in four years. Just 00:06:11.259 --> 00:06:13.560 think about the curatorial skill needed for that. 00:06:13.680 --> 00:06:16.300 To program that many diverse people and keep 00:06:16.300 --> 00:06:19.839 it coherent, keep it relevant. especially in 00:06:19.839 --> 00:06:22.860 that notoriously competitive, opinionated downtown 00:06:22.860 --> 00:06:25.639 scene. It really takes serious vision. It became 00:06:25.639 --> 00:06:27.720 this weekly institution that kind of normalized 00:06:27.720 --> 00:06:30.680 mixing disciplines, you know, poetry right alongside 00:06:30.680 --> 00:06:33.680 performance art, fiction next to music. And the 00:06:33.680 --> 00:06:35.850 fact that it's still going today. That really 00:06:35.850 --> 00:06:38.449 says something. It's a testament to how important 00:06:38.449 --> 00:06:41.949 it was, how solid its foundation was in the NYC 00:06:41.949 --> 00:06:44.310 literary infrastructure. Definitely. And that 00:06:44.310 --> 00:06:46.449 ability, you know, to manage all those voices, 00:06:46.449 --> 00:06:49.110 those different art forms, to synthesize that 00:06:49.110 --> 00:06:51.709 chaos into a program people actually wanted to 00:06:51.709 --> 00:06:53.889 come back to week after week. That's the exact 00:06:53.889 --> 00:06:56.430 skill set, isn't it? The transferable skill she'd 00:06:56.430 --> 00:06:58.670 immediately apply to her big nonfiction projects 00:06:58.670 --> 00:07:01.350 later. That period at St. Mark's was her training 00:07:01.350 --> 00:07:03.810 ground for large -scale synthesis. And we also 00:07:03.810 --> 00:07:06.149 see a clear pivot point here. She commits to 00:07:06.149 --> 00:07:08.790 writing full -time starting in 1995. Right. It 00:07:08.790 --> 00:07:11.250 was also clearly a deeply personal space for 00:07:11.250 --> 00:07:13.430 her, too, not just professional. Also. Well, 00:07:13.470 --> 00:07:15.670 she met her future husband, the writer James 00:07:15.670 --> 00:07:17.769 J. Marshall, right there at the Poetry Project. 00:07:18.069 --> 00:07:22.209 They got married in 2002. Ah, okay. So it really 00:07:22.209 --> 00:07:24.290 proves the place was more than just, you know, 00:07:24.290 --> 00:07:26.149 a line on her resume. It was really the crucible 00:07:26.149 --> 00:07:27.850 for her creative life and her personal life, 00:07:27.910 --> 00:07:30.910 too. Exactly. And that pivot to full -time writing 00:07:30.910 --> 00:07:33.589 in 95, armed with all those editorial skills, 00:07:33.829 --> 00:07:36.430 those organizational chops honed at St. Mark's, 00:07:36.449 --> 00:07:38.790 well, that led her straight to the project that 00:07:38.790 --> 00:07:41.370 would pretty much define her public image for 00:07:41.370 --> 00:07:44.610 decades. Okay, yeah. Let's get into it. The book 00:07:44.610 --> 00:07:46.970 that, for so many people, is Gillian of Pain, 00:07:47.149 --> 00:07:50.480 Please Kill Me. The Uncensored Oral History of 00:07:50.480 --> 00:07:55.139 Punk. Grove Press, 1996. Co -written with Legs 00:07:55.139 --> 00:07:57.680 McNeil. This book was, well, it was a landmark. 00:07:57.759 --> 00:08:00.100 Before this, most rock history, especially the 00:08:00.100 --> 00:08:02.180 counterculture stuff, it was often told, you 00:08:02.180 --> 00:08:03.560 know, through journalists writing analytical 00:08:03.560 --> 00:08:05.920 narratives or maybe kind of sanitized biographies. 00:08:05.920 --> 00:08:08.000 Right, someone telling you about the scene. Exactly. 00:08:08.199 --> 00:08:10.579 Please kill me. Yeah. Just codified a totally 00:08:10.579 --> 00:08:12.939 different approach. The Uncensored Oral History. 00:08:13.579 --> 00:08:16.120 The book is structured almost entirely as dialogue. 00:08:16.259 --> 00:08:19.019 It's just chunks taken from hundreds of interviews, 00:08:19.220 --> 00:08:22.500 letting the messy, often contradictory voices 00:08:22.500 --> 00:08:24.680 of the people who are actually there speak for 00:08:24.680 --> 00:08:26.860 themselves. And the subject matter. I mean, it's 00:08:26.860 --> 00:08:29.660 the absolute core of that American counterculture 00:08:29.660 --> 00:08:32.419 explosion. It covers such a crucial period, starting 00:08:32.419 --> 00:08:35.679 with the formative influence of the Velvet Underground. 00:08:35.919 --> 00:08:38.279 That primal force. Yeah. And then charting the 00:08:38.279 --> 00:08:41.379 rise and often the fall of icons through the 00:08:41.379 --> 00:08:45.200 70s. Iggy Pop. the New York Dolls, the Ramones. 00:08:45.580 --> 00:08:47.820 It's volatile, complicated history, but it's 00:08:47.820 --> 00:08:50.700 presented as just raw, unvarnished testimony. 