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Ghosts Of My Life Paperback – July 29, 2022

by Mark Fisher (Author)
4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 533 ratings
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'A must read for modernists, and for anyone who misses the future.' Bob Stanley, musician, journalist, author, and film producer

This collection of writings by Mark Fisher, author of the acclaimed Capitalist Realism, argues that we are haunted by futures that failed to happen. Fisher searches for the traces of these lost futures in the work of David Peace, John Le Carré, Christopher Nolan, Joy Division, Burial and many others.
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  1. Print length
    296 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Zer0 Books
  4. Publication date
    July 29, 2022
  5. Dimensions
    5.51 x 0.67 x 8.5 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    1780992262
  7. ISBN-13
    978-1780992266
  8. See all details
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From the Publisher

hauntology, depression, popular culture, new politics, radical, music culture, capitalist realism
hauntology, depression, popular culture, new politics, radical, music culture, capitalist realism
hauntology, depression, popular culture, new politics, radical, music culture, capitalist realism
hauntology, depression, popular culture, new politics, radical, music culture, capitalist realism
hauntology, depression, popular culture, new politics, radical, music culture, capitalist realism

Editorial Reviews

Review

After the brilliance of Capitalist Realism, Ghosts Of My Life confirms Mark Fisher's role as our greatest and most trusted navigator of these times out of joint, through all their frissons and ruptures, among all their apparitions and spectres, past, present and future.--David Peace, author of the Red Riding Quartet and Red or Dead

About the Author

Mark Fisher is highly respected both as a music writer and a theorist. He writes regularly for The Wire, frieze, New Statesman, and Sight & Sound.
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Zer0 Books (July 29, 2022)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 296 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1780992262
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1780992266
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.31 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.51 x 0.67 x 8.5 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 533 ratings

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Mark Fisher

Mark Fisher

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Customer reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars
533 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Andrew Acker
5.0 out of 5 stars Surprisingly insightful for our time
Reviewed in the United States on August 5, 2024
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Fischer is surprisingly capable of naming and summarizing the cultural experiences (or lack thereof) we share since the age of the internet consumed all of our medias, pointing out how we're not only caught in the redux of older styles and lost our ability to innovate, but also are haunted by the specters of lost futures while we indulge endless nostalgias during an age of rapid technological change. If you want to expand not only your media and cultural literacy, but your vocabulary, read this book.
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John Allred
5.0 out of 5 stars A Fascinating Book
Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2015
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I really enjoyef this book!
I am also going to try to get any other books or articles Mark Fisher has.done.
Many parts of "Ghosts of My Life" felt like he was talking about my own life and hauntological
observations, although in a much more literate
And concise manner than I could hope to attempt!
Thank you Mark Fisher for this wonderful book I read it in just about a day and it gave me so much to contemplate!
21 people found this helpful
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Nigel J Harsch
5.0 out of 5 stars RIP Mark Fisher
Reviewed in the United States on June 18, 2019
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Some great essays by one of the best culture writers of our time.
4 people found this helpful
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Anton
4.0 out of 5 stars Smart, touching, though sometimes artificial string of confessions
Reviewed in the United States on September 14, 2018
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I've read this book after the news of Mark's suicide, and the whole reading inevitably became colored with this black sadness of knowing about this tragedy. However, the "hauntology" and "lost futures" are very interesting strings of essays, sometimes too personal, sometimes too generic, but truly brilliant, if you're interested in "hauntology" discourse (I mean, really interested and not just kinda lover of Belbury Poly). The essay about Joy Division is outstandingly powerful, on the other side, piece about "The Shining" is kinda weak (you should better watch documentary "Room 237", inspired by Fisher's k-punk blog), That is the only problem with the book - it is a compilation with very uneven pieces, though Mark tried to smooth them with good editing, However, it is a good book by a very good and smart person, and I utterly recommend it to everyone along with other Fisher's books on Amazon.
23 people found this helpful
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5.0 out of 5 stars Yep
Reviewed in the United States on December 26, 2019
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Yes
4 people found this helpful
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Walker Storz
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on October 4, 2017
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rlly evocative.
One person found this helpful
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Spunk Monkey
3.0 out of 5 stars Near Random Assortment of Essays Tentatively Linked By Idea of Hauntology
Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2017
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The subtitle of this book is Writings on Depression, Hauntology, and Lost Futures. A more accurate description would have been something like Writings on Electronic Music, Some Movies and Television Shows, with a short Intro on Hauntology.

