Gnostic Pulp is written by Jacob Austin. It features a free newsletter released every other Thursday. These will largely consist of essays on what I have deemed Gnostic Pulp, a genre which refers to that particular vein of literature and art that mashes together deep investigations into the nature of reality with dime novel tropes, general buffoonery, and other pulpy low-browisms.
The roots of Gnostic Pulp go back at least to Melville, stretch throughout the history of American letters, and have now gone global. Some writers wear the influence as openly and obviously as Lovecraft. Others do so in more subtle ways. It is a slippery thing, this spirit of Gnostic Pulp, but its light has never gone out. The tradition remained alive and well through the late twentieth century, even peaking in popularity with names like Pynchon, LeGuin, and Philip K. Dick.
Today, it has once again infused the zeitgeist. Its influence is all over the new new weird, slipstream, speculative fiction, horror, etc., and it’s about time a spiritual gumshoe hit the pavement and starts keeping tabs on this thing. That’s what we are doing here. Tell your friends.
& thanks for joining,
Jacob Austin