00:08:51.000 --> 00:08:54.000 And the impact was, well, it was immediate, explosive, 00:08:54.200 --> 00:08:56.539 really. It wasn't just a hit book. It very quickly 00:08:56.539 --> 00:08:59.379 became a cult classic. And it basically inspired 00:08:59.379 --> 00:09:02.220 a whole new genre of book. The musical oral history. 00:09:02.480 --> 00:09:05.799 Right. Suddenly, history, especially music history, 00:09:05.940 --> 00:09:08.700 could be told is this kind of collective autobiography. 00:09:09.259 --> 00:09:11.919 You didn't need a narrator stepping in to mediate 00:09:11.919 --> 00:09:14.620 the experience for you. It validated the voices 00:09:14.620 --> 00:09:17.840 from the fringes, you know, elevated their stories 00:09:17.840 --> 00:09:21.379 to actual historical record. The praise was pretty 00:09:21.379 --> 00:09:24.159 definitive, too. Right away, it was named a top 00:09:24.159 --> 00:09:26.620 10 book of the year by both Time Out and the 00:09:26.620 --> 00:09:28.679 Daily News. And look at the language they used. 00:09:28.899 --> 00:09:31.299 Time Out New York said it ranks up there with 00:09:31.299 --> 00:09:33.580 the great rock and roll books of all time. That's 00:09:33.580 --> 00:09:35.799 not faint praise for just a niche music book. 00:09:36.090 --> 00:09:38.850 That's elevating the oral history of Tunk to 00:09:38.850 --> 00:09:41.190 the level of classic cultural literature. And 00:09:41.190 --> 00:09:43.649 its reach was clearly global. It's been translated 00:09:43.649 --> 00:09:46.169 and published in tons of countries. Brazil, China, 00:09:46.509 --> 00:09:49.990 France, Germany, Japan, Russia, Italy, so many 00:09:49.990 --> 00:09:52.370 others. Plus, excerpts ran in Vanity Fair when 00:09:52.370 --> 00:09:54.610 it came out. That signals that even the mainstream 00:09:54.610 --> 00:09:57.490 establishment recognized this history as essential. 00:09:57.769 --> 00:10:00.409 It really became the definitive synthesized account 00:10:00.409 --> 00:10:03.450 of what was, let's face it, a pretty fragmented 00:10:03.450 --> 00:10:05.889 scene. And the energy of it, the raw energy, 00:10:06.110 --> 00:10:07.789 it apparently translated right off the page. 00:10:07.929 --> 00:10:11.950 In 2011, a French director, Mathieu Bauer, took 00:10:11.950 --> 00:10:14.450 the whole text and adapted it into a stage show. 00:10:14.830 --> 00:10:17.470 a punk musical. Wow, a musical based on the oral 00:10:17.470 --> 00:10:19.970 history. Yeah, which was then toured by the Nouveau 00:10:19.970 --> 00:10:22.470 Theatre Montreuil. It just speaks to the, I guess, 00:10:22.570 --> 00:10:25.409 the inherent theatricality and the enduring raw 00:10:25.409 --> 00:10:28.190 power that she and McNeil captured in collecting 00:10:28.190 --> 00:10:30.389 all those interviews. Now here's where we really 00:10:30.389 --> 00:10:33.730 see McCain's core philosophy, that idea of synthesis, 00:10:34.049 --> 00:10:36.830 demonstrated again, but with a massive thematic 00:10:36.830 --> 00:10:39.909 shift. Her next major collaboration with Legs 00:10:39.909 --> 00:10:43.860 McNeil in 2014 was Dear Nobody. The True Diary 00:10:43.860 --> 00:10:46.220 of Mary Rose. Right. This one maintains that 00:10:46.220 --> 00:10:48.259 commitment to the uncensored voice, that raw 00:10:48.259 --> 00:10:52.039 truth. But it pivots completely away from famous 00:10:52.039 --> 00:10:54.860 rock stars to someone completely anonymous and 00:10:54.860 --> 00:10:57.100 tragically so. It seems like a huge leap, doesn't 00:10:57.100 --> 00:10:59.879 it? From celebrated documented rock royalty to 00:10:59.879 --> 00:11:02.659 an unknown teenager's private struggles. Was 00:11:02.659 --> 00:11:05.019 that seen as a gamble? Commercially? Critically? 00:11:05.080 --> 00:11:07.799 Was there any pushback about potentially exploiting 00:11:07.799 --> 00:11:10.009 a painful personal story? That's a really important 00:11:10.009 --> 00:11:12.309 question. And from what our sources suggest, 00:11:12.529 --> 00:11:15.809 the reception was largely positive. And I think 00:11:15.809 --> 00:11:17.730 it's because the editorial philosophy stayed 00:11:17.730 --> 00:11:21.029 consistent. Okay. How so? Just like Please Kill 00:11:21.029 --> 00:11:23.690 Me compiled all those different, sometimes conflicting 00:11:23.690 --> 00:11:26.009 accounts from punk rockers to try and find the 00:11:26.009 --> 00:11:30.159 truth of the scene. Dear Dendy. Nobody compiles 00:11:30.159 --> 00:11:32.720 and edits the actual journal entries of one specific 00:11:32.720 --> 00:11:35.799 person. A 17 -year -old Pennsylvania teenager 00:11:35.799 --> 00:11:38.539 named Mary Rose. Detailing her struggles with 00:11:38.539 --> 00:11:42.259 addiction, alcoholism, and also cystic fibrosis, 00:11:42.259 --> 00:11:45.019 right? Exactly. So the goal is the same in a 00:11:45.019 --> 00:11:48.000 way. Present an unmediated raw truth. Let the 00:11:48.000 --> 00:11:50.059 voice speak for itself. So the common thread 00:11:50.059 --> 00:11:53.179 isn't fame, it's... It's documenting these marginalized 00:11:53.179 --> 00:11:55.340 voices, voices kind of fighting against the void, 00:11:55.460 --> 00:11:56.840 whether they're doing it with electric guitars 00:11:56.840 --> 00:11:59.620 or, you know, a pen and a diary. I think that's 00:11:59.620 --> 00:12:02.379 it precisely. Publishers Weekly called it a rare, 00:12:02.519 --> 00:12:04.820 no holds barred documentation of an American 00:12:04.820 --> 00:12:07.360 teenager's life written for no audience but herself. 00:12:07.639 --> 00:12:10.590 Written for no audience but herself. That phrase 00:12:10.590 --> 00:12:12.490 really elevates it, doesn't it? It makes it the 00:12:12.490 --> 00:12:15.309 ultimate found historical document. Something 00:12:15.309 --> 00:12:17.870 never intended for public eyes, but revealing 00:12:17.870 --> 00:12:20.490 this searing truth about, well, contemporary 00:12:20.490 --> 00:12:23.309 American life for some people. It was also specifically 00:12:23.309 --> 00:12:25.870 praised, and this is interesting, as being the 00:12:25.870 --> 00:12:29.269 true version of that famous 1971 novel, Go Ask 00:12:29.269 --> 00:12:32.210 Alice. Ah, right. Which was presented as a real 00:12:32.210 --> 00:12:34.730 diary. But later revealed to be fiction. Exactly. 00:12:35.029 --> 00:12:37.929 So Dear Nobody, in a sense, gave an authentic 00:12:37.929 --> 00:12:40.470 voice to a type of tragedy that had previously 00:12:40.470 --> 00:12:43.070 been fictionalized. It restored that commitment 00:12:43.070 --> 00:12:46.309 to reality, to the actual found document. And 00:12:46.309 --> 00:12:48.029 the way people talked about the book seems to 00:12:48.029 --> 00:12:50.929 confirm its cultural weight. The diarist Mary 00:12:50.929 --> 00:12:54.889 Rose was famously described on WNYC -FM, I think 00:12:54.889 --> 00:12:56.549 it was during an interview with McCain and Mary 00:12:56.549 --> 00:12:59.450 Rose's mother back in 2014, as the Jane Austen 00:12:59.450 --> 00:13:02.350 of juvenile delinquents. Wow. The Jane Austen 00:13:02.350 --> 00:13:04.370 of juvenile delinquents. That's quite a phrase. 00:13:04.570 --> 00:13:07.549 It really is. It elevates this raw, painful, 00:13:07.690 --> 00:13:11.629 private testimony. It recognizes that the emotional 00:13:11.629 --> 00:13:14.529 depth, the observational detail found in these 00:13:14.529 --> 00:13:17.490 private fragments is profound enough to stand 00:13:17.490 --> 00:13:19.929 alongside great literature. Okay, so we have 00:13:19.929 --> 00:13:22.929 her curating hundreds of public voices into a 00:13:22.929 --> 00:13:25.789 historical narrative, Please Kill Me, then curating 00:13:25.789 --> 00:13:28.629 one private voice into this powerful literary 00:13:28.629 --> 00:13:32.259 document, Dear Nobody. Now we need to pivot again, 00:13:32.399 --> 00:13:34.700 because at the same time, she's focusing on an 00:13:34.700 --> 00:13:38.080 even smaller unit of language, the poetic line 00:13:38.080 --> 00:13:40.039 in her own poetry. Right. It's amazing, isn't 00:13:40.039 --> 00:13:42.580 it? While managing these huge nonfiction projects, 00:13:42.820 --> 00:13:45.259 she's also rigorously developing her own poetic 00:13:45.259 --> 00:13:47.580 voice. She started out apparently interested 00:13:47.580 --> 00:13:49.840 in free verse. Pretty standard. And then? But 00:13:49.840 --> 00:13:51.820 then her studies with the poet Larry Fagan, who 00:13:51.820 --> 00:13:54.340 was a significant figure himself, influenced 00:13:54.340 --> 00:13:57.639 her to pivot towards the very specific structure 00:13:57.639 --> 00:13:59.700 of prose poetry. We should probably pause there 00:13:59.700 --> 00:14:01.360 for a second just to clarify what prose poetry 00:14:01.360 --> 00:14:03.419 actually means for listeners who might not be 00:14:03.419 --> 00:14:05.279 familiar. It's not just, you know, poetry printed 00:14:05.279 --> 00:14:08.460 like a paragraph. Oh, absolutely not. No. Prose 00:14:08.460 --> 00:14:13.340 poetry is a really specific hybrid form. It rejects 00:14:13.340 --> 00:14:15.379 the traditional line breaks, the sort of rhythmic 00:14:15.379 --> 00:14:18.659 scaffolding