RadixJournal - January 16, 2018


Remembering Johnathan Bowden


Episode Stats

Length

13 minutes

Words per Minute

96.87402

Word Count

1,346

Sentence Count

98


Summary

This limited series is a re-release of 14 conversations I had with Jonathan Bowden, beginning in late 2011 and stretching into the spring of 2012, just before his untimely death in April of that year. These are actually some of the last published speeches or podcast conversations that Jonathan ever produced, and I hope that by re-releasing them, his fans and admirers can have a chance to rediscover him.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 Hello everyone, this is Richard Spencer, and it's my pleasure to introduce this new limited run podcast series titled simply Bowden, exclamation mark.
00:00:12.920 And this limited series is a re-release of 14 conversations I had with Jonathan Bowden, beginning in late winter 2011 and stretching into the spring of 2012, just before his untimely death in April of that year.
00:00:34.880 These are actually some of the last published speeches or podcast conversations that Jonathan ever produced.
00:00:46.040 My hope in re-releasing these episodes is that Jonathan can find a new audience, and also that Jonathan's fans and admirers can have an opportunity to rediscover him.
00:01:04.920 And there really is a lot of wonderful material in these 14 conversations.
00:01:11.880 They stretch from Nietzsche to Mitt Romney, as it were.
00:01:18.160 They include discussions of philosophy, of the essential natures of left and right, of the European new right, what is it and what is its relevance.
00:01:28.560 And they even go into things like foreign policy, such as the geopolitics and Israel, Iran, and the bomb.
00:01:38.440 My friend and mentor, Louie Andrews, said that we mere mortals give talks.
00:01:48.760 That is, when we're invited to a conference, we'll go up to the podium and string some words together and hope it all makes sense.
00:01:56.220 Some of the best of us can give a speech, that is, to speak definitively on a subject and do it with a little banash.
00:02:07.540 Jonathan Bowden, on the other hand, gave orations.
00:02:12.180 And it's important that he always spoke extemporaneously.
00:02:15.940 That is, without notes, he would, as it were, just open his mouth and he would allow the spirit to move him.
00:02:22.580 And anyone who witnessed one of these performances will tell you that Jonathan was, when he was on stage, possessed by a demon, or he was able to channel a life force, or he was a force of nature.
00:02:42.380 All of these metaphors I'm using express the fact that a Jonathan Bowden speech wasn't simply about the words.
00:02:52.460 It was about being there in his presence and experiencing him.
00:02:58.740 But it also was about the words.
00:03:01.060 And as these podcasts reveal, not only was Jonathan a brilliant speaker and a brilliant performer,
00:03:07.600 but he was also a very useful speaker.
00:03:12.220 And I don't use the word useful as a way to belittle him.
00:03:17.240 He was able to boil down to an essence very difficult thinkers, such as Spengler or Evola,
00:03:25.160 and make them immediately understandable to nationalist and activist.
00:03:31.180 At the same time, Jonathan was able to access the profundity of these writers,
00:03:39.720 the things that made their works eternal.
00:03:43.620 There are very few people who can do that, and Jonathan was really one of the best.
00:03:50.000 I can't say that I was Jonathan's good friend, although I would call myself one of his friends.
00:03:57.920 I knew him rather fleetingly, and when I learned of his death,
00:04:04.880 I deeply regretted that I didn't strike up a deeper friendship with him,
00:04:11.600 because we certainly got along.
00:04:13.720 I first met him in 2009, and it was actually at a private conference,
00:04:20.420 and he was invited and flown over to the United States from England.
00:04:25.060 And when I first saw him, he was a rather quiet man.
00:04:29.340 He seemed reclusive, although I did notice he was wearing a life rune medallion,
00:04:35.820 which was a sign of things to come.
00:04:38.600 And I didn't know what to think about him when I first met him.
00:04:42.220 And then it was time for his performance that night.
00:04:46.600 He was giving the keynote address,
00:04:48.260 and he walked up to the stage and announced that he would not need a microphone.
00:04:56.540 And he gave a talk that was essentially about everything.
00:05:03.240 It was about the nature of man, the nature of European man in particular,
00:05:08.480 the situation European man finds himself in in the 20th century,
00:05:14.780 but maybe even longer than that.
00:05:18.500 He talked about our fears and our anxieties, but also our great potential.
00:05:25.800 It was a very realistic, maybe even hard-headed talk,