Instead of the thematic cohesiveness of Capitalist Realism, one really feels that this text was thrown together by cobbling old essays from Mark's blog and trying to link them via the theme of Hauntology. You get the sense the publishers were trying to hide the true nature of the text in an attempt to nab some sales from those thinking it might be another C.R. Even the main concept of hauntology is only obliquely referenced in most of the articles, if it is at all.

That said, I did enjoy some of the articles. For instance, the ones on Joy Division and Christopher Nolan's Inception. However, by the end I was skimming most of the articles due to the fact I was not familiar with the musicians or shows, etc. The concept of hauntology is indeed interesting and useful, and that will be a take away, for sure, but it isn't explored in suitably nuanced detail to be at all definitive on the subject. In fact, you can read the intro and get most of the meat there.

Mark is a talented writer. It is impossible not to get something out of most of what he writes. He is a particularly creative music writer, it turns out, describing songs and genres in ways that are creative and striking.

All in all, if you are coming to this text because you were impressed with his book Capitalist Realism and were hoping for more of that [social critiques], you may find yourself disappointed with this as it is less a philosophical tome which uses cultural texts to explicate its main points [a la Zizek] as it is a collection of reviews given a light philosophical gloss. All in all, a minor work in this thinker's oeuvre.
32 people found this helpful
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Kindle-Kunde
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on March 26, 2015
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Pretty much the ghosts of all our lives.
6 people found this helpful
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Bernardo Moreira
2.0 out of 5 stars Um bom livro, mas levemente decepcionante.
Reviewed in Brazil on August 17, 2021
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Talvez a culpa nem seja do Fisher. Eu que estava esperando algo mais teórico, mais voltado pro conceito de hauntology do que um grande panorama de formas culturais que o encorporam.
Em alguns pontos, a argumentação de Fisher é realmente acurada, rigorosa e teoricamente rica, principalmente no início. Tenho algumas questões sobre o que as orientações políticas que Fisher deduz da relação entre hauntology e algo como uma política da memória, mas a errância conceitual de Fisher faz com que tal confrontação seja difícil de ser assinalada em suas coordenadas precisas.
Há duas vias que são tomadas no livro, ambas operando em gradientes que as põe majoritariamente em um campo ou em outro. Os melhores caminhos de Ghosts of My Life são os momentos onde Fisher consegue pôr em paralelo a lógica do conceito e a lógica da obra de arte e demonstrar suas relações de determinação recíproca, ilustrando que não se trata de "achar" hauntology nas obras de nossa era, mas analisar como as determinações da própria obra implicam em uma configuração específica do período onde a hauntology é hegemônica. Por essa via, Fisher é um grande discípulo de Jameson, quem acredito que seja sua maior influência (maior que Deleuze, Zizek e Land para Fisher).
Há, por outro lado, caminhos mais fracos que Fisher toma. Por vezes parece que estamos lendo algum review da Pitchfork. Quem conhece vai entender do que eu estou falando.
Uma analogia talvez ilustre o que quero dizer: imaginemos que Fisher é um biólogo, preocupado em comunicar aos espectadores o modo de vida dos animais que ele estuda. Para isso, nosso biólogo imaginário pensa em maneiras de apresentar como aquele animal se comporta em seu habitat natural. Eis o caminho que Fisher toma: as "ambientações" de zoológico. Ao invés de demonstrar a lógica segundo a qual aquele animal vive, o "cenário" funciona para indicar, de forma mistificada, certos signos que remetem a um simulacro de "natureza". Fisher acaba fazendo isso com alguns de seus objetos. Tentando expor os aspectos "hauntológicos" dos objetos artísticos apresentados, Fisher mistifica sua "ambiência", montando um texto característico de uma "crítica descritiva". Descrevendo o objeto, ficamos apenas com a areia artificialmente colorida e o arbusto seco que deveria nos dizer algo sobre onde vive essa cobra do deserto. Falta um pouco de crítica, é apenas isso que quero dizer.
O livro é bom, os objetos são interessantes, mas o engajamento teórico deixa um pouco a desejar. Em retrospectiva, Realismo Capitalista é mais entusiasmante pois carrega a cadência humorística de Zizek, o tratamento minucioso de Jameson, a perspicácia de Deleuze e a forma de apresentação do blogger/colunista da Pitchfork/NME. Ghosts of My Life não consegue alcançar os mesmos níveis, sendo mais uma coletânea de resenhas curtas orientadas em torno de um conceito interessante mas pouco desenvolvido do que uma robusta exposição teórica de um dos conceitos mais importantes para entender a cultura, a temporalidade e a crise do capitalismo tardio.
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Miguel
5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful on U.K. politics and culture
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 16, 2022
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This is an excellent collection of essays and manages to break down how U.K. popular culture has been undermined by neoliberalism. Curious set of essays.
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PJ Johnson
1.0 out of 5 stars Waste of money and time.
Reviewed in Canada on March 13, 2020
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Totally unreadable.
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WilliamDaniel
5.0 out of 5 stars Thoughful, poetic writings on Hauntology
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on October 27, 2020
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Superb collection of articles on politics and culture, and musicians such as Burial, thought provoking, profund writing.
2 people found this helpful
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John Fletcher
4.0 out of 5 stars Ghosts, nightmares and regrets.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 7, 2014
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If you have read Mark Fisher's previous book, the incendiary pamphlet "Capitalist Realism", then you will need little encouragement to go and seek out his new collection of his essays and reviews. And although the book is necessarily much less focused than its predecessor, it is well worth your time, subject to a couple of observations (rather than criticisms) about the kind of person who will get the most out of it.