of verse, but it tries to keep the 00:14:18.659 --> 00:14:20.860 density, the compression, the heightened imagery 00:14:20.860 --> 00:14:24.200 of poetry. So it looks like prose on the page. 00:14:24.559 --> 00:14:26.960 Right. But it feels like poetry when you read 00:14:26.960 --> 00:14:31.090 it. It aims to blend that maybe musical quality 00:14:31.090 --> 00:14:34.289 of poetry with the visual flow of prose. Often 00:14:34.289 --> 00:14:37.169 it's quite fragmented, maybe diaristic, focused 00:14:37.169 --> 00:14:39.610 on intense moments rather than, you know, big 00:14:39.610 --> 00:14:42.919 narrative arcs. So her first book of poetry in 00:14:42.919 --> 00:14:46.519 this style, Tilt, comes out in 1996, which is 00:14:46.519 --> 00:14:48.860 the exact same year that Please Kill Me drops. 00:14:49.000 --> 00:14:51.840 Incredible bandwidth, right. Managing two massive, 00:14:51.919 --> 00:14:53.899 structurally demanding projects at the exact 00:14:53.899 --> 00:14:56.720 same time. One collecting external voices, the 00:14:56.720 --> 00:14:58.990 other crafting her own. And Tilt, you said, is 00:14:58.990 --> 00:15:00.990 deeply connected to the New York School of Poetry 00:15:00.990 --> 00:15:03.370 Aesthetic. Very much so, yeah. To really get 00:15:03.370 --> 00:15:05.169 the analysis of her work, we need to quickly 00:15:05.169 --> 00:15:07.049 touch on what defined that movement. You know, 00:15:07.090 --> 00:15:09.230 the figures like Frank O 'Hara, John Ashbery. 00:15:09.470 --> 00:15:11.529 Okay, so what are the key characteristics of 00:15:11.529 --> 00:15:13.210 the New York School? Well, broadly speaking, 00:15:13.389 --> 00:15:17.210 it's known for its urbanity. It's kind of anti 00:15:17.210 --> 00:15:20.269 -academic stance sometimes, and especially its 00:15:20.269 --> 00:15:23.820 focus on the immediate, often mundane. details 00:15:23.820 --> 00:15:26.519 of daily life. Like diary entries almost. Sort 00:15:26.519 --> 00:15:29.100 of, yeah. Diaristic observations, spontaneous 00:15:29.100 --> 00:15:32.200 images popping up, a rejection of the big formal 00:15:32.200 --> 00:15:34.379 themes that maybe earlier poetic schools liked. 00:15:34.539 --> 00:15:37.940 And McCain's work fits right in. Tilt is described 00:15:37.940 --> 00:15:41.059 as reflecting the day -to -day chaos and intensity 00:15:41.059 --> 00:15:44.539 of New York life. And noted for its chatty, detached 00:15:44.539 --> 00:15:47.240 style. Exactly, that immediate observational 00:15:47.240 --> 00:15:50.259 style. It perfectly mirrors the kind of fragmented 00:15:50.259 --> 00:15:52.919 snapshot quality we see later in her visual art 00:15:52.919 --> 00:15:54.960 curation. And here's where it gets really interesting 00:15:54.960 --> 00:15:57.659 conceptually, I think. Because the critical praise 00:15:57.659 --> 00:16:00.299 for Tilt, it almost creates this bridge linking 00:16:00.299 --> 00:16:02.620 her poetry to her later work with found photos. 00:16:02.840 --> 00:16:04.889 How so? Well, the poet John Ashbery himself, 00:16:05.190 --> 00:16:07.090 you know, one of the giants of the New York school, 00:16:07.250 --> 00:16:09.529 he gave this amazing quote about Tilt. He said, 00:16:09.570 --> 00:16:11.990 McCain's poems are like urgent telegrams from 00:16:11.990 --> 00:16:14.269 the next door or oddly but brilliantly cropped 00:16:14.269 --> 00:16:16.929 snapshots of a life that is going by. Brilliantly 00:16:16.929 --> 00:16:20.470 cropped snapshots. Let's just hold on to that 00:16:20.470 --> 00:16:22.529 phrase for a second, because that feels like 00:16:22.529 --> 00:16:24.570 the conceptual key, doesn't it? It really was. 00:16:25.029 --> 00:16:28.129 Ashbery saw right back then that the way she 00:16:28.129 --> 00:16:30.639 presented these language fragments. isolated, 00:16:30.659 --> 00:16:33.399 framed moments. It was basically a form of visual 00:16:33.399 --> 00:16:35.779 curation. The meaning was in the editing and 00:16:35.779 --> 00:16:38.100 the framing, just like a curator deciding which 00:16:38.100 --> 00:16:40.600 photo to hang on a wall. The small piece, the 00:16:40.600 --> 00:16:42.480 isolated fragment, whether it's a line of text 00:16:42.480 --> 00:16:44.639 or a moment caught on film, it contains the whole 00:16:44.639 --> 00:16:47.519 story. Exactly. And the praise for this style 00:16:47.519 --> 00:16:49.840 was high. Harry Matthews, another respective 00:16:49.840 --> 00:16:52.899 author and poet, called Tilt, a brilliant collection 00:16:52.899 --> 00:16:55.840 of prose poems. She followed that up with a second 00:16:55.840 --> 00:16:59.240 