Found at Burning Man decompression party, New York, 11/2002:

 

 

Excerpts from the ULA message board.

While it lasted, the Underground Literary Alliance web site forum was a great source of argument and entertainment for all involved. Before it was dismantled some messages were saved in zines and elsewhere. What follows are a few exchanges saved before the plug was pulled on things:

Emerson Dameron on 10/7/102 0:03 AM said [in response to what I can't remember]:

...And it got me noticed by the legendary Ann Sterzinger, so I suppose the two minutes of effort paid off.

Aces,
Emerson Dameron

 

Emerson:

Mr. Dameron, you needn't go to the trouble of sitting down and writing things to get Miss Sterzinger's attention! One need only wave a canister of nitrous oxide in the air, jingle the change in one's pocket, or pull one's zipper down and she will bound across the room like a puppy to its master.

Regards,
Will RatBlood

 

Ggeorge Balgobin on 10/2/102 1:08 PM said: [in response partly to Lisa Collins’ ULA article in Detroit's Metrotimes]

The ULA is the preeminent literary movement on the landscape today. Mamatas points out Lisa Collins' backhand comments about realizing she wasn't going to witness anything legendary, but that fact remains that she was still drawn to the ULA. The hipster vibe that pervades much of the younger writing community insists that she not express unqualified interest in anything, or at least anything that isn't obscure her enough to save her from having to justify her tastes. But in her article she can't suppress the charisma and energy that attracts her to the movement, the fascination that drives her to write despite all intellectual protestations. She is compelled by the ULA wrecking ball that crashes through the polite facade of the KGB, the undying commitment to writers who get the shaft even in the face of intense waves of ridicule and personal attack, and the emerging steadfastness of our directors, surefooted men whose each step is mocked, but whose each step takes the us further toward literary relevance and redemption.

What's more, though, is that Ms. Collins is wrong. What's she's witnessing is legendary. When Wild Bill steps onto that stage to read with gentle voice and sincere eyes, it is legendary, because Wild Bill is a legend. Far more intriguing than his life of lean-tos and rabbit snares is his devotion to the pure expression of a human life. His work, untouched by hands that work to interpret and predigest, is not only unique and unremitting, it's a great read. He tells stories no one else has told, in a voice no one else will ever use. That some don't like it is their business, but just the same, the ULA will never be interested in the sounds gargling up in response to the Academy's style directives. If Wild Bill had quit writing long ago and his work were only later discovered, his vision would be hailed on the spot. That he has kept writing even till today makes him a legend in our own time.

The ULA is growing, perhaps not a little due to the redoubling of commitment from its current members in the face of fierce attack. Mostly, however, it grows because it can do nothing else. Members like Chris Zee, with inexhaustible energy and allegiance, represent the future of the group. He may be mocked, assigned the intellect of a moron, taken to task as a lemming (he wouldn't be a ULAer otherwise) but he stays undeterred by the fits of his critics. And that's what the ULA is about, building a safe haven for those who see no beauty in artistic compromise. Let it be known, that this safe haven for the outcasts of literature is a training camp for the overthrow of the elite. Society has a breaking point, and the ULA will find it.

George Balgobin

 

George:

Balgobin, your sense of humor will always be beside you, like a shadow or a big hairy wart.

Ann Sterzinger

 

Miss Sterzinger:

I think this deserves to be pushed, or "bumped" to use the gay Internet terminology, to the top as Private Balgobin so lucidly offers response to attacks and sober explanation of ULA purpose at once.

Ann, as George points out the ULA is a training camp, an inclusive one that had opened its arms to even such a fidgety, neurotic trollop as yourself. That you could not handle the rigorous routine required of all recruits is not the fault of the base where you were stationed, but rather a reflection of your own shortcomings.

That you could not run through the obstacle course of muddy truck tires unless fur was glued to them, could not climb the rope until a baggie of crack was tied to the top, and could not manage more than one push-up until a pickle was stuck in the ground beneath you reveals that you just don't have what it takes to make it in the most dynamic underground LITERARY ARMY in existence. You could not "hang."

For those of us who are willing to rise at 4am to the King's firing his gun in the air on his way home from the bar, to awaken and run in formation alongside Director Jackman to Kinkos while singing songs from the ULA songbook, to communally shower with both Chris Estey and Lisa Falour, and to sleep in a tent with Chris Zee -- for us there are rewards both outer and intrinsic the likes of which an unmotivated, flippant slut such as yourself could never imagine.

Onward, ULA brothers,

Will von Ratblood

 

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