First, the positive bit. With one bound, Mr Fisher has established himself as one of our foremost cultural critics, and here he talks (in refreshingly direct prose for the most part), about books, television, cinema, and most of all music. His writings are organised around two main themes, each of which, he acknowledges, was originally developed by others. First, there is Franco Berardi's idea of the cancellation of the future. This does not necessarily mean the end of the world, nor does it mean an end to trivial developments in science and technology. What it means is that the promise of the future, the promise of a better life, which was so much a part of popular thinking and culture until the 1970s, has now been officially abandoned. In turn this reminds us of the "hantologie" of Derrida, anglicised by Mr Fisher under the name of "hauntology". The play on words is not as precise in English, because in French "ontologie" and "hantologie" are direct homophones. (And no, homophony is not a new political cause, just a word meaning that two words sound identical.) In this concept of things, popular culture since the 1980s is "haunted". These hauntings are not necessarily of the past, and they're not necessarily of real things. If anything, they are more usually hauntings of choices not made and roads not taken. They are memories of knowledge non-existent futures, better than the one we actually have. (Indeed, while I was reading the book I kept thinking of Rob Young's exemplary study "Electric Eden," The book, written by an exact contemporary, with almost spine-chilling accuracy about the 1960s and 1970s, acts as a kind of extended preface). It has to be said that Mr Fisher works through these ideas with some determination and rigour, and they largely succeeds in proving his case. In addition, there are individual essays (notably on John Le Carré and Jimmy Savile) which actually have something new and interesting to say about politics in each case.

Here, then, are the promised observations. We are all to some extent prisoners of the popular culture that we grew up with. Mr Fisher seems to have been born in 1967, and for him the optimistic culture of the year of his birth is emblematic of a way not taken, and in practical terms also raw material for some of the electronic music that he writes about so eloquently. His own musical taste was formed in the 1980s, and if you were born much before or much after him then your emotional response to that music will be different. I have to say that, whilst I had heard of some of the artists discussed, others meant absolutely nothing to me at all. That said, Mr Fisher not only succeeds in conveying an enthusiasm for certain types of music that I was unaware even existed, he almost makes me want to go and listen to some of them - aways the marker of a good critic. in addition, in discussing artists as unlikely as Frank Sinatra, he also demonstrates an ability to engage with music from different generations.

Second observation, the overall tone of the book is wistful and regretful (though not nostalgic), rather than positive, and this may not appeal to everyone. It's essentially a description of a popular culture without hope, where even dreams turn out to be nightmares, and to be largely re-cycled memories of the past, whether actual or imagined. I must say that I sometimes wished he would write an essay on a musical act where the artist neither committed suicide themselves or encourage others to do so.

But as I say, this is a fascinating and rewarding book which also demonstrates Mr Fisher's very wide reading and clarity of thinking, and will certainly set you off after other authors in turn, as well as enlarging your collection of - well I almost said recorda and CDs, but as the book so well points out, we don't have them any more.

And I might just get around to listening to Joy Division.
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