collection, Religion, in 1999. Right. And the 00:16:59.240 --> 00:17:01.480 poet Mark Wallace, reviewing it in the Poetry 00:17:01.480 --> 00:17:04.380 Project newsletter, he really nailed her technique, 00:17:04.519 --> 00:17:06.519 I think. Yeah. Especially highlighting that critical 00:17:06.519 --> 00:17:09.019 distance she maintains. What did he say? He noted 00:17:09.019 --> 00:17:12.119 her work has that characteristic, I did this, 00:17:12.160 --> 00:17:15.140 then I did that New York school immediacy, you 00:17:15.140 --> 00:17:17.839 know, that fast observational present tense kind 00:17:17.839 --> 00:17:21.480 of flow. He says she undermines it with ironic 00:17:21.480 --> 00:17:24.799 distance that collapses any naive faith in the 00:17:24.799 --> 00:17:28.059 immediate as a source of value. That ironic distance 00:17:28.059 --> 00:17:30.660 that feels key to her being such a good editor 00:17:30.660 --> 00:17:32.859 and archivist, too, doesn't it? Whether she's 00:17:32.859 --> 00:17:34.779 editing hundreds of interviews for Please Kill 00:17:34.779 --> 00:17:37.279 Me or compiling her own observations in a poem, 00:17:37.380 --> 00:17:39.799 she pulls back slightly. Right. She lets the 00:17:39.799 --> 00:17:42.420 fragment speak for itself. She doesn't over explain 00:17:42.420 --> 00:17:45.269 or over sentimentalize the material. It's kind 00:17:45.269 --> 00:17:47.890 of the opposite of self -indulgence in a way. 00:17:47.970 --> 00:17:50.430 And her actual process for writing poetry, it 00:17:50.430 --> 00:17:54.089 reinforces this whole idea of finding and curating 00:17:54.089 --> 00:17:56.769 fragments. She famously calls writing poetry 00:17:56.769 --> 00:17:59.230 treasure hunting. Treasure hunting. I like that. 00:17:59.329 --> 00:18:01.910 Yeah. Her method involves actively grabbing lines 00:18:01.910 --> 00:18:04.890 from outside sources, like conversations she 00:18:04.890 --> 00:18:06.930 overhears on the street, random lines pulled 00:18:06.930 --> 00:18:09.569 out of books, magazines, newspapers. So she's 00:18:09.569 --> 00:18:11.990 literally collecting the discarded language of 00:18:11.990 --> 00:18:14.859 the world around her. giving these verbal castoffs 00:18:14.859 --> 00:18:18.460 new value, new context within her poems. Exactly. 00:18:18.460 --> 00:18:21.299 She's treating language itself like it's a found 00:18:21.299 --> 00:18:23.839 object, which is fascinating because it means 00:18:23.839 --> 00:18:26.359 her poetry isn't solely about like internal emotional 00:18:26.359 --> 00:18:29.599 expression. It's much more about external observation 00:18:29.599 --> 00:18:32.440 and assembly. Putting things together. Precisely. 00:18:32.440 --> 00:18:34.460 And the Encyclopedia of the New York School Poets 00:18:34.460 --> 00:18:36.980 actually synthesized the bigger meaning of this 00:18:36.980 --> 00:18:39.579 method really well. It said her prose manages 00:18:39.579 --> 00:18:43.500 to be both playful and deadly serious in its 00:18:43.500 --> 00:18:46.859 criticism of its form. Okay. Criticism of form. 00:18:46.960 --> 00:18:49.400 The forms of contemporary society and the forms 00:18:49.400 --> 00:18:52.259 of opposition to society. So she's using this 00:18:52.259 --> 00:18:54.319 prose poem structure, this highly fragmented 00:18:54.319 --> 00:18:58.160 found object way of writing to implicitly critique 00:18:58.160 --> 00:19:00.880 the more organized formal structures of society 00:19:00.880 --> 00:19:03.339 itself. It's quite sophisticated. And this focus 00:19:03.339 --> 00:19:05.920 on shared voice, on fragmented experience, it 00:19:05.920 --> 00:19:07.880 carries on into her later work, too, right? Like 00:19:07.880 --> 00:19:10.000 that collaboration Descent of the Dolls, part 00:19:10.000 --> 00:19:12.920 one in 2017, which she wrote with Jeffrey Conway 00:19:12.920 --> 00:19:15.559 and David Trinidad. Right. The very fact that 00:19:15.559 --> 00:19:18.240 it's collaborative reinforces that idea that 00:19:18.240 --> 00:19:21.009 the strongest voice for her, perhaps. is often 00:19:21.009 --> 00:19:23.410 a synthesized one, a collective one, not just 00:19:23.410 --> 00:19:26.190 a single authorial voice. Okay, so we've tracked 00:19:26.190 --> 00:19:28.490 her journey from coordinating the New York scene 00:19:28.490 --> 00:19:31.509 to being this major punk historian synthesizing 00:19:31.509 --> 00:19:34.970 hundreds of voices to being a prose poet collecting 00:19:34.970 --> 00:19:37.789 found language. Now we shift to the third major 00:19:37.789 --> 00:19:39.930 part of her work, which is maybe the most visual, 00:19:40.009 --> 00:19:42.849 the most tangible. Her collection and curation 00:19:42.849 --> 00:19:45.569 of physical fragments found photography. Yes, 00:19:45.569 --> 00:19:47.529 and this is where all those conceptual threads 00:19:47.529 --> 00:19:49.430 we've been pulling really come together visually. 