2022: Year in Review

It’s been an odd year… I’ve spent most of it doing the following: settling into a new city, Newcastle Upon Tyne; finishing my second book, Narcissus in Bloom; starting my PhD; and having a breakdown.

When I think about time spent blogging, I feel like I’ve actually neglected this space a lot this year. That has perhaps only been true the last few months, from late summer onwards. And it was certainly strange to use this space so sparingly. My life has revolved around it for around five years. And then suddenly, it didn’t.

Or maybe it is more accurate to say that I’ve simply used the blog differently this year — more diaristically, perhaps. As I look back over everything posted this year, the suggestion I’ve used the blog less than previous years certainly feels like an illusion. I’ve written about as much as I have any other year, albeit perhaps not on such a wide array of topics. It has most served a more explicitly therapeutic purpose than ever before.

But I think a lot of what has come out of this changed relation has been interesting. It remains so to me, at least. In fact, I’m oddly proud of what I did write this year. I moved into new territory and onto new topics and spent plenty of time feeling inspired as a result. I only wish I didn’t have to have a breakdown to appreciate the breakthroughs.

Outside of the blog, I think the most significant thing published this year was my introduction to the reissue of Mark Fisher’s Ghosts of my Life, which I’m also very proud of, as it’s not often I get to really flex my cybrarian muscles these days, sketching out the development of a given concept or idea (in this instance, “hauntology”) through a URL rabbit hole.

The last few months have also given me time to travel. Trips to London, Kraków and Málaga have been hugely inspiring in terms of building international solidarity post-Covid and reconnecting with a broader community of people who all share similar interests. (Something I do not take for granted, as the blogging life can be quite solitary.) I’m hoping there’ll be more opportunities to talk with people in the flesh in 2023.

But until then, as is tradition, here are all of the posts I’ve written this year, sorted into loose categories. Apologies that one category definitely takes precedence over all the others… But that’s just how this year has gone…

There’s a bunch of Mark Fisher-related stuff, as ever; a few posts on more general topics or current events, and also a few podcast / radio appearances. Seeing it all together, it looks like quite a lot… Weird to feel like I’ve distinctly slowed down… Time and productivity have lost all meaning, it seems.

Here’s hoping 2023 isn’t an utter crap shoot, for all of us.

Mark Fisher

Five Years [13/01/2022]
Disintensification-by-Canonisation: Thoughts on the Fisher-Function [20/01/2022]
For K-Punk 2022: Robin Mackay’s ‘By The North Sea’ [21/01/2022]
For K-Punk 2022 // By The North Sea [28/01/2022]
Jornada de Vigilia por Mark Fisher [15/02/2022]
“Maintaining Now the Spectres of Mark.” [20/02/2022]
Caja Negra’s Mark Fisher Vigil [23/02/2022]
Egress Review: “Un lenguaje común” by Óscar Brox [08/03/2022]
Notes on Capitalist Surrealism [17/03/2022]
Mark Fisher in Translation: Transnational Communities of Capitalist Realism [07/04/2022]
Mark Fisher’s Ghosts of my Life: Zer0 Classics Edition [08/05/2022]
Mark Fisher in Translation — Video Now Online [09/06/2022]
Desiderio Postcapitalista. Le Ultime Lezioni. [03/07/2022]
ポスト資本主義の欲望 — Japanese Translation of Postcapitalist Desire [18/07/2022]
Rob Doyle on Ghosts of My Life [26/07/2022]
Storm Crow [01/08/2022]
Mental Health is (Still) a Political Issue: On Mark Fisher’s Lost Futures at the Moth Club [10/08/2022]
For K-Punk: Ghosts of My Life [12/09/2022]
For K-Punk: Ghosts of My Life — Full Lineup Announcement [04/10/2022]
Resurfacing, Resisting: Capitalist Realism in 2022 [05/10/2022]
For K-Punk: Ghosts of My Life — Photos and Audio [24/10/2022]