00:05:30.220 but at the same time, it was profoundly inspiring.
00:05:34.500 And I was certainly not the only one there that was wrapped up in it all.
00:05:41.640 He spoke probably for an hour, but I don't even know how long he spoke.
00:05:46.880 It almost felt like five minutes, or it felt like an eternity.
00:05:51.320 He was able to grab your attention and not let go.
00:05:57.400 He was truly a charismatic personality,
00:05:59.640 and was certainly the greatest speaker that I've ever witnessed.
00:06:04.980 And I certainly have witnessed other people who might have his charisma,
00:06:07.880 but I don't think anyone can combine his charisma with his philosophical depth.
00:06:16.380 As you might also know, Jonathan Bowden suffered in his life.
00:06:23.620 He suffered from illnesses.
00:06:25.660 He suffered from mental illness.
00:06:27.080 And I won't go into the details simply because
00:06:29.220 I don't know all of the details for certain,
00:06:32.860 and I don't want to misspeak.
00:06:34.240 I do know that he suffered a few breakdowns.
00:06:41.840 Not too long after I saw him speak,
00:06:45.840 or experienced him speak in 2009,
00:06:49.540 he suffered another breakdown.
00:06:52.480 But then he seemed to be on the up-and-up,
00:06:55.680 and he actually was going to be a speaker
00:06:59.040 at the American Renaissance Conference in early 2011,
00:07:02.960 although that was canceled.
00:07:05.440 And he actually was going to be a speaker
00:07:07.720 at the first MPI National Conference,
00:07:10.520 which I hosted in 2011 in Washington, D.C.
00:07:15.440 But he actually canceled that himself.
00:07:17.940 I don't think he was quite ready
00:07:19.640 to make a comeback, as it were.
00:07:23.040 But in lieu of his speaking at the MPI conference in 2011,
00:07:29.020 we decided to do some podcasts.
00:07:33.320 And that is not for him to give a formal speech,
00:07:36.480 but for the two of us to talk about issues.
00:07:40.120 And, you know, a lot of podcasts are very temporal,
00:07:43.680 very passing.
00:07:44.580 They're about current events.
00:07:46.080 But we wanted to do a little bit of that.
00:07:47.820 But we decided we also wanted to talk
00:07:49.440 about really big issues
00:07:50.700 and perhaps produce some recordings
00:07:53.640 that were lasting
00:07:55.900 and that people would want to revisit later on.
00:07:58.620 And that's why we actually did a study
00:08:00.840 on Nietzsche's on the genealogy of morals.
00:08:04.160 We talked about Spengler and the left
00:08:06.500 and Marx and all this kind of stuff.
00:08:10.420 These podcasts became very popular
00:08:14.140 at the website, alternativeright.com,
00:08:17.680 which was the predecessor to rateexternal.com.
00:08:22.500 And these became so popular,
00:08:24.300 I decided I wanted to pay them.
00:08:25.740 I said, I'm going to, you know, send you some payments.
00:08:27.800 You're really bringing in a lot of traffic.
00:08:29.640 You're generating a lot of responses and comments.
00:08:33.840 And that was actually in the fairly early spring of 2012.
00:08:40.220 And as April went on,
00:08:42.480 I began calling Jonathan Bowden.
00:08:45.620 We were going to do a podcast on Ernst Jünger.
00:08:51.440 I was very excited about that.
00:08:52.680 And I began to call him and not get a response.
00:08:55.900 And then I noticed that he never deposited that check
00:08:59.680 that I sent him.
00:09:00.660 And I began to worry.
00:09:03.580 And as it happened,
00:09:05.400 all of our worst fears were actually realized.
00:09:08.940 He succumbed to a heart attack that spring.
00:09:12.280 You could say that Jonathan Bowden
00:09:18.340 always lived on the edge of madness.
00:09:23.340 It was what gave all of his work its power.
00:09:30.240 And that certainly includes his oratory,
00:09:32.740 but it also includes his novels
00:09:35.740 that were, anyway, streams of consciousness,
00:09:39.760 deeply esoteric and complex.
00:09:44.620 They certainly inform his paintings as well.
00:09:48.260 And you just have to look at them
00:09:49.480 to know what I'm talking about.
00:09:51.360 And so I think being on the edge of madness
00:09:54.480 gave Jonathan Bowden so much of his power.
00:09:57.900 And it might have also destined
00:10:00.820 that his life would be too short.
00:10:06.260 But I remain very proud and very grateful
00:10:10.280 that I was able to complete these podcasts with Jonathan.
00:10:14.980 He has certainly influenced my thinking,
00:10:17.480 and I know he's influenced the thinking
00:10:19.260 of countless others.
00:10:22.280 So while we weep, Valhalla rejoices.
00:10:26.140 These are for you, Jonathan.
00:10:30.220 Thank you.
00:10:56.140 Thank you.
00:10:58.920 Thank you.
00:10:59.340 Thank you.
00:11:01.380 Thank you.
00:11:23.520 Thank you.
00:11:23.680 Thank you.
00:11:53.680 Thank you.
00:12:23.680 Thank you.
00:12:53.680 Thank you.
00:13:23.680 Thank you.