00:19:49.710 --> 00:19:53.109 She specializes in found photographs. Let's just 00:19:53.109 --> 00:19:55.470 define that concept clearly. Found photographs 00:19:55.470 --> 00:19:58.589 are basically vernacular images, everyday pictures 00:19:58.589 --> 00:20:01.549 that have been, well, forgotten, discarded, orphaned, 00:20:01.549 --> 00:20:04.720 lost, stolen. maybe bought at flea markets or 00:20:04.720 --> 00:20:07.539 estate sales. There are snapshots that were once 00:20:07.539 --> 00:20:10.160 incredibly meaningful to a specific person or 00:20:10.160 --> 00:20:12.279 family, right? But now they're just artifacts 00:20:12.279 --> 00:20:14.599 floating free of their original context. It really 00:20:14.599 --> 00:20:16.660 is the visual equivalent of her grabbing an overheard 00:20:16.660 --> 00:20:19.400 line for a poem, isn't it? Or using a raw anecdote 00:20:19.400 --> 00:20:21.759 in the punk history. These are the spontaneous, 00:20:22.039 --> 00:20:24.980 unmediated expressions of everyday life, usually 00:20:24.980 --> 00:20:27.519 without any high art pretensions. Exactly. They 00:20:27.519 --> 00:20:30.339 capture real moments. Awfully accidentally beautiful 00:20:30.339 --> 00:20:34.259 or maybe just strange in a way that maybe a professional 00:20:34.259 --> 00:20:37.220 photographer aiming for perfection might miss. 00:20:37.420 --> 00:20:39.980 And her dedication to these orphaned images led 00:20:39.980 --> 00:20:42.980 to a major exhibition and a book both called 00:20:42.980 --> 00:20:47.319 H .L .P .M .E. back in 2010. She co -curated 00:20:47.319 --> 00:20:49.819 this show, selecting photos from her own collection 00:20:49.819 --> 00:20:52.680 with the artist Megan Kump. When it was exhibited 00:20:52.680 --> 00:20:54.759 at the Gallery of the Camera Club of New York. 00:20:55.079 --> 00:20:57.220 Her collection itself is incredibly broad in 00:20:57.220 --> 00:20:59.799 terms of format, which really shows her archival 00:20:59.799 --> 00:21:03.000 passion. It includes things like early tin types. 00:21:03.140 --> 00:21:05.660 Wow, really early stuff. Yeah, and formal cabinet 00:21:05.660 --> 00:21:07.559 cards from the 19th century, right up through 00:21:07.559 --> 00:21:09.680 instant Polaroids and more modern snapshots. 00:21:09.779 --> 00:21:11.880 She's not just collecting pictures. She's collecting 00:21:11.880 --> 00:21:14.119 the physical history of everyday photography 00:21:14.119 --> 00:21:16.599 itself, making sure these forgotten moments get 00:21:16.599 --> 00:21:19.559 preserved. And this artistic effort got validated 00:21:19.559 --> 00:21:22.099 pretty quickly. Vince Aletti, who's a very respected 00:21:22.099 --> 00:21:24.700 photography critic for The New Yorker, he reviewed 00:21:24.700 --> 00:21:28.140 the show and called it exhilarating. Exhilarating. 00:21:28.140 --> 00:21:30.779 That's strong praise. It really validates the 00:21:30.779 --> 00:21:33.940 idea that these anonymous, discarded, often accidental 00:21:33.940 --> 00:21:36.660 images, they can be elevated to high artistic 00:21:36.660 --> 00:21:39.619 merit, but it takes that thoughtful curatorial 00:21:39.619 --> 00:21:43.650 eye. Letty's specific comments are really telling, 00:21:43.690 --> 00:21:45.650 too, because they highlight the kind of bizarre 00:21:45.650 --> 00:21:48.349 reality that vernacular photos often capture. 00:21:48.890 --> 00:21:51.809 He noted that images of rifles, costumes, and 00:21:51.809 --> 00:21:54.789 injuries crop up repeatedly. Rifles, costumes, 00:21:54.990 --> 00:21:58.069 and injuries. That's the uncensored life again, 00:21:58.150 --> 00:22:00.529 isn't it? The inherent weirdness of everyday 00:22:00.529 --> 00:22:03.309 American life caught outside of the usual posed 00:22:03.309 --> 00:22:05.990 family portraits. Right. And Aleti concluded 00:22:05.990 --> 00:22:09.049 that there was no real theme, only plenty of 00:22:09.049 --> 00:22:11.369 diverting quirkiness and inspiration. And that 00:22:11.369 --> 00:22:13.829 idea that the randomness is the theme that feels 00:22:13.829 --> 00:22:16.369 essential to her whole project. It forces you, 00:22:16.490 --> 00:22:18.390 the viewer, to kind of construct your... own 00:22:18.390 --> 00:22:20.430 meaning your own narrative from the fragments 00:22:20.430 --> 00:22:22.730 she provides just like reading please kill me 00:22:22.730 --> 00:22:25.029 where you have to synthesize the history from 00:22:25.029 --> 00:22:27.670 all those conflicting voices it becomes a shared 00:22:27.670 --> 00:22:29.710 act of creation between the curator and the audience 00:22:29.710 --> 00:22:32.309 exactly and the international appeal of her collection 00:22:32.309 --> 00:22:34.470 was highlighted too it was featured in the december 00:22:34.470 --> 00:22:38.369 2010 issue of the big french magazine photo so 00:22:38.369 --> 00:22:41.710 the appeal of these universal yet totally anonymous 00:22:41.710 --> 00:22:46.359 moments Clearly crosses borders. Also in 2010, 00:22:46.460 --> 00:22:48.480 she published another collaboration focused on 00:22:48.480 --> 00:22:51.380 found images. But this one added a really interesting 00:22:51.380 --> 00:22:54.539 digital, almost collective element. 50 photos 00:22:54.539 --> 00:22:57.680 found by Fang with text by the hound. Ah, yes. 00:22:57.740 --> 00:23:00.039 This project is great because it merges her literary 00:23:00.039 --> 00:23:03.099 side, her curatorial side, and her personal life 00:23:03.099 --> 00:23:06.059 so beautifully. Fang is the nickname, the sobriquet, 00:23:06.240 --> 00:23:08.359 for McCain herself, the finder, the collector. 00:23:08.539 --> 00:23:10.539 And the hound. That's her husband, James Marshall. 00:23:10.859 --> 00:23:12.839 he provided the text descriptions for the photos 00:23:12.839 --> 00:23:14.940 okay so the structure here sounds pretty complex 00:23:14.940 --> 00:23:17.740 very interactive especially for 2010 reflecting 00:23:17.740 --> 00:23:20.579 how media was changing it's her found photos 00:23:20.579 --> 00:23:23.539 paired with descriptions by marshall and crucially 00:23:23.539 --> 00:23:25.920 also paired with commentary from readers of his 00:23:25.920 --> 00:23:28.200 popular music website because the photos were 00:23:28.200 --> 00:23:30.660 initially posted online there Ah, so it's not 00:23:30.660 --> 00:23:32.700 just found art, it's collectively interpreted 00:23:32.700 --> 00:23:36.720 art by this anonymous digital community. That 00:23:36.720 --> 00:23:39.339 really is the ultimate exercise in synthesizing 00:23:39.339 --> 00:23:42.160 fragmented visuals and fragmented digital voices. 00:23:42.400 --> 00:23:44.440 Totally. And to get a feel for the sheer compelling 00:23:44.440 --> 00:23:46.920 strangeness of the content, there's a great quote 00:23:46.920 --> 00:23:49.420 from Joe Bonomo's blog, No Such Thing As Was. 00:23:49.619 --> 00:23:51.779 What did he say? He described the book as this 00:23:51.779 --> 00:23:55.759 incredible collage of life. He wrote, In 50 photos 00:23:55.759 --> 00:23:58.400 found, there's young love, old love, doubtful 00:23:58.400 --> 00:24:02.140 love, drinking, hamming, military life, beach 00:24:02.140 --> 00:24:04.819 bums, and barflies. Okay, a real slice of life. 00:24:05.019 --> 00:24:07.680 Nudie posters on the wall, maybe pimps, parties, 00:24:07.980 --> 00:24:10.500 teenagers, bedrooms, and basements. A generous 00:24:10.500 --> 00:24:12.900 slice of living enacted by mysterious strangers 00:24:12.900 --> 00:24:15.740 caught in perpetuity doing strange things, or 00:24:15.740 --> 00:24:17.660 things so ordinary that they become strange. 00:24:17.900 --> 00:24:19.740 Things so ordinary that they become strange. 00:24:19.799 --> 00:24:22.259 That line just perfectly encapulates the whole 00:24:22.259 --> 00:24:24.240 aesthetic, doesn't it? The goal of looking at... 00:24:24.329 --> 00:24:26.549 vernacular art? It really does. It's about pulling 00:24:26.549 --> 00:24:29.410 significance out of the mundane, capturing those 00:24:29.410 --> 00:24:32.650 fleeting moments that, as Bonomo says, blink 00:24:32.650 --> 00:24:34.730 and you'd miss it. It's the visual equivalent 00:24:34.730 --> 00:24:36.869 of her collecting that overheard conversation 00:24:36.869 --> 00:24:40.089 for a poem. It's really an exercise in deep attention. 00:24:40.430 --> 00:24:42.329 And her collection has kept drawing attention 00:24:42.329 --> 00:24:45.569 from both literary and art worlds, sort of cementing 00:24:45.569 --> 00:24:48.369 her role as a key archivist of this kind of material. 00:24:48.730 --> 00:24:50.769 Yeah, it was featured in Lid Magazine in 2012 00:24:50.769 --> 00:24:53.930 in a section called Sleepwalking. photographs 00:24:53.930 --> 00:24:56.509 from the collection of Gillian McCain, and images 00:24:56.509 --> 00:24:58.390 were also featured in the Columbia Poetry Review 00:24:58.390 --> 00:25:01.809 in 2014. Her curation, her act of selecting and 00:25:01.809 --> 00:25:04.490 presenting these images, is consistently recognized 00:25:04.490 --> 00:25:06.829 as being almost a form of literature itself. 00:25:07.190 --> 00:25:09.589 So, okay, if we step back now and look at the 00:25:09.589 --> 00:25:12.369 whole arc of this incredible career, what's the 00:25:12.369 --> 00:25:14.829 big unifying idea? We started with, you know, 00:25:14.849 --> 00:25:17.890 punk rock chaos and academic rigor, and we ended 00:25:17.890 --> 00:25:20.369 up looking at anonymous family photos and overheard 00:25:20.369 --> 00:25:23.220 snippets of dialogue. I think the unity is absolutely 00:25:23.220 --> 00:25:26.339 in the methodology. This whole deep dive into 00:25:26.339 --> 00:25:28.920 Gillian McCain's work, it reviews this powerful 00:25:28.920 --> 00:25:32.299 lifelong practice of collection, editing and 00:25:32.299 --> 00:25:35.559 synthesis. And maybe most importantly, giving 00:25:35.559 --> 00:25:38.720 enduring value to things that other people might 00:25:38.720 --> 00:25:41.200 have deemed abandoned or maybe even worthless. 00:25:41.279 --> 00:25:44.240 Right. She collected. hundreds of competing stories 00:25:44.240 --> 00:25:46.839 for Please Kill Me. She collected these disparate 00:25:46.839 --> 00:25:49.279 bits of language for her poems, and she collected 00:25:49.279 --> 00:25:51.500 these visual fragments, these orphaned photos 00:25:51.500 --> 00:25:54.200 for her exhibitions. She consistently acts as 00:25:54.200 --> 00:25:57.410 this archivist of the overlooked. She gives weight 00:25:57.410 --> 00:25:59.869 and significance to fragments, to previously 00:25:59.869 --> 00:26:02.690 discarded voices or artifacts, whether that's 00:26:02.690 --> 00:26:05.269 a punk rocker's crude anecdote about some filthy 00:26:05.269 --> 00:26:07.390 hotel. Or a struggling teenager's incredibly 00:26:07.390 --> 00:26:09.690 painful diary entry about addiction. Or just 00:26:09.690 --> 00:26:12.269 a blurry, forgotten Polaroid snapshot found at 00:26:12.269 --> 00:26:14.609 a flea market. She sees the value in all of it. 00:26:14.779 --> 00:26:16.940 So the big takeaway here for you, the listener, 00:26:17.099 --> 00:26:19.759 is maybe that her work teaches us something important. 00:26:19.940 --> 00:26:21.920 That the greatest insights, whether you're trying 00:26:21.920 --> 00:26:24.200 to write history or poetry or even just understand 00:26:24.200 --> 00:26:26.740 art, they're often found not in the big, grand 00:26:26.740 --> 00:26:29.420 narratives. But in the seemingly random stuff, 00:26:29.640 --> 00:26:31.799 the overlooked things, the things that, like 00:26:31.799 --> 00:26:34.519 Bonomo said, blink and you'd miss them, it takes 00:26:34.519 --> 00:26:36.640 a certain kind of editorial eye, I think, to 00:26:36.640 --> 00:26:39.480 be able to spot the truth hidden in the wreckage, 00:26:39.539 --> 00:26:41.930 so to speak. And that leads us perfectly into 00:26:41.930 --> 00:26:44.289 our final provocative thought for you to chew 00:26:44.289 --> 00:26:46.990 on. Given her deep commitment to capturing the 00:26:46.990 --> 00:26:50.730 raw, the uncensored voice that fragmented maybe 00:26:50.730 --> 00:26:53.509 accidental truth of a moment, we have to think 00:26:53.509 --> 00:26:56.390 about how her method applies now. Right. We live 00:26:56.390 --> 00:26:59.670 in an age of just unprecedented digital debris, 00:26:59.809 --> 00:27:02.279 don't we? Billions of forgotten social media 00:27:02.279 --> 00:27:05.880 posts, blurry phone pics, abandoned digital diaries. 00:27:06.079 --> 00:27:09.640 So what new forms of found art are being created 00:27:09.640 --> 00:27:11.900 and maybe instantly discarded every single day 00:27:11.900 --> 00:27:14.319 in the digital realm? And how will future curators, 00:27:14.339 --> 00:27:16.740 future archivists, applying McCain's kind of 00:27:16.740 --> 00:27:19.799 ethos of synthesis and preservation, how will 00:27:19.799 --> 00:27:21.859 they ever manage to sift through that absolutely 00:27:21.859 --> 00:27:24.680 endless stream of digital fragments to find the 00:27:24.680 --> 00:27:26.819 pieces that have enduring power and meaning? 00:27:27.079 --> 00:27:29.640 That's a huge question. And maybe answering that 00:27:29.640 --> 00:27:31.339 and perhaps... seeking out your own overlooked 00:27:31.339 --> 00:27:33.519 fragments in the world around you is your task 00:27:33.519 --> 00:27:35.759 until the next deep dive. Thanks for joining 00:27:35.759 --> 00:27:39.460 us as we explored the incredible, really multifaceted 00:27:39.460 --> 00:27:40.759 career of Gillian